I Must Have Wandered

An Adopted Air Force Daughter Recalls

Mary Ellen Gambutti, Lmhc Brooke Randolph

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English

Mary Ellen Gambutti
08 August 2022

Autobiography: historical, political & military; Memoirs; Adoption & fostering; Adoption

Travel across the years in this inspiring and lyrical collage memoir. In post-WWII South Carolina, chance and choice connected a childless Air Force couple with an abandoned baby girl. Seventy years later, she has framed a deeply personal narrative of vignettes and poetic prose with old and new correspondence, reflections on maternal severance, the injustice of sealed birth records, and the ills of adoption secrecy.

She has documented her military family transfers and separations from early childhood through the Cold War Era and the turbulent 1960s. The encultured discipline and secrecy of her father's Intelligence rank; his parental code of threat, punishment, and expected gratitude for the privilege of adoption, heightened the sensitive adoptee's vigilance and identity confusion.

At forty, her need to know her true origins surfaced. With help from adoptee advocates, she launched the search for her natural mother. DNA testing set her on a parallel journey of self-discovery decades later, and she began to reconcile her adopted life, the meaning of heritage, and the wealth of family.

This 2nd edition features a new cover, Epilogue, and About the Author, and an updated Notes, Books, Resources, and expanded photo Gallery in the e-book, with a link to the Gallery in the paperback.

By: Mary Ellen Gambutti
Foreword by: Lmhc Brooke Randolph
Imprint: Mary Ellen Gambutti
Edition: 2nd ed.
Dimensions: Height: 216mm, Width: 140mm, Spine: 14mm
Weight: 308g
ISBN: 9781643888620
ISBN 10: 1643888625
Pages: 240
Publication Date: 08 August 2022
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

Gambutti was born in Post-WWII South Carolina, adopted and raised in an Air Force family, and is in reunion with her biological family. The strength she earned from her gardening and healthcare careers served her in rehabilitation from a hemorrhagic stroke at fifty-seven. Since retirement, she has pursued her love of words, writing the memoirs and personal essays which bring her solace and the satisfaction of publication in journals and books. She is an adoptee rights advocate, a devoted wife and partner, mom, nana, and friend to a tiny toy poodle.

Reviews for I Must Have Wandered: An Adopted Air Force Daughter Recalls

"A Five Star Book! ""...hits the core issues most adopted people experience...belonging, differentness, loss, and loneliness...excellent writing skills that reflect her poetic side...leaving no stone unturned...research, citations, documentation, and photographs..."" --Joanne Wolf Small, MSW, LCSW-C"