Adapting to Adoption

(Revised 4/26/24)

Finding yourself. It’s one of those things we hear about, see other people talk about, but often wait way too long to try out for ourselves.

Learning to really look at yourself in the mirror, to see the reality of the whole person that you are—is a bit daunting. It’s much easier to either focus on your great qualities or wallow around in the not-so-stellar qualities. It’s not until you connect both parts of you and take a step back that you can actually see a bigger picture. A picture that, more often than not, doesn’t necessarily look like what you dreamed about and while you still might not see the “big picture,” so-to-speak, you do start to see purpose.

This type of deep-dive is not something you typically experience over a few months or even a few years. It usually begins well before you realize what is unfolding… and why it’s unfolding… and then…trying to figure out what you are supposed to do with all that unfolds.

I am adopted.

I was around the 10^th grade in high school when I realized I couldn’t escape the abandonment feelings that stem from being given away. Feeling a loss from the family I would never be a part of and a loss from what I perceived to be a normal family.

It was always hard for me to express the pain of abandonment openly when I was younger because at face-value, my life looked pretty great. I mean, it was/is pretty great! I had two parents who chose me. I can’t tell you how many times I heard “you are even more lucky because your parents chose you,” or “you were hand-picked.” You know what I also was?

Given up. I was handed over—I was left behind. I was an accident. I was unwanted yet—I should be grateful because I was chosen.

It was quite a difficult thing to wrap my brain around while growing up and I never wanted to bring up how I felt about being adopted or ask questions because it always seemed to me that there was never the “right” time. If I brought it up when things were going great at home, I was afraid I would offend one or both of my parents. I would possibly make them wonder if I was questioning them as parents vs simply questioning my existence in this world.

If things were a little tense around the house, I definitely didn’t want to bring it up as I feared it would be viewed as me just trying to be hurtful or somehow using my own adoption as a reason for acting out and being a turd-of-a-teenager.

I felt sorry for my parents that they had to go pick out a baby like you might a new pet. I truly knew that is not how they felt and that to them I was an answer to their prayers—but this is how I felt and I have no doubt others have felt this same thing if you were adopted. We just don’t talk about it.

I spent a lot of time trying to understand what the deep emotions were that were starting to bubble up and realizing that no one came to mind in terms of talking to someone who understands what adoption feels like – from the adoptee side.

So, when I was in 10^th grade and these feelings of being discarded were beginning to surface, I really didn’t have anywhere to turn. Sure, I could have confided in a friend and my parents always told me I could ask them anything—but, attempt to put yourself in my shoes. You don’t necessarily want to strike up a conversation that begins with, “So I’ve been feeling kind of sad and/or mad lately because of being adopted. No, nothing really happened and no, I am not having any issues with my parents. In fact, my parents are wonderful.”

Most people just can’t understand how hard it can be to talk about these things.

Sometimes I would have trouble sleeping at night, as I would lay there and just wonder why I was given up—what was so wrong with me that my birth parents could just give me away. How could they know anything about me if they just gave me up from the start?

The tough part was that I was smart enough to understand that a conscious decision was made to give me up. There were a good 9-10 months to think about it—and guess what? She still chose to give me away. That is a feeling that I truly believe if you haven’t actually felt, you will never be able to understand. You can imagine what it feels like to be given up just as easily as you can imagine what it is like to have a child of yours die. You just can’t.

I would often tell myself how differently my life could have been. I could have gone into the system and bounced around in foster homes. I could have gone to a family who abused me whether physically, emotionally, sexually—you name it, but I didn’t. I went right into a loving family and became the center of their world. Sounds fabulous, right?

It was, but it didn’t fill the void I felt and couldn’t seem to get out of my mind. I think for a good while many people didn’t have a clue that I was adopted. Adoption was like something you only heard of here and there in a lifetime movie or maybe a soap opera. Once I started to bring it up or found myself in situations where it was going to be hard to avoid – I realized some people really don’t know what to say…. and how unfortunately that leaves you with more questions and almost a feeling of shame.

To back up a little, when I was in the 5^th grade the entire school was in the gym for a pep-rally. I’m not exactly sure what I did in this particular situation, but the retort I got back from a girl in my own grade was, “No wonder no one likes you, your own mother didn’t even want you.”

Whew. That was quite the blow and totally rocked my happy little world. I was stunned. Speechless. Those words cut so deep, and I didn’t understand why someone would say something so unfair and hateful to me. That may have been the very first time I looked at being adopted as a bad thing. A thing that someone could make fun of me for or point out in front of others…like this girl did at the pep-rally. It opened up this completely new level of doubt and insecurity in me that I wouldn’t understand for decades.

Around the 6^th or 7^th grade we were having to create some kind of poster-project-type thing that was about our birth. I think it was supposed to be a birth announcement and a drawing of ourselves. Well, as we are sitting in class preparing to do this, I realize that one of the things we had to do was list the name of the hospital where we were born.

I didn’t know the hospital’s name where I was born.

I realized again, how this being adopted thing was going to come up even when I didn’t want it to. It seemed very unfair to have to do something like this, for a grade, and through no fault of my own, I didn’t know all the answers.

It felt pretty awful if I am being honest. It felt like I was singled out. It was obvious that it never dawned on the teacher that anyone might have trouble with a project like this if they were adopted. I know the teacher felt bad and tried to comfort me with some of the same things always told to me to presumably make me feel better: “you were chosen,” “you were hand-picked.” While those things may have been true, you know what else was happening in this moment? My feelings of hurt and shame were met immediately with dismissal and swiftly turned into why I should be thankful.

It’s such a terrible thing when you are a child and you don’t know if what is being said to you is how you should feel or if it’s okay to have the feelings you have. To question if you are a bad person for being sad sometimes that you are adopted and didn’t just “come from” the only parents you know (like all of my friends and…basically every person I had ever met.)

What took me awhile to learn is that it is always okay to feel what you feel. It is entirely possible that no one will understand you or maybe they will even question WHY you feel the way you do—but regardless, this will never change the fact that it is always okay to feel what you feel. They are YOUR feelings.

I was guided to believe that I was special growing up. Specially made for my mom and dad to bring me home and love. That feels great, right? Of course, but on the other hand I felt especially unwanted and unloved by the person who gave birth to me. These were just facts.

In time, I began to realize that everything I had felt and continued to feel was as normal as could be. What I want others to know is that you can absolutely be surrounded by love, have all your needs met, do well in school, even be told that you are a “pretty girl” and still feel unwanted and alone.

Alone in my head. Which can be a very scary place to hang out for long periods of time, haha. I would spend countless hours trying to make sense of why it seemed that I was a pretty-good person and decently well-liked, yet I felt like I was thrown away. What did I ever do wrong to not be wanted?

Of course, I knew in my brain that I didn’t do anything wrong. Yet again, I would be told what a wonderful person my birth mother was to love me so much that she only wanted the best for me—which just didn’t happen to be a life with her.

It stung. It ate away at me silently. It was the dark area in my thoughts that I didn’t talk about much. I always had a sense of being rejected and maybe even subconsciously felt that it would be a double-rejection if others rejected me for being rejected by my own birth mother.

The lies we tell ourselves can be so damaging, but there is so much to be said about understanding why we told ourselves those lies. More importantly, why the things that happen to us help us peel back the layers to better see the truth.

The truth that we all have stuff in our lives that make us feel a little uncertain, maybe a little unstable or maybe just flat out weird. Weird often brings with it the ability to accept other people’s “weirdness.” To encourage others to laugh at the concept of perfectly functional families with zero problems. They just don’t exist. What does exist is pain, disappointment, regret, resentment…the things we aren’t really suppose to talk about unless we want to be judged for not focusing on all that we have to be thankful for. Yes, it is better to remain the most focused on what is wonderful in your life—but never disregard your other feelings. They are just as real and just as important.

They are a part of you as a whole. They make us real.

Those yucky feelings teach us how to grow. How to pivot. How to find ourselves.