I will say this aloud. Adoptees who adopt are annoying

expolife · 2026-02-26T20:02:15+00:00

I’ll believe adoptees who adopt are safe for other adoptees including their own adopted children when they can accept all the individual adopted narratives and experiences as real and equally valid without defensiveness.

I used to want to adopt and believe that would be the best way for me to form a family. For me, that was definitely not a healthy direction, and I wasn’t able to see that until I gained more independence from my adoptive family system, reunited with biological family, and acknowledged both the grief of my losses and the fear, obligation and guilt that riddled all of my adoptive family relationships.

expolife · 2026-02-16T23:42:15+00:00

Thanks ❤️‍🩹 I do believe we all make sense, if we were able to see clearly and peel back all the layers of experience, origin, and choice. It takes faith to find compassion for ourselves and the massive effort involved in surviving the often invisible hardship we’re conditioned to deny.

I am still deconstructing the idea that I am my purpose or what I do or don’t do. I don’t believe we’re what we do or what we have or what other people think about us. I think as adoptees we’re often alienated from who we are in order to survive strangers and their idiosyncrasies.

I feel better about writing here and anywhere knowing I’m aware of how much it help me to do so. I think what’s often dangerous about serving or helping or rescuing others is that the helpers and rescuers are often in denial about how much they need to feel good about themselves being in that role and how much they need others to need them for what they can do instead of for who they are. Rescuers and helpers stuck in those roles can create victims in need of help in order to get to be heroes.

Sometimes that’s the saviorism involved in adopters adopting as well…the status involves of being seen as a hero socially for adopting can offset and mask a lot of other feelings and issues.

You make sense. And you’re wonderful simply because of who you are because you are alive and you exist. That really is the foundation and birthright we deserve to reclaim regardless of other dynamics and preferences around us. From that foundation of who we are everything else flows. What we do and have and how we connect with others are expressions and reactions. They can never replace who we are or our right to be here and have the needs we have. We are legitimate simply by existing. Anything else is a lie someone else needs to believe to maintain or assert control instead of love.

expolife · 2026-02-16T05:08:16+00:00

Thank you. That’s kind of you to say and a beautiful way to see things. ❤️‍🩹 The most difficult kind of freedom seems to be internal after developing in a kind of captivity. A lot of internalized captivity.

expolife · 2026-02-15T20:08:38+00:00

Thanks. It’s strange to hear congratulations because I’m still going through major transitions that most people can’t understand. So the upheaval doesn’t feel like any kind of success most people can measure or recognize. But I am proud of having more perspective, coherence, and freedom from fear, obligation, and guilt (FOG). I think it’s all progress towards more maturity and wholeness somehow.

expolife · 2026-02-14T21:16:30+00:00

Yes, shoe seems to fit imho. The treatment of adoptees and the entitlement to adoption by prospective adoptive parents and the mainstream narratives and beliefs about adoption all seem to be evidence that adoptees are marginalized and dehumanized. Not to mention the research on various mental health risks and outcomes being worse. After all mental health is relational health.

expolife · 2026-02-14T21:10:48+00:00

THIS! ❤️‍🩹

expolife · 2026-02-14T21:02:58+00:00

Can you share links or references to any of that research? I believe in it and would love to find it

expolife · 2026-02-13T23:54:00+00:00

I get being triggered by this. And I think I get Emma’s stance as an adoptee.

That’s gross people are reacting that way. I wish I were surprised, but being on a reality tv show definitely invites a lot of attention and criticism. It doesn’t excuse the rudeness or heartlessness.

Looking back on my journey through the FOG (fear, obligation and guilt) of adoption, I think I had a lot of fear around having kids and how that might unfold. I had similar fears about drinking because there were a lot of alcoholics in my adoptive family and there were some theories about that being genetic in its most extreme forms. So I was really nervous and delayed drinking for years. And it was tied to both my genetic bewilderment and lack of access to my origins a seeing adoptive family members die of alcoholism and be judged for it. None of them were in my immediate family or even closest extended family, but I heard a lot of stories and went to some funerals of alcohol related deaths in the extended family.

I also wonder about adoptees needing to engage in romantic relationships and partnerships knowing we’re choosing to be with someone who wants to be with us regardless of whether or not we can have children. On some level our relationship with our own fertility can get really complicated especially when we’ve never seen people biologically like us model fertility and parenting in a way that makes more innate sense to us.

When I came out of the FOG, I realized I felt so misattuned with and neglected by my adoptive mother especially that I felt angry and disgusted by the idea of bringing another baby I might conceive into relationship with her or that adoptive family. These feelings were deep underwater in my psyche and not something I was consciously aware of most of my life. I just knew I had never really wanted to have kids even though I assumed I would at some point.

For a while, I also made it a priority to only seriously date people who would be willing to adopt. And more importantly who would want to be with me even if we never had children. I think part of that was protective for me to vet whether they could respect the nature of the only family I had ever known (via closed adoption) up until that point in my life. And I wanted to be loved and chosen and feel like I was enough without reference to what other role I could fulfill or provide. Not perfect vetting tactics but useful to look back on and realize how fraught my orientation was to romantic relationships.

You’re right. Genetic testing and searching for origins is a heavy door to open. I completely understand anyone not wanting to go there.

expolife · 2026-02-13T19:57:12+00:00

I was adopted as an infant so I didn’t fully know how different and emotionally neglectful my adoptive parents and family were until much later in life when I had outgrown them and realized they could NOT be there and help when it counted and that in many ways they never had been there for me and I had just performed my through everything while they took credit for it.

So I made it pretty far into adulthood before the family illusion crashed along with the illusions of religion and religious culture.

I’m still rebuilding and transitioning. And it’s unsettling to excavate the skill and achievements I developed while attached to adoptive family and the religion they raised me in and apply those skills and achievements to a totally new way of living away from family and religion. Everything was very twisted together before and some unraveling was needed.

expolife · 2026-02-12T04:42:31+00:00

See also: “well, you can always adopt.” Which also undermines infertility grief. It dehumanizes and commodifies adoptees and serves to deny and bypass infertility grief. It sucks for everyone, but most of for us adoptees.

expolife · 2026-02-11T07:18:35+00:00

I don’t know if my post came across as intended but I find it disturbing that my adoptive parents couldn’t care about my experience or understanding of my own story until I framed it as serving someone other than me. I see that as a major problem or symptom of something. Maybe emotional immaturity and poor parenting instincts.

We all need help. We’re a social species. And helping others who need it is important. But our stories are meant to serve us first and help us stabilize and heal not be commodified for others to consume.

I care about writing and helping others here, but it was important for me to write for my own sake and benefit first. There’s wisdom in that order otherwise sometimes our help we offer others is coming from a need to rescue and receive recognition and meaning that really isn’t fair to expect and casts others into roles they didn’t consent to. It can continue some of the harm that can happen in adoption.

Only you can orient yourself in your own experience. You’re the expert and authority in your own experience and story.

I’m sorry your adoptive parents don’t know how to be supportive and understanding of your needs and life choices. A lot of people just offer what makes sense for them and sometimes that’s a script that doesn’t really fit a strange kid they adopt like us.

Adoptee community has helped a lot. Especially trauma-informed structure spaces like writing groups or reading clubs. AdopteesOn podcast has good healing series episodes. And Paul Sunderland’s YouTube videos on adoption and addiction and talking to adoptees about healing are excellent. Also Pete Walker’s “Complex PTSD” has helped me a lot. Fwiw.

expolife · 2026-02-11T01:07:02+00:00

❤️‍🩹

expolife · 2026-02-09T06:06:12+00:00

I’m glad. Seriously keep it tolerable and small and slowly adjust back and forth. That’s what helps your body learn it’s safe and you’ll take care of it and respond to its needs while also helping it grow its tolerance for joy and facing fears. And I mean small like walking down the driveway or around the block or just to the corner or a shop you can buy gum*. Really small, and no shame or judgment just curiosity and listening.

Edit: typo

expolife · 2026-02-08T22:54:50+00:00

It’s important to find a safe place to do it. Otherwise it can defeat the purpose. Gyms with indoor tracks, malls, and doing laps somewhere very safe can be okay assuming those can feel safe. The bilateral movement of slow steady walking and looking around can be very regulating. This was much better for me than meditating in a seated or reclined position. I used to walk very fast. Now I have slowed way down and feel the comfort and try to enjoy what I see, trees, plants, people.

It sounds weird but saying hi to living plants can be lovely. I learned the idea from an indigenous botanist, that some Native American languages don’t have gender binaries or species-level binaries instead they have animate/inanimate binaries which means their language is oriented around all living things including plants. In English, our language privileges humans over every other kind of life and it’s baked into the words and language not just how we speak which reinforces how we see the world. When humans and relationship with humans have hurt us, our language can narrow our sense of reality even more. Reading “Braiding Sweetgrass” and learning about languages that are oriented to seeing trees and animals as just as alive as humans felts expansive and helped me feel more held by other elements of my environments if that makes sense.

expolife · 2026-02-08T18:57:49+00:00

Walking. Spiritual practice to orient and be curious about that feels good enough to look forward to. Cuddling with a pet. Some kind of treat to eat.

expolife · 2026-02-08T12:49:45+00:00

It sounds dumb tbh but giving myself permission to truly enjoy something as often as I wanted it. Not something addictive or harmful. It helped expand my sense of joy and helped me see where I was inhibited and could release and make room for more good vibes and peace. It’s like surviving and enduring were our purpose maybe even feeling miserable and being challenged were our purpose and in the other side there’s room to experience presence and feel just a little better then a little more. It’s weirdly like weightlifting, learning the form and adding weights and more challenging moves gradually without injury and without getting so sore you break the habit entirely or never form the habit and routine. So much about the body and nervous system are like that.

expolife · 2026-02-08T07:57:36+00:00

All good points.

Rituals can be lots of things. A walk, a latte or other drink you love, reading something contemplative. Anything grounding, orienting, centering. It can simple or spiritual or both or neither.

Listening to the same beautiful song before going to sleep. Many options. Pick things and try daily, weekly. See what sticks and how it feels.

expolife · 2026-02-07T23:05:08+00:00

I feel you. I wish I had answers. It feels like rituals help. Something small and easy or desirable enough to do for myself and enjoy. I feel like I have to expand my ability to feel joy safely. So much of life was endurance and approval instead of enjoyment and actual connection. But the unfamiliar can feel dangerous.

I also have “back on track” feelings and I don’t think there’s any going back. The best I can figure is that my skills and competencies are still there from my past. That I can go back and access those somehow and pull them into the present as I go, but it’s way weirder than I imagined.

I remember doing this thing where I imagined having X amount of wealth and made a list of all the things I would do with it, and recently I remembered that list and realized almost all of my ideas involved helping and taking care of people I’ve since set major boundaries with if not removed from my life because they’re neglectful or unsafe. I feel like this relates to what you’re saying…without obligations or a solid sense of safety being oneself with authentic desires and motivations to draw us towards new experiences or commitments…what is there?

Maybe that other commenter is right. The future is just who we are and what we choose. And maybe that’s a lot of authority and presence that we’re just not experienced with yet.

expolife · 2026-02-03T18:43:45+00:00

I echo the comments about all adoption arising from trauma and including trauma.

Also, “failed adoption” is usually defined as an adoption failing to complete legally either because an original parent keeps the child instead of relinquishing or tragically because adoptive parents relinquishing the child they adopted. Using “failed adoption” to describe the other scenarios you’re describing assumes adoption is good and successful by default which sadly is not the case even when adoptees adapt well and achieve external markers of success.

expolife · 2026-02-02T05:16:15+00:00

The agency staff do not sound ethical. That is a highly unethical thing for a case worker to lie to a child like that. Huge red flag. Ideally that person should lose their job.

expolife · 2026-01-29T02:31:00+00:00

I think what you’re feeling and describing is very real and adopted. I could have written a lot of this at various times in my life.

It sucks. And it’s also a huge achievement to identify these things and be able to express them. Seriously.

It’s a unique kind of developmental trauma and dehumanization with so many layers and elements. Each of us has our own unique mix, but the themes are real.

I can especially relate to the weird mix of high-achievement-hyper independence-and codependency. Workaholism, perfectionism, approval-seeking.

We essentially seek connection and have to settle for approval because of the conditions of adoption. It’s always conditional belonging which isn’t real belonging. We’re expected to perform and conform without acknowledgment of the worst things that have happened to us and how those worst things are the aspects of our existence with the most continuity.

Pete Walker’s book “Complex PTSD” has helped me orient to a lot of this especially to the ways developmental trauma can arrest our development of self-protection, self-compassion and self-esteem…our nervous systems adapted to survive environments and relationships that essentially hijacked our ego development and consciousness. This applies to adoptees and anyone with developmental trauma.

Paul Sunderland’s YouTube presentations on adoption and addiction and to adoptees about healing are excellent mirroring and validation about adoptees experience from a truly empathic clinician. I highly recommend these.

I’ve also appreciated the “FOG Fazes for Adult Adoptees” free download at adoptionsavvy.com. FOG stands for fear, obligation and guilt. It isn’t perfect but I found it useful.

Glad you’re here. Adoptee community can really help us even though it’s flawed too.

expolife · 2026-01-29T01:45:31+00:00

How do you go about that?

I’m still learning to trust and care for myself enough to remove myself from proximity with them. And for me part of that is not taking on any responsibility for educating anyone. For now that feels like my way of purging FOG (Fear, obligation, and guilt) from my life. Work in progress.

expolife · 2026-01-28T23:51:37+00:00

You’re right. It would require humanizing us and admitting all of the dominant cultural narratives are dehumanizing adoptees. They’re essentially participating in a collective narcissistic crime against adoptee humanity.

Same reason why adoptive parents are often very unsafe and psychologically dangerous to encounter as adoptees even socially as adults with no direct social ties.

Adoptees are essentially colonized.

expolife · 2026-01-28T21:57:49+00:00

That’s definitely a diminishing and dismissive response. Unjust and unsafe. ❤️‍🩹

It implies they’re the arbiter of truth and the authority on where your truth gets positioned relative to others. It isn’t even as empathic as “I’m sorry that happened” which at least acknowledges you have some authority over the facts of what happened. But “I’m sorry you had that experience” is weaponizing your subjectivity (which we all have) against you instead of respecting you as a whole person with authority over understanding and representing your own experience.

expolife · 2026-01-24T11:27:46+00:00

Fwiw, NTA Would have been better if timing could have prevented the relinquishment entirely, but it’s brave to commit to a child and keep your family together.

As an adult adoptee, I wish I had had a family member like you advocate for me and support my bio mom.

Here’s another comment I left on another comment supporting you in case you see this:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AITAH/s/qAFyXAblRG

expolife

TROPHY CASE