Family quest:
“The Lonely Child” traces author’s search for kinship she yearned for as adoptee.
Even before Susan Moyer’s parents finally told her she was adopted, she knew. Her parents were short and dark, and she was tall and fair. She felt different, something her parents were trying to avoid by keeping her origin a secret until she was 16.
As an adult, Moyer searched for her biological family, a journey that led her to Albany and uncovered shocking secrets along the way. The story is the subject of her book, “The Lonely Child, The Journey of Search to Find My Biological Family.”
It took Moyer, 65, years to start searching. Although she thought about it often — searching faces in crowds to see if she looked like anyone, wondering if she had brothers and sisters — it wasn’t until her own children were born that she started her quest. When she gave birth and then held her sons, first Jeffrey, in 1981 and then Jason in 1984, she realized they were the first people she had ever known who were connected to her by blood.
In 1986, Moyer wrote New York state for the non-identifying information about her birth parents, the only information
she was allowed to see without permission from her birth and adoptive parents. She learned her mother was divorced, which she gave as the reason for giving Susan up for adoption. She was 29 years old at the time of Susan’s birth, and described as a “well set up person, well regarded by her employer.”
It was maddening. Moyer writes in the book, “What the hell did that mean?”
The documents described her mother as pretty, and said her father was a truck driver, between the ages of 24 and 27, and of Irish descent.
In 1998, Moyer picked up the trail again. She traveled to Albany from her home near Rochester, near where she grew up, to see the former Brady Maternity Hospital, where she was born, and visited St. Catherine’s Home for Children, the orphanage where she spent her first six months. It is now administrative offices for the Albany Catholic Diocese. She saw the room where her crib was located. It was an emotional experience, as every step of the way would be, Moyer said. She had so many questions and feelings she carried all her life. In the book, she writes about trying to share the journey with her adoptive mother, who would have nothing to do with it.
The visit to the former orphanage led to a revelation from the archivist at St. Catherine’s that she had three older halfbrothers. Moyer hated being an only child, and introduced herself as “a lonely child” when she was young. On a summer morning in June 1998, she found out for the first time she had siblings. She was overjoyed – but immediately stymied again by the lack of information, until 2005 when she registered with the sibling
adoption registry. She expected disappointment again, but instead, a shock: one of her brothers was registered and was looking for her.
In the book, Moyer describes the events surrounding her first contact with her half-brother, Richard Missita, who lives in Queensbury. She was in New York City for her birthday when her son called from home to say a registered letter had arrived for her, containing Richard’s information. When they spoke on the phone, she learned his adoptive parents never told him he was adopted. He found out after they died, when he found his birth certificate.
Moyer still cries when she tells the story of when she and Richard met in 2005 at the Albany train station. It was a moment that seems meant for reality TV. The crowd parted. Moyer’s son, Jeff, was there with a video camera, and then – feeling numb from head to toe – she was hugging her brother.
The siblings shared information – Moyer knew details Richard did not, and he knew something she didn’t know. Their mother’s name was Margaret Taggart, later O’connor. Once she knew that and learned her mother’s family immigrated to Queens from Ireland, she started searching census records in the municipal archives in Manhattan. It was a lot of guesswork and she was frustrated that state law keeps adoptees’ records a secret.
She writes in the book, “Many states are trying to pass bills that make everyone’s records available. These bills would allow adult adoptees to obtain their original birth certificates and medical histories … I strongly believe that it is the birthright of every individual in that they have access to their birth records.”
Eventually, with the help of DNA research, Moyer found eight half-siblings and has formed close relationships with many of them. She talked with people still alive who knew her parents and has visited the places where they lived in Albany. She sat in her car outside 5 Mcpherson Place (off Clinton Avenue) and imagined her mother coming and going from the house when she was pregnant. She found her mother’s grave in Albany and her father Kenneth Palmer’s grave in Coxsackie. She discovered heartbreaking details and still has questions she can never answer, but she is at peace.
“My three brothers and I have missed out on a lifetime of knowing each other. We do not have childhood memories to share, but we are connected by chance and by a woman who none of us knew or will ever understand. She will always remain an enigma. I hold no animosity toward Margaret. She did what she felt she had to do.”