Each day I wake up, I say a prayer and thank God for allowing me to see another day on earth. Even when it’s hell on earth. I get out of bed, and muzzle through the morning. I play my worship music, I have some time with God. If time permits I do some writing, or journaling. Writing seems to be my escape. I can share my real feelings here, when no one else in the world seems to want to know how I feel. Part of me doesn’t want to share my feelings with anyone in my “REAL” world. I’m afraid it would hurt them, then once again it would be about me worrying about others feelings before my own. Being adopted, that’s how it’s been since day one. I’m mentioning this because part of me wishes the people in my life close to me cared enough to want to read my feelings, and the other part feels like I need to protect them. People generally want to start giving unsolicited advice, and I’m just not ready to receive it from those who have no idea how it feels to be adopted. I wish more people would just LISTEN. That’s all I need.
Complicated, huh? I want people to understand me and if they try I will feel like they at least care. I also want to protect them from knowing how I really feel, so I don’t want to share it. I say “Protect them” because I have found that those close to me feel like because I have such deep rooted sadness due to my adoption experience (I have hope it will get better!) they feel as if they aren’t enough to make me happy. In reality, it has nothing to do with them, nothing at all. It has everything to do with losing so much by being adopted.
I’ve found most people who aren’t adopted can’t even comprehend how we feel. They might try, some of those close to me listen to me and I love them for that. That’s really all I need. But generally it’s on my mind every single day. Every single day I keep my feelings locked up in my mind, I pray and ask God for help to get through each day. It’s not easy. This holiday has been very trying. I’m so glad it’s over. I literally had to pull myself away from “Adoptee Land” and stay away from my computer, adoption sites, etc. It was extremely difficult to make it through each day aside from adding extra to it. Holiday’s are full of triggers. I hate the holidays. I found myself putting on a fake smile for everyone around me. If they only knew how I really felt, they would want to leave my like everyone else has. I think that’s a another reason I don’t really want them knowing my true feelings. They would never understand, and they would label me as an angry adoptee like the rest of society. Just so happens my story is one of heartbreak after heartbreak. There really is no happy ending for me. Not when it comes to my adoption story. I just have to learn to navigate through the emotions, even when they come souring like a tsunami. I must continue to work on healing, sharing how I feel, and moving forward. The hardest for me, is acceptance. I have accepted a lot of my adoption experience. There are so many aspects to it. I kept thinking as I go through year after year of healing, that one day a light was going to click and my pain would be all gone. Or much less than it is now. It’s actually worse since I’ve been living in recovery. My feelings aren’t being masked by alcohol and drugs. They are very real & raw but it’s not getting easier. Treading through the unknown of working through past adoptee abandonment & rejection issues has been scary and some days I want to give up. It would be so much easier to just give up. But my inspiration is my kids, and future grand kids. I want to be a happy grandma for them, and a healthy mother for my kids. Not just on the outside but on the inside as well. Accepting this pain is here to stay was hard. I don’t think I will ever feel whole. Too much was lost, never to return. Too much was stolen, and the beginning of my life was just too messed up to be able to feel normal like everyone else might. What is normal anyway? Who knows. I just know even after finding all my biological family, being rejected by my birth parents, and closing the door on that chapter of my life I am still a broken woman. Finding everyone was a HUGE success in my journey, but it didn’t end there. You never know what you will find, and you never know how the reunions will turn out. Mine failed. It’s been beyond difficult. I know other adoptees can feel my pain.
Next one up that’s difficult for many adoptees is Mother’s Day but thankfully I have a few months to even have to worry about it.
For those out there who aren’t adopted who might be reading this, if you can just listen when someone adopted is sharing their feelings to you, that’s the best thing you can do. Please don’t try to fix us, or say anything that could be taken the wrong way. We don’t need to hear things like, “Aren’t you glad you are alive and not aborted?” or “You were a gift from God”. Spare us… That only minimizes our pain, and we need our pain validated. The safest place you can be is to remain an active listener. That’s all I need anyway.
I will be writing more later.
Blessings,
Pamela AKA Adoptee In Recovery
http://www.facebook.com/howdoesitfeeltobeadopted
I pray God helps me find my purpose in this world.
Pamela Karanova 
I’ve basically given up on discussing adoption with non-adopted people. I know what I know, and I don’t have time to try and explain how it feels to be adopted. I have found that it is simply something that cannot be explained. I do have one friend who spent time in foster care, so she understands how abandonment feels. Other than that, I lean heavily on writing and reading other adoptee blogs – adoptees don’t have to explain anything to one another. We just KNOW.
It’s so hard. Because I would like for those close to me to understand better, but I’ve had a realization recently that maybe I’ve shared too much of my pain w/ my kids and in return maybe it’s hurting them to know I hurt so deeply from this experience. Is it something I should try harder to hide? I’ve had to do it my whole life anyway. . I GUESS me sharing some with them is to help them understand why I am the way I am. I’ve decided I really never want them to see my blog, or others close to me. Because I’m afraid they will get hurt feelings because they will feel like they aren’t enough to make me happy. That’s not it. They have nothing no th do w. The day I was born and what happened that day.
How far have you gone sharing your feelings Mary? Kids? Significant other?
I talk about it to my husband to a certain extent and my biological brother sort of understands. I also share about adoption with my sponsor, though she’s not adopted, she spent some time in foster care, so she understands feeling abandoned. I dont have kids, but I think its healthy for you to be honest w your kids about your feelings. You could just ask them how they feel about your sharing with them. Kids are incredibly wise and you seem like an awesome mom.
That makes me feel better. It’s been weighing me a little bit lately. Like I maybe have shared to much. But I am pretty honest with them about it, but I try to cover up the deep sadness as much as I can. It’s extra hard on my bday and mothers day, and holidays. You know what I mean I’m sure.
That’s great your sponsor can relate to an extent. In CR (Celebrate Recovery) they say that abandonment, rejection and abuse (of any kind) are the leading root causes of people’s dysfunctional lifestyle habits and addictions. I believe my abandonment & rejection from my adoption experience are my root issues.
Let me ask, do we follow each other on Facebook?
“I believe my abandonment & rejection from my adoption experience are my root issues.” I am discovering that this is absolutely true for me as well. All roads (triggers) trace back to my first day of life, the moment I was taken from my mother.
I rarely go on Facebook, but here’s my email discoveringmary64(at) gmail.com if you ever want to connect. I’d love to hear from you! We’ve got a lot to talk about my friend 🙂
Agree completely with yourself and ‘Mary’. Just been having a really dizzying few-days in adoption world and near to a(nother) breakdown until I read your post and could breathe and remember there are others who JUST GET IT. Thank you so much for your post. Perfect words at a perfect time.
Smilingelephant..
So glad you are here and always remember you aren’t alone. I know how adoption world can be and it’s so overwhelming at times. I had to break away for awhile during the holidays just to make it through w.o relapsing! Not sure if you read that I’m in recovery for alcohol/drugs 2.5 years sobriety. Root issues: Abandonment & rejection from my adoption experience! Go figure! !!♡
Congrats on your sobriety! So strange how adoption can unknowingly manifest itself throughout our lives… I had a session with my psychiatrist (bipolar… go figure) yesterday and got so frustrated trying to defend my case when he kept going, ‘Just live in the present and enjoy the time you have with them now. Stop being so self-pitying.’ etc, and in the end I had to throw my hands up and give up. Some things you have to be an adoptee to understand, and although I am lucky and so, so fortunate with my situation (for which I am ALWAYS grateful and letting my family know so) it’s awful to feel as though you are the blame for your own emotions, and selfish and greedy for feeling what you do. I told him it’s the feelings that get in the way of the logic, which I am aware of, but can’t escape because of the overpowering emotion on top of that… therefore feeling guilt where guilt is not needed. Everything that goes wrong feels like I’m being selfish or the cause of it all, and I feel so guilty when the questions start bubbling up; but even worse when I realise it is not my place to ask or tell without hurting someone, always my biggest worry. So good to have blogs like yours just to keep your chin up, because even when it feels that no-one is understanding, there is a community that do. An adoptee can post a semi-colon and we would all instinctively understand!! So, rant over, I really am grateful for your posts. We aren’t that raft floating around the waters with no solid island to land upon, cos there’s a whole community of rafts out there willing to lend you a hand…