HOW DO YOU HEAL THE UNEXPLAINABLE?

Sometimes it’s so hard to be adopted. 

Things that are said, things that happen are so activating. Sometimes it’s just a word or a phase. People around you have no idea what they have said or what they have done to upset you. It’s as confusing to me as it is to you! Me, as this adopted person, has no idea how to express what is going on, because in many ways I’m still a child trying to form the words for the feelings that are inside my body. I can revert to my 5-year-old self in a split second, pouting and quiet or angry and frustrated.

I know, to the non-adopted person your like wait, what? This makes no sense. Truly, it doesn’t either to me, the adopted person. 

This likely only makes sense to a person that has experienced trauma in their childhood. I would say that the only trauma (as if this isn’t very much) I have had was being relinquished at 18 days old. For the 18 days between my birth and my placement with my family, I have no idea where I was and how I was cared for. It’s as if my second chapter is missing. 

Let that sink in a minute.

Up until 6 months ago, I had no idea it was 18 days that I was in foster care for most of that time. 

In my heart, the story I told myself for most of my years is that I was in a magical in- between place that was full of happy babies and caring, nurturing nurses. Unicorns and rainbows too, I am sure.

In my body now, it feels like I missed a lot in that time. Mostly being held, talked to and bonding. Of course, I don’t know any of this for sure and I never will. 

My story is different from most and I realize am grieving that now. 

Do you have time missing from your story? 

Can you ask your biological mother for the story of your birth? 

My grief comes out of me in different ways. Sometimes anger, sometimes I’m quiet and sometimes, rarely, I can talk about it. The grief takes over and carries me down a rabbit hole, luckily the rabbit hole is less deep than it was years ago and I can find my way out faster. Nonetheless, it’s a thing that is there. I am always aware that it can pop up its ugly head and send me spinning.

There are days I am on top of the mountain, feeling good and nothing is going to trip me up. Other days I am struggling to figure out what is the matter. Its unexplainable. Something I am feeling, something that was said, or the way someone has treated me. It sometimes only takes a second for the abandonment, loss and the grief to knock me over like a wave.  

Lately I have gotten better at catching myself, better at feeling my body and talking myself out of the rabbit hole.  This means I am on high alert for things that can activate me. This means that there are very few places I can relax and feel safe. As I am learning to feel safe and the people closest to me are learning as well. I spent 57 years just wandering in my life feeling as if the world was out to get me because that’s how it felt. It’s going to take time to find myself in my body. 

I wonder if we could have talked openly about adoption and my mother who gave me away. What if I could have been told that she existed, she was a real person with a name. No, she wasn’t a movie star that just didn’t have time for me, and no, she wasn’t coming back for me. Would I have then stopped looking in all the eyes of people we passed for something familiar? Would I have stopped waiting for the doorbell to ring and she would be there to get me? Yes, you can tell people your adopted; it’s not a shameful topic for anyone. Would the shame I felt deep inside dissipated?

Growing up, I could not talk about any of this.  I wonder how it might have been better or maybe just different. So many questions, so few answers.

All I know is that I need to give myself a break and heal my wounds.

Thanks, as always for reading.