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As seen on "20/20"!
In this poignant and heartwarming narrative, renowned genealogist Pamela Slaton tells the most striking stories from her incredibly successful career of reconnecting adoptees with long-lost birth parents
After a traumatic reunion with her own birth mother, Pamela Slaton realized two things: That she wanted to help other adoptees have happier reunions with their birth families, and that she had the unique skill to do so – a strong ability to find what others could not.
Reunited shares the riveting stories of some of Pam's most powerful cases from her long career as an investigative genealogist, and the lessons learned along the way. From the identical twins separated at birth, unknowingly part of a secret study on development, to the man who finally met his birth mother just in the nick of time, Reunited is a collection of these unforgettable moments, told by the woman who orchestrated and witnessed them first-hand. Both heartbreaking and inspiring, they will move anyone who knows the true life-affirming power of family.
- Sales Rank: #574089 in Books
- Published on: 2012-05-08
- Released on: 2012-05-08
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.31" h x .73" w x 5.48" l, .50 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 272 pages
Review
“This book is a must read… It will make all people understand the truth of our existence, the story of who we are and how we are all connected.” ―Darryl "DMC" McDaniels, Adoptee, Founder of Run DMC
“Pam has created a wonderful and gripping collection of heartfelt stories - bringing you along as she reunites people separated in life by adoption or other circumstances. Finding my birth mother was life changing in so many ways – Pam and her life's work will inspire everyone to reach for the truth.” ―Cathy Konrad, Adoptee, Golden Globe Award-winning Producer (Walk the Line)
“Reunited is a powerful, page-turning account of Pam's incredible work …. With Pam on your side the door can open, the secrets dissolve. I can't imagine my life without ever knowing the truth of my birth situation. No one starts a book on chapter two – Pam helped me have my chapter one, and for that I am eternally grateful.” ―Sheila Jaffe, Adoptee, Emmy-award-winning casting director (The Sopranos)
About the Author
PAMELA SLATON is known as a miracle worker by the nearly 3,000 adoptees she's helped. After founding her own practice and using a never-quit policy to get around restrictive state laws, she has been able to locate 90% of her clients' missing relatives, and has earned a reputation as one of the country's leading investigative genealogists. She helped DMC find his birth parents on Vh1's Emmy-Award-winning documentary My Adoption Journey, and now facilitates powerful reunions from start to finish on her Oprah Winfrey Network show, "Searching For…" Pamela lives in New Jersey with her family.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
CHAPTER ONE
A Searcher Is Born
It was a conversation I’d been waiting to have my whole life. For my thirtieth birthday, my husband, Mike, hired a private investigator, and in five days this man did what I hadn’t been able to do in fourteen years. He found my birth mother. I finally had a name, a number, and an address for this elusive woman. There was no doubt.
When Mike called me from work with the contact details, he made me promise not to call until he got home. He should have known better. “Yeah, yeah, sure, babe, don’t worry. I promise I’ll wait,” I told him, my fingers itching to start dialing as soon as I got him off the phone. My heart was racing. Meanwhile, my mother-in-law was hovering. She knew what I was up to and she had a bad feeling.
“Why don’t you look happy for me?” I asked her.
“Because I’m worried; I don’t want to see you get hurt.”
“It’ll be fine. If she’s anything like me, she’ll be thrilled to get this call.”
I picked up the phone and dialed, but the person who answered—presumably my half brother—told me she was at the supermarket. I tried again later and got my half sister, who told me she was still out. I was on tenterhooks. I couldn’t get over the fact that I had a brother and sister, and I’d just talked to them for the first time, although they had no idea who I was.
I waited for another interminable hour. Finally, on my third try, my birth mother answered the phone. We’ll call her Priscilla.
“Yeah? Who is this?”
“Hello, Priscilla. My name is Pamela Slaton. I was born on February 23, 1964, under the name of Wade, then given up for adoption. I recently found out that I am your daughter.”
“No, you’re not. And you should never have called me!”
“Yes, I am. I have documented proof that you are my birth mother. It’s true.”
“Oh no, I’m not!”
“Oh yes, you are!”
“No! I am NOT!”
This back-and-forth continued for a while. Priscilla was tough. She grew up in the Bronx and had that thick accent of the streets. But I grew up in Queens and could be just as tough. Not that I felt strong. It was really just my defense mechanism kicking in. The last thing I expected was to be denied by my own flesh and blood, and I was stunned. So I resorted to being a wiseass.
“Listen, Priscilla, we can do this now, over the phone, or I can get in my car and be on your doorstep in three hours. Which would you prefer?”
“You just stay away from me, you hear? Okay, yeah, I may be your biological mother, but I never cared about you or gave you a second thought in all these years. I don’t know what you want from me.”
“You know what, Priscilla? It’s cool. It’s fine. Just tell me who my father is and I’ll go away.”
“You want to know who your father is? Sure, I’ll tell you who your father is. Your father was my father. I hope you enjoy knowing that.”
Then she slammed down the phone, and my whole world turned upside down. I never saw it coming. I’d been so sure Priscilla would be overjoyed to hear from me. Instead, I felt like I’d had my teeth kicked out. The room was spinning and I literally saw black and white dots, as if the cable had gone out on an old TV set in my head. The woman I’d been searching for and dreamed of meeting ever since I could remember had flung this horrifying information at me as if it were a poison dart, and her aim was dead-on. It pierced right through my chest.
The next day, I was scheduled to have gallbladder surgery. Like an idiot, I went through with it. The doctors expected me to be out of recovery in an hour, but it took seven hours. They couldn’t lower my heart rate. Every time I came to, I’d remember the conversation from the night before and get slammed with an anxiety attack. A nurse came out of the waiting room and told my husband she was concerned that my vital signs still weren’t stable. She asked him if I’d been traumatized in any way recently, and he told her what had happened.
“Well, that would do it,” she said.
Obviously, I survived. But now I understand what people mean when they say you can literally die of a broken heart. I almost did.
CHILDHOOD FANTASY
I was about three years old when I first thought about searching for my birth mother. Becoming a searcher for adoptees and their birth relatives is something I was born to do. My aunt has told me she remembers that I said, “I am going to find that woman.” I kept saying it over and over. She asked me, “What woman?” Then it dawned on her who I meant.
I never discussed this with my parents. Even as a child, I instinctively knew it would hurt them. My desire to find my birth mother was in no way intended to be a slight against my mother and father. No blood relation could ever replace the people who loved me and raised me. I was brought into a loving middle-class home in the suburbs. My dad was a funeral director and my mother was a stay-at-home mom. I had an older brother, who was also adopted. If anything, we were made to feel even more special that we had been “chosen.” Because of the positive way my parents framed it for me, I was actually proud of the fact I was adopted. My poor mom was mortified when, as a toddler, I’d blurt out this fact of my existence to any random person who came within earshot. I was adopted and proud of it.
Don’t misunderstand me. It’s always been very clear in my mind that the Monaci family, who raised me, is my real family. I was brought up by the most incredible, loving, wonderful parents. None of us was tied by blood, but that didn’t matter. Love, loyalty, and honesty were our bond, and it was much bigger than sharing someone’s DNA.
My mom married my father, Ron, at nineteen. My dad suffered many illnesses during their marriage. They could not have biological children because, as a young child, my father had suffered a devastating injury that forced him to undergo repeated exposure to radiation. All those X-rays made him sterile. Dad actually had undiagnosed lupus and spent most of his life suffering from the many side effects of this disease. When I was five years old, a blood clot almost took his life, and I remember a feeling of overwhelming terror at the thought of losing this great man. As if seeing my father suffer from one health crisis after another was not enough, my brother, Ronnie, was diagnosed with bone cancer at the tender age of nineteen. My mother was a soldier at my brother’s side as she struggled to do whatever possible to nurture him back to health. We supported each other through the greatest of hardships, and we survived them together.
I learned from my parents the true meaning of family as we sat down to a dinner that my mom had on the table by 5:00 P.M. sharp every evening. It was our chance to talk about our day and just check in with the people who cared about us the most. I felt secure and safe. My parents were best friends who helped each other through every obstacle in their lives. My brother and I were raised in a God-fearing family and were sent to private school for our early education. We went to church every Sunday and arrived home to await the arrival of our grandparents (my dad’s parents), who were Italian and brought with them all of my favorite foods—meatballs, manicotti, cannoli. I gain weight just thinking about it! Our extended family dined together every Sunday. Our grandmother smothered us with kisses (we called her “the Octopus”), and our grandfather, who chain-smoked Lucky Strike cigarettes, squeezed our noses with his tobacco-stained fingers. These were good, hardworking people who taught me the meaning of the word integrity and gave me all the unconditional love I could ever have asked for. It was a great foundation.
But this yearning to find the woman who gave me life was so fundamental that I couldn’t switch it off. I think this is true for most adoptees. Think of all those millions of people who are fascinated with their family ancestry, and then multiply that obsession by a factor of a thousand. It’s something primal. There’s so much that our immediate blood relatives can tell us about ourselves. This need to connect is especially intense when it comes to our birth mothers. It’s an organic bond that’s always there. You were in this person’s womb. No matter what happens, you are her flesh and blood, and it will always feel like a piece of you is missing without her acknowledgment.
That feeling stays close to the surface your whole life. In school, I always wanted to be a writer, and when I was fifteen, I wrote a haiku that went something like this:
THE RING
It sat glistening at the bottom of the ocean
Forever lost
Cast away uncaringly
As he cast away her
Of course, it was about my birth parents, or how I’d imagined them to be. You create so many scenarios in your head about what happened and the circumstances that led to your being given up for adoption. Until you know the real answers, it never stops.
THE FIRST STEP
At sixteen, my best friend took me into Manhattan to visit the agency that had handled my adoption, Spence-Chapin. She bought me a teddy bear at Lord & Taylor, we had lunch, and then we went to the place where it all began. I was turned away almost immediately and told to come back when I was eighteen. But I stayed in the lobby for a few minutes to take it all in—the furniture, the shabby wallpaper, everything. There was something almost mystical about that spot, because I knew it was the last place I’d been with my birth mother, and the first location where I met my parents. Of course, I had been just a baby at the time, but I tried...
Most helpful customer reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful.
Fabulous!
By Mickey
As a huge fan of Pam's "Searching For ..." TV show, I could hardly wait to read this book. As an adult adoptee, I have read several adoption-themed books by various authors, but so far, this has been the best. I thought she did a great job of accurately summarizing the wide range of feelings adoptees have; the ones we share and the ones we don't talk about because they are just too painful. Every chapter tugged at my heart and I caught myself wiping my eyes. The "Lesson" at the end of each chapter was a really nice touch.
This was a GREAT read. I couldn't put it down.
Thanks, Pam. Please tell us we can look forward to a Volume II!
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful.
Big Book for Adoption
By John Knox
A must read for all adoptee's and Birth Parents. This really is The Big Book for adoption. This is an exciting & emotionally challenging read -- the truth -- really does set you free. Pam & Sam must have had divine intervention because the book will certainly create miracles.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful.
My Search Angel
By Carlease Burke
I knew firsthand about this gem of an author when I was led to her by one of the adoptees whose story she tells in this book.
I am an adoptee and had been sporadically searching for my birth mother for almost 20 years. I am also an actress and a random tweet to a casting director changed my life. I was introduced to Pamela Slaton by Sheila Jaffee, reluctantly hired her and three weeks later my birth mother had been found…still alive at 95!!! That was two years ago. I’m just now getting around to reading this book. I can relate to some part of each and every story regardless of the outcome and circumstances. Reunited is beautifully written, connecting the dots throughout just like Pamela connects the dots in her work to bring families together. I enjoyed reading her personal story and loved how it unfolds from chapter to chapter.
If you are any part of the adoption triad: adoptee, birth parent or adoptive parents, reading this book will cause you to understand adoptees better and why Pamela Slaton’s work is so valuable. She gives us hope and brings us closure. I’ve been reunited with my birth family, found a family of fellow adoptees and celebrate a happy ending to my lifelong search for self. Thank you Sheila. Thank you Pam. I am forever grateful.
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