OK, here goes. This will take a bit of digging into records and old papers that you will have to track down. Most will be archived or not readily available without requests. To start with, current parents should be comfortable with you asking about the adoption stuff. If they are willing to help participate, begin with asking them about the adoption process. The main thing is who handled the process. What agency, where, and who was involved. If you can get the agency to release the info then it should be a simple process. Not likely. So now you will need to go back to the source. The hospital records. At some point the hospital keeps records for only so long, 1 yr maybe 5, but for 40 yrs probably not likely. Check anyway and find out what happens to those. Since the records are vital statistics, they will be filed with the state. First check with the local county courts in the vital statistic records for births on the exact date. The trick will be that the hospital most likely filed the records, but not with your current name info. The record will have to be picked out by fishing for pieces within the record. The date is known, the hospital is known, and the rest is missing. Some agencies will allow what is called a viewing inquiry. This is looking at the record without issue of the certificate. This allows for looking at info within the record to see if it matches. Most likely you are not the only birth at the hospital for this date, but how many others did occur, for this hospital on this date. If you get this far, you can most likely find the certificate, in its original form with names intact, unless it has been reissued. My mother has this type. She was adopted but has the original certificate as well as the reissued. If you find the original, it will have all the info at the time of issue. A reissue will be either the original with cross outs or total revamp with no edits. In either case, a note is usually posted with the original indicating that the reissue is the current record for issue. At any point in this process of searching for the records, there is a chance that the courts will be needed. Usually from the adoption agency there will have to be a letter of inquiry or request to the courts to open files. All this is, is a file kept in records about the adoption case. When you or someone else inquires about the case, a file holds all the info and they tell you that you can't have access to it because it is sealed and it protects all who are involved. Lately, the process is you go to the adoption agency and see if they can provide info, if not, you got the court route and write a request letter to have the sealed records opened and viewed, under court control, if there is anything that they want to relay to you about the items they will tell you. There may be actual records available or just names, but ultimately it will be the courts that will help you or burst your bubble.