You are at the doctor's office and are asked, “Before we move on, do you know, or can you tell me any family medical history that we should know about?” “No. I’m adopted.”
As we shift into Adoption Awareness Month, adoptees are quick to consider their experiences and relationship to being adopted. In fact, an adoptee's thoughts and feelings regarding the subject tend to surface and resurface again throughout their lives, like a sea turtle coming up for air, only to slip beneath the waves again until it’s ready to surface once more.
So, what exactly is adoption all about? Is it to be celebrated? Discussed? Shushed?
It is a subject that can take the shape of an innocent conversation held among friends, or an internal dialogue that lives rent-free in the mind of the adoptee when they consider their adoptive identity. As you continue to explore this blog in its entirety, I encourage you to keep in mind that everyone is going to have a different response, reaction, and story to tell — some with delight, some with tears, some with shyness, and some with a sense of confidence, comfort, and acceptance.
Adoption — a singular word that takes on myriad forms throughout the world. Open adoption refers to communication among birth parents, adoptive parents, and the adoptee. Closed adoption suggests that identifying information is not shared between the birth family and the adoptive family, and there is no contact between the two families (Von Korff & Grotevant, 2011). Regardless of the adoptee's circumstances, adopted children are going to have their own thoughts and feelings about being adopted. Curiosity, indifference, discomfort, and excitement are some of the many feelings that no adoptee is a stranger to. Some are eager to understand where they come from, while others prefer to treat this part of their identity as a chapter that neither needs to be returned to nor expanded beyond what it was meant to be. Either way, every adoptee has the right and freedom to decide how they understand and explore who they are as an adoptee — no one else. Furthermore, their thoughts and feelings regarding this part of their identity — their adoptive identity — can also either remain the same or evolve and change over time.
Adoptive identity refers to the understanding and recognition of oneself as an adopted person. The development of one's adoptive identity begins when an adoptee asks themself "Who am I as an adopted person?" and "What does being an adopted person mean to me, and how does this fit into my understanding of myself, relationships, and family?" (Grotevant et al., 2000).
But how and when do adopted persons know they were, well, adopted? Some are informed — whether at a very young age, or, as an adult — and some, never. And yet, many inquisitive folks are quick to follow up with, "But when did you actually know you were adopted?" In other words, when do adoptees comprehend the complexity and weight of their adopted self?
Adoption is a complex concept — one that takes time to grasp, particularly with its multifaceted layers and nuances. Contrary to belief, adoptees do not necessarily have an "a-ha!" moment that most people believe them to have when they are asked, "So when did you realize you were adopted?" Instead, adoptees may come to "realize" this part of their identity when they are reminded of it — when they notice that they do not share physical similarities with their family members, or when they visit a new doctor only to jot down "Unknown" in the sections related to family medical history, or when others exclaim, "You must be so lucky!" and "Do you ever wish you knew your real parents?" or, when their respective adoptive parents reminisce about the day they met their child for the very first time.
It is vital to recognize that no one but the adoptee has control over how they perceive their adoption, let alone how they feel about it, and that is okay. If we can be so quick to change our thoughts and preferences throughout the day, one can only imagine how an adoptee might feel as they continue to process the part of themself that they never had power to either accept or deny in the first place. Exploring one's adoptive identity can elicit various feelings, and the adoptee will have a less tumultuous journey so long as they give themself grace and patience as they tread down paths that can either lead them to more untrodden paths, or, maybe even, dead ends. Most importantly, adoptees have control over how deeply they want to understand themselves as well as the people they express their thoughts and opinions to.
Conversing about one's adoption relies solely on the adoptee themself — should they wish to delve into the topic, we respect their wishes. Should they wish to gently change the topic and/or not disclose any more information, we respect their decision. To anyone who has the itch to understand more about adoption and the nuances it entails, do not hesitate to do your own research and not to rely too heavily on solely your adopted friends and familiy, since everyone is going to have a unique perspective. I also encourage soon-to-be adoptive parents to recognize the role they play in their adopted child's life — especially when the child begins to show signs of curiosity and interest in their adoptive identity. An adoptee's desire to explore their adoptive identity with their adoptive parents' guidance and genuine interest is a reflection of how secure and comfortable the child feels; it takes an extreme amount of courage and vulnerability to ask a loved one, let alone one's adoptive parent(s), to explore a part of themself that is completely special and personal to them.