In the words of Gloria Gaynor ...

I am Rosamund Mary
I was born on the Isle of Man
I was adopted when I was 12 weeks old
I have a rare form of Von Willebrand's disease
I have less than 3% Von Willebrand's factor
I have less than 1% factor 8
I have injections to replace the clotting factor and stop bleeding
I learned to do them myself when I was 14
I started my periods when I was 13
I would bleed for 3 weeks out of 4 and then start all over again
I have taken hormone pills ever since then to keep the bleeding under control
I have always had acne on my chest from the hormone pills
I used to have horrendous period pain every month
I once had to stop my car and knock on a strangers door for help because I was blacking out from period pain
I now take hormones continuously because it's safer for me not to bleed
I was given Hepatitis C from contaminated NHS blood products
I was probably exposed with every injection I had in the 70's and early 80's
I had on average 1 injection a week then to control bleeds
I was not told by my specialist about my infection with Hepatitis C
I found out by accident at another hospital
I had a 12 month and then a 6 month course of treatment for the Hepatitis C
I had a biopsy before the 2nd course of treatment
I lost six pints of blood and nearly died after a bleed in my liver
I discovered just before I got married the Hepatitis C was no longer detectable in my blood
I have been ill with chronic fatigue ever since those treatments
I now have on average 2 injections a week of clotting factor to control bleeds
I have been exposed to vCJD
I have been unable to work since 2008
I have been unable to have children because of my ill health

I am what I am
I am just right
I am all this
I am me

Your Blood Supplement

Recently I was asked to write about having von Willebrand's disorder for a supplement called Your Blood which is soon to come out with an issue of The Independent.  I was asked to write a paragraph but being me that was like trying to insert an elephant into a letter  box.

I am going to publish on my blog what I wrote, as it's a synopsis of my life with funny blood and I've not really put anything like that on here so far.  The supplement that is being published contains a mere snippet as they only had a tiny space to fill.  On here I'll break it down into sections. 

Your Blood - Part 1

When my mum and dad adopted me at the age of 6 weeks old in 1974, they thought they had been given a perfect little girl.  At the age of 6 months when mum was at the GPs and mentioned that I had a bruise, she expected the doctor to say, oh yes that’s quite normal.  She did not expect what actually happened next.

I was referred to the hospital to have blood tests done.  Mum sat on a stool at the hospital with me on her knee while they pricked my ear with a needle and watched it bleed.  After over an hour with me crying and mum worrying, they told her the fact it had not stopped bleeding was abnormal and that I would need more tests.

Mum was told by the Royal Manchester Children’s Hospital (RMCH) that her daughter had severe von Willebrand’s disease later that year.  The next few years were particularly tricky.  Learning to crawl, to walk and cutting then losing tiny teeth were all massive challenges.  Mum and dad decided early on not to wrap me in cotton wool – though they were tempted, and some padding fashioned from socks with their toes cut off, filled with foam rubber, were popped over my knees when I began to crawl.

As a severe bleeder every time I bumped, tripped over or cut myself we had the pleasure of a trip to the hospital over 20 miles away.  This could be many times a week.  When I bled it wasn’t necessarily heavy but it oozed for hours without stopping until I had treatment.  Treatment in the 70s consisted of cryo-precipitate, which had to be defrosted once we arrived at the hospital, and then loaded up into a 50ml syringe or into bags that were infused via one of my veins.  

I remember a lot of my childhood as being spent in hospital and the nurses became part of our family and I felt at home there.  I bruised very easily and had frequent nosebleeds and gum bleeds, all of which meant a trip to RMCH.  I also had problems with internal bleeding into my joints – these were very painful and more disruptive for me as I had to rest until they got better.  I also had to be pushed to school in a big blue stripy buggy which as a girl of 6 or 7 was not much fun.  Generally though I lived my life as normally as possible given the amount of time I was on my way to, or from, or at hospital.

To be continued...

Don't Disturb The Scab

... as my mother said to me, while I was hobbling down the kitchen towards the microwave with a tub of carrot and coriander.

I have got various things to tell you, blogees. But I have not got the energy to write much more than this in one go.

See that's it. I'm done in.

Anyhoo - if you can hang around a bit longer I'll try and expand on the various things that are occurring currently (now that's one too many currs for my liking!)

1. No bleeding in February thus far - don't tell anyone, my womb lining might hear you and decide its had enough of being sidelined and needs to make a speedy comeback with a new hairdo but to all intents and purposes the same motivation ... gore galore!

2. My trace of the adoption has, after a slightly hesitant and covert start, moved on apace and more is being revealed and illuminated than ever before.

3. Ade and I had a trip into the Welsh hills on Monday this week looking for a woman who can do for Chronic Fatigue what Hugh FW has done for battery farming - i.e. hopefully get rid. We found her halfway up a hill and have got a whole new plan of attack, tons of bumpf and another vast array of supples and miners and vits, along with a book and a load of articles to back up her advice.

Just in case you're feeling swizzed - that's not the expansion that's merely the teaser, as these TV types like to say. The prologue before the novella, the preview before the performance, the canape before the cordon bleu ... ok, now I'm bigging it up way too much. Suffice to say I will update anon. If you can hang on. Please.

X

Wishing Tom, Ade's cousin, a happy birthday for yesterday.
And wishing the boys going to Paris for Dave's 40th a blooming good time!

Who Do I Think I Am?

Since I decided earlier this year to find out more about my birth family I have made a little progress:

• Rang Isle of Man Adoption Service - found the number on-line and spoke to a social worker who gave me the number of the Birmingham branch of the National Children's Home (NCH) and a name to contact, to try and get my adoption records.
• He said I would need proof of ID and my adoption certificate in order to access my records.
  
• Rang NCH Birmingham - left message for the woman I needed to speak to, asking for information.
• Asked mum and dad for adoption certificate.
• Mum and dad gave me more correspondence they received and notes they made at the time of my adoption - they have a record of my birth name.
• General Register Office - they manage the Adoption Contact Register which exists to put adopted people and their birth relatives in touch with each other if that is what they both wish. Part 1 of the Contact Register is for adopted adults to record their wishes for contact or no contact with birth relatives. Part 2 of the Contact Register is for birth relatives to record their wishes for contact or no contact with the adopted person.
• Sent application to go on part 1 of Adoption Contact Register - recording wish for contact.
  
• Rang General Register Office - they maintain a record of adoptions made on the authority of courts in England and Wales in the Adopted Children Register. At 18, an adopted person can apply for a certificate of their original birth registration, via the Access to Birth Records service at the General Register Office. The General Register Office cannot help with accessing IOM birth records. Gave me a number to try in IOM.
• Rang IOM General Registry - said they might not have records as would have been handled by NCH but are sending an application form.
  
• Mum and dad found small birth certificate - looking for adoption certificate.
• NCH Birmingham - the woman rang and is sending me a form to fill in. They are very busy and warned that it might be a while before anyone got back to me.
• Filled in and posted NCH Access to Personal Records leaflet I'd picked up.
• Filled in and posted NCH Access to Birth Records for Adoptees leaflet I'd picked up.
• Received application form for Access to Birth Records form from IOM General Registry - may be the same as NCH form which I've already sent so I'll wait and see results of that one first.
• Registered on Ancestry.co.uk - looked for any people with my birth surname from IOM - no matches.
• Received letter from NCH Birmingham - they do have records of my adoption, due to their operating a waiting list I will be contacted in 4 - 6 weeks for an appointment.
  
• Received a letter from the Adoption Contact Register to inform me that no relatives were registered on part 2. This means no-one has registered wishing contact with me, but also that no-one has registered wishing no contact with me.
• Appointment come through for NCH Birmingham.
• Saw social worker at NCH Birmingham - discussed the implications of tracing birth family, possible outcomes, what I was hoping for, what I was expecting, best and worse case scenarios. She asked if I wanted to look at my adoption record. Ade and I read it all. From before my birth up to my transfer to Frodsham and my adoption. She asked if I wanted copies of all the information in the file. Obviously I said "Yes please!"

So here it is - my adoption file!

It contains my little period of previously unknown personal history. The clues with which to trace my birth relatives and my own ancestry might well be inside.

Will the clues be there? Will they enable me to find my roots and follow them into my past? Will I find what I'm looking for? What is it I am looking for??

It remains to be seen...

Who am I again?

Actually, it's not who am I?
Or where do I come from?
Or even - is there anyone out there?

It's more a case of mild curiosity and the Manx cat.

As an adopted person I have never felt any undeniable desires to trace my birth family. I was adopted at about 3 months old and have always felt totally happy and a part of that the family I grew up with. Mum and Dad told me from the very beginning of my memories that I was adopted and I never felt like I didn't know who I was. They made me a scrapbook to explain where I came from - how I'd flown over from the Isle of Man and how they'd come and picked me up from a children's home in Frodsham.


My brother who was also adopted had a different background and birth family to mine. He was adopted at the age of three and so had a history prior to coming to live with us. He never seemed as comfortable or settled in our extended family. He had been taken in and then rejected a number of times before coming to be with us and I believe that affected his ability to trust those who were supposed to care for him. I think he felt like he was obviously different and found it hard to accept this new family at face value. He looked into his background as a teenager and traced his birth family over time, becoming close to them and developing relationships - these weren't always easy but helped him understand himself I think. This in turn has perhaps led to an acceptance and appreciation of the parents and family that brought him up?

My lack of desire to find out about my birth family was purely a sign of my sense of belonging to my new family life and a happy childhood. We had a fair few problems to handle but I felt that I had a strong and loving family, dedicated to each other and of which I was very much a part.

When I hit 21 I remember thinking maybe now would be a good time to look into my past, where I came from. It was a milestone. I was in my final year at university and had plenty of family and friends to support my quest for information. However something stopped me moving from thought into action. That, thinking back, was Hepatitis C. I had found out in 1991 at the age of 17 that I had the virus and whilst it had not affected me at all and life was continuing as if I'd never heard of the virus, I felt like I couldn't look up my birth family and say:

"Hello, it's me, your long lost daughter - and by the way, not only have I got a severe bleeding disorder but I've also got hepatitis C - now you gonna make me a cup of tea or what . . ."

This was enough to put me off the idea and to get on with life and what that threw at me. Again there were no feelings of dissatisfaction or of incompleteness, I suppose I had other things on my mind.

This year I have again been having health problems, both bleeding and chronic fatigue. I have had more time off, which has given me time to think about my future and surprisingly this had led to me thinking about my past.

I've realised the longer I leave finding out about my birth parents, the lower the chances of finding them - who knows what's happened to them, where their lives have taken them over the years. It's not as simple as looking them up on the internet and getting an address and bobbing on round. Or is it?

I've acknowledged that I am curious about them. Purely in terms of - will there be any family resemblances? My adoptive family share many features and personality traits which link them together - I do miss that, is there someone out there with my nose? My dodgy sense of humour? Or in fact if I did find anyone would my upbringing have influenced my life so very much that we actually had very little in common - except for perhaps the nose?

The point is I don't know. And I'm coming to the realisation that I can actually find out if I put my mind to it. And it might take months, it might take years, but at least then the pieces will all have been fitted together - even if there are some missing and maybe I never want to do the jigsaw again.