Every day, I’ve been going to the mailbox like a little kid anticipating a package containing something like a Captain Midnight Decoder Ring. That should give you an indication of my age. I was born on August 27, 1951 at Wishard Memorial Hospital in Indianapolis, Indiana and returned to my temporary home, The Suemma Coleman Home for Unwed Mothers. I’m not exactly sure when “for Unwed Mothers” disappeared from its bothersome identity? All the communications that came to my adoptive parents were on The Suemma Coleman Home letterhead. For some historical perspective, I did copy a couple of excerpts from the blog Coleman Moms and Babes ,with references to the book A Public Charity: Religion & Social Welfare in Indianapolis, 1929-2002 by Mary L, Mapes:

“In the 1940s and the 1950s, it was a quite different philosophy of thought. They considered single mothers a threat to the middle class ideal. So often you hear stories that these women either got spiritual training or psychological counseling to get them to see the error of their ways. We can all imagine what that was like. Suemma Coleman Home for Unwed Mothers was the protestant version of St. Elizabeth’s Home for Unwed Mothers. This was the time that worshiped the concept of the middle class family. They stopped encouraging women to keep their children.”

These next two paragraphs are particularly disturbing, describing the discriminating attitudes of that era:

“Interestingly enough they condemned the African American mother and forced her to raise her own child. They wanted her to take responsibility of her own child. With the white mother, it was the opposite. They wanted her to relinquish her child. Many of these social workers at these agencies thought this new pattern was a sign of the unwed mother having a personality disorder. They felt it was a unwed mother’s attempt to get back at her parents for the lack of love and attention. They felt that it was ultimately the unwed mother’s mother who was responsible for her daughter getting pregnant. They described this pregnancy as a form of rebellion. These homes changed their focus from lower class mothers to middle class mothers. They became very selective in the unwed mothers. Neither one of these homes for years would accept an African American mother in their maternity homes.”

“Ruth Henderson, the Suemma Coleman Home for Unwed Mothers director, described how these girls coming to the home would want to keep their children. These girls were strongly discouraged from that train of thought. Her words, I swear. The maternity homes had to make sure that these young girls followed through with relinquishment. Most of these girls were told that since they got pregnant that they would NOT be good mothers. These homes told these women that they could not be mothers without a husband. A husband is what made them mothers. Ms. Henderson happily reported that most of these mothers willingly changed their minds once they understood this. “

Ruth Henderson signed most of the paperwork that my parents received, so I was familiar with her name when I read this. They left me most of the original paperwork in their safe deposit box that I opened after they passed a few years ago. I could find no record of Ruth’s death. My 18-year old birth mother probably had discussions with both her and her staff as she prepared to give birth to me and pass the responsibility of my care on to others.

Apparently all of the documents related to my adoption were legally sealed from public inspection until just recently. You can imagine the flood of inquiries that the Indiana State Department of Health has had to accommodate. Over 30 years ago, a close friend of mine in the media business somehow got access to these files, and gave me the name Edna Faye Banister as my birth mother. I’ve often wondered what other information in my files have been protected all these years? This poor woman is now 85 years old and will probably never accept any connection to me, even despite genetic evidence. However, I’m still curious about these documents. As a result, I submitted my request over 5 months ago (in October), and have been waiting impatiently on a package in the mail ever since.

The Indiana State Department of Health initially indicated that it would be 16 weeks to respond. Over twenty weeks had passed a few days ago, so I sent a follow -up email. Here’s their response: “Your request is in line for processing. We do not have a turnaround time frame due to the high volume of requests for the adoption matching registry. We are currently working on July’s requests at this time.”

It looks like I have at least 3 more months to wait for this information that may or may not be useful. At least, there’s no longer any need to wait by the mailbox for the adult version of a Secret Decoder Ring.