ABSTRACT
This chapter explains a deeper, more meaningful understanding of birth mothers by looking closely at their experiences since researchers became interested in their lives. Birth mothers, natural mothers, first mothers and biological mothers are all terms used for mothers who relinquish, surrender or lose a child to adoption to be raised by another family. Researchers investigated the effect of baby adoption on unmarried mothers. Although the act of relinquishment of a child for adoption and the adoption of a child from care who has been removed from home by a local authority are conceptually different, later research found comparisons in how birth mothers experienced the adoption of their child. Historical birth mothers were found to experience the onset of morbidity following relinquishment. In the late 1990s K. Mason and P. Selman investigated birth mothers and contested adoption. They advanced the recommendations set out by Logan on the importance of proper counselling and support for birth mothers.
