10 Things Adoptees Want You to Know

This is a piece written by Lesli Johnson. It was published by the huffington post last week. She does a great job of writing about the adoption experience generally speaking, which is incredibly difficult to do without being offensive. Her article is by no means perfect but it is by far the best of its […]

Internalizations Gone Wild

I grew up assuming that I was adopted because my biological relatives could not take care of me. Implicit within that assumption was that they did not want to take care of me. I never found it to be very harsh. I just assumed that they were unable to care for me and so they […]

Adoption Blogger Interview Project 2012: Robyn

Dear Blogosphere, Today, as a participant in the Adoption Blogger Interview Project 2012, I am submitting my interview with blogger and professional Robyn from AfrikAdvantage. Robyn and I met through this project a few weeks ago and since then have exchanged many emails and have had a few lengthy phone conversations. Through our conversations and […]

Difference Doesn’t Always Mean Separate

There are a lot of negative adoption stories and experiences “out there”. I have been privileged in many many ways and that privilege carries over into my experiences with adoption. Although it hasn’t all been good, I can confidently say that I am glad I was adopted. I can’t really say I would prefer it […]

My File Part III: Mouse Free

[This is a continuation of My File Part II: Bites Away] A few days after graduating from college and returning to my childhood home I found myself in our dirty cobwebbed basement rummaging through Tupperware boxes. These boxes were filled with contents from my childhood. Most of the contents of the hulking green metal desk […]

Family In Flux

A theme that keeps cropping up is this idea that adoptees, although I still don’t really like that title, are not really related to their adoptive families. It seems that underlying this argument is the assumption that family is defined by who is biologically related to each other. Obviously though, as I’m sure everyone acknowledges […]

No Typical Adoption

I started writing about adoption because I wanted to reflect on my own experiences. I wanted to explore them more thoroughly. I also wanted to hear what other people thought. I had a seemingly primal human inclination at heart. I wanted to know if there were other people “like” me, who had similar experiences. I’m […]

My File Part II: Bites Away

[This is a continuation from My File Part I: A Baby’s Biography] Sitting on my hardwood bedroom floor I pulled back the manila cover. An old typwritten piece of white stained paper sat in front of me. The top of the page read “Congregation of the Sisters of The Cross of Chavanod” below in bold […]

Pretending

Pretending that your child is not adopted or withholding that information from an adopted child may be the single most disrespectful thing a parent can do to their child. In essence, the act of withholding that information is a statement by the adoptive parent’s that the act or state of being adopted is, in of […]

Unsually Aware

I am an unusually aware person. Or at least I am unusually aware of how people perceive me. As a young adult most people have a strong understanding of how social norms work and thus know how to evoke a desired response in most situations. But as children we are less adept in picking up […]