"Oh, I'm Sorry"

Most adoptees have heard the phrase, "Oh, I'm sorry" at one point or another. I heard it a lot more as a child than I have as an adult. I'm not sure if that's because people are more cautious of what they say to one another now or if it's because so many more people are affected by adoption. My knee-jerk reaction to that has always been, "I'm not." I'm not sorry that I was adopted. I'm not sorry that I grew up where I did. I'm not sorry for the parents who raised me. I'm not sorry for my adopted siblings. I don't regret those things, nor would I change them. Maybe when people hear the word adoption they picture an infant abandoned outside of a hospital. Maybe people associate adoption with a child who had bounced around from home to home in foster care. Those may be the stories of some adoptees, but those aren't my story. I realize the current narrative on adoption and trauma is meant to be sensitive to adoptees for the loss of their birth family. I understand, and I empathize with all members of the adoption triad who have experienced trauma. The problem is that narrative doesn't apply to everyone. I feel like the movement behind the adoption trauma scenario is moving us in the wrong direction. It projects the circumstances and emotions of some onto the many. It solidifies a need for an apology universally. Most people have a sense of pride in their history, in their family's history. I should be able to have that too. Being adopted isn't who I am, but it's part of my story. My story doesn't need an apology.