im an adopted child...

jprincessa · August 2010

hello everyone i just thought i would say hi and offer to answer any questions anyone might have for some one who was adopted since i have been pregnant people always ask kind of invasive things a lot of which i cannot even answer myself. i find that when i tell people in conversation that i am adopted they are full of questions, so it occurred to me who would have more than an adoptive parent?! im not sure if that interests anyone but if so im happy to answer.

just to give u some background.... i am 26, and come from a family of 3 adopted children. 2 of us are half siblings. i am the youngest. my 2 brothers were born here in the us and i was born in mexico.

happy adopting!!!

come*on*baby · August 2010

Welcome to the board!

I have half siblings that we have adopted/ing (in the process of adopting the second one!)

silliestbunny · August 2010

Welcome and thanks for extending yourself here!

I echo the previous question about your family make up and how it impacted you.

Also, is it a closed relationship or do have some knowledge of your birth parents? Any thoughts?

jprincessa · August 2010

LovedByHim316:
If your parents are of a different background than you and it's obvious (if not, just ignore this question )--- how did they handle the questions in public & in front of you? What type of response made you feel the most comfortable?
Were there a lot of questions at school about being adopted? How did you handle them and how did your parents prepare you to face that? Could they have done/said anything to make you feel more prepared?*
Thanks! And welcome to the board!!
*edited

yes my parents are both "white" and looked very obviously different from me most of my life in public if people would say to my mom "shes so dark" or" she is so exotic looking" she will always say i look like my father.....ummm LIE. so that always bothered me a lot, i realized later in my life that this was definitely the start of a lot of my self esteem/ body image issues. something that didnt make me feel like i should be hiding who i really am would have been better!

when i was a kid in school there wasnt a lot of questions per say but it was hard kids are mean and because we did look different my brother and i looked very mexican in a very white neighborhood we were the most ethnic thing these kids ever saw! i did hear a few "ur not a real kid" comments or "ur parents didnt even want u" which sucked. my advice is to be honest with ur adopted kids and never treat the fact that they are adopted as something shameful or a secret. i think it creates an emotional snowball for them. be supportive and understanding, in my house it was neevr talked about and if we would be upset they would say ignore them.... easier said than done for a child. i wish some one would have explained to me what being adopted meant and that it was normal and we were normal, it would have helped me a lot. i always felt like my parents werent mine or like they could give me back because i neevr really understood. so talking helps.

jprincessa · August 2010

silliestbunny:
Welcome and thanks for extending yourself here!

I echo the previous question about your family make up and how it impacted you.
Also, is it a closed relationship or do have some knowledge of your birth parents? Any thoughts?

like i said in the pp my family definitely had a huge impact on me. i left home when i was 17 and moved out on my own which is very odd since i live in ny most teenagers drive bmws where i grew up not work 3 jobs and go to school so they dont have to live home..... anyway there was a very big struggle in our house because obvious issues (the fact that were all adopted, and only 2 of us are related) my natural brother and i have always lived in the shadow of the oldest who came first and never adjusted to us. he is now 30 and still behaves this way, my parents coddle him so he has never coped with it, in my opinion this is not healthy! so wheni left home i had a lot to deal with and i did, i worked through a ton of issues that included years of not speaking because in general i felt like i had a blessed life i never wanted for anything but love and that wasnt really fair since they chose me, they chose to bring us into their home and then ignored us? but after all this i did come out on top, i took it into my own hands to find the answers i needed.

when i was i think 23 or so i decided i wanted some information about myself and after a ton of traveling and searching i discovered it was actually impossible for me to uncover. private adoption. i wish i had access to any records about myself even medical but being international and private everything is sealed. i think it is very important to offer your children information about their heritage and birth families (within reason some info is obviously inappropriate). i have a few adopted friends and i had the unique experience of interning in an adoption agency an di have to say this makes a huge difference to a childs personal sanity and sense of self.

i hope that answers your questions

this is why i did extend myself here i think it is brave to adopt children but i also think it is more important to consider the effect it has on them.

best of luck!

smith486 · August 2010

I just wanted to say thank you for coming on here and volunteering to answer any questions we all have.

I recently read the book "20 Things Adopted Kids Wish Their Adoptive Parents Knew." It sounds like a lot of the difficulties you had as an adopted child are the same as many other adopted children. Unfortunately, there was a long period in history where it was taboo to talk about adoption. I think that lead to a couple generations of adopted children seeking answers and affirmation of their feelings.

Maybe I do have a question after all! Do you think if your parents had been open and forthright with information regarding your adoption, had answered questions about your "ethic appearance" with pride it would have helped you?

I think what I really struggle with is what to say when people ask about my future adopted children in front of them. I want to answer honestly, but I don't want to unintentionally hurt my child by offending him/her by talking about adoption all the time. Am I making any sense? Do you have any insight?

hway24 · August 2010

Welcome to the board! Thank you so much for sharing your insight and experiences with us!

SaveTheWorld2014 · August 2010

jprincessa:
LovedByHim316:

If your parents are of a different background than you and it's obvious (if not, just ignore this question )--- how did they handle the questions in public & in front of you? What type of response made you feel the most comfortable?

Were there a lot of questions at school about being adopted? How did you handle them and how did your parents prepare you to face that? Could they have done/said anything to make you feel more prepared?*

Thanks! And welcome to the board!!

*edited

yes my parents are both "white" and looked very obviously different from me most of my life in public if people would say to my mom "shes so dark" or" she is so exotic looking" she will always say i look like my father.....ummm LIE. so that always bothered me a lot, i realized later in my life that this was definitely the start of a lot of my self esteem/ body image issues. something that didnt make me feel like i should be hiding who i really am would have been better!

when i was a kid in school there wasnt a lot of questions per say but it was hard kids are mean and because we did look different my brother and i looked very mexican in a very white neighborhood we were the most ethnic thing these kids ever saw! i did hear a few "ur not a real kid" comments or "ur parents didnt even want u" which sucked. my advice is to be honest with ur adopted kids and never treat the fact that they are adopted as something shameful or a secret. i think it creates an emotional snowball for them. be supportive and understanding, in my house it was neevr talked about and if we would be upset they would say ignore them.... easier said than done for a child. i wish some one would have explained to me what being adopted meant and that it was normal and we were normal, it would have helped me a lot. i always felt like my parents werent mine or like they could give me back because i neevr really understood. so talking helps.

Again, to acho everyone else, thank you so much for coming here and offering your insight!

MH and I are still in the waiting stage as we are relatively young (23, 25). However, we plan to foster (not just as a stepway to adoption, we plan to foster for years) and adopt through the foster care system.

As others have mentioned, race is always an issue. I imagine our kids, at least some of them, will not 'look like us' and I have always worried the best way to handle that. I imagine I will also have the same situation as you, some of my kids 'could be mine' and some won't 'look like me.'

What could your parents have said that was better re: you not looking like them and re: you and your bio sib not looking like your adopted sib? Thanks in advance so much for this.

Would it have been better to just say "Yes, isn't she gorgeous?" or something that does directly address the fact that you were adopted.

I don't want to deny my childrens' heritage(s), I plan to embrace them as much as I can, but I also don't want to tell EVERY stranger that my kids are fosters or adopted. My kids will be MY KIDS, you know?

Thanks again so much, I (and I'm sure, the rest of the board) really appreciate it! :-) GL with your pregnancy!

scatterbrainliz · August 2010

You & I seem to have similar backgrounds as I'm adopted as well. I had always known I was adopted and hated being asked intrusive questions as a child. I got asked a lot by teachers and other kids in middle/high school which was annoying to no end. Aren't strangers the worst especially when you're a kid? (asking all types of questions)

jprincessa · August 2010

i really like the idea of off setting a strangers question with a statement thats a good idea like " yes, isnt she gorgeous!" that is really nice i think it draws a clear line between yes its my kid and no its none of ur damn business

LOVE THAT SUGGESTION. i also think it will help the kid realize that you dont NEED to remind people they arent biologically yours, it isnt important and it will make them feel special. it seems like this is one thing everyone is concerned about its sensitive for both parties

(parent and child) you will know what works for your family also, the amount of honesty and open speaking there is will also probably help their comfort level.

jprincessa · August 2010

fredalina:
OK, if you were me, how would you handle our situation? There are quite a few issues, i'm afraid.
My DD was our foster daughter from 2 days old, and we finalized our adoption when she was 13 months old. Her birthmother and birthfather are both long-time drug-abusers and small-time criminals (things like shoplifting, check fraud, public intoxication, DUI, etc; nothing violent).
When her birthmother was 17 or 18, she had Charlotte's half-sister, C. C was always raised either by her father or his family, and i only know her birthdate and what i think is her full name, and possibly another woman's name (but her name and the other name are similar -- think Kelly and Carrie -- so i'm not positive it's not the same person). She would be about 13 at this time.
Charlotte also has 2 full biological brothers, S and T. S is about 7 years old now, and when he was about 3, their birthmoher had a very large overdose (which she has said once was a suicide attempt but has also denied it). She suffered some significant brain damage from it and is considered disabled now. S was removed by the state at that time, and was placed in a safety plan with a friend of the birthmom. At one point, he was removed from this friend and placed in foster (stranger) care. He was also reunified with the birthmom at some point but it didn't last long. Eventually parental rights were terminated and he was adopted by his foster parents.
When T was born, the hospital suspected drug use based on the behavior of the parents, and performed drug tests. T tested positive, and he was placed in foster care at 3 days old. The state contacted S's adoptive family who declined to take T (not sure why). The birthparents were given 6 months to work a plan; they didn't and he was adopted by his foster parents.
Char's situation is just like T's except the birthparents weren't given a plan to work and they never contacted DCS about her. S's parents were not contacted because they had declined T. T's parents were contacted when she was 2 months old, and after praying about it decided not to take her. We have a relationship with T and his parents. If there are additional kids, we will be called and we will not decline (most likely; things change obviously).
In our state, each party must consent to contact through the state's database. Which means that C probably doesn't know she has 3 half-siblings, and if S's parents tell him about T, he still won't know about Charlotte.
Every piece of information we've gotten, every name, birthdate, etc, we've written down for her for someday. We will support her if she wants to seek out her birthfamily, particularly her brother and sister.
One other thing: We changed Char's name. Her old name was something we would never have chosen and was a little embarrassing to say when people would ask her name. i chose her first name, DH chose her middle name, and we kept her old middle name and made it a second middle name. We plan to tell her that mommy chose a name, daddy chose a name, and her birthparents chose a name.
Would love to hear your take on how to handle this. My big fears are that she'll feel abandoned since her birthparents fought for S, halfway fought for T, and never tried for her at all; that she'll resent us changing her name; that she'll feel like a "bad person" because her birthparents are "bad people" (i do NOT believe that, just putting it into simple child language).
FWIW Char is caucasian as are DH and i. In fact, she actually looks a lot like me and i get those comments constantly from strangers who wouldn't know that we're not biologically related. i don't know if she'll continue to look like me or if we'll keep getting those comments, but i'm kind of faced with the opposite of a transracial adoption. Obviously it's not fair to tell strangers about her being adopted, but i wonder if i don't acknowledge in such a case that it will feel like it's something to be hidden or ashamed of in some way. Also, DH and i want to have another child (at least). There are 3 possibilities: 1) Her birthparents will have another baby and we'll be called and adopt him/her, 2) In a couple/few years if there is no birthsibling, we will start the domestic adoption process and very possibly adopt a non-caucasian baby, 3) Very unlikely but possible we could have a biological child. Any of those 3 brings its own set of issues.
That was a handful, eh? (And it should go without saying that we don't plan to parent the way your parents did, but i doubt anyone intends to be a bad parent so there's not much to say about that besides i'm sorry you went through that).

woah that was a long one! but good story. that is a very involved situation and i can only speak from my circumstances, my brother and i who share a mother kno very little about our past or outside family however what we do know is a handful because it was brutally honest. i found a home study i guess that was done for my adoption and so included the details about his. so he has the honor of knowing that he was born addicted and that he was totally abandoned as an infant with no effort to be kept, found etc. i know that this information has definitely changed his life. he has an unhealthy relationship with drugs and alcohol and not in an addcitive way but he is soo far opposed to it that it is actually strange and definitely has its own negative impact. it is hard to watch him suffer with this because i know it stems from his fear of being addicted. its sad. he has never had any issues with abuse but has also never experienced these sort of life experiences. i wish i could take that knowledge away from him and im sure he does too. he also seemed to develop strange habits with emotional relationships like girlfriends, even friends. he has an obvious fear of abandonment and almost aims to over please. i have to believe he would have been better off without any of this knowledge. that beign said we also know when it came to me the mother wouldnt give up without a fight (it was clearly for money) but a fight none the less. i can tell there is a struggle with all of this information. to me i feel like my life has been blessed my parents are great people, crap parents but great people and i have done more living in my 26 years of life than some can even imagine. so i try to stay that way and think im blessed.

i think you have a really good handle on your situationa dn you obviously understand the challenge it might bring to your child. i commend that. all i can say is what i said before which is some information is not important for a child to know this is what i mean if you fear it may create a psychological issue either now or in the future, it is probably ok to leave that info out. there is a time and a place for everythingin life and when she is old enough to truly understand and accept all the circumstances that wil be a better time. it seems like there is so much going on there it may overwhelm a kid plus some details are kind of scary (suicide attempts etc.)

it is a very hard thing to hold "secrets" about someone you love, but i do believe in some cases it is for their own good

im an adopted child...

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