As a mom who’s adopted child number 6 of 7 and worked very hard to make sure the adoptive parents of all these kids have contact, I have needed to be able to keep tabs on our son’s birth mother. This goes for our younger son’s birth mother as well. It might come across as a bit of an obsession of mine. It grieves my heart at the possibility of a child being born and none of us ever knowing of their existence.
Not all birth mothers who’ve lost their children to the state have criminal records, but many of them do! I often do a check of their inmate status. This can be done in most states by visiting VineLink and clicking on your state. If your county is fairly open about records, you might try Googling in “(your county, state) jail roster” or “(your county, state) inmate status”. When I’ve found a birth parent that way, I know they are alive and the state has more than likely had an opportunity to find out if there is a pregnancy.
By visiting your county’s website, you might be able to find mug shots too. I had one fuzzy picture taken of a Polaroid shot of my older son’s birth father. When my husband went on the county’s early inmate releases site, he found a recent photo of him in good detail. My son will now get to know what his birth father really looked like!
Sometimes, you can find out about the status of birth parents by finding other birth family members. I must caution you; this is not always a good idea. I braved finding a couple of the adoptive mothers which led me to birth great grandparents, another adoptive mom and sibling. I have since found more family members through ZabaSearch but have chosen at this time not to contact them due to a currently open case.
There is a lot of information out there on the internet. Just as easy as it might be to find out about a birth parent, your information may be readily available as well. If you are interested in keeping your personal information private, visit the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse.
Please check out my related blog: Protecting Your Child’s Identity
(Melissa is a Families.com Christian Blogger. Read her blogs at: http://members.families.com/mj7/blog)