Blind In One Eye by David R. Ford

What I Can Tell You:
Imagine growing up as an only child with loving adoptive parents knowing you have a brother out there with your birth family but then finding out that you don't just have a brother, you have 5 other siblings too! David calls them "the keepers" and "the throwaways". His birth parents put him up for adoption along with three girls before him then went on to have more babies that they kept.

It's a complicated story, one that David tells with a candid approach encased in realism and humor. It reads like an letter between friends. I felt like David is a wonderful person who is sharing his very complicated story because he wants to advocate for open adoption. He spent 40 years of his life searching for a family he knew was out there and then to hear that his eldest sister had been looking for him for years and had a semi relationship with the birth mother who comes off as a scared woman of the 40's. As a mother, reading the story of these "throwaways" and wondering how a mother could continue to have babies and give them up could if written by a different person, may have made me angry. However, David has such a way of telling the story, that I don't feel anger toward his birth mother. I feel pity, sadness and shame. If it were a different time maybe things would have been different. I am so happy that David has a family that he is getting to know and love.

Enjoyable, good read even if you have never experienced adoption. David is truly a wonderful story teller and I love his relationship with his wife. Kudos to him for putting this all down on paper for other adoptees to have a reference on how removing the veil of secrecy with adoptions can heal, soothe, and foster relationships that wouldn't have had a chance to flourish without knowledge and communication.


Disclosure: I received a copy of this book from FordWords Publishing for my honest opinion.