What Questions Should I Ask My Birth Mother Now That I’ve Found Her?

You have probably had thousands of questions pop-up over the years about your birth family. Now that your search for them is over, you need to know what important questions should be tackled first. For me, there were two big ones. I made sure to ask right away because, at that point in my life, I knew life was tricky and uncertain. I didn’t want to miss my chance.

A major question, and probably the most important, is your family’s medical history. You need to know what health issues to be on the lookout for based on what your family has been diagnosed with over the last couple of decades. At one point it was completely acceptable to put “no known illnesses” on an adoption file and call it a day. Now that people are coming down with medical ailments all the time, it is crucial that you get your family’s medical history as soon as possible. Early detection is the key to successful treatment, so this information is imperative.

The other important question is extensive: I wanted to know my adoption story through her eyes. I heard it many times before from my adoptive mom, but I wanted to know the part of the story that took place before I arrived at the hospital. I wanted the story to include how my birth parents met and how I came to be. Also, I wanted to know why they decided not to parent me. The story I got was not at all what I had come up with in my head. It took some time for me to wrap my head around the story of my birth. I finally had to decide that I couldn’t get upset about something that happened such a long time ago.

No matter what answers you get from your birth mother, you must decide that it is better to know the truth than not. Be armed with forgiveness and prepared for anything.

Ashley Foster is a freelance writer. She is a wife and a mother of two, currently residing in Florida. She loves taking trips to the beach with her husband and sons. As an infant, she was placed with a couple in a closed adoption. Ashley was raised with two sisters who were also adopted. In 2016, she was reunited with her biological family. She advocates for adoptees’ rights and DNA testing for those who are searching for family. Above all, she is thankful that she was given life.