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Hello, my name is Rachel, I am very new to this but I am struggling with my identity as an individual and I think it may stem from my adoption and I thought I might be able to share it and perhaps find some answers.
When I was three and a half months my parents adopted me in Ireland, my father is British and my mother is Canadian. They had previously adopted twins about three years prior also from Ireland. When I was five years old we moved from Ireland to Canada and I have been living here ever since (almost 20 years).
I have never in the past had any issues with my adoption whatsoever I have incredible parents who have taught me well and have taken the best of care of me and I am grateful for that. I grew up accepting and knowing I was adopted and have been proud of that.
When I turned 18 I requested information about my birth mother and her family and received a lot of information from her and was put in touch with her and we had fairly regular contact. However more recently perhaps shortly after I got in contact with her I seem to find myself struggling with who I am and who I identify myself with, if I am Irish anymore or am I Canadian. It seems so petty and silly but I just cant seem to shake the feeling. My parents aren't Irish and I haven't been back to Ireland in over ten years. Id like to think that if i went back everything would be fine but I have nothing to go back to, unlike my sisters who left when they were a bit older, I left when I was so young that I don't have friends or really anything connecting me there anymore.
I don't know if this is normal because I have found my birth mother and her family recently, as a result of this battle in my mind I havent been able to talk to her as i am unsure if it makes it better or worse so then i feel as though i am betraying her.
I have always said I had no issues with my adoption but maybe I do? Does anyone have any ideas or can relate to me i'd really appreciate it.
Thanks, Take Care
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I can sympathize completely, and I can tell you that you may never completely come to terms with it.
I would recommend talking to your birth family and your adoptive family.
I'm speaking theoretically because although I was adopted, I will say honestly that I have never been able to come to terms with it. I was adopted as an infant from Korea and my parents never told me. I found out when Immigration came to deport me and I spent 3 years in ICE detention trying to find my adoption paper to prove I was legally adopted here--I still don't know if ICE lost it or if Dad and Mom simply didn't know that they had to carry the paper back up to ICE.
They died six months before ICE picked me up in a car accident. According to the ICE paperwork, I was an orphan--found one morning on the doorstep of an orphnage in Korea. I have no original birth certificate, no record of where or even when I was born--the orphanage doctor said I was approximately eight months old and they just went back eight months from that date and made that my birthdate, so I have no idea even how old I really am. I don't know if they ever found my birth parent (s) or even if they tried; girls are 'worthless' in oriental culture.
I did struggle with that for a long time; I didn't know who I was. I guess it kind of helped that for the three years after I found out I was held first in prison, then in a deportation camp, and I didn't have any thought to spare for existential questions; I was too busy trying to survive. And after I got out I was too busy trying to find a job, get off welfare and get back on my feet.
I do still have a lot of questions, most of which will never be answered now, but you learn to live with them. Focus on your life, on what you need to do to get by day after day, and eventully you'll find a middle ground.
Hope this helps!
It happened and there is nothing I can do about it from this end of time. My focus now has shifted to what I can do to educate those rabid 'anti-illegals' out thre who advocate 'dumping us all back over the border'. We are undocumented, not illegal--aside from the three year prison record I have a squeaky clean background check and don't even have so much as a point on my driving record or a parking ticket.