Search Angels ~ They really are angels

Dottye had been divorced?

This was a huge clue. Huge!!

I had joined an Arizona search group on line and started loading my questions to the group.

What is a "Search Angel"?? I don't know what it means to others but to me it meant having people who wanted the answer almost if not as much as I did.

In looking for my siblings in Arizona, I was lucky enough to be connected with such a search angel.

Her name was Becci and we spoke the same language. When I threw the "F-bomb" she threw it back. I knew I could speak or type my mind with her. She shot right from the hip, as did I.

She lived in Arizona and did a ton of foot work for me. 

I have often found along my search that while I can be creative, I'm not legally knowledgeable and she totally was.

She did a ton of research online and then headed to the court house, where she obtained Dottye's marriage and divorce records.

This is where lie's come into play.

And ya, this is my blog so I get to pick and chose what I tell you about.

Today I'll touch on one person whom I believe lives in a very safe place, who likes the world to revolve around her survival, and whom I often wish I can crawl in and take a peek at what she is really thinking.

Dottye had a sister named Ruby. It is our understanding that Ruby and Dottye are blood sisters, or at the very least half sisters. We know that they were adopted together, from the same orphanage. Ruby says that she herself was at the orphanage for a year before Dottye arrived, and then they were adopted together almost right away.

When Karen called her, that very first night that Karen and I spoke, she asked Ruby if she knew about me. Ruby replied that she didn't know a thing about me, but that Dottye had one child while in high school. That was all she mentioned, that was "All I know" as she said.

Becci called me to tell me what was on the court documents. She was mailing me hard copies as well but didn't want me to have to wait for the information.

Affidavit for Marriage:

The filed to get married on December 11 1964. I knew in my heart she had to be pregnant when I saw that she was 16 years old and getting married to a man who was 22 years old. There is no way her parents would have allowed this, unless she was indeed pregnant. 

I also got a copy of her Marriage License:

They were married on December 11 1964.

Point of interest?

When you get married you have to have people sign as witnesses.

I am still looking for one of them, a man named Rudolph Steele. His name is as a witness, though I do not see his signature in Dottye's funeral book so I am not sure how they knew each other.

The other witness you might ask??

Ruby Robertson.

Yes folks, she signed as a witness. Yes she claimed to not know of the marriage when confronted with the question of if she knew Ronald Crittenden. We never confronted her more then the question of if she knew who he was.

Next were a lot of documents on the divorce. She filed for divorce and asked that her father be her legal guardian again in April of 1965. The reason for the file of divorce, while she was pregnant was in part:

V

That the defendant has been guilty of excesses, cruel treatment and outrages towards Plaintiff....................

............................ As a consequence of said cruel treatment, excesses and outrages toward Plaintiff on the part of Defendant, further continuance of marital relations between Plaintiff and Defendant will be detrimental to the heath and welfare of Plaintiff.

He abused her, or she claimed that she did. What I could imagine is it was bad enough to make her want to go back home, while pregnant. I could only imagine how desperate she must have felt. I put myself in her shoes and imagined having to go home after thinking you were free.

She got the divorce, we know that. She was pregnant when she got divorced. In one of the documents it stated that:

the care, custody and control of the unborn child of the parties hereto be awarded to Plaintiff, with Defendant to have reasonable visitation rights.

There was a huge uh oh when I read that.

My gut instinct once again included :Ruby knew all along, there was more then one child, and Dottye must have thought that she was going to be "allowed" to keep this child.

Also notice, that Dottye was not great at dates. She had the birth of this child in the wrong year compared to what she had told people with my placement records. 

We needed to find this child....now adult.

We had an idea of when this child must have been born, we at least knew what year to look at now. !965. Jesus she was only 16 years old. As we researched I also looked at the photos that I had of her. Some of them I questioned. Her look changed so many times, she was never fat, however in a few she was for sure looking a tad plump. Well, now we knew why.

One of them we are guessing was on her wedding day. I'll post that the end of my entry.

Becci and I searched and searched but couldn't seem to find this child. I knew that Dottye was supposed to have had a girl while in high school, I wasn't sure if this was going to a be a girl or boy though so we kept our mind open on it.

I finally caved and hired a CI. I hated doing this, it went against everything I believed in but I could not find another way. I had to pay her, and the thought that someone could look into Dottye's/ her birth child's records to see what was there, and I couldn't, it made me red with fire. I played nice and sent in my forms.

My CI got the file and called me to fill me in. She told me that she had his address and it was not in Arizona so it might take a while for him to reply. I had sent her a letter to send to him as well as some photos. I did not tell him that Dottye was dead, I figured we would speak on that at some point.  The photos were of  myself . I had no idea if he would want contact or not but felt that he had the right to know the very same things that I had always wanted to know.

Who is my birth family? Why isn't anyone looking for me.

The CI also told me that he was placed in a home and then later removed at 4 months of age due to abuse/ neglect. He went to one more home she believed before being adopted finally by a third family. His third family received him with a fracture to his skull. They had the fracture repaired but he lost vision in one of his eyes.

She also informed me that there was no mention of any other births in the file.......when my sister and I did the math, we knew that any other children had to have been born before him. What did that mean?

I was heart broken and could only imagine how he must have felt about his beginnings and how those feelings would reflect for the rest of his life.

While speaking to the CI, she said his first name.

As soon as I hung up with her I began once again surfing the adoption registries on the net, now having his first name and date of birth which was the summer of 1965.

It didn't take long to find him. There was something about the tone of his post that suggested he was less then happy in his search. He wanted medical information and that was it. Lots of adoptee's say that, but I had a feeling that he may have meant it. I hoped that my kindness might open him up a little, man was I wrong.

Below is a post the day of his horrible email. I posted it at a place called the Adoption Forums. It is a place to seek help in searching as well as support, at least that is what it was 6 and a half years ago.

Lets see if I can type what has happened.
Tuesday, after looking for 6 months I found a half brother. He was adopted, as was I. I contacted him. I got his email from a post he had on a different site. He put it there 3.5 years ago at the age of 36. I told him I thought I might be his half sister and asked him if his name was "R". He replied. Yes it was him. What did I want? Told him I wanted to share with him the same information that I had on birth relatives. Back and fourth emails. One time he wants info, the next time he is content. One time he tells me a bit about himself and that he would meet me but only for my benefit. The next time he does not want to know anything personal about birth family just medical. Last night I emailed him that I have a contact for his birth father so he can get his medical as he wants to. Then told him the medical on birth mom is brief as she too was adopted.(I did not give him any history or the fact that she died when he was 8). This morning I wake up to this email from him.

Wendy,

You know, this whole thing is a bit silly. Your (our?) mom doesn't know her
medical history beyond herself, so that knowledge is fairly useless. And
I'm sorry because it seems you've put out effort for all of this, but I've
lived almost 40 years of my life without knowing anything and this is a bit
too much drama. Nothing personal, but this hasn't made me happy or relived
or anything but a bit depressed...and who needs that.

You can have the satisfaction of knowing your search hit pay-dirt, so to
speak...ya found me. But I'd just as soon not take it any further, so I
will not be calling Judy, she has no consent to be divulging addresses, etc.
I would prefer not to be contacted by anyone for any reason, unless my
real dad was Bill Gates and he feels so bad about things he wants to pass
off a million or so bucks my way. I won't say no to that. Otherwise,
please cease and desist all contact, phone calls, emails, missives, etc.
I've got a family even if they're not genetically related. Thanks.

Please guys help me out here. The only contact I have for him is email and you see he asked me not to contact him at all. Please be honest in what you think I should do but please be gentle, this is really painful for me.
Thanks
Wendy

So there you have it. I had found my half brother and got a big old slap in the face from it. I don't think it hurts anymore, but I had always wanted to see what a male from our blood line would look like. Maybe part of that was because I had no way to see what my birth father looked like, I can't say for sure. I did later track down his ex wife and told her that it was probably wrong of me to do so but that my one desire was to see what he looked like. She sent me an email back saying she was so sorry that she could not do that for me and touched on his personality. I knew that she knew first hand and decided that would be my last attempt at any contact with him. She did tell him about it to which he emailed me and warned me that he was going to turn me into the FBI for cyber stalking. My husband, sister and I had to laugh at that. The threat didn't surprise me and the threat fit right in with his personality.

Photo of what we believe to be Dottye's first wedding day?