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| "I didn't know THAT!" |
What a great discussion on adoptee anger! Several have written with a request for the 12 Steps for Adoptees. They will become available again soon when the new Under His Wings Workbook is released.
How would you describe being stuck in adoptee anger, or any anger!
I would say "driving with one foot on the brake and the other on the accelerator."
Obviously, not a good place to be.
How would you feel if you were the one driving the car, if you were a passenger in the car, or a bystander on the curb? How would your anger or someone else's affect you then?
What descriptor would you use?
Love to all!
Sherrie
I just caught up on reading these posts, and I really appreciate the open sharing by Shefalie and Deb. I am grateful to you as well, Sherrie, for making this forum available for adult adoptees and adoptive parents to talk!
ReplyDeleteI relate to many aspects of Shefalie's story, from the perspective of the adoptive parents. My husband and I are delighted to be the parents of seven children, six by birth and one by adoption. We adopted our daughter, who is almost three, when she was one week old. She is of a different ethnic background from us also. We are praying that the Lord will bring more children into our home by adoption, as we have a desire for a large family, we have a heart to provide a home for children beyond just our bio ones, and we don't want our daughter to grow up as the only "different" one in our family.
We haven't had to deal with adoptee anger so far, as our daughter is very young and has been with us from infancy. But we are always reading, learning, listening, and praying to have wisdom to parent her proactively now and to be prepared as we move into each phase of her life with her. I am grateful that there are so many resources available now for adoptive parents that weren't there in the past. Finding out how deep the wounds go, I can imagine that it was even harder and more confusing for adoptive parents ten or twenty years ago. We learn and apply everything I can, praying that we will be able to always reach her heart and that she will know she is LOVED beyond comprehension, and has been since before she was born.
This morning, while reading these posts, I printed a picture of her bmother. We've talked about her bmother and told her the story of her birth and adoption since she was a baby, but of course her understanding is growing gradually. She attached to that picture quickly, carrying it around with her, showing it to her newborn brother and other siblings, asking me if I wanted to see it, folding it up and putting it in her pocket, then taking it out and showing it to all of us again. I was glad to give her a concrete reminder of her story. I need to remember to do that more often. It's a motivation to me to get her birth and adoption story book finished, which I have been working on for a long time, so that she can have lots of pictures to look at along with lots of information.
I often fear what the future could hold as she begins to comprehend and process the pain and losses that she has to endure, and then I bring all that fear to the Lord, asking Him to do in her heart what we are unable to do, making us able to love her well so that it's as easy for her to deal with as possible.
Michelle,
ReplyDeleteWhat a beautiful story about your daughter! Thanks for sharing with us. Yes, a TANGIBLE reminder means so much to we adoptees. It proves that we were a real baby, with a real first mom, and that we are real.
Love you,
Sherrie
Michelle, what a great story and thanks for sharing it......you are so right, how hard it must have been for adoptive parents years back without much of the understanding the years have given to us in resources for those of the open adoption era, with story books and a little history......
ReplyDeleteI could just imagine your little daughter holding tight to her photo of her bmother, and wanting to show it to people.....do you think there are similarities? Is she of the same colouring?
I find as an adult with the photos I now have found on FB of my bsisters, that I want to show them to some people.....because they resemble me, they are part of me....they are the same skin tone as me and it's like if others can see it, which they do.....it kind of makes me feel a bit more "normal", a bit more connected even though we don't have a relationship as such.....maybe it's also they years of barrenness of having nothing or knowi ng nothing about anything.....so it's great your daughter can do this, and she has something, even if she does not fully understand the complexities.....what she will know within her is this is my bmother.....I was born the same as others......and here she is.....she's mine......my words of course.....
Bless you for being so open and willing to love other children besides your own.......
Ps. I am trying to write myself a story book.....but am finding it difficult.....Sherrie or Deb......do you have one?
Shefalie
Michelle, your story about giving your daughter the picture of her birth mother and how she carried it around to show to everyone and then put it back into her pocket brought tears to my eyes. What a great mother you are and will continue to be.
ReplyDeleteLike Sherrie said, knowing we have a real history makes all the difference in the world. Even more is the knowledge that it is safe to let on how important that history is to our family. My parents never hid my adoption, always knew, there was never that "talk". I still never knew it was ok to wonder, to ask, to speak of where I came from. I didn't want to hurt their feelings, so I never did.
Just as Sherrie mentioned about being a real baby, it isn't real to me that I was born from a woman like every one else. I can't wrap my head around it. It was like I just popped out of thin air into existence.
My parents did not get me until I was 4 months old due to a heart murmur. So, I do not have any pictures of me any younger than 4 months, except one. I didn't know it existed until we were going through old files after my father passed (my mom had already passed). I found a picture of me at about 2 months old given to my parents as they waited for me to be "cleared" for adoption. It was like gold to me, like Sherrie said, it was one piece that made me feel a little more real.
Shefalie, I can't imagine how incredible it had to be to have pictures of your sisters. I think non-adoptees don't realize how fascinating it is to us when we find a picture of someone who looks like us. We grow up in a world where no one looks like us. Most people take that for granted. I would have wanted to show everyone the pictures too. It wasn't until I had my children that anyone in my world looked like me. It is the little things like that which are huge to us, that make us feel real, that make us feel normal.
Shef, I don't have a story book either. I wouldn't know what to write. I know nothing, absolutely nothing. This was 1960 when everything was slammed shut and locked tight. I don't even know which hospital I was born in. All I have is the date and City. The agency that handled the adoption no longer exists. Dan made some calls, did some preliminary searches, nothing. I haven't spent much time on it. I think in some ways I am still numb about it all. In a way I am okay with how things are as well.
Deb
Deb I am so sorry that you do not have concrete info or history......I only have info known to me because I have years of social workers reports when they came to visit the family I was placed with......and I only got my file about 5 years ago. I never knew I Had one.
ReplyDeleteI like you do not have baby photos.....and I had shut all things out as non existing till the age of 3..... I never knew I was born.....no one ever talked about it, how daft is that......but with no history, nothing.....what could I say.....and therefore the infant, young toddler got locked away...and I thought I was a person at the age of 3. So I know what you mean......I have tried to piece some things together but there are such gaps......no one knows where I was for the first few months, other than a holding place for unwanted babies, before I was transferred to children's home...I certainly was not with my bmother, she left me in the hospital. She must have been in a right mental state.it can't have been easy on her.
Shefalie
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ReplyDeleteWhat courage you all have to discuss and share these things for us amothers to learn and grow from to help our children.
ReplyDeleteThank you.