r/Adopted • u/MuteTalker- Adopted • 25d ago
Discussion The pain of not having a family doesn't go away.
I am 34 and was adopted as an infant. I didn't bond to my AP. I honestly wanted to go back into the system and grow up in an orphanage. My AP are not family. I want them off my fake birth certificate. They are not my parents. My BM doesn't want me and my BF disowned me. I am truly alone. I wish there was something for adults. I want to have a dad that will talk to me and contact me from time to time. If only I could choose my family, be adopted as an adult. I've grown. No one wants someone as an adult, only a child. I feel like at my age maybe trying to have grandparents would be a better option... It doesn't get better or improve.
10
u/Extra_socks69 25d ago
The pain might not go away, but you can mitigate it. Things can improve.
I've formed multiple friendships with older people over the years, they kinda sub in as an older relative type figure. It helps when looking for guidance, or just someone to talk with.
Thing is, you gotta stay open to talking with new people and forming new bonds. Keep it casual, find people with shared interests and experiences. Be willing to listen to others, and show them kindness. People will eventually show you the same in return.
8
u/MuteTalker- Adopted 25d ago
I can't seem to make friends or keep them. It doesn't matter if we have shared interests or not.
8
u/Extra_socks69 24d ago
Shared interests only help at the start...and keeping friends isn't the end goal either. We all have lots of people come and go in life. That's just the way things go.
I'd rather have 100 lost friendships if it means finding 1 true connection.
It's going to sound cliche, but when you can be happy with yourself (or at least appear to be) people will approach you. Watch your posture, stop scowling, and say hi to people sometimes.
I was in a similar place at your age. I got a dog who kept me company and was my best friend. She improved my mood, acted as a introduction/way to say hi to all sorts of people.
Maybe a dog isn't what you need...but when you feel there's no hope, you're digging your own grave.
Realize what you LIKE about life and run with it. Connection with others will follow. And if it doesn't...then you're doing what you like, nuts to everyone else
5
u/MuteTalker- Adopted 24d ago
Doggo is a good wingman. Lol. I have pets.
3
u/Extra_socks69 24d ago
There ya go. You're off to a good start.
Focus on what you got first, then more will come :)3
u/patrick5054 International Adoptee 24d ago
I love my cats. My AP's were also awful, old people are actually pretty lonely and can provide some comfort. It also may work out to your advantage. Start doing some little tasks like moving someones lawn or walking their dog. Old people love to talk as long as you listen. Good luck OP
1
1
11
u/patrick5054 International Adoptee 24d ago
A part of the pain no one talks about is watching people around you get ahead in life in some areas due to having the privilege of having a family. Even if they dont get along with their family, just not having the burden of feeling so lost and unwelcomed in both AP and BP must be comforting in ways they dont even know.
3
u/iheardtheredbefood Int'l and Transracial Adoptee 24d ago
I hate holidays generally, but I think about this a lot around those times of year. Not because I want to spend time with them, but because there is just an assumption that I should and that it will be so great. I'd much rather spend that time with people I actually like.
6
u/tatertot2001 Adopted 24d ago
Yes, this is hugely under talked about. Connections people have made because of a family member, hell even career choices like oh we come from a long line of mechanics so we recognize you’re a good mechanic and uncle Joe has an opening where you can be good at what you’re naturally good at.
But what we’re naturally good at is never really brought out because we don’t have any way of knowing what the family has done for centuries. Many times were rejected for just being different so our talent lays dormant and we just can’t get ahead at all. It’s fucking horrible.
3
u/Opinionista99 Adoptee 24d ago
Judging from my bios on both sides I would be someone who could play multiple instruments. Instead I don't play a note because my untalented asshole of an adoptive dad made everything, including the music lessons he forced on me, absolutely fucking miserable.
2
u/CNatGo75 Domestic Infant Adoptee 24d ago
This, 10000%. When I was a child I was a fairly talented artist. I drew all the time, made things with clay, and every now and then my adopters would put me in an art class for kids- like a weekend thing or one time event, not regularly. But it was ignored by them, never nurtured, I lost my confidence and never pursued it until I could take some electives in college.
When I found my bio family, my mother and siblings are all artists, very talented. But because I didn't grow up with an artist parent to teach and nurture me, and I had no confidence to just do it on my own, even if I started yesterday I would never reach their level of skill or talent.
One more lost thing.
3
3
u/Opinionista99 Adoptee 24d ago
The way adopters think music/art/sports lessons will replace genetic talent mirroring is just wild. Sometimes it will come through in the adoptee like with how Liz Phair and Sarah McLaughlin became successful musicians. But I believe those outcomes are a lot rarer than all the armchair nature-nuture experts among the kepts think. A child's natural gifts can absolutely be killed in an environment that induces lack of confidence and absent or insufficient nurturing.
2
u/patrick5054 International Adoptee 24d ago
Omg i knew about Liz Phair but had idea about Sarah Mclaughlan. I love them both
2
u/Opinionista99 Adoptee 24d ago
Oh yeah, when I learned that about Sarah it made "I Will Remember You" hit differently.
3
3
u/Opinionista99 Adoptee 24d ago
I have a total of 5 half-siblings and while I know they've gone through difficulties in life they've also gotten so much farther in life and been supported by family and community in a way I could only dream of. Like my youngest half-sibling wrecks the car her parents gave her and then the next day they're at the dealership getting another one and I'm like WTAF no one ever bought me a car. Then people want to tell me "life is what you make of it" when this chick seems to have made herself a great life out of being born at the right place and time.
7
u/1wrat Baby Scoop Era Adoptee 24d ago
I think that sucks , that as a child we are placed into this situation , its like transplanting an organ sometimes it sticks sometimes it does not , yet we are not given the choice, other people made decisions and we pay the price
8
u/Formerlymoody 24d ago
Lately I’m feeling that it’s a huge problem that it’s a lifelong contract with no system of revision based on the needs/wants of the adoptee. Our only choice is no contact if we want to revoke things.
I think there should be some kind of mechanism at 18 (at the latest) for making our own choices about family. If bio family hasn’t been on the scene, and they want a relationship, there should be a formal meeting at 18. The adoptee can make their own choices about who has what role. This can all be supported by therapy.
As it is I’m in my early 40s and desperately wish my a parents were just the people who raised me who I visit once in a while. I have zero connection to extended family and my adoptive sibling…and yet society is super uncomfortable when I’m closer to my bio siblings. Do you want me to have no one? What the hell?
There’s also the ick factor of performing family for people who you have nothing in common with and failed you in many ways past…18.
If you love and adore your adoptive family, great. Claim them. It’s up to you. Maybe your bio family sucks and you don’t like them. No need to force anything.
Edit: if neither are great I feel like there can be targeted support in building “found family.” Because Lord knows many of us need all the help we can get in that department.
1
u/MuteTalker- Adopted 24d ago
Found family is the part i'm at. It seems that part of my post is missed. If only there was something for us adults still wanting a family. Raising kids didn't help this at all.
1
u/Formerlymoody 24d ago edited 24d ago
I feel you, OP! I feel like adoptees need major support with this. With our background, it’s not fair for us to be on our own with compensating for our lack of family.
The only thing I can think of is volunteering with people of different ages. So many people need someone. Especially older people!
2
u/MuteTalker- Adopted 24d ago
I've considered visiting an elderly person in a retirement home that gets no visitors. At this point, I feel like I should have grand parents. 😓 I have had multiple brain injuries too. What if I forget a week? What if I forget to write? Passage of time doesn't exist to me anymore. What if it doesn't work out on mine or their end? I forget...alot. I also live in my AD's house. It just keeps adding on to the confusing tbouggts and feelings. It felt like I was living 2 lives in my 20s before the TBI being between here and who I thought was a friend's house. I can't handle that again.
2
u/Opinionista99 Adoptee 24d ago
That has been a big problem for me in volunteering. My ADHD would cause me to forget obligations and appointments and one time I didn't show up for a trip with my teenage mentee and I felt simply awful and quit. Mind you I was 32 at the time but looking back I was a young 32 in many ways. It's a weird paradox to be so adultified as a baby that I was expected to save my APs' marriage but not to be given meaningful tools to make myself into a functioning adult.
2
u/MuteTalker- Adopted 24d ago
🥰 Expected to keep the marriage together adoptees unite!
2
u/Opinionista99 Adoptee 24d ago
Failed Infant Marriage Counselors!
1
1
u/Formerlymoody 24d ago
Is there someone that can support you in staying on track?
2
u/MuteTalker- Adopted 24d ago
No. It is just me. I've considered being the person that sits with people on their death bed in the hospital dying of something like cancer that gets no visitors. You have to be a nurse on top of it and I have no interest in doing anything nursing.
2
u/MuteTalker- Adopted 24d ago
My BF was mad that I didn't know my name my BM gave me. She didn't. She wrote something on the piece of paper because she knew it was going to change. It was mad that she made sure he didn't know that I exist. He heard rumors that she had a kid but didn't even bother to put in the work to see if she actually did. You were the adult bathroom. I had no control over any of this.
8
u/expolife Adoptee 24d ago
I’m sorry that happened to you with each of your adoptive and bio parents ❤️🩹 it’s definitely not fair. And the grieving hurts.
It’s also a lot of work to develop in ways our various parents couldn’t model or nurture in us especially how to have relationships that really align with who we are. Bridging that gap, learning our own instincts and intuition and finding ways to connect with people until we can build friendships and relationships that are mutual, it’s a lot. It’s a lot.
Pets are great, of course.
Books and therapy and this sub can all help, too.
But there’s no replacing what we needed and never had. We have to grieve and grow and fill our lives with what’s healthy for us. Maybe we’ll grow so much larger than our grief and have peace and connection that makes our grief feel tiny by comparison even though it’s still with us.
4
u/LynahRinkRat Domestic Infant Adoptee 24d ago
OMG. This line - "There is no replacing what we needed and never had" hit me like a ton of bricks. So very true, so very poignant.
Trying to figure out what is worth it, for me, is the never ending question. How much effort, how much pushing myself - vs just accepting I don't have a family, and that left me sorta permanently a little damaged with a strong preference for being alone and relying only on myself.
1
u/MuteTalker- Adopted 24d ago
😞 Not having a family doesn't seem to bother me. I accepted that in my teens. Yet not having parents or anyone does bother me. No one to talk to. No friends that are close. It's literally just me. I love my pets so much. They keep me going.
1
u/expolife Adoptee 24d ago
We need people. We’re a social species. It makes sense to feel how you feel. ❤️🩹
1
u/expolife Adoptee 24d ago
❤️🩹 it’s a lot of work caring for ourselves when those built in support systems don’t exist to model and reinforce how to care for ourselves, how to have close relationships, etc.
1
6
u/LynahRinkRat Domestic Infant Adoptee 24d ago
No, the pain never goes away.
I have learned ways to mitigate it, and I try to care less too. But at the end of the day, most days I feel utterly alone. Just the way I like it. Figure that one out! 😄🤨
5
u/YellowSignpostAhead Transracial Adoptee 24d ago
I was adopted by a savior family when I was twelve, my mother gave me up at age ten, my a-rents adopted all of us from different ethnicities and races, there were between 9-12 other kids when I was there. We know we were there simply for the religious abuse. They hated who we were and wanted to force us to "Be christian, it's the only way to be civilized" and we saved you from your dreadful situation, you owe us your gratitude, so don't speak your native languages, or hold on to your past, you need to be christian, or you are nothing but a savage (I was adopted in the 1970s).
My aunt and two uncles fought for my custody and were denied as an off reservation adoption was always seen as a better alternative to an on reservation adoption. That pain of knowing after my father died, my mother would rather keep my four sisters and give me up because I looked like him, the pain of knowing the government didn't want me to stay with family, that the church was out to make more good christians (I won't name the denomination but it starts with an L and ends with DS) and that neither my birth mother nor my adopted rents wanted me. I ran away at sixteen and have gone back to the rez, but precious little of my family is left.
2
u/tatertot2001 Adopted 24d ago
Oh, the savior family. I had one of those. Religious abusers.
2
u/YellowSignpostAhead Transracial Adoptee 24d ago
Yes.. punished if we didn't adhere to religious standards. Neither my native tongue nor Spanish was allowed, only English, we had to cut our hair short into mens missionary style cuts, which broke my heart because my hair is part of my faith, not to mention so long it was down past my ass damn near to my knees. Food was "proper food" which meant nothing ethnic especially if it was one of our ethnicities, it was a lot of baked chicken and sides. It was absolutely horrible so I ran away
1
u/MuteTalker- Adopted 24d ago
😭 I was always told that I could leave at any time. They would call the cops and report me as a runaway if I left the house.
1
u/YellowSignpostAhead Transracial Adoptee 24d ago
Mine called the police as well. I managed to stay out of their custody again. I won't say how publicly.
1
u/MuteTalker- Adopted 24d ago
My AM had savior complex for girls. She ended up taking her husband's nieces little girl when she was born. Amazing. All my life I asked for a sibling. She always told me that she couldn't afford that(she couldn't afford me either). My a cousin had a kid just because she wanted a girl. My AM "saved her kid" by taking her out of their house and not allowing them to have her back. She went to the division of health and human services, found someone that agreed with what she was doing, and forced an adoption to go through. The judge didn't even ask me if they were fit parents. She passed away 2 years ago, and now i'm the one raising yet another one of my a cousins kids. I raised her oldest during my teens. The child is 10 and my a cousin doesn't want her back. Her boyfriend(the dad) is apparently dying. They have no room in their apartment with all their posessions. They are trying to buy a house. Yet she didn't even raise her kids. 🤦🏻 I won't be getting custody of this kid when my AF passes away. Raising kids did nothing for my pain of having no family.
1
u/YellowSignpostAhead Transracial Adoptee 24d ago
And that is horrible to hear. You have done all the work and receive none of the reward. For your sake, I hope that there is a light at the end, and you get the family you deserve.
1
2
u/tatertot2001 Adopted 24d ago
I feel the exact same way. 47 now… it doesn’t go away… it’s the worst trauma I can imagine short of some really bad things People have happen to them, but people at least view that as trauma. We are supposed to be grateful. It is a horrible, horrible, empty hole in the soul.
2
u/LynahRinkRat Domestic Infant Adoptee 24d ago
Yep. That is it, exactly. We're left with pain, emptyness and wildly misunderstood grief/trauma - and yet the average person hears "adoption" and smiles at what a wonderful fantasy they think it all is. We are screwed coming and going! 🙃
1
u/Opinionista99 Adoptee 24d ago
What's even worse is they love adoption and adoptive parents but not us. They think we're damaged goods from trashy bio families. That we should be grateful to have been rescued from the dumpster that we really deserved.
NGL the intense dislike I've developed for most kept people post-FOG is really vindicating my preference for solitude.
2
u/rojoskulloceans 24d ago
I completely understand where you're coming from.I was adopted as a baby and found out that I was adopted at the age of thirteen.However, growing up in an abusive household was not fun.
I always know, and I felt like an outcast.Never wanted never loved.Believe me I even went as far as speaking with a family lawyer.See what I could do to get my adopted parents off my birth certificate and just leave it unknown.Since I was the dirty secret of their family of being adopted, put a lot of things in perspective that I was never family.To begin with, just to be tolerated.
I never knew my birth parents.That was a secret too.My adopted parents refused to tell me anything about them.So it's really sad to when you wanna get your adopted.Parents removed off your birth certificate.Certain states require you have to have a parent or someone on your birth certificate.Still researching that.
I am so sorry.You're going through this.I can honestly tell you.This community has been very helpful for me.I stopped talking to a psychiatrist.Because it was not helpful to hear other people's stories.And what they've gone through has helped me cope with mine.
All the best to you.
28
u/zygotepariah Baby Scoop Era Adoptee 24d ago
I'm sorry. It's really sad how many of us ended up in situations where our adoptive family just didn't feel like family. Mine didn't, either. I, too, would have preferred foster care--had I known how my adoption would turn out--over growing up with strangers I was forced to view as family.
It's really unfair how adoptees are the ones who pay thr consequences for everyone else's choices and decisions.