Avery Lansing

We don't know the extent of our birthmother or adoptive mother's pain they've experienced. You're right in validating their pain while at the same time setting boundaries for yourself. Be cautious in moving forward in your relationship with your birthmother if there is a noticeable toxic trait that she brings to the relationship. Also check yourself, are you doing what is best for you, the adult Adoptee? Or, are you still trying to gain the love and acceptance you have subconsciously and relentlessly sought since you were relinquished as a baby? Adoptive parents and birth parents can never truly understand what it's like to be the product of adoption. For example , to be the baby who was sold and bought by parents who had not yet grieved the fact they could not have their own biological children. To also be relinquished by a person who was either forced into this situation, or did not understand the consequences and thought adoption was the best option. Some of these children byproducts of adoption grow up feeling as though they never truly belong, to anything. No matter what you do, it's engrained at relinquishment, we don't belong to anyone, we must learn how to self soothe, and mask, oh the masking. It's heartbreaking, because as badly as these now grown adult Adoptees want to have healthy relationships, it's dang near impossible because of the inability to bond with others in the way most people are introduced to as they enter this world. When our infant bonds are severed, that trauma lives in the body, subconsciously coming out in ways we may or may not be aware of. Adoption can really f*** up adoptees, and we don't usually figure this out until halfway through life. Everyone has a different path, but when commonalities become prevalent and research shows how being relinquished as an infant impacts adult Adoptee relationships, it is imperative that we dig deeper to better understand as opposed to slough this off as nothing. As an adoptee in my 40s, I can say with 100% honesty that being adopted has brought challenges to me in adulthood that impact relationships and have revealed how detrimental the impact of adoption can be on adoptees. I've put in many many hours to heal the first wound, the severed bond, it is painful and I'm still working through that. Accepting that some of us will never be able to fix certain aspects of our personalities because of the depth of that primal wound is painful. It doesn't feel fair, and it's not. But we also need to take into account that our adoptive parents and birthparents experienced both pain and joy that led to adoption, and the life lived thereafter. It is hard to adequately describe what this side of the triangle feels like. One way would be to say that being an adult adoptee is like being dropped into a warzone with no weapons, no tools, and noone to have your back. Adoptees have to learn how to not let that feeling rule their lives. Some adoptees just shove that feeling down and act like nothing ever happened. Some adoptees end up having significant mental health challenges, and some even, well lookup the percentage of known serial killers that were adopted. Whoever sold adoption as this beautiful solution to an unwanted problem failed big time. While the warzone analogy may seem dramatic, even though we adoptees were raised by our adoptive parents, in my case, I never felt like I truly belonged to either my adoptive or bio family, the damage was already done on day one. Even if I convince myself otherwise, I know that little me felt like I was flying solo through this life. Even now, I love isolation and sometimes I have to force myself to interact with people. There's a stigma that Adoptees are narcissistic by default. First, that's horrible, and if you're not a psychiatrist, do not diagnose your adoptee as a narcissist, that is in itself narcissistic, though investigating the data, we see that the commonalities that cause narcissistic behaviors are more significant in those who have been adopted due to the severed primal bond. Man, if only we had this data 45 years ago. At least moving forward, open adoptions are more common and mental health resources have increased. Now we work on the stigmas, and on ourselves as individuals.