I am the oldest child of a teenage mother. My mom discovered she was pregnant when she was 16 and still in high school. My dad a first year university student chose to quit advanced education and marry her, go to work in an oil refinery, often double 16 hour shifts in a noisy, stinky environment (I know because he brought those smells home with him). The miracle is, though both of my young parents were adoptees, I was not also given up for adoption. I will be forever grateful for that.
I had not considered what my mom may have endured as a teen mother. And in fact, she had my younger sister only 13 months later. Today, I saw an article in a Huffington Post “Personal” essay by Laura Good, a teen mom – LINK>I Had My Daughter At 16. I Was Shocked By These Things People Felt Comfortable Saying To Me. She adds – “While people regularly expected me to tell them how I would fix my ruined life… I can’t help but notice the questions I was not asked.”
She also admits that “My responses change depending on the tone of the comment. They vary from matter-of-fact to sarcastic and snide.” She notes that it’s common among pregnant people to have to navigate unsolicited opinions and advice from strangers. Being pregnant as a child also invites that behavior, but the overall tone takes a sharp turn toward shaming and judgment.
She remembers “I would get comments from people at the grocery store, people in waiting rooms, phlebotomists, hairstylists, friends, parents of friends, bullies, strange adults, and people from my school whom I’d never spoken to before. Mostly they felt entitled to know how old I was, who got me pregnant and what I was planning to do with my baby.” blogger’s note – That last one is code for are you going to give up your baby for adoption ?
She did not give up her daughter but chose to parent. She shares how she was able to manage that. “Things would have been much harder as a young mom if I hadn’t had the support of my own mother. Thanks to her, my daughter has so many treasured memories of time spent with her grandma growing up. I also had the support of one of my mother’s dear friends, who took me and my infant daughter in during a very dark time and included us in her family. We are still family to this day.”
“Between them and a few of my close friends, I raised my daughter surrounded by a beautiful circle of strong women. Even so, it wasn’t until my daughter was grown up that I began to chip away at the layers of shame that had been holding me together for close to 20 years of my life.”
She notes that “People routinely made major assumptions about me and my character that were never based in fact. Several of my daughter’s teachers underestimated my intelligence or assumed I was an irresponsible parent before speaking to me. One of her elementary school teachers told me that I was a bad parent because my child was tired at school one day.”
“Shame has a tangible impact on our brains and self-image, affecting our neurobiology and attachment style. When we are shamed by our community, we begin to feel like we are not worthy of love and belonging. It can become a part of our personalities. The shame I experienced in my life has profoundly shaped how I walk through the world. It has taken years of therapy and self-work to get over that, and that work is not done.”
She is also surprised by the questions no one ever asked her – Are you OK? Things like: Do you need support? Things like: Are you safe? She acknowledges the lack of gender equality in her situation and notes – “I raised a child while navigating severe PTSD, and I shouldered all of the blame.”
The good news that she shares is this – “My daughter and I grew up together, and we have a powerful bond and a wonderful relationship. I did my best to raise her with care and validation. She is almost 30 now, and I am so proud of the person she has become. I’m very intentional about the kinds of people I surround myself with now. I certainly couldn’t have done the parenting job I did without the help and support of my chosen community.”
She also shares – “I’m so passionate about advocacy and empowerment that I went back to school and earned a master’s degree in clinical social work, or MSW. My daughter joined me on stage for the hooding ceremony that is part of graduating with a master’s degree. Having her put that sash over my head and walking up there with me was an incredibly fulfilling moment. I recently started my first job as a mental health therapist. It’s truly a gift that I now get to support other people in healing from their shame and trauma.”
The inability to receive support from others is a trauma response.
Your “I don’t need anyone, I’ll just do it all myself” conditioning is a survival tactic. You needed it to shield your tender heart from abuse, neglect, betrayal, and disappointment from those who could not or would not be there for you.
From the parent who was absent by choice or by the circumstance of working three jobs to feed and house you.
From the lovers who offered sexual intimacy but no offered no safe haven that honored your heart.
From the friendships that always took more than they gave.
From all the situations when someone told you “we’re in this together” then abandoned you, leaving you to pick up the pieces when shit got real, leaving you to handle your part and their part, too.
From the lies. The betrayals.
You learned along the way that you just couldn’t really trust people. Or that you could trust people, but only up to a certain point.
Ultra-independence is a trust issue.
You learned: if I don’t put myself in a situation where I rely on someone, I won’t have to be disappointed when they don’t show up for me, or when they drop the ball… because they will always drop the ball sooner or later, right?
You may even have been intentionally taught this protection strategy by generations of hurt ancestors who came before you.
Ultra-independence is a preemptive strike against heartbreak. So, you don’t trust anyone.
And you don’t trust yourself, either, to choose people.
To trust is to hope, to trust is vulnerability.
“Never again,” you vowed.
But no matter how you dress it up and display it proudly to make it seem like this level of independence is what you always wanted to be, in truth it’s your wounded, scarred, broken heart behind a protective brick wall.
Impenetrable. Nothing gets in. No hurt gets in. But no love gets in either.
Fortresses and armor are for those in battle, or who believe the battle is coming.
It’s trauma response.
The good news is trauma that is acknowledged is trauma that can be healed.
You are worthy of having support. You are worthy of having true partnership. You are worthy of love. You are worthy of having your heart held. You are worthy to be adored. You are worthy to be cherished.
You are worthy to have someone say, “You rest. I got this.” And actually deliver on that promise.
You are worthy to receive. You are worthy to receive. You are worthy.
You don’t have to earn it. You don’t have to prove it. You don’t have to bargain for it. You don’t have to beg for it.
It is not unusual to hear adoptees express this kind of feeling – Adoption damned me to a lifetime of wondering why ? Why didn’t you love me enough to stay ? Do I deserve love ? What is love ? Am I unlovable ?
When a mother breaks the bond the infant had with her, it’s tears away everything the infant knew. The child’s heart is like a broken record or a confused GPS constantly re-calculating and playing over and over again the trauma, trying to make sense of it.
We are given a connection at birth. The moment that a severing happens a new attachment is formed. Heartbeats heard for months comfort us as we lay skin to skin. A voice we fell asleep to in our water beds is clearer and easy to recognize. The hands that pressed against the womb like a window now cradle and caress us. They do so for years. Or as long as we let them. I was nothing to you and no one was that special someone to me again.
I used to look for you. Staring in the faces of strangers, trying to remember how you looked and praying my eyes would settle on the face my heart would remember. I used to sit in a fog, while other children played around me, with thoughts only for you. I used to lay awake at night in my bed and see the moon peeking through the window and despair that tomorrow was another day of looking. Another long night apart.
So yes, I do remember. Even now, decades later – my body, my soul, and my heart remembers. I have learned love and I have learned loss. I have learned to draw happy little stick families with a sticker heart border and “my family” scrawled at the top. I still remember being pressed against your chest with your hair and smoky breath swirling around me. Pressed against your chest until I couldn’t breathe and it was all warm and black and fuzzy – YOU.
I know where you are now. You are buried on the side of a mountain. I never found you again no matter how hard I looked and believe me I never stopped looking. I do plan to visit your grave someday. I want to stop my heart from looking. I want to say the goodbye I never got to say and I want to do it for the little girl who still remembers.
Blogger’s note – on my own “roots” journey to discover who my adoptee parents’ biological, genetic parents were, I have been able to visit the graves of my mom’s parents. And I did sit there next to their gravestones and pour my heart out with the good-bye’s I never had an opportunity to say, before then.
Today’s story from an adoptive mother – she asks, are there any adoptees out there who grew up with a lot of openness with birth parents ? She gives her background – My daughter came to me at 2 through public adoption, now 7.5. I thought I was well-informed. We have established a relatively high degree of “openness” – spend time with mom approx every two weeks… but especially whenever she’s having a hard time, I wonder if this is “enough”. Sometimes I hear the horror stories about adoptive parents who are abusive or even just unaware of adoption trauma, and it’s easy to heave a sigh of relief, that I’m not that bad, but really am I offering my (our shared) daughter enough of what she needs? I’d really love to hear from adoptees who grew up with openness about the benefits and any challenges that came with that.
One slew of suggestions came – it is good that they see one another as often as you describe. I think one thing that can get closer to what the child deserves to get from their parent is productive contact instead of visitation. Can she check her homework or help her study for a test for a half hour one night a week? Even via zoom? Can you ask her to make a list of things she’d like to teach her daughter over the course of a year like – how to braid hair, ride a bike, memorize her multiplication tables, cook a chicken dinner, bake a cake, sew a button, hem a dress, make mini furniture for a doll, build a model airplane, make a volcano that blows smoke, run a 10 min mile, do a cartwheel, do the splits, play an instrument – you know things she already knows how to do and wants to teach, or stuff they could read instructions for and learn how to do together during short scheduled visits on line or in person. You could offer to get the supplies they need to facilitate Mom’s lesson plan. It is kind of unnatural for children to visit with their parents and awkward for parents to observe their child and not be contributing to their growth. Ask mom to make a list of things she’d be teaching her at 7.5 years old; and then, help make it happen. The child deserves at least that from her mom. You’ll feel good for facilitating that too.
When she was commended for her suggestions, her reply was – I just pour the love of my heart out, praying that maybe one adopted kid will get a chance to interact with their mother or father in a way that kids should interact with their parents, not like visiting strangers but like as parents who are teachers, who are deeply concerned with growing their potential, rather than ‘catching up’ like strangers, outsiders with nothing to offer. If I lost my kid to adoption, I’d be dying every day and of course, I’d probably spiral into some drug induced pain numbing self destructive cycle. Who wouldn’t ? I just to like engage with these parents as parents, help them to know their role is growing their child’s world and maybe, the parent will grow some self worth too. Maybe the kid will have some really positive memories. Maybe the adoptive parent will be less resentful but shit, people get so jealous, like oh they lost their right to parent – they lost their right to custody and nobody but God can take away their parenthood, so why not help the kid have some good memories but people are such assholes usually, they won’t allow for anything but ‘visitation’. WTF is that to a kid ? uh oh, I ranted. Thanks for listening.
This woman is the child of an orphan (blogger’s note – not an adoptee herself, so not who the original poster was hoping to hear frombut I feel this woman’s perspectives are helpful, so I decided to run with them), who having found her biological genetic family, started helping others. She admits – after finding that family almost 30 years ago, she got really mad when she read the laws. That caused her to become a loudmouthed activist after having reunited a few hundred families. She had found that they all have that same violation of the person’s kinship rights and identity. It made her cranky and want to stop the separation of families.
After being called out for not being an adoptee, she had more to say – I don’t believe in the concept of a triad, it’s a false construct by the adoption industry seeking to pretend that there is some kind equal stakeholders in a bid for the property rights to a human being. I provide information from a neutral position, given my 30 years of exposure to parents who lost their kids to adoption, who want to be doing lots more and contributing lots more than they are allowed to – it’s just bullshit. So, I took the opportunity to say what I thought. I had something to say. It is a topic I care a lot about – I spend most of my free time either helping people search or in advocacy efforts to educate people out of adoption. If an adopted person had posted and dictated parameters of who should and should not answer, I would NEVER have answered – this post was by an adoptive mother, they have a preference for who they want to respond, but I have been a listener and recorder of good information, given to me by families who have struggled to find each other.
One day I’m gonna die and I’m hoping to get that message to people who adopted or who are hoping to adopt. I’m not gonna write a book, create a youtube channel or a tic tock or an instagram page and I’m not gonna blog about it. Commenting in a few Facebook forums is as far as I take it because I’m not trying to draw attention to myself, only be helpful.
One adoptive mother shares – my son’s Dad takes him to boxing every week and then, out for afternoon tea before dropping him off at home. Works really well for us. I think it works for Dad because there is something pre-arranged to do, plus also more free time with the afternoon tea to talk or whatever. It’s also something my son wouldn’t be able to do if Dad couldn’t take him because I’m at work at that time. I am hoping to set up something similar with his Mum in future but it’s not the right time at the moment (she has regular contact, just in a different way).
To which the woman above responds – Productive contact ! Brilliant, frequent contact doing something, one small thing a father would normally do for his kid. It’s a tiny fraction of all the things parents are supposed to do but it is really healthy for a child to interact with their parent that way I think, instead of just visiting for an hour and what did you do this week ? I like that you set it up so it is productive for your household too. Very smart. Other things parents can do for productive visits are like have a kid pick a newspaper article to read and discuss – teach a kid how to read a map – start studying the drivers training manual early, describe a scene and each draw it in 5 minutes then swap pictures. Tell the kid a story from their childhood or culture, make a family tree, create emergency plans for different situations, safety topics like “what would you do if someone came to the door and wanted to use your phone saying they had a car accident?” What to do if the person taking care of you hits their head and gets knocked unconscious? Don’t throw water on a grease fire. Don’t try to give a cat a bath. Don’t use dish soap in a dishwasher.
Back to the original poster, she acknowledges the adoptive mother who appreciates her son’s dad taking him to boxing. This is a great idea ! They do spend alone time together for the past year. We are very different and it is often not things I’m super keen on (lots of tv time, phone time, and processed foods) but I have been working on letting go of trying to have control over what happens in their time together because it hasn’t always been well-received and I can understand that especially, in this situation, people don’t want to be micromanaged. She also acknowledges the one with lots of suggestions – her message about having meaningful parenting tasks to do is appreciated. Maybe finding ways to incorporate more of these would be helpful…. There is a possible opportunity for mom to take her to skating lesson this Saturday.
It’s a problem I feel compassion for – from a woman who aged out of foster care . . .
I never was adopted. I almost was and then, my dad got custody. Then, I went back into foster care from the age of 13 until I turned 18. When you’re a teen in foster care, everyone knows no one wants you because you’re too old. It sucks. Like you’re just damaged goods.
Advice to hopeful adoptive parents – Maybe use your desire to reach out and get to know and/or adopt a teen.
I will say from personal experience, it’s not easy. Because for me – I was damaged goods. But I still deserved to know I had worth and was loved. Teenagers also can make choices regarding adoption and name change vs younger kids who can’t. So if you’re wanting to adopt to “be the change”, and not just because you want a baby to cuddle, then actually make real contribution to change. Help someone in foster care who is likely to turn 18 while still in the state’s care. When they look at their future, there seems to be no one there who cares.
Through writing this story, I became *very* angry with my biological mother for the first time since I met her almost ten years ago now.
I’ve always known I was adopted (at birth, through Catholic Charities, not “private” adoption but also not a foster care adoption.). I had great adoptive parents, who I know loved me (but didn’t always). There were no biological children in the family. My sister was adopted at four years old (when I was six) from foster care.
Blogger’s note – adoptive parents often adopt another child to be a sibling to the first one they adopted. This was true for my mom – the Jill for the Jack they already had – as her adoptive mother actually wrote in a letter to the Tennessee Children’s Home Society. This was true for my dad – who’s adoptive mother went back to The Salvation Army home for unwed mothers in El Paso TX to get a brother for him.
I always, always, always felt alone. I’d cry, when I was very young, and curl up on the couch and sob “I want to go home, why can’t you just let me go home.” I’d never known another home, but that was what I always wanted when I was very small, was to “go home.”
I always believed I was something different than my peers. I found it hard to make friends. I had no sense of my own identity. I spent my entire childhood longing for my blood kin. When I grew up and finally found them, only my mother and her younger son (who wants nothing to do with me) were alive. My older sister, my father, my older brother, all gone.
Blogger’s note – it is interesting that as a child I never connected the dots that my parents being adoptees made me “different”. I never thought about the fact that my parents were “different” from the parents of my school peers, that their parents were not also adopted, though subconsciously I knew this because I could not say to anyone what my cultural identity was (Danish, Scottish are what I have learned, along with Irish and English).
Even now, in my early forties, a part of me feels like there’s something about me not worthy of being wanted by them, not worthy of knowing them (the biological, genetic family).
I’d have rather been aborted.
Blogger’s note -This is true for many, not all adoptees, but in my all things adoption group, I’ve seen this written many times.
Great adoptive family or not, this life is not what I deserved. My biological mother doesn’t regret her choice. And part of me hates her for that, now that I’ve had some time to really process everything that’s happened since we met.
Two Forms (Divided Circle) 1969 by Dame Barbara Hepworth
At the bottom of this blog, I’ll link the Adoption & Addiction, Remembered Not Recalled video by Paul Sunderland but first, for those who don’t want to watch for almost an hour, I share a few snippets.
The issue of adoption is all about divided attention, it’s all about 2 sets of families. It’s all about the conflicting feelings of wanting to belong, yet fearing belonging. (As the child of two adoptees, I’m certain this has filtered down into my own soul. I have never felt that I added up to be as much as the golden people I surround myself with – whether in social online networking communities or in my writer’s guild up in St Louis – those are just two examples but it probably goes back into my childhood as well.)
Adoption is a pretty weird word because it’s about the only condition that doesn’t really describe what has happened. Talking about adoption is a denial of relinquishment. The relinquishment wounds can be seen as a developmental post-traumatic stress disorder.
The word adoption is a cover-up. When we think about the adoption triangle, we think about the 3 parties in adoption. The adopted child, there are the birth or natural parents and there is the adoptive parent(s). Sunderland’s focus in his lecture is mostly about the adopted child. And as the title of his lecture suggests, his lecture is also about the apparent addition of addiction to that adopted child.
(And I do believe it is in struggling with an abandonment that one is lead into addiction. As an aside, we watched the 2008 Will Smith movie Hancock last night. He is an alcoholic and it seems to me that his alcoholism is due to similar issues of not knowing who one is at the core and feeling abandoned but not knowing by who.)
Back to the Sunderland lecture, he says that when he encounters birth parents in a treatment setting they usually say, “Not a day goes by when I don’t think about what happened.”
Adoptees are massively over-represented in treatment. And that leads to a question, Why is that ?
He has met quite a few adoptive parents, particularly as cross-cultural adoptions have been so popular. It is clear that many are feeling like, this is just not what we signed up to do.
Sunderland’s perspective is that there are NO adoptions without trauma. What he is talking about in his lecture is an enormous grief. A baby who has been waiting 9 months to meet somebody that they are not going to meet. It is about a mother who cannot live with having her child because society has told her that she cannot do it. Relinquishment goes against her biology.
And very often, the adoptive parents come into adoption carrying their own enormous grief due to having been unable to have a child of their own, naturally. One of the problems that Sunderland has with the word adoption is that it covers up the adoptive parents own grief.
So often, an adoptee will be told that they were chosen but the reality is that child has entered into a family that does not genetically fit them and given an impossible job description. They are forced to be someone that they can never actually be to fix the wound that the adoptive parents have. Infertility is an enormous disappointment for a couple and adoption tries to cover that up.
For an adoptee, the issue of abandonment is life threatening. There is nothing worse than to be separated from the one person (your mother) who you needed most at the beginning of your life. This is preverbal – it can’t be recalled – however, it IS remembered.
The word adoption tries to suggest that it is going to be a happily ever after situation. The human brain begins working before it is entirely built and experience is what programs the brain. If the beginning is a trauma and separation, then this is the experience that is wiring the neurons in the brain of the infant. For an adoptee there is a constant desire to attach accompanied by the conflicting sense that it isn’t safe to do so. There is no pre-trauma personality in an adoptee because there is no normal to compare this experience to as there would be for other traumatic events (war, car accidents, etc).
Being born prematurely and placed into an incubator is another kind of relinquishment when the infant leaves that containing environment. If a child is placed into foster care, that is also a relinquishment. Each change of foster family is yet another in a series of relinquishments. And second chance adoptions, where an adopted child is given back, is another relinquishment. In some cross-cultural adoptive situations, the child is born into such poverty, they are separated from the mother into an orphanage.
The bonding of an infant with their human mother actually begins 2 months before birth, while in utero, as proven by multiple experiments. Adoptees will often share that they have heard stories that they cried and cried. And I think of the mention of that in my mom’s adoption file via a letter from her adoptive mother to the Tennessee Children’s Home about the train trip upsetting my mom but that the doctor had her settled down now (and I always think – they drugged her, though it is not said directly). And I can understand now that my mom was relinquished twice because her mother took her to Porter Leath Orphanage in desperation for TEMPORARY care while she tried to get on her feet because her lawfully married husband had abandoned her and did not respond to a letter that the Juvenile Court in Memphis had written to him about his obligations.
Sunderland speaks about the stability of a child being dependent on a mother being able to know herself (which certainly was a black hole, actually for both of my parents, that I had until I was well over 60 years old and began to discover my own adoptee parents origin stories). People who are adopted and end up in treatment, often present themselves as fairly well put together.
Sunderland speaks of “love addiction” as needing to have the positive regard of a significant other. Addiction is genetically proposed and environmentally disposed. The hormonal aspects of having been relinquished are similar to living one’s life on red alert. In an adoption, there is a slow loss of self. A belief that they cannot be them self and get along with the people with whom they have been placed. The hormonal aspects affect sleep and stomach issues (and certainly my mom had her share of gastrointestinal issues throughout her entire life). Real difficulties managing moods (I think of my dad’s underlying seething anger that occasionally popped out).
If you think about serotonin, it is a soothing hormone. Addiction is usually an effort to self soothe. Eating sugar is one such effort to self soothe. Both of my parents were seriously diabetic and myself to some extent (though I am trying to manage my own sugar issues without ending up on insulin). Serotonin also manages shame and let’s you know you are okay but if your levels are low, the answer is “I’m not okay.”
Some people are not given up at birth and that was certainly true with both of my parents who spent 6-8 months with their original mothers before being adopted. People who diet and then give up on themselves, often multiple times. The chemicals in the brains of adoptees who have early psychological wounds are very different from other people without this personal background.
Adoptees have a tendency towards catastrophic thinking, always expecting the worst. The original wound of being separated from their mother was a life-threatening one. Shame is an unacknowledged aspect that is the understanding that I am not good enough, the bad baby (I’m unworthy, unlovable, there is something flawed in me) because if I was given up by my mother, I don’t have value. People pleasing arises from this feeling. How do I need to be to be accepted ?
Being extremely self-reliant (if you want something done, do it yourself) is also an outcome. It is interesting to note that both of my parents’ mothers had early abandonment or separation wounds from their own mothers caused by the deaths of their mothers. My dad’s mother had the worst one as her mother died when she was only 3 mos old. When she discovered that she was pregnant by a married man that she was not married to, she simply handled it herself and he never knew. With my mom’s mother, she was in her pre-teens and had to become “mom” to her 4 siblings.
Shame and anxiety are at the root of all addictions. There is an attempt to manage anxiety by managing the externals out there. Addictions are attempts to put anxieties elsewhere and explain the inexplicable. And there is the belief that somehow it is your own fault. Up until about the age of 10, infants and children believe that everything that happens to them, happened because of them.
In life, it’s not so much what happens to you as how secure you were with your early attachments. Roots, the secure base. Without these, one is less resilient. Adaption is a better word for what is done, not adoption. Adoptees end up with two minds. Real difficulties making decisions. The limbic system – fight, flight or freeze – is what kicks in with the catastrophic thinking. It is the part of the brain that developed before the frontal cortex. If you have an attachment wound, you never learned how to become a separate person. Any successful relationship exists in separateness, not in trying to adapt yourself to be accepted by that other person. The erotic exists in the space between the two. The real challenge for an adopted person is to actually BE their own self.
One of the most important “missions” in my all things adoption group is to support and encourage single moms to attempt to parent their baby rather than reflexively giving the baby up of adoption. Fortunately, that is more acceptable during the last couple of decades for a woman to be a single mom, than it would have been earlier in our collective history.
Several questions were asked of those who had made the choice to keep and parent their baby –
What is/would be/would have been the deciding factor in choosing to parent your child?
Of course, finances are a huge issue. But is money enough?
Better enforcement of revocation periods?
More/better emotional support?
Believing you are worthy enough to deserve your child?
Safe and affordable housing?
Yes, all of this helps. But what is the single factor that would be enough to tip the scales one way or the other?
Some of the responses –
Family and friends helping and being involved and better mental health care.
As someone who parented: A job that paid $15/hr that was full time during daycare hours. Literally that was all I needed. The most basic thing we should be fighting for: the right to be fairly compensated for our work. For me it was a labor rights issue, 100%. Why are jobs like this so hard to come by? The flip side would be: affordable childcare that matched the hours of your job.
Another one shared this was an issue for her as well. My exact problem right now. I’m unemployed, single mom of 4 kids and while I qualify for daycare, I can’t find one near me that has space for all my kids and is open for reasonable hours. 90% of daycares I find close at 5:30pm. My experience is service industry and retail. These jobs usually have varying work schedules and very low pay.
Yet another issue – I am a single mom raising my 4 children. The 2 fathers claimed the kids on their taxes and collected all the stimulus money. It took me 2yrs to get my tax return back because I had to file a paper return.. And I don’t know if I will get any of the stimulus money. The child support orders are ridiculously low. $600 a month for all 4 kids, IF I even get the payments. It’s rough.
This one found it a struggle but felt lucky as well – I was extremely lucky that the owner of our daycare knew the father of my child because his mother worked there years ago, so she gave me the toddler rate instead of the infant rate. She knew he wasn’t contributing. I was also extremely lucky to have found a mobile home for under $1,000/mo because the landlord was just an all around good guy who didn’t want to take advantage of single people and seniors. My job was a $24,000/yr salary, which meant that my paychecks were static and not variable, which made it easier to budget. I didn’t have much left over at the end of the month, but I managed to save $25 a month until I felt certain we were not going to be homeless again. Literally the bare minimum, but I spent most of my working life living on or below that and I was amazed by how little it took to change everything. We did great on this. She added – I agree that daycare should be subsidized and paid for by the government the same way school is. It doesn’t make sense to have you starting out paying the equivalent of a college tuition just so you can work.
It’s the myth – that adoption means everyone’s happy and doing well.
One shared why she didn’t go through with adoption and credits our all things adoption group as well – When he was born and that was it for me. I wasn’t letting go. And I would do anything and I mean ANYTHING in the world to make it possible. So for me it was that. However. I had a daughter that was going through cancer treatment, I didn’t feel it was fair to her. Those feelings washed away when I had him, I knew in my heart she needed him too. I definitely needed the support of my family. At the hospital I cried all night, My sister woke up and asked me if I was okay and I said “I cant just give him away, I can’t let him go” she said “then don’t “. And called all my family and they made it possible to bring him home providing all of the necessities we needed. Had I felt I had this support before the hospital in keeping him, I would not considered adoption all the way up to giving birth to him at the hospital. Honestly I still would have kept him after his birth at the hospital. I was definitely in mama bear mode. He’s 3 now and I update about every year in this group. Had I not been here, who knows if I would have gotten talked into letting him go by the hopeful adoptive parents -or not. But she definitely tried. She went on to share that her daughter was completely surprised. She said “you finally got me my very OWN BABY?!” She thought he was for her lol I love seeing them together, they are so cute.
Another woman shared – Not feeling good enough and finances were the primary reasons I placed. Instead of receiving encouragement, my past traumas were used against me as evidence that I wasn’t “ready.” I was made to feel like if I parented I was doomed to ruin my child’s life. The single one thing that would have tipped the scales for me though would have been honest information about the trauma adoption causes adoptees. I was VERY concerned about my daughter’s emotional well being. I was promised that my daughter would be unaffected as long as she was placed by three months. I DIRECTLY asked about the emotional consequences of adoption on my daughter and I was told there are none. I was told adoptees have no more problems than anyone else and most are “grateful” to have been given a “better” life. I really wish that some one would have told me that all first time moms are scared. That it would be hard but it was doable. The one single sentence that could have convinced me to parent though is “Adoptees are 4x times likely to commit suicide than non-adoptees.” I had struggled a lot with suicide before than. If I knew that adoption would could cause my daughter to feel suicidal like I felt, there’s no way I would have placed. I could have never intentionally done that to my daughter.
The response to this by the woman who first asked the questions was this – I didn’t ask this question to feel validated, but your answer has made me feel so validated. Because adoptees are always told to shut up and be grateful, and to stop being bitter and angry. For the most part, I refuse to speak to prospective adopters because they’re so full of themselves that they insult and demean me in order to preserve their fantasies. And how can you know what to believe when the people in power tell convenient lies? They benefit from you believing the lies. You’ve made me grateful (genuinely, not being snarky) that this group has given me the chance to tell expecting moms that if I had had a choice, I would have grown up in poverty with my mom. I would have endured whatever deprivation necessary, just to have my mom. Everyone else acts like I’m living in some stupid fantasy world. Thank you for telling me that what I want and would have wanted has validity, and that it would have aligned with what you wanted.
And closing with this one – I never would have considered adoption if I’d had an adult that was willing to help and support me at the time. I got pregnant as a minor and the only people who reacted supportively were other minors, and I was already living on the street, so it didn’t seem like navigating being a parent would be possible for me. I stopped responding to the agency after my school’s social worker started helping me set up appointments and apply for assistance and I found someone with an empty spare bedroom. She helped transfer me to another school nearby that had a parenting program for teen mothers where I was able to catch up and graduate on time. All I really needed was one adult to vaguely care in my direction.
In there never ending quest to make adopting a child a celebration, here is what one couple is doing –
With adoption day on the horizon, my husband and I plan to recite a modified version of (see image above) to our daughter at her court hearing. Changing “I” to “We” and making a few personalized adjustments for her. Adoption vows . . . loving it. What else did you do to make it a special day ?
The person in my all things adoption group who shared this writes – I want to compose a response that she will hear! Because this is complete bs! What about the kids who end up not fitting in and get ” rehomed” or sent away to group homes… they where made all the same ” promises” and now look where they are. How should I word it where she will hear me or do I even waste the time? She is clearly caught up in the unicorn and rainbow effects.
The first response is – The whole point of vows is that they’re made between consenting adults, who also have a right to break that consent. Adoptees can’t consent. Decisions are made for them. And they can’t easily dissolve the relationship, even as adults.
Another comment – The whole thing is yuck…but especially the “Til death do us part” which could be super triggering for any kiddo but especially those with loss. Not only that but often if an adopted parent dies, the adopted children are no longer seen or treated as family by the remaining family members.
This was confirmed by one adoptee’s experience – The only member of my adoptive family who still treats me like family is my dad. The rest of them turned their backs on me after my mom died.
Another also shares – all I have of my adoptive family is one cousin in California. She was my mom’s very best and favorite cousin. I love her guts but the rest literally told me I was not family and good as killed my mom with my “drama,” whatever that means.
So here was one suggestion –
If you want her to (maybe) hear you it’s important to try to prevent her becoming defensive, so I would keep it semi-validating. Like
Wow !! I can see how much you love her through your excitement! As an adopted person, I want to open up to you a little and be clear I do it to support – not upset. But I’m sure you’ll understand, you seem really open minded. Adoption represents a huge loss. Even if our biological parents are terribly troubled, dead, uninterested, in prison…this is the death of something every human wants – to be be loved by, raised by, and important to their own parents. At the same time, no child wants to hurt the feelings of the adults they now must count on, who they are often silently trying to prove their worth to. I say this to encourage you to remember that in your approach. These marriage vow style things make sense to you, since you are only gaining, not losing, and you get choices. I would suggest having a private, special day where you say to your daughter that you love her, are so happy to have her, but also to validate that it’s ok for her to feel a lot of conflicting emotions. That you accept and love her whole story. Take pictures but don’t share them anywhere and only with her when she’s old enough. Let her be the one to do it, if that is her choice. Adoption is more like a divorce than a marriage. I hope this makes sense. Best of luck.
It was also suggested that the couple modify these vows. Then go and make these vows with each other and their preacher. To make a commitment between themselves that these things are true. Lots of adopted kids hear these kinds of promises and yet, their adoptive relationship is later disrupted. This makes good sense to me.
Finally, this is celebrating the girl’s worst day. One adoptee felt this was unbelievably cruel. She also noted how common it is that marriage vows are broken. Adoption disruptions and dissolutions are estimated to occur at approximately 25% for all adoptions in the US.
Just noting, regarding those vows – Autism is not an illness or a tragedy.
I am a adoptee. Here is the issue, My daughter just had my first granddaughter on Sunday and she is absolutely perfect. But the problem is this, I now am living in daily fear. Fear of the unknown, fear of something happening, fear my daughter won’t need me anymore, fear I won’t bond or connect with the baby. I feel like I’m going crazy . Like today she told me to come over and then a little while later she said I could go home.. not in a mean way.. just wanted time with the dad… well, I didn’t let it show in front of her but I literally got in the car and balled my eyes out and then had a panic attack, feeling like I wasn’t good enough, that I wouldn’t see her again, that she didn’t need me or want me around… I know all of that is completely crazy but my mind won’t let me accept that. Is this normal for adoptees?, is this even normal for non adoptees? What can I do to get through this??
The first comment was – I am donor-conceived and my mother is not, but her own parents were absent/abusive. My mother is like this but she doesn’t have the courage or self-awareness to say it out loud. You did great by not putting this on your daughter’s shoulders.
The next one was – I’m sorry for what you’re going through. I’m not an adoptee but I do have an adult daughter and sometimes it’s hard when it seems like they don’t need you. But they do and they reach out when they do. We raise them to be independent but it hurts when we did it too well. She’s definitely going to need you.
Here is the next one – I’m not an adoptee and I’m answering because you asked if it’s normal for non-adoptees. I have TOTALLY had these exact feelings with my oldest; however I’m from a trauma background and have zero relationship with my bio mother – I think it may be normal for anyone coming from a trauma background. What I did was just be honest with my daughter and told her that I’m sure it was from my background and that I didn’t want her to feel responsible for my feelings but I wanted to be sure it was me and not true – we talk a lot and have a fabulous relationship. I have these feelings SO MUCH LESS NOW because she reassured me I had nothing to worry about – she accepts my worries and I accept that she is a private person and just has me around less than I originally thought would happen – I hope that helps you. And congratulations grandma!
Then there was this – That’s a totally a trauma reaction. The level of emotional response is way out of balance with the request.. and you know it… which only makes you feel even crazier, right?
So I’m gonna say something major in you baby adoptee brain has been triggered by the birth (sooo normal! ) and you now have a wonderful opportunity to find that wound and heal it. And it sounds like very expected abandonment stuff.. not being worthy of what you now see in the mother-child bond. The baby in you is crying for that experience and mourning you didn’t have it. Let your baby self cry it out and at the same time, mother yourself and know that you are worthy and deserved what your grandchild has. An adoption competent trauma informed therapist can help!
Then she adds – I used to believe that I had done enough work that I was always going to be in control.. and then, I lost my mind one day in the middle of the SPCA over a kitten. Like I became this crying, hysterical, screaming Karen .. and that is not me! That’s the day I learned that no matter how much you think you have healed.. sometimes the weirdest thing worms it’s way in! And boom.. you’re a sniveling mess lying on the kitchen floor.
Yet another shares this – My mother spent several years in an orphanage as a child and she is like this—if I reschedule a coffee date or something like that she feels abandoned and devastated. It breaks my heart. I love her so much and never want to cause her pain. I know therapy has helped her some.
A second woman confirmed – It is a trauma based response. I experienced the same sort of thing when my daughter got pregnant with my grandson. I was terrified and an emotional wreck thinking I wouldn’t have a relationship with the baby when it was born. Everything triggered me and despite my daughter reassuring me she wanted me involved – internally I felt it would all dissolve because of course, as an adoptee how do we trust we will be loved, included, not rejected ? I now have a wonderful relationship with my grandson and he is the joy in my life. I still feel that fear sometimes but I have gotten more confident that we can get past the bumps and not every bump means the end a relationship and bond.
Another woman shared – I am not a adoptee, my biological dad left and my biological mom got me and my sisters out of foster care. (Just for back ground) I just had a baby 6 months ago and my mom felt the same way. She was raised by her grandparents because her parents didn’t want her and couldn’t provide for her or my uncle. I think it’s definitely a trauma based thing, but I can tell you from the other side, I would cry for my mom at night when things got hard. I never once thought I could do it without her but also telling her was hard. Your child needs you always, a baby doesn’t change that.
A woman who gave her baby up for adoption writes – I feel like that about my daughter and she’s 31. (Found her when she was 18.) I am in therapy and am working on it. I think the important thing to realize is that these are thought distortions. They are your mind’s way of protecting itself, but this time it went out of control…. Like emotional keloids.
An adoptee writes – This is trauma talking! Trauma lies. It’s the brain telling you your trauma will repeat itself. My therapist has me do several things to combat this. One is I talk back to myself, out loud, as if I’m defending young Andrea or sometimes a friend. It feels really silly but we’re so hard on ourselves, so defending a child or a friend is so much easier! Another activity is to write down all those worst case scenarios and plan them out. What would you actually do if it happened? Then it might not feel so realistic and you’ll feel some measure of being in-control again. Also, my brain demands proof that it’s lying or it won’t shut up.
Missing Mom 