I am not grateful to my parents for adopting me

Dec 18

Dec 18 I am not grateful to my parents for adopting me

When I started my blog in 2017, I used the strapline: “Just your average angry/grateful adoptee here in London, UK.” This was to convey the dichotomy of emotions I, and many/some other adoptees, feel. I was coming out of the fog when I started this adoptee blog, and many of my early posts are full of anger, sadness, grief and confusion.

I made a conscious decision not to include any expressions of gratitude in my blog or my tweets. This is because as adoptees many of us have been (subconsciously?) conditioned to preface any comments about being adopted with grateful acknowledgements such as:

“I love my parents but… one day I’d like to find out more about my roots”

“I’m grateful I was adopted but… it has brought certain challenges”

“I had a great upbringing but… one day I’d like to have a relationship with my biological parent/s”

The reason I choose not to use prefaces such as the ones above is not because I don’t love my parents or have a good relationship with them. And it’s certainly not because I want to hurt or upset them. It baffles me that because I don’t use these prefaces people assume I had a “bad adoption” (whatever that means). However, the reason I choose (not) to do this is because I want to make the point that we shouldn’t have to preface our thoughts and experiences with these platitudes and – surely – if we don’t feel the need to use them, that could mean we have a really strong relationship with our adoptive parents? I’ve noticed that some people, including APs, only choose to listen to adoptees who have had a “good adoption” (whatever that means) and I do not want to contribute to that problem.

I don’t think it’s healthy for adoptees to feel they have to add these caveats. I myself used them in the past and this must have started at such an early age that I don’t remember, but I do remember the conversations always went more smoothly if I took the time to acknowledge my parents’ feelings before my own.

Having made the decision not to use these caveats in my (at this stage anonymous) writing was the easy part. Sticking to it was difficult. I had to edit and triple edit my blogs and I held my breath every time I pressed publish in case somehow my mum would instinctively know I’d written about adoption without including my caveats ‘like a good girl’.

I meet lots of adoptees as a result of the groups I help run and events I attend, and I can tell you that adoptees of all ages from 20 to 80 are using these caveats, as well as ones like,

“I had a happy upbringing but…”

“I don’t want to upset my lovely parents but…”.

We don’t even realise we are doing it most of the time!

I suspect one of the reasons we use these caveats could be that somehow deep down we believe we are ‘less than’ and our needs are secondary (to those of our adoptive parents).

This speaks to a deep insecurity that if we do not show a level of deference or gratitude we may be rejected or ‘sent back’ because we are not honouring the unspoken agreement. This unspoken agreement comes from the shame narrative around (often young) unwed mothers and illegitimate babies. As illegitimate babies, we were seen as ‘lucky’ to get a home and a family, particularly if this was a two-parent heterosexual Christian family. Presumably to save our souls from the sins of our mothers (never our fathers, of course).

So we grew up with the spectre of the children’s home looming over us, familiar with phrases like “languishing in care” (which was used only recently on Twitter). With the unspoken inference being, if it wasn’t for us “taking you in” bringing you up “as our own” who knows where you would be. Maybe in an orphanage, left on a doorstep, or even dead…? Whilst our parents themselves may not have said or thought these things, we were exposed to popular culture, playground taunts and comments from extended family, neighbours and teachers. In fact, when my sister hit a crisis point in her adolescence, our uncle – incidentally also her godfather – was quick to suggest my parents “wash their hands of her.” And many of us can tell of experiences where we have been urged to show gratitude and avoid upsetting our APs after “all they’ve done for you” by acquaintances and even strangers at dinner parties and on aeroplanes.

I wish I could say that only older adoptees such as myself heard things like this, but I know of one teen adoptee whose parents said they will “put her back into care” if she doesn’t toe the line. I told a close friend I was nervous about appearing in Grazia magazine talking about being adopted and having post-natal depression. I said I hoped my mum would be supportive of my choice to appear in the magazine. My close friend urged caution, reminding me of everything my parents have done for me.

My parents have done a lot for me, yes. But no more and no less than any of my non-adopted friends’ parents have done for them. Again, the inference I hear here is that they have done something extra to be commended, given that I am an unwanted baby who would have “languished” in the raggy doll bin if my parents hadn’t come along and “saved” me. The thing is, my parents didn’t wake up one day and decide to offer a family and home to an unwanted baby. They tried to have a baby for ten years and then decided to adopt. They don’t campaign for support for adoptees; they don’t advocate for birth parents’ rights; they simply wanted a baby. Preferably one that they could pretend was their own. (*Forces self not to add “That’s just the way things were in those days.”*)

And I am theirs. I am very happily their daughter. However, I am also genetically someone else’s daughter too, and I have a complete and total right to: