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View Full Version : How do I go about finding my older sister who was given up for adoption?


Bonnie0414
Dec 31, 2010, 11:20 PM
I have her birthday, the hosptile she was born in the county and state but nothing else. I am 21 and she is I believe like between 32 and 34 I don't have her birthday sitting right in front of me. But my mother gave her and my other older sister up for adoption and the other sister found me and my mother but I she was also given up for adoption in the same state we live in. Did that make it eaiser for her to find me and my mother? Should I even try to find her? I don't know if she even knows that she was adopted. I am at a total loss... Someone please help...

joypulv
Jan 1, 2011, 07:52 AM
Surely the sister who did find you can help. You can also go to the hospital and ask, since they only have to look at records on 3 dates. If they are in storage, you might be able to pay for a search. It's possible they are gone. If that fails, you contact the state adoption agency, or rather your mother would to make it go faster. Whether that will result in release of records will depend on the arrangement when she gave your sister up. She may have to put her wish to be contacted into the file and wait for her child to ask too. If she doesn't even know she's adopted, that may never happen. But if your mother knows she doesn't know she's adopted, that might be a clue that she had access to the information back then and may now too.

Synnen
Jan 1, 2011, 09:53 AM
Joy--ABSOLUTELY not. No way. Hospital records will most DEFINTELY not be released to someone who is not only NOT next of kin, but is ALSO not even legally related!

Searching for a sibling is difficult. You can try reunion websites and a licensed private investigator, and that's it. Biological parents and adoptees have more options than that, but not many.

And Joy--they didn't PUT that into the adoption file back then. Sorry, but they didn't. The adoption LAW in place (which is still in place in many places) stated that the state would NEVER divulge the information in either direction. To get those records, you have to go through the court, and you'd better have a really good reason--like, you're dying, and need your medical history.

I suggest you register on reunion websites. If she knows she is adopted, and WANTS to be contacted, she will find you there. If she doesn't know, or doesn't want to be contacted, then you will not find her because SHE isn't looking. If you look for and find an adoptee that doesn't know they were adopted, you can tear their life apart.