October 30th is Adoptee Remembrance Day. Created by Pamela Karanova, the founder of Adoptees Connect, Adoptee Remembrance Day is designed to raise awareness around the impact of adoption on mental health and suicide. For more information about Adoptees Connect check out Pamela's website, which can be found here: adopteesconnect.com/.
Information on Adoptee Remembrance Day is here: adopteesconnect.com/adoptee-remembrance-day-friday-october-30th/
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Being rejected is possibly one of the most soul destroying things that can ever happen to someone. Being abandoned is often worse. For children who were adopted at birth feelings of abandonment and rejection can be very intense, particularly when there is secrecy around the adoption. Which can cause us to question our worth. Why was I abandoned? Why was I rejected? What was wrong with me? Often one of the coping mechanisms for abandonment and rejection is to build walls - so that we will never be hurt again. Or, we might distance ourselves emotionally from others in an attempt to protect us from what we believe will be inevitable - being rejected again. But in building walls, or in keeping ourselves emotionally shut off, we often create the very thing we fear most. We make it so hard for anyone else to get close to us that they end up walking away. We need to find better coping mechanisms. We also need to name the feelings for what they are, and where they have come from. We need to break the cycle.
The notion of forgiveness in relation to the adoptive experience can be contentious for many people who were adopted. Being angry makes more sense. But what does anger achieve in the end? The reality is that for there to be meaningful change in adoption practices around the word then we need to stand up to the system and say why it is wrong, and explain the damage that it has potentially caused to our lives. But advocacy does not necessarily require anger or aggression. Sometimes the best change occurs through well reasoned arguments rather than heightened emotion. Jean's belief was that for true healing and change to occur, adopted people needed to consider the role of forgiveness in the process. Forgiveness towards their birth parents, their adopting parents, the system and themselves. We have all read memoirs by adopted people that are filled with emotion and rage, and we can identify with much of what is being said. But if we remain trapped in a place of anger and bitterness, then all that happens is that we become angry and bitter people. There has to be more to life than that.
This meme was created in response to an experience we had, where someone from within the adoption community objected to some of our views on the podcast. Were our views wrong, or objectionable, or ill informed? We don't think so, they were simply our opinions, our reflections, our views. Sometimes it is easier to take offence at someone else's ideas rather than to reflect on our own. You see, it is absolutely fine for us to disagree with another's opinions...but it is not okay to lash out at that person when those opinions challenge our own ideas. An adult response is not to lash out at others, but rather to reflect on the emotions they evoke in us. As we have said in another post. To lash out is a B.S. thing to do.
I think many people who were adopted would like the chance to be able to go back and rewrite the past, in order to see if there could be an alternate version of life where they were not relinquished. But this isn't possible. What is important is to see the past for what it is, and to recognise that there is much that we can never change (much as we would wish we could). It is also important to see how much of our past informs the narrative of the future. Is there anything in that narrative that is unhelpful? Is there anything in the narrative that is holding us back, or causing us to follow old, familiar patterns of hurt, rejection, shame or loss? We cannot rewrite the past, but when we reflect upon it, and face the pain of it sometimes that enables us to write a very different future. Someone once said, if we come from nowhere (and have no history) then this gives us the ability to shape our own future. Maybe that is a pipe-dream, but one worth considering.
We love this quote from Marlou Russell PhD, the author of the book Adoption Wisdom: A Guide to the Issues and Feelings of Adoption. Truth wins every time.
Ambiguous loss is a term that was coined by Pauline Boss and defined as an “incomplete or uncertain loss.” Boss describes it in two ways. It can be a loss when a loved one is physically absent but psychologically present such as an adoption, divorce, or incarceration. Equally it can also be a loss when a loved one is psychologically absent but physically present such as through dementia or Alzheimer’s Disease. Of course, when it comes to adoption, there can be the added difficulty of society not recognising or understanding the losses involved. The ambiguous loss that can result from adoption is often ignored...because an adopted person may have lost a birth family, but they now have a new family to replace them. Such ignorance.
Earlier this year Lance met with a psychologist who said "every human being has issues, there is no such thing as adoption issues." In reality, we know that this is both true and untrue. Yes, we all do have issues - every person has issues. But for those of us who were adopted many of our issues revolve around the unknowing that comes through closed stranger adoption practices. We have issues, and many of those issues come from being adopted.
It is oddly weird when many people, who were adopted through private (predominantly Church run) institutions between the 1940s and 1970s, approach those institutions seeking copies of their records they get told that the records were all destroyed in a fire or flood. It is equally weird when an adopted person searches local newspaper archives for information about the said floods or fires, that there are never any mentions of these taking place. Some would think that there might be a conspiracy, whereas we wonder if it just happens to be a coincidence. I mean, why would so many church-run adoption agencies be hit by floods or destroyed by fires...one might almost think that God was angry with the things they were doing.
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Adoptee AwarenessSome thoughtful memes developed for Adoptee Awareness month. ArchivesCategories |