Lesbians of Color: Social and Human Services by Hilda Hidalgo

Author:Hilda Hidalgo [Hidalgo, Hilda]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Ethnic Studies, Public Policy, American, LGBTQ+ Studies, Gay Studies, Social Policy, Social Science, African American & Black Studies, Political Science, Sociology, Women's Studies, General, Gender Studies
ISBN: 9781317952688
Google: STKOAQAAQBAJ
Goodreads: 20858652
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2013-10-18T00:00:00+00:00

DISCUSSION

Perhaps one of the most prominent conclusions of this paper is that an overwhelming majority of the lesbians who were adopted and were interviewed for this study felt more comfortable with their lesbian identity than with their adoption issues.

For example, the majority of these lesbians who were adopted had come out as lesbians and were active in the lesbian community, to greater or lesser degrees. However, most of the lesbians represented in this study had not actively discussed their adoption issues with their adoptive families. Many of these women also had not joined a support group and thus felt isolated from and uninvolved in the adoption community.

This study points to a possible need for adoption support groups that focus on the issues of lesbians who are adopted. Many of the women who were interviewed expressed interest in joining a support group for lesbians who are adopted.

For those who were adopted before six months of age, the adoption experience was positive and nonconflictual. However, women adopted closer to one year old or older tended to consider the adoption experience as a shame-based issue, and as something that was not discussed openly by their adoptive families, either during their childhood or adulthood. For these women, disappointment and shame were part of their negative baggage of being adopted. A question that needs further exploration is why all women found it more difficult to even discuss their adoptive status than their lesbianism, and why this difficulty was also operative within the context of their adoptive families.

This situation might be based on the fact that the women in the study were adults and adoption was secretive in the ‘50s and ‘60s when these women were adopted. A follow-up study to explore these issues with lesbians adopted when the veil of secrecy had begun to lift might provide alternative insights into this issue.

My inquiry identified that loyalty issues played a role in the subjects’ lack of action in searching for birth parents/family. Loyalty to the adopted family contributed to feelings of deep sadness and regret on the part of some subjects for not searching for their birth mothers.

Searching is helpful in understanding the reasons for being relinquished for adoption and thus easing the pain of rejection and self-blame for this rejection. Fantasies about birth parents, particularly birth mothers, are also coping techniques often used by the subjects to resolve feelings of rejection by their birth families.

It is clear that the stigma of adoption bears more heavily on lesbians than the stigma of lesbianism. One might speculate that lesbian identity is greatly an adult task, while adoptive identity is a childhood task. Adoptive issues seem to be more related to the core of “who am I?” by linking the questions to “whose daughter am I?”, while lesbian identity relates more to “who I want to share my life with.”

Issues related to intimacy, fear, and trust are of crucial importance to all lesbians since we do not have the legal protection that heterosexuals have when they establish intimate relations through the institution of marriage.

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