Doing a search had been on my mind for a long time. I had started many times before, hit brick walls, and just given up. I had requested my non-identifying information from the adoption agency many years ago during one of my many start-ups. So far this was the only real information I had, other than my amended birth certificate. Then one day my motivation was kick started again, this time hard and fast.

A woman called my house about a posting I had placed on one of the web-based adoption registration forms. She thought she might be my mother. It turned out that she wasn’t, but those few moments of incredible excitement were the turning point. I knew it was time to get serious.

I contacted a volunteer searcher in my birth state of Virginia, as I now live in Mississippi. She told me that I had 2 options. One was that she could research and research, and more than likely find some more information. The other was that I could get my Final Order of Adoption from my adoptive mother and with this we could without a doubt find out everything in a short period of time. She said the Final Order of Adoption would have my birth name on it, and with that the search would be easy.

I had often thought of asking my adoptive mother if she had any other information about my adoption that she had not shared with me. I always talked myself out of asking though, with the reasoning that since she had always been so honest and open about my adoption, surely she would have given me anything relevant that she might have. In addition, I really didn’t want to hurt her by telling her that I wanted to search.

Well over the years a lot of family turmoil has happened and I have been estranged from my adoptive mother for several years. I decided I would just confront her. I wrote a letter to her stating simply that in preparing legal documents for me, my attorney had requested my Final Order of Adoption and any other documents she might have pertaining to my adoption. Within a few days, I had 4 pages of court documents, attorney letters, and adoption agency consent forms. BINGO! Two of these forms had my birth name on them. Immediately I went online and did a switchboard (http://www.switchboard.com) search of Virginia for the last name. It returned only 3 names. I then did the search for the entire U.S. and it returned a little over 100. After weeding out the redundant ones, there were only 78 in the whole country! Now what should I do? If I just started calling people, I might scare someone off or close a door. I certainly didn’t want to embarrass anyone either. In the mean time I had created this site.

Over the weeks that I thought about how to approach this situation, while I considered phone calls and/or letters to try and get identifying information from the names I had, I received many helpful emails in response to this web page. One in particular stood out. A woman wrote me saying that she was born in the same hospital I was, and that she had written to the hospital using her birth name requesting all her birth records including admission, discharge, nursery, etc. She had sent them a $20 money order to cover clerical fees, requested that they bill her if the charges exceeded that amount, and signed it in her birth name. The letter she wrote was short and concise and never mentioned adoption. The packet she received had her mothers name on some of the documents! Great idea! Immediately I did the same and also included with my request a self-addressed, stamped envelope (one of the large brownish 9" x 11.5" kind with a $3 stamp) and with my birth name as the recipient, care of my wife’s name to avoid delivery confusion.

Within 2 weeks I receive 10 pages of medical records, 2 of which had my birth mothers first name. It was interesting to note that none of these records had my first name on them - it was only "Baby Boy <lastname>". Anyway I thought now I could figure out a way to research marriage certificates and find what her new last name is. Just out of curiosity, I picked up my switchboard list of and there was her name! NO WAY! It couldn’t possibly be that easy! The call was made and so was the match! It turned out that she had been married for years, but after a messy divorce she had taken back her maiden name. She had just remarried a few weeks prior to my find, so her name changed again but had not been updated in phone directories yet. Talk about lucky for me! Timing was everything in this search.

Anyway we have talked, written, exchanged pictures, and it’s GREAT. I have 2 half sisters. I found out my father’s name, but have not yet pursued that as it is very common and there are hundreds of listings in Virginia alone, and thousands in the U.S. We all plan to meet in person and are currently working on when and where we can.