I've been thinking of writing an autobiography or memoir but it just never comes together for me but I figured if I write one story at a time and post it on my blog maybe once a month, I can do that. Maybe one day I'll pull all the stories together and put them in a book but for now I'll just share some stories with you about my childhood and into adulthood. Some of the stories will be happy, some sad and some horrific because that was my childhood. But they will all be real, things that actually happened. If it seems like something that people enjoy reading maybe I'll keep it going. These stories will not be in any kind of order, I'll just write them as they come to me.
My brother's adoption reunion story
These two brothers and I have the same mother. The one on the right making the face is the older brother (Bear) who had been adopted and I found back in 2004. The brother on the right is Billy who I've posted on here before.
I found out I had another older brother when I was 12 years old. My mom was talking to her boyfriend about him and I overheard and asked her about it later. I found out that when my mom was a teenager she was raped by her mothers boyfriend. My mom told her mother and her mother kicked the guy out. She called my grandpa who she had been divorced from for a few years and he dropped everything to come and move them out of state. My grandparents got back together for a while after that but they made my mom give up her baby when he was born in 1967.
When I got my first computer I started searching online. Even then it was hard and I wasn't having much luck until I started finding websites that you and the adopted person can register at and when they see a match they contact you. That's what happened to me.
In 2004 I registered at a site called The International Soundex Reunion Registry (ISRR) and I had a whole bunch on info on my brother so it was fairly easy to make a match with him since he had registered years before with his information.
I knew his adopted parents names, where and when he was born and his birth mom's name. I didn't know that he had spent many years searching for us as well.
I got a call from a lady at ISRR telling me she thought she had found him and was going to be sending letters to the last known address she had on file. They came back because he had moved. So she looked him up on the computer and found some of the other addresses he had lived at and sent out more letters. They all came back undeliverable because he had either not left a forwarding address or had moved from the address more than a year before and they only forward mail for a year.
One day she called me and told me we had one more chance to find him but I would have to send this letter myself. If you have a person's date of birth, parents names their full name and $10, back then you could send a letter to DMV and they would see if that person had a drivers license in their state and forward the letter to them. I don't know if California DMV does this anymore, I couldn't find a link for it. The lady at ISRR sent me the link way back when I did this.
I was warned that the letter I wrote to him had to be very benign. I couldn't say Hi, I'm your long lost sister. For whatever reason if the DMV reads the letter and thinks it would be upsetting... or anything but Hey, I'm trying to get in touch with you, here's my number...call me... they won't forward it.
So I wrote the letter saying Hi, What my name was. My mother's name and that we were trying to get a hold of him would he please give me a call. And I left my phone number.
It was about 2 weeks later that I started to think that I wasn't going to get a response. The lady at ISRR was calling me just about everyday asking me if I had heard anything yet, she was so nice and supportive. All this time, I hadn't told my mother that I was looking for my brother. I wasn't sure what I was going to do if I found out he was in jail, had died or was a dead beat. I'm not sure I would have told her if he had died, I think that might have been too much for her. So I kept it a secret until one day about 17 days after I had sent the letter to DMV..I got a call. It was my brother's wife. She asked me why I had sent such a strange letter to her husband. The funny thing was, she thought I was an old girlfriend trying to get a hold of him. lol
I explained to her who I was and why I had worded the letter the way I had and once she realized who she was talking to, she got all excited and told me that my brother was active Army and was in Iraq. She told me she usually just put all his mail in a box for him to open in a few months when he got home, but my letter was so unusual she had to call and find out who the heck I was. So I was very happy I had worded it so mysteriously.
Just then she got another call and told me it was my brother. She put me on hold gave him my number and he called me a few minutes later. We didn't talk for very long but we exchanged email addresses so we could email each other later. After I got off the phone I took a deep breath and called my mom. I just said, "I found him." She knew exactly who I was talking about and she started crying. She asked me all kinds of questions but when she found out he was in the Army and deployed in Iraq, she got scared thinking he could be killed before she had a chance to meet him.
He went by Bear and we emailed back and forth for a while and my mom came over and I showed her all his pictures I had on the computer and printed out some for her, let her read all the emails we had shared and dictated an email from her while she was here to him and sent it. It was mostly emails because phone time wasn't available too often.
He was sent home in 2004 after his leg was injured in an IED explosion and a little while later he and his wife made the trip out here from California and we all got to meet for the first time. We all got along really well. He and his wife divorced soon after but a few years later he met another lady and married her.
In 2004 I registered at a site called The International Soundex Reunion Registry (ISRR) and I had a whole bunch on info on my brother so it was fairly easy to make a match with him since he had registered years before with his information.
I knew his adopted parents names, where and when he was born and his birth mom's name. I didn't know that he had spent many years searching for us as well.
I got a call from a lady at ISRR telling me she thought she had found him and was going to be sending letters to the last known address she had on file. They came back because he had moved. So she looked him up on the computer and found some of the other addresses he had lived at and sent out more letters. They all came back undeliverable because he had either not left a forwarding address or had moved from the address more than a year before and they only forward mail for a year.
One day she called me and told me we had one more chance to find him but I would have to send this letter myself. If you have a person's date of birth, parents names their full name and $10, back then you could send a letter to DMV and they would see if that person had a drivers license in their state and forward the letter to them. I don't know if California DMV does this anymore, I couldn't find a link for it. The lady at ISRR sent me the link way back when I did this.
I was warned that the letter I wrote to him had to be very benign. I couldn't say Hi, I'm your long lost sister. For whatever reason if the DMV reads the letter and thinks it would be upsetting... or anything but Hey, I'm trying to get in touch with you, here's my number...call me... they won't forward it.
So I wrote the letter saying Hi, What my name was. My mother's name and that we were trying to get a hold of him would he please give me a call. And I left my phone number.
It was about 2 weeks later that I started to think that I wasn't going to get a response. The lady at ISRR was calling me just about everyday asking me if I had heard anything yet, she was so nice and supportive. All this time, I hadn't told my mother that I was looking for my brother. I wasn't sure what I was going to do if I found out he was in jail, had died or was a dead beat. I'm not sure I would have told her if he had died, I think that might have been too much for her. So I kept it a secret until one day about 17 days after I had sent the letter to DMV..I got a call. It was my brother's wife. She asked me why I had sent such a strange letter to her husband. The funny thing was, she thought I was an old girlfriend trying to get a hold of him. lol
I explained to her who I was and why I had worded the letter the way I had and once she realized who she was talking to, she got all excited and told me that my brother was active Army and was in Iraq. She told me she usually just put all his mail in a box for him to open in a few months when he got home, but my letter was so unusual she had to call and find out who the heck I was. So I was very happy I had worded it so mysteriously.
Just then she got another call and told me it was my brother. She put me on hold gave him my number and he called me a few minutes later. We didn't talk for very long but we exchanged email addresses so we could email each other later. After I got off the phone I took a deep breath and called my mom. I just said, "I found him." She knew exactly who I was talking about and she started crying. She asked me all kinds of questions but when she found out he was in the Army and deployed in Iraq, she got scared thinking he could be killed before she had a chance to meet him.
He went by Bear and we emailed back and forth for a while and my mom came over and I showed her all his pictures I had on the computer and printed out some for her, let her read all the emails we had shared and dictated an email from her while she was here to him and sent it. It was mostly emails because phone time wasn't available too often.
He was sent home in 2004 after his leg was injured in an IED explosion and a little while later he and his wife made the trip out here from California and we all got to meet for the first time. We all got along really well. He and his wife divorced soon after but a few years later he met another lady and married her.
My older brother Bear, and his new wife, Melissa when they got married.
I'm just glad that I was able to find him before our mom passed away in 2011. 7 years isn't a lot of time to get to know someone, but they got a lot of memories in those 7 years and I'm glad about that. I know that finding him really mended a hole that was left in my mom's heart.
But less than 2 months after my mom passed away, Bear -John Radell got drunk, and went on a crime spree in the town he lived in. You can read the article here but essentially what he did was pull a gun at a guy in a bar, then went to a convenience store and pulled his gun on another guy and pistol whipped the man with the gun. He was arrested and spent some time in jail. Bear just got more drunk and high on Marijuana after that and then his wife had a stroke. She was in bad shape and lost the ability to walk and ended up in a wheelchair. But he was so out of it for most of the time she was in the hospital that he didn't go to the hospital to see her.
Billy and I distanced ourselves from him because of his erratic behaviour and we found out from a family member that he was threatening to come and kill all of us including our kids and grandkids. Billy and I both had enough so we filled out police reports and tried to get restraining orders but were denied because it was hearsay what we learned and he hadn't done anything to us. So we stopped talking to him but he kept emailing and calling us for more than a year after that.
We didn't talk to Bear until 2020 when Billy reached out to him again and when he found out that my husband had cancer, he called me. We talked and I emailed him and few times, but we were never very close after that. Bear passed away from a heart attack in 2023. I'm glad I found him mostly for my mom, I know she was really happy that she got to meet the baby that she gave up for adoption. But not all adoption stories end happily.
Links to past stories
2023
2024
what a good story and I'm so glad you found him, such a pity he went like that but at least you both were looking for each other, and it made your mum happy, Mary.
ReplyDeleteYes, my mom was really happy that she finally got to meet him.
DeleteJeez what a sad story. Great you found him for your mum's sake. Sounds like Bear had a tough time of it too. Alcoholism is such a bad disease, seen it take a lot of good people. Good you got back in touch before he passed.
ReplyDeleteIt had some happy parts but it was sad the way it ended.
DeleteI thought this was going to be a happy story but it had a sad ending. I'm glad your mum got to meet him though.
ReplyDeleteThat's the one thing I'm happy about.
DeleteIt is an amazing road you followed to find your brother. I am sure your mother was glad for it. Too bad people have dangerous sides to their personality.
ReplyDeleteShe was really happy to have known him before she passed.
DeleteThat's crazy! Whew! I have a friend who works with genetic testing to help reunite families like this...but man, where did his trauma come from that he went off the deep end?
ReplyDeleteThere was a lot to his story that I didn't tell here.
DeleteWhat a story! Sorry it didn't end up happily thereafter.
ReplyDeleteSo am I. I'm glad my mom got closure though.
DeleteOh man, Mary. I was really hoping this story had a happy ending. I'm glad you found him though, esp. for your Mom's sake. PTSD is so common for veterans. It's terrible that our military doesn't help their own.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad my mom had closure and got to meet him.
DeleteMaybe he suffered from undiagnosed PTSD, who knows, to do what he did. I'm glad your mom got the chance to reconnect with him and (barely) missed the time when he started to go off the rails. To think that you went through all that pain in order to find him.
ReplyDeleteIt made my mom happy and so it was worth it.
DeleteNot a happy ending, but at least you answered some questions and gave your mother her peace.
ReplyDeleteYes, my mom was happy and got some closure.
DeleteIt's heartbreaking that the story took such a painful turn later on, but the reality that "not all adoption stories end happily" is a powerful truth to share. Writing these one at a time is a fantastic way to honor all those complex parts of your life.
ReplyDeletewww.melodyjacob.com
Thank you so much.
Deletewhat a rollercoaster of a story! I'm glad you found him for your mom for her closure but I was surprised at the turn of his life in the end, so very sad.
ReplyDeleteIt was worth it all to give my mom the closure she needed.
DeleteIt's good that you found him. I'm sure he had many questions that could only be answered by you and your mom. But it's a very tragic story. Yikes. Most of your stories end up like this. If you ever write this memoir, it'll be a best seller, because there's so much there.
ReplyDeleteThank you so much.
DeleteI'm sorry things turned sour for a bit there with Bear. I imagine he had some trauma from being in the service. I'm going to check that registry because I've never been able to shake the feeling that I've got an adopted sister or brother out there somewhere. When I was 13, mom went into the hospital to deliver a baby, came home without, and gave me the death stare to don't ask. So, since then I've wondered, even mentioned it to my daughters. I even sent in my DNA to those sites, thinking the person would eventually pop up as a close family match. Going to check the ISRR registry today.
ReplyDeleteI hope you find the answers you're looking for.
DeleteThanks for sharing such an intimate look into your life. I'm sorry about how things ended up, but happy you were able to find some closure at least.
ReplyDeleteMy mom was happy to meet him and get to know him, so it was worth it just for that.
DeleteYou are right, not all end happily. It was good you know the story, though. I don't know what happened to my birth mother.
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing.
So many tragic baggage left to you from the parents. I can totally relate, sadly, in a different way, but also terrible parents.
ReplyDeleteWow, that one had a lot of ups and downs. ❣️
ReplyDelete