My name is Christie. I am the founder of Birth Family Finder. I am a birth mother of a 6 year old little boy. I placed him for adoption when I was just 19 years old and am very blessed with an open adoption. I am now married with 2 beautiful children of our own (and 1 on the way!). I met my husband in the US, and we now live in Canada.
About a year ago, I became actively involved in the adoption community through BIB (Blessings in a Basket). Throughout the 6 years since placing my beautiful son, I had wanted to give back somehow. I knew that other birth mothers out there needed support, just as I did during my placement and the years since. I was so proud to finally be part of something that helped birth mothers.
How It All Began....
The past few months I have been seeing more and more "please help me find..." on Facebook. Everyone has seen them, there have been news reports, and now the internet is flooded with these searching pictures. Pictures of birth mothers trying to find the precious babies they love and placed. Pictures of birth children searching for the birth parents they wish to know or thank. Pictures of adopted siblings or grandparents searching for the children that were placed so they may reconnect and share one another's families. I loved this idea. I loved the idea of families being reunited and becoming bigger families! I love having my open adoption because in a way, my son's adoptive family is more like an extension of my own extended family. I wish all adoptions could be like this (though I know not all circumstances permit this). I felt such a pull to somehow help these people "bigger" their families - join the adoptive family that raised them and love them with the family that gave them life and love! How wonderful this reunion could be! But how?
As more and more of these pictures came up, it was getting harder and harder to "share" them without annoying my own family and friends with constant pictures. Its so hard to post them all! There are hundreds if not thousands! I'm also quite a "list" person. Although I have some artistic views, my mind works very much in a "system" with excel sheets, and lists. I'm sure there are plenty of other people out there like that too. I wished there was a place everyone could go to not only see the pictures, but also search just for people within the "parameters" others were searching. So, the "Master List" was born (I'm also not very creative when it comes to naming things haha!). Right now everything is done manually - you enter your information, then are taken to a "results page" where you can see the other people who are "searching" out there. One day, I hope that we can afford to host a site that helps you find your matches automatically; however, that's still a little while away.
So that's it. My site is simply a site to help people searching find others who may be searching. You can post your picture on our Facebook page, and enter your information, or just do one or the other. The more places that you are, the better your chances of being seen! My hope and prayer is that this site somehow, somewhere, sometime helps reconnect families... even if its just one it will be worth it to me.
No comments:
Post a Comment