The Adoption Triad

Have you ever considered the profound impact adoption has on all parties involved? Our heartfelt conversation with Vera Snow and Tina Langseth peels back the layers of joy and sorrow that constitute the adoption experience. As we traverse the emotional landscapes of the adoption triad, Vera, an adoptive mother of twins, and Tina, an adoptee, share their intimate stories of love, loss, and the search for identity. They bring authenticity to the table, revealing how the echoes of the birth family's presence can resonate through an adoptee's life and the adoptive family's dynamic.


Contact:
www.asiliveandgrieve.com
info@asiliveandgrieve.com 
Facebook:  As I Live and Grieve 
Instagram:  @asiliveandgrieve 

To Reach Vera:
Website:  www.griefenthusiast.com
Publications written by Vera:
● When You are Coping with Infertility
● Eight Life Lessons I Learned from the Ricochet Heart of a Narcissist


To Reach Tina:
info@asiliveandgrieve.com (I will forward your inquiry to Tina)

Credits: 
Music by Kevin MacLeod 

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

Welcome to, as I Live in Grief, a podcast that tells the truth about how hard this is. We're glad you joined us today. We know how hard it is to lose someone you love and how well-intentioned friends and family try so hard to comfort us. We created this podcast to provide you with comfort, knowledge and support. We are grief advocates, not professionals, not licensed therapists. We are you.

Speaker 2: 0:25

Hi everyone. Welcome back again to another episode of as I Live in Grief. Thanks so much for joining me yet again. You guys are terrific to keep tuning in and I appreciate it so so much. Today it's a bogo Buy one, get one. I have two guests today. With me today are Vera Snow and Tina Lineseth. Vera was with me recently and we talked about immigrant grief. She had another perspective of grief and as soon as she mentioned it, I was all in. So she brought along her friend Tina today. Today we're going to talk about the adoption triad, I think was the phrase that I saw used. So, on that note, I'm going to first say Vera, would you briefly introduce yourself to our listeners, and then it'll be Tina's turn.

Speaker 3: 1:14

Sure, thanks again for having me back. Yes, I'm Vera Snow, and last time I talked a little bit about the work I do with grief and it's just part of who I am and I have a grief journey I had with adoption and that is just something. Again that just continues to be a grief topic for me and for kind of everyone involved in that experience. But it's not a bad thing, it's just, again, part of life. And so my friend Tina I brought along because she is an adoptee and we talk all the time. So I thought it would be really great to discuss her point of view as an adoptee and mine as an adoptive parent.

Speaker 2: 1:54

Okay, Tina.

Speaker 4: 1:55

Well, like Vera said, I am an adoptee. I have been dealing with my own adoption and grief over several issues related to that my whole life. Basically, I'm 64 years old and this started when I was a young child, when I first discovered that I was adopted and it just started the ball rolling. I have been, I've been in search and reunion and I just have worked through a lot of different grief issues around this topic and, like Vera said, we have done a few workshops and I think it's so important for all of the members of the triad the adoptee, the adoptive parents and the birth person or the birth mother to just have a dialogue and to understand that, even though adoption is promoted as just this beautiful, healthy, wonderful thing and it can be that's not the case for every person and there are people who go through extreme trauma due to adoption, and so I think it's really important for us to have that dialogue.

Speaker 2: 3:04

Well said, well said, tina. I admit I tend sometimes to be one of those very naive people that if someone mentions the word adoption, I think isn't that great. There are people out there willing to welcome in a child, a young person, who knows what they've gone through and you know, just welcome them to their family and it's a happy, happy, happy, happy thing. I never, never and Tina's laughing I never have considered for a moment the grief aspect of it, and we talk so often on this podcast that grief isn't tied just to the death of someone you care about. Grief can relate to any loss at all. In fact, one of the very simplistic definitions of grief that I use is that grief is, very simply put, a natural response to an unfortunate experience. So if you use that simplistic definition and you think of adoption, let's flip it over and talk about the losses that each of the triad points is experiencing. Who wants to start?

Speaker 3: 4:15

Go for it, Tina.

Speaker 4: 4:16

Okay, well, I can only speak as an adoptee because I had both my children, naturally, and I have been in touch with my birth mother over the years periodically.

Speaker 4: 4:30

She is not necessarily interested in having an ongoing relationship.

Speaker 4: 4:36

I found her when I was 19 years old and it was a mixed bag of feelings Happy to have concluded that part of my search, but also feeling again somewhat abandoned, which is a running theme with many adoptees, even because she again just was not particularly interested in knowing me, knowing my life, wanting to hear how my childhood was.

Speaker 4: 5:06

And I learned a lot through that experience because, honestly, I thought that that's how it would go and I then discovered that that wasn't the case in my situation. So I think, as an adoptee and again I don't speak for all adoptees, just for myself, but I have grieved so many things around this. I have grieved the idea of what my life would have been had I not been adopted, grieving the genetic relationships I may have had and also grieving the adoptive family that I was adopted into because there were severe problems in that family, including alcoholism and abuse, and so again I'm coming at this just simply trying to talk about my feelings and my grief that I have dealt with, but if you talk to a different adoptee, you might get a different story. In fact, you will get a different story because we all have our own unique stories.

Speaker 2: 6:10

And I would expect that, because with grief, every single grief experience is different. I've experienced grief for I don't know sometimes I lose count. Every time you know my mother, my father, an infant child and my spouse. That's four times, and they've been decades apart, yet each experience has been entirely different. So I would fully expect that the experience for each adoptee and adopted parent and birth parent I expect those would all be different as well. We appreciate the fact that you're willing today, tina, to talk to us very candidly and openly about this experience, because, even though it may be different for others, I expect there are many that your words are going to resonate with.

Speaker 4: 6:59

Yeah, for sure, because I belong to many discussion boards for adult adoptees and this seems to be a running theme throughout all of the discussions that. I am.

Speaker 2: 7:13

I'm sure, and I think that kind of adoptees either may never find, or never want to find, their biological parent or parents as well. Correct?

Speaker 4: 7:24

I have two brothers who were also adopted. We're not genetically related and they neither one of them has ever wanted to pursue anything and I actually have given them information that I've researched and, with their permission, and when I've given them the information, that's where it ended, that's where it ends.

Speaker 2: 7:45

They just don't want to go there, and that's fully okay, that we all have to respect that fact that not everyone wants to go in a certain direction with it. Now I was reminded when you were speaking about a perspective that and I don't know where I heard it I could have read it in a book. I'm not sure that the woman who makes the decision to give her child, especially an infant or a toddler, up for adoption can be viewed and respected, is very brave for making that decision, because you could think you could put it in the perspective that they realize that they would not be the best parent for that child. Did that concept enter your mind at all? Have you struggled with or thought about that?

Speaker 4: 8:35

Well, yes, because I actually heard those words from my mother, my birth mother, that she, like I said, she had really no interest in. She wanted to put it behind her and she felt that it was a decision she made at the time. She told me that she regretted the decision for a while but then, as time passed, she felt that she had made the right decision and she just never wanted to be a parent. She never did have any other children and so I think yeah, I think that resonates for probably many birth parents that they just feel like this is the unselfish thing to do, and for good reasons, very benevolent reasons, and unfortunately, what happens after that is up to the adoption system and the court system and family services, and that's where things can get a bit haywire.

Speaker 2: 9:35

In what respect?

Speaker 4: 9:36

Well, I was placed into a family where there was my father, my birth, I'm sorry. My adopted father was an alcoholic and he was very abusive, and my adoptive mother couldn't have enough children. She was raised in a large Catholic family and they had trouble conceiving and so they adopted my brother, then they had a natural child, then they adopted me, then they adopted another child, then they had another natural child. We also had four foster children living with us during most of my childhood, and so for her there was this incredible deep well of need to have children around her, and so my adoption was tainted with that in some respects, because it was about her, it was about what she needed, and so, and with my father, he just was completely overwhelmed with the family that we had, understandably, and so you know, it was it tainted my experience for sure.

Speaker 2: 10:45

Yeah, yeah, it's an interesting word, tainted but I like it. To me it describes it describes it accurately. You mentioned you also have given birth to two children. Yes, so, being a mother yourself, can you imagine? Have you ever tried to put yourself in that position of having to consider giving one of your own babies up, and what was that thought process like?

Speaker 4: 11:11

Yeah, I think I thought about that a lot when I was pregnant with my son. The first time I thought about that a lot because I felt like I already loved this baby, who I hadn't met yet or I didn't really know, but just was moving around inside me and I already knew and loved that person. Trying to imagine, trying to get in that mindset where I know that after that person leaves my body they will be out in the world without me and I found myself going through a lot of sorrow about that and trying to be happy and enjoy the fact that I was going to have a baby, but also really feeling that heavy, heavy grief that birth mothers some birth mothers will go through.

Speaker 2: 12:00

And had you not gone through that adoptive experience personally, do you think those thoughts would have entered your mind?

Speaker 4: 12:10

I don't think so. I mean it's possible. But I think because that, because that issue is so prescient with me that I just kind of live and breathe it and always have. I think that if I were, just if I'd just gotten pregnant and I had been born from a natural mother, I don't know that that would have been something I would even think about.

Speaker 2: 12:33

Right, right, I wondered about that myself, but because it's been part of the thoughts in the back of your mind forever, you know it would be only natural for you to consider that or contemplate that. One more question, and then we're going to move to Vera for a few minutes. The question I have is did you go directly from being given up for adoption and being adopted, or were you in the foster system for a while?

Speaker 4: 13:00

I was in the foster system for nine months and then I was given to my family for the trial period which is a year, and so I was officially adopted a year and nine months after I was born.

Speaker 2: 13:15

Okay, all right, and that was the first family that had requested to adopt you, correct, correct? Yes, okay, all right. Okay, thanks, we'll be back to you in a moment. Vera, catch us up with a perspective from the adopted parent.

Speaker 3: 13:31

Well, yeah, the grief that, as an adoptive parent, that I go through is not anything anyone prepared you for. Again, it was supposed to be this. You know this wonderful and it is. It isn't a great experience, but there is this phantom. I guess Tina and I've talked about this so many times she has given me so much insight into this phantom mom or phantom family that's out there. So it's this dream that is always I'm always kind of dealing with. My kids are grown now, but I had twins, I adopted twins, and it's like anytime things would go bad or you know they were disciplined or something they would could throw it in your face. You know like and did and did you know like well, my birth family, you know we're not.

Speaker 3: 14:21

My mother, you're not or yeah or like, and I've had this discussion with another woman who's adopted to that like you to ask them to clean their rooms and they will like, over, exaggerate, like I'm not a slave, you know, and you're like what?

Speaker 1: 14:36

You know.

Speaker 3: 14:37

So there's this there's this phantom out there and she helped me so much to put my finger on it. Like, what is this that I'm dealing with? I mean, you are literally almost I. Again, my experience is that I would get jealous of, I'd get jealous of this phantom birth mom that I know nothing about, my kids don't know anything about, but she's always around in their fantasy, and so I guess one of the stories I wrote down here is like the things I never thought about. Right, so I adopted twins, right?

Speaker 3: 15:11

So I'm in the grocery line with my twins, their babies they're white, you know, they could easily be biologically related and somebody says, hey, did you know you were having twins when you were pregnant? And again, it was like it never occurred to me that I would have to sit there in the grocery line and answer that question. Well, and then decide is this person somebody I'm going to share this with? Like, this is such an intimate detail, Wow, and wow is right. And so it was like you know, so I had to make these all of a sudden, these. Like you know what I'd say yeah, I did, and I did know, you know, but it was like you don't I don't need to tell you everything. So it was or or. They would say. People would be like, oh, are words that? Are they identical? And we did not know if they were. So I actually had a blood test done after that encounter and at least I got that for them. So they have that part of their identity. They are identical. But again it was like what? Like who are you people? And they're just asking me these questions and one woman said, Well, either it's one egg or two. Lady, you know, like how rude about it. And so you know, it's these kind of things, it's, it's the every day, like today. This is, I think, is so wonderful.

Speaker 3: 16:31

Today is adoption day for my kids, and it's we called it gotcha day, right? And my daughter actually texted me. She's like, hey, it's gotcha day and again, it's one of those. Okay, is this something I needed to bring up this morning, or is it something she should bring up this morning? Like again, is this about me? Is this about them? Do I want to force this day on them? Like, oh, this is such a happy day. It may not be for them, you know. So it's it's, and Tina's helped me so much with this. Is that we, as adaptive parents, we make so many assumptions that somehow we've created this beautiful place for them and then we just completely forget about their trauma and their possible needs to look for their birth parent or you know. So, always trying to be open to that possibility. Mother's Day, you know, is this about me? Is this about your birthmark, Like always trying to keep it open somehow for them to you know right, so you're not pushing it on them Exactly.

Speaker 3: 17:34

You know, like in school, just the family tree project, oh yeah, was a nightmare. I they had a friend who had lesbian parents, so she was, you know, inseminated and she was in their class and remember we really bonded over that because she's like what are we going to do about this project, you know? So we had to actually go to the principal's office and had to like, explain, yeah, explain what seems like it would be common sense that not everybody comes not everybody as a genuine tree.

Speaker 2: 18:11

Exactly, it's like I'd almost want to redesign the tree and make it one of those like two or three trees that kind of grew together and twisted or something like that you know, yeah, yeah, there was recently I can't even remember what it was.

Speaker 2: 18:25

There was recently a I don't know, this was a Hallmark movie or something that had a portion of the plot about that that the child had to, was adopted, in fact, and had to do a family tree and was just rebelling in school because he did not want to do this assignment, because he didn't know what to do, and his solution, eventually, was to draw a sapling. It was a brand new tree with one branch for him and one branch for the dad who adopted him.

Speaker 4: 18:56

Oh, I love that.

Speaker 2: 18:57

Yeah, it was a brand new tree, a very young sapling, because it was a new family. And then, you know, he stood up in class and explained that to the class. So, yeah, all of these, all of these details I know exist. So it's one of those like, so the adopted parents are kind of walking on eggshells because while you may be so happy and over the moon because you've got these new children or child in your life, they're likely not quite so happy about it. For them it's just, you know, something else they've got to do.

Speaker 4: 19:31

Well, in Vera's case I don't want to speak for her, but in Vera's case it's an inter-country adoption, which adds another layer, because I was locally adopted domestically, and when you had an inter-country adoption, you then add a language barrier and culture barrier, Exactly, and you're taking them from everything that is familiar to them in every way the smells, the sights, the sounds and putting them in a completely different situation.

Speaker 2: 20:08

Oh my goodness, oh my goodness Right.

Speaker 3: 20:10

Yeah, good point Tina.

Speaker 2: 20:12

Now it sounds like, Vera, that you have told your two children that they are adopted. At what age were they when you told them that?

Speaker 3: 20:22

Well, they were seven months when we adopted them and so it's just been. We've always told you know if we started celebrating or whatever talking about adoption day, since day one. Okay so, they've never known anything different. Okay so you know. And again, as much, it's always about giving them as much information that you can give them and international adoptions they don't give you hardly anything. So you're always trying to fill in these blanks. You know, just going to the doctor, you know you have to write adopted genetic information.

Speaker 3: 20:57

You know, it's just these reminders all the time. And you know, one of the things that always bothered me the most and I know Tina's heard this from her own birth mom you are so lucky, they are so lucky, you know, and then people would tell them that you are so lucky that you got adopted. You know, like who says that?

Speaker 4: 21:16

You know what? Yeah, my first mother I mean my active mother said that through my whole life. Yeah, she was lucky I was. Yeah, she saved me.

Speaker 2: 21:26

Yeah she and yeah she. That's a whole other concept. How old were you, tina, when you were adopted?

Speaker 4: 21:34

Well, I was officially adopted at one year and nine months. I found out when I was pretty young, I mean, I was old enough to read. I remember that because I was sitting with my adoptive mom in her bedroom and there were this box with some papers in it, and while she was busy doing something, I was, because I'm a very curious person I just couldn't resist looking through these papers. So I came across a document that said they were my adoption papers. Oh my, it had my original birth name on the certificate. Oh. And so of course I said what's this? And? And my mom I mean she was very good about saying well, you know you're adopted. I think I already knew, because I just felt like a fish out of water in my family.

Speaker 2: 22:27

And.

Speaker 4: 22:27

I thought just something just isn't right here. And so ever since then, so again young, but I don't know exactly how old.

Speaker 2: 22:35

I am Okay, but you've really known for a long, long time. You were very young. Do you know of families where they wait until the kids are teenagers anymore? I think that used to be a thing, oh, I think in the era that I was adopted.

Speaker 4: 22:50

I think, it was unusual for me to know at that early age, right, right, I think the idea was I was adopted in 1961. And the idea at that time was you basically erase the adoptees past Right, and you bring them into the family as if they were always in the family, and so there's no talk about what culture you might have been raised in or what your parents were, what ethnicity or anything like that. You were told to be a member of this family. This is who you are.

Speaker 4: 23:26

Right, these are your roots Right and that always felt so disingenuous to me because I thought, well, it's not hurting anybody if I do know what my actual ancestry is or where I came from. But it always felt like a threat to my adoptive parents, especially my adoptive mother. If I wanted to know, she had a lot of problems with me searching.

Speaker 2: 23:50

Right and that you know that practice of trying to hide all that and everything, when it finally does come to the forefront and is divulged, that the child is adopted, that must have an incredible, overwhelming impact on grief because all of a sudden there's this huge loss. Huge. It's not something that you've been able to deal with as you've aged, as you've grown up, but just all of a sudden it's there in your face.

Speaker 4: 24:17

Yeah, I had a dear friend years ago. She had a child before she got married and then she got married and the new husband officially adopted the child and she just couldn't bring herself to tell him that that was not her natural father or not his natural father. And I implored her for years. I said you have got to tell him you, it's so important to his identity and for him to know. And so she finally did tell him when he was 14 and he erupted. He wouldn't speak to her for probably a year. Then he got so angry he probably felt he'd been betrayed.

Speaker 4: 25:00

Exactly, and so then I had to try to work with her and get her to understand that this is a process. He has to go through this anger and grief Okay, he has to, and so I kind of helped her work through some of that. But it is, yeah, it's a powerful, powerful thing to be told that you did not arrive in this family, the so-called normal way, right, it's a very powerful thing.

Speaker 2: 25:29

Yeah. So if we consider and I know we can't speak so much on the perspective of the biological parent, so let's just focus on the adoptee and the adopted parent A way to potentially bridge a gap and be supportive in grief would be, for no secrets, but as the child grows up, as a child ages, to introduce them to the fact that they were adopted, that they have another mom, another dad perhaps, or whatever you may or may not know just anything, so that you can make it as normal for them. Would both of you agree that that would be a way to be supportive as an adopted parent to your adoptive child, or how would you?

Speaker 4: 26:22

change that.

Speaker 3: 26:22

Do you want to take that one? No, you can take that one, you can.

Speaker 4: 26:28

Actually, I'd like to hear from you first as a adoptive parent.

Speaker 3: 26:32

So yeah, just help me a little bit more to make it normal.

Speaker 2: 26:35

You're asking how to normalize it Well, so that it's not a big secret that's going to jump out of the closet at age 15 or 16, to make it part of conversation, whether even through traditions, celebrations or whatever.

Speaker 2: 26:50

And I know that there are occasions that you may still have an awareness or a small relationship with biological parents. I'm not considering that so much, I'm just leaving the biological parent out of it. Yeah, but just a way that you can maybe not have that blow up of sudden knowledge of adoption, just a way. So I'm looking at it more as supporting your adoptive child so that the grieving part of it can be normalized a bit. Does that make sense?

Speaker 4: 27:21

I think you've got to try to say yeah, if I may interject, I have always loved the way that Vera has parented her children, because she has allowed them to really chart the course. There are a lot of adoptive parents and Vera knows this who are just hell bent on imposing the child's original culture on them and making sure that they learn the language, making sure that they participate in the tradition, the festivals the opposite side of the spectrum Exactly Not so much when I was adopted, but so much more so now that there's almost an anti-denial denial they want to make sure that child understands their roots, which I applaud. But I think that sometimes it goes overboard and Vera and I have talked about this a lot. She didn't do that. She and her husband were. They let it arrive organically.

Speaker 2: 28:26

They give us an example.

Speaker 4: 28:28

Well, if the girls had questions, vera and her husband were always ready to give them a direct, clear answer. So there was never any evasion, there was never any need to cover up anything. I mean, they always told them what they knew and what they didn't know, which is also as equally important, whereas in my experience you just weren't supposed to talk about it. You just didn't talk about that because it was somehow a betrayal to the adoptive family that you would ever want to know that and certainly participate in it. That would be a huge betrayal to the family. So while I was growing up, I was involved in the religion, the traditions, the culture of my adoptive parents, which were both Eastern European and, as I come to know later as an adult, I have a minuscule amount of that ancestry, and so it's just an interesting concept to understand from all of the different perspectives. But I applaud Vera and her husband because they have just been in my mind, they've been model adoptive parents. Honestly.

Speaker 3: 29:43

Okay, well, and it's thanks to Tina too, but I was, you know, I was on your podcast with the immigration group and so I also came from that perspective of not over killing them with these roots because they are adopted from Russia and I mean, I've, I've seen these poor children like from Korea. You know the mom. The mom comes in, it's Korean day and she's got the kid, you know, in those outfits and she's baking something Korean for the class. And just looking at this poor, like kindergarten or like dude, like do you, do you really, you really want this, like you? Just why they just want to be, you know, normal and they, they don't. They're not ready, probably, for any of that.

Speaker 2: 30:30

You almost suspect the parents want to do things so that they can't be blamed later for for holding back. But so I think what I'm hearing here is very. You and your husband allowed it to be a more organic conversation, and now did you generally wait until one of the children brought up a question or a comment?

Speaker 3: 30:54

Yeah, you know I did like the lifebooks where you know you take string. You know it's like make it tangible. You take a piece of string and you make it the length that they were when they were born and you know, just like there's so there's so much out there and I mean it just became overkill, right, and so I was just like you know what, let's, let's just kind of let this happen. You know they don't see one of them has their lifebook, the other one I seriously found it like under their bed the other day. You know they're 26, one does you know they, they one cares, one doesn't, whatever they, you know they're Russian, so we talk about it.

Speaker 3: 31:30

But you know, at school people will, you know, calm commies or something you know. I mean it's kind of like okay, whatever, so they can't be president. That bothers them to know when. That's the kind of thing you know that makes sense, but it's it's kind of like there aren't necessarily these deep need for these things about their culture, that it may not exist, all right, and it just comes out in conversation, right. So like my daughter met a Ukrainian girl, a friend of a friend who was Ukrainian, and she comes home from a dinner party and she's like Mom, we have like the same taste in food and I'm like, well, again, I would never have thought of it Somehow.

Speaker 2: 32:14

She noticed this about this Ukrainian girl, so that came organically like wow, okay never thought of that, you know so it's you, just don't know Okay so if we circle back to grief, then yeah, I'm guessing that both of you might say that because of the way you and your husband have parented Vera, even though your girls are grieving the losses in their life, they are probably feeling more supported and it's not been as traumatic for them as it is in many families. I see Tina's nodding her head. Perhaps.

Speaker 3: 32:52

Yeah, perhaps you know, and there's like a grief, like they didn't come from my stomach. You know, sometimes you know they'll, somebody will say, god, I can't, I just totally forget they're adopted, or you know, or I'm with women who have multiples and I'd be in a multiples like support group and they'd all be talking about these traumatic births and I'm like, well, I didn't have that experience, you know. So there is just this ebb and flow of you know remembering that step, that that wound it's just interwoven into your, into your life. But I think, yeah, like you're saying, it's just to be honest, I guess, about your feelings as much as as humanly possible.

Speaker 2: 33:35

Right and make it as I. You know, I really don't like the word normal, because it's really reflective of what's around you at any given moment. So yeah, you know many times I'm abnormal, certainly, but I guess more organic maybe is a better word for that, Tina? Do you have any thoughts on that perspective, the more organic process, if you will, from the adopted parents perspective? That would help the adoptive children be more comfortable.

Speaker 4: 34:05

Yes, many, I think number one. I think I have to make it very clear that the different eras in adoption really dictate how adoptive parents treat adoption with their adoptive children.

Speaker 2: 34:20

Absolutely.

Speaker 4: 34:20

And I was raised again, born in 59, raised in the 60s. The adopted parents were basically told this is how you do it. You do not refer to them as being adopted, you don't recognize that they're adopted Right, you don't bring up anything around their adoption, you incorporate them into your family as if you gave life, birth to them. And so during my era, there was so much secrecy and so much hidden and so much that was felt to be of benefit to the adopted child. Really, that was the thinking of that era. As time went on, and when Vera adopted her daughters, there was such a difference in how that mentality was and how adopted parents were told to parent their children Right. So I think that's really something that has to be understood. I grew up in a completely different system than Vera's daughters do, and so when I say that Vera is a hero of mine because of the way she's adopted, part of that is because I never had that and never would have had that as an adoptee in that era.

Speaker 2: 35:32

Okay, Is that enough to draw a conclusion? Maybe that for adoptive children today they likely may not have as burdensome grief as those from the 50s and 60s and earlier decades may have.

Speaker 4: 35:53

I think, yes, that's my personal opinion, because they haven't been kept in the dark. Okay, they've been brought up in the light, and the light is you're here because we wanted to have you adopted and you're an American now and this is our life and it's all very up and up. There's no covert. There are no covert messages, right, and I received a lot of covert messages that really told me you have to fit in, you can't be different, and I could not have been more different in my family than my brothers and sisters. We are polar opposites and I always felt like the odd duck, yeah, and so I think if back then, somebody would have validated that and said you know, I understand why you feel this way, but that there was never that conversation.

Speaker 4: 36:51

Right, there was no recognition that that that you, as an adoptee, could all be struggling or grieving Right.

Speaker 2: 36:59

And not just that, but also that when you do have a question, like Vera's daughters, when there is a question, they know they can ask it without the world exploding or re-emloading and that they'll get an honest answer, even if the answer is I don't know Right. So that entire thing, wow, what a disservice we used to do. And I'm so glad that, however, it has shaped and transformed, that it has done that and so that Vera has gained the knowledge and the practice of having that type of environment at home. But I fear, tina, that we've added like another layer to your grief, because now you grieve the fact that you didn't have that experience.

Speaker 4: 37:43

Well, that's you know yeah, that's, that's very true, but I again, I look at it as a very positive thing, right, and I can see how current adoptive parents yes are dealing with adoptees, because I have talked to many adoptees of all different ages and I think it does make a huge difference that the more current adoptees have parents who are open. This is not a secret. It's not something to be for lack of a better phrase ashamed of. I always felt ashamed that I was adopted, right, right, because I thought there was, it was a flaw, a defect, exactly, and it it never felt like it was something I could be proud of. Right, and so few people that I knew when I was growing up were adopted. I think I knew two other adoptees Well, two are my brothers and then there were two others that I knew in our community.

Speaker 2: 38:36

Right, right, right. Well, kudos to you for being willing again to speak very candidly, because, regardless of the fact that it was decades ago and done differently, it's still a cautionary piece for today's families that don't lapse back into something like this, to continue forward and develop these things. So, yeah, go ahead, vera.

Speaker 3: 39:00

Yeah, I think that you know Tina talked about that abandonment wound. I do think that is something that is always there, you know, no matter what the culture has done with adoption, and I never forget, you know how they did a movie. Well, there's a book about Steve Jobs and many movies right, and there's that one line in the movie where he's he here's, here's this guy right, the most this incredibly successful man, and I don't know who he was talking to. Tina remembers it and and he just says what he was adopted and he's like what is what did a baby, what did I do as a baby? Like, what did I do wrong? Yeah, like that wound was still that like what did I do as a baby that I would be and not wanted, or something. And I was just like shocked, you know, because, again, who know, I don't know what his adoptive experience was, but that wound like it's, somehow I did something wrong and that's the heart of it, that it's, it's the right fault, and I mean feeling, yeah, that's.

Speaker 3: 40:01

And I just want to circle back real quick with Tina. Tina took our kids and another child. She did a little workshop with them to talk more about their adoption. Tina, tell them a little bit. I mean it was shocking how they play us sometimes, right, oh?

Speaker 4: 40:19

I mean, I was the, I was the good adoptee there's a whole model.

Speaker 4: 40:23

Yeah, adopting the bad adopt Okay, the bad adoptee is not grateful Bad adoptee. If you're a good adoptee, you play the role, you do what you're told and you do not question authority. You just live your life according to how your parents want you to live it. And so when I got together with these three girls, I I was laughing hysterically through most of it, because they Were telling me how they totally use their adoption in terms of their behavior and what they can get away with and and how they can play the guilt card. And I knew I never Experienced that as a child because I was the good adoptee. I would never have done that. And yeah, here they were, just story after story after story about how they use their adoption to manipulate their parents, and I just was blown away by that.

Speaker 1: 41:22

Wow.

Speaker 2: 41:24

That needs to be published somewhere too. Well, you know I have to at this point kind of raise my hand with the the time signal, but I know for a fact that we're gonna do a sequel to this episode Because there's so much more to cover and so many more specifics we have. Today. We've kind of established, loosely, I think, how the grief can tie in With the child, especially particularly a little bit with the adopted parents as well. Grief equaling loss, okay, but I really would like to dig in a little bit more deeply at another time. So I'm gonna invite both of you ladies back at another time to continue on with the Adoption and how it connects with grief, and maybe another time we can bring in a Biological parent and have the triad right here, absolutely Okay. So before I actually sign off, do either of you want to say something directly to the listeners, without me directing you with question or comment or anything?

Speaker 4: 42:38

Well, I guess the only thing I would say is and again, there are a million discussion boards. There are groups I belong to, adoptees United, many, many groups where Advocacy for positive adoption Experiences is the primary reason for the group, but there are also a lot of other groups that are. Most of their discussion revolves around negative aspects. One of them in particular is a website called bastard nation, and when I first saw that website, I my initial knee-jerk reaction was wow, how can they call themselves that? That's terrible, but they are diehard Adoptes who believe that they need their truth to be told, and so I find it most interesting to be on those websites as well.

Speaker 4: 43:30

But I would say to anybody who is in the triad, and especially to adoptees the only thing that really works is to keep talking about it, keep dialoguing about it, keep Expressing feelings about it. It's not something to be in the shadow anymore, it's something to be brought into the light, and it's necessary To talk about all of these feelings, the grief, the loss, anything really. So that would be my advice. As to adoptees, well said well said Vera.

Speaker 3: 44:02

Um, yeah, I think it's. For me it's just that openness and that just to let yourself be surprised, because I, I remember also thinking as an adoptive parent, I was gonna have these incredible conversations With my kids and then like when they're older, about you know what happened and you know, and all these feelings. And then one day they were like four or five and we're eating pork chops and my daughter, just out of the blue, goes hey mom, did you guys steal us from another family? No, I just, I just choked on my pork chop and I'm like this is not how it's supposed to happen. This is not, I'm not ready for this. And so, embracing the surprises along the way and that what you think is going on in their heads is Probably not what's going at all.

Speaker 3: 44:50

What's going on in their heads? Oh my gosh.

Speaker 2: 44:53

Oh my gosh, you know I have thoroughly, thoroughly enjoyed our conversation. Not only does it give me a whole new outlook on the process, from from either side, from both sides but it's just, it makes everything so genuine. It really does. You know, it's a part of life. So, listeners, you've been very, very patient. I know we've run over today, but I think you will agree that it was well, well worth it, and I want you to look for both Vera and Tina to come back again and maybe we can have the third point of the triad as well. We'll work on that.

Speaker 2: 45:30

But at any rate, I want to kind of Summarize, if you will, that grief is not always about losing someone to death. It's grief equals loss period. And for the adoptive child you know they have lost a life, that as they grow and find out they were adopted it's only natural that they're going to wonder about that and about that loss and what would have been different and what would I have been like, and all the experiences, even if they're in a wonderful, wonderful environment. It's curiosity, it's natural there, you know and there are other losses along the way that they're going to feel siblings, relatives, traditions, cultures, language, whatever for the adopted parent. You know they have losses too. They may have an idea of what this new family is going to be like and that may be far, far far from the truth as these other little Occurrences happen, and also they may have also suffered with the initial loss that they themselves were not able to bear children. That's a huge, huge component of grief.

Speaker 2: 46:37

So know that, whether it is grief through loss by death or grief because of loss of something Important in your life that you wanted had needed, deserved whatever, grief just sucks. You're in, simple, it really does. You know, I Can't, I can't figure it out better, and you have to try to heal through your grief. I've already admitted I'm gonna grieve for the rest of my life. I've accepted that.

Speaker 2: 47:08

I have welcomed grief into my life now and I've kind of molded it. It fits, it's right there, it's part of my soul and I have healed through it. I still have more healing to do, admittedly, and I talk about that from time to time. But yeah, grief sucks, it hurts to heal, but truly, if you move forward through your grief you'll be better for it. So, reminder for self-care that's a part of grieving, so don't forget that. I think I've got a pedicure on my books for another week or so, and that's one of my self-cares that I love being pampered. But at any rate, I hope you'll take care of yourself and come back and join us again very soon, as we all continue to live in grief.

Speaker 1: 47:52

Thank you so much for listening with us today. Do you have a topic that you'd like us to cover or do you have a question from one of our episodes? Please email us at info, at as I live in grief comm, and let us know. We hope you will find a moment to leave a review, send an email and share with others. Join us next time as we continue to live in grief together.