Miscarriage of "Birth Justice"

Forward Together's Stealth Attack on Motherhood

As an adoptive mother, I often felt sheepish standing up in church with the many biological mothers to receive my carnation and curvy-lettered prayer card on the second Sunday in May. I was plagued with self-doubts because I believed that I lacked the key experience common to all biological mothers: childbirth. In part because adoptive parenting put me more in contact with the losses of birth parents, I was initially sympathetic when I came across discussions of "Mamas Day," an alternative holiday to Mother's Day. I thought that any holiday that stood up for marginalized mothers and the mother-child bond, especially in these days of working women postponing childbearing, would be a help to mothers. Yet I couldn't have...