Clouse connects with birth mom after 25 years Friday, February 15, 2013 By Sarah Summers - photographer Katelyn Rowan Advertising When you turn 13, you take the leap into your teenage years. At 16 you get your license, or try to. At 18 you get to vote and are legally an adult in most states. At 21 you can legally drink alcohol. At 25, you find your birth parents. At 35 you can run for president.  For Spanish teacher Kathryn Paige Clouse, known for two days as Katie Anne Matchiner, age 25 was a monumental time. In Nebraska, 25 is how old you must be to file for your original birth certificate without adoptive parental consent. When you’re adopted, you are issued your original birth certificate as well as an adoptive one with adoptive parents’ names and your new name. Clouse’s mother gave her the first name of her birth mother, Kathy Matchiner.  Clouse found out at age 8 that she had been adopted simply by looking through baby photos and cards. One card referenced the adoption. She was disappointed her adoptive parents hadn’t told her, but they said they had when she was 5.  “It was a missing part of me that I was just so curious about. I always hoped my birth parents would be like movie stars or something,” Clouse said. “If you don’t know who they are, you can just imagine them to be anything you want them to be.”  When Clouse turned 25, she was at the adoption agency ready to search.  After being told her birth mother’s name, she looked her up on the internet. She found KathyMatchiner.com, which had photos, bios, and contact information. First, Clouse e-mailed her and waited for a month with no response. Then Clouse sent her birth mother a message on Facebook.  English teacher Kristen Madler, Clouse’s close friend, recalled the initial connection Clouse made with her birth mother. “She called me after each step: contacting the agency, finding information online, etc.,” Madler said. “I remember the day she called me and told me she found her and that she lived in Lincoln. The details were so unbelievable — they have so much in common, it’s like they were meant to find each other.”  Clouse is an optimistic person, and she continued to believe in God’s plan. A month after the Facebook attempt, she called the adoption agency to help contact her birth mother. They sent a letter, but it was the wrong address. After finding the correct address, Clouse received a life-altering phone call during her plan period at PL South. It was the agency explaining her birth mother’s reaction to the news and that both the e-mail and Facebook messages had gone to spam folders.  “It was three months from me finding her name to actually hearing from her,” Clouse said. “Those three months were so important. It was just a really important time of growing and accepting what could be.”  They first heard each other’s voices on voicemail.  Clouse left a voicemail message saying, “Hi. This is Paige. I was going to wait to call you, but then I thought, why would I wait? I’ve been waiting a long time. Then I thought I wouldn’t know what to say, but I knew I would never know what to say. So I just decided to call.” Clouse missed the return call but received a voicemail.  Once they finally spoke to each other on the phone, they talked for hours. It was very emotional. Matchiner told Clouse she had received letters and photos from Clouse’s adoptive mother until Clouse turned 13. They discussed their similarities, including their musical interests. Matchiner studied to be a music teacher, which was Clouse’s initial major.  “Paige’s birth mom never had any other children and was waiting for her,” Madler said. “There are so many similarities in their talents, interests, personalities, etc., so they already have a really strong foundation.”  Clouse and Matchiner have a multitide of things in common. They are both freaked out by roller coasters, they do the same hand gestures and they laugh the same.  “I think people take it for granted when they grow up with their biological family -- you have traits that are very similar because you have the same genes,” Clouse said. For Clouse, closing up loose ends and finding answers to questions she had been wondering about for years made her realize how wonderful her life is. The discussions made Matchiner grateful to the parents who raised Clouse. Matchiner had wanted her daughter to be raised with a father figure, because she was very close with her own father. Clouse is also now close with her birth father, which posed another hurdle when it came to telling her parents about her recent experiences.  “It’s a huge emotional thing. I didn’t want my parents to feel like I didn’t love them or that they weren’t enough,” Clouse said. “I told my parents separately about a month after I met my birth mother.... My mom was very happy for me, but kind of upset I didn’t involve her in the whole process. But I felt that it was something I had to do on my own. And my dad was really happy for me, too.”  It was an amazing experience not only for Clouse’s family, but also for her close friends.  “This journey definitely fulfilled a goal or a missing piece,” Madler said, “and I think it provides her with answers as to why she is the way she is. She is lucky, because she already had a supportive family -- so this is an additional person in her life who cares about her.”

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