Donate DNA Kits for #AdopteeRightsAwareness

November is the month of my birthday, and it also happens to be the month designated for all sorts of adoption awareness campaigns. This year a number of us have “flipped the script” and have essentially owned all of the Twitter hashtags for adoption-related issues, such as #NAAM2017, #NAAM, #NAAM17, etc. Honestly, click on these hashtags associated with National Adoption Awareness Month and see what you get.

As part of my own celebration of “Adoptee Rights Awareness Month,” I’ve also created a few memes with fellow adoptee Shawna Hodgson, who with Kim Dimick runs a Texas-based adoptee-rights organization called Equality4Adoptees. But I wanted to do more, so I came up with an idea to accomplish two things: 1) celebrate my birthday; and 2) help other adoptees who may not be able to afford DNA test kits.

So, I am donating at least one AncestryDNA kit to an adoptee this month as my own birthday gift. It will go to a person whom I corresponded with briefly on Facebook and who said she literally cried when she heard that a program known as Kits of Kindness donated DNA test kits to those who need them. Turns out, though, Kits of Kindness currently does not have test kits to donate, though I expect they will again soon. So, provided I can find this person again (for some reason she disappeared from my threads), she’s going to get my own donated kit.

And here’s what I ask of you, whether an adoptee, adoptive parent, birthparent, stepparent, sibling, LDA, ICA, desendant—however you identify yourself during this month of awareness. Please consider donating a bit during November to help adoptees. Already, just in posting on Twitter, I’ve had two people match my own $69 donation for a kit as well as others pledging time to help interpret and use the results. But I’m not asking for people to do that much. Five bucks is enough if many of us donate. That’s it. I will then collect those donations, report back on everything collected, and throw out all the kudos to all of you for pitching in. Then, we’ll start the process of determining how best to distribute donated kits to adoptees who would like to do DNA testing but can’t quite afford the cost.

If you are still with me, it’s easy to donate. Use the form below. Thanks, and we’ll see all of us on the right side of awareness.

Please understand that Adoptee Rights Law Center PLLC is not a charitable 501(c)(3) organization. Donations are not tax-deductible, but I will provide a receipt and will publicly report—without your name unless you want it— all donations and expenditures. And no funds go to me; I’m actually donating the credit card fees charged to me when you make an online donation.