Burning of the Marriage Hat

SAN FRANCISCO, CA -- Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), best known as a war disease, is about loss of life, a job, a home, a child. It's related to uncompleted grieving. Most know little about its effects on the six million U.S. women who have lost children to adoption. As Mother's Day approaches, it's time to recognize these women's losses and honor their motherhood, says Author Margaret Benshoof-Holler, whose book Burning of the Marriage Hat chronicles her own experience of giving a child up for adoption in the 1960's and how she learned to grieve.

Stigmas forced unwed pregnant women into maternity homes to hide and then coerced them to give their children up for adoption during the 1960's. They had a child one day, signed the relinquishment paper the next. The following they were back home where the loss of a child was never talked about again. They were not given the opportunity to grieve for the children they gave away. Author Margaret, who was one of the approximately 200,000 to 250,000 U.S. women per year who gave children up for adoption during the 60's era, sees that the stigmas that kept women from grieving in the 60s are the same stigmas that keep these women hidden today.

Stigmas still linger today in places like Florida where unwed pregnant women are being forced to run newspaper ads listing their sexual partners, when single welfare mothers are forced to marry, and in the current Bush Administration's push for adoption as an end-all to solve the problem of unwed pregnant women.

Writing a book changed Margaret's life and helped her complete the grieving process. She would like to help other women work through their grieving and come to the fore as mothers. Burning of the Marriage Hat is based, in part, on her account of coming of age and getting pregnant out-of-wedlock in 1960's Wyoming whose motto is the "Equality State" because that's where women first gained the right to vote and sit on juries in the U.S. In her book, she returns to her Wyoming roots to confront past ghosts. Unearthing the past and coming out as a birthmother with the writing of her book has helped her finish grieving.

Margaret Benshoof-Holler is journalist, a teacher, and writer of fiction and poetry. She has worked as a freelance writer and op ed columnist for various newspapers and magazines including the Hearst-owned San Francisco Examiner. She has written about U.S. culture, California community college education, women's issues, race, domestic violence, and post-traumatic stress disorder. She has lived and taught in Boulder, Colorado, Jakarta, Indonesia, Malmo, Sweden, and Madrid, Spain before moving to San Francisco where she currently writes and teaches at City College of San Francisco.

The author was recently interviewed on KPFA 94.1 FM "Cover to Cover" in Berkeley, CA, San Francisco's KGO morning news, FM 107 WFMP Radio's Lorie & Julia Show in St. Paul, MN, WBEB FM's "The Women's File," Philadelphia, PA, and KMPS-FM morning news, Seattle, WA. She has also been featured on the Manhattan Neighborhood Network cable channel 34's "Woman's Connection (sm)," NPR affiliate WFSS 91.9 FM's "Women's Voices, Women's Lives."

To arrange an interview or for more information or a review copy,
send an e-mail to: katehoffmanpromo@earthlink.net

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