Many adoptee bloggers begin by telling their own story. Maybe they are in the process of searching and chronicle unfolding events. Sometimes they are like me and begin writing the story years after the reunion has unfolded.
My biggest advice to someone going through the search and reunion process is to start a journal and record everything. It doesn’t have to be a public blog, but at least get that journal started. Trust me! You are going to wish you did.
I did not begin writing about my search and reunion until many years post reunion which made it difficult to remember many details. I don’t remember the details of those early conversations, but only generally what was discussed. If I had kept a journal my writing now would be so much easier.
You just never know how events are going to unfold. From the very beginning I wanted to write my story, but I never anticipated putting in online in a blog or publishing a book. Never in a million years did I expect to put it out there for the whole world to see.
Why do we put it out there for the whole world to see?
I recently had a friend comment “there should be places where people can go to discuss these things without putting it out on the Internet.”
Well, the thing is, aside from a few support groups scattered across the nation there really aren’t places to go to share our experiences and find support.
I knew several adoptees growing up, but it was like this unspoken rule that we didn’t talk about being adopted.
Adoptees don’t talk about it. We keep our feelings about our adoption hidden in the deepest recesses of our being. There is no place safe to talk about it.
I did not grow up talking about my adoption and how I felt about it. I know that everyone assumed I was just fine and didn’t have any questions or issues about being adopted. They could not have been more wrong. You can’t make assumptions on the fact that the adoptee never talks about it. In fact if you asked me back then I would have flat out denied it. We all deny it!
When adoptees try to talk about it we are seen as having adoption issues. Because we talk about it people automatically assume that means we had a bad adoption experience. They label us angry and bitter adoptees. Society doesn’t want to hear the truth. They don’t want to hear anything but pretty adoption stories with all the rainbows and unicorns. They only want the fairytale version of adoption. They can’t handle the idea that adoption is anything less than perfect and wonderful.
As a result thousands of adoptees have gone online to find support and have their voices heard. There is a whole online adoption community of adoptees, birth mothers, adoption reform activists and legislators.
Just go on Amazon and do a search of adoption literature written by adoptees. We practically have our own genre!
I recently had a discussion with a fellow adoptee who said she had always wanted to write her memoir but was told it wouldn’t sell. I beg to differ! We read everything we can get our hands on written by fellow adoptees, and there are literally millions of us!
We get each other. We totally understand. Even though in most cases we have never met in person there is a connection that our whole lives we have just never been able to find anywhere else, even in some of our closest relationships.
We finally have a safe place to talk about it.
Somewhere along the way in the telling of our stories we begin to find our voices. Through the writing we are able to make sense of all that has happened. We are able to stand back and look at what we have written and see perspectives we might have missed living the story. We find healing not only by telling our story but in realizing the story has the ability to help someone else.
About the time we finish telling the story, we begin to realize it’s no longer just about us and our story, but now it’s about the greater good. It’s about using the story to make a difference, to advocate change, to educate society, to tell the world the way things have been done in the past is no longer okay, that it’s time to reform the adoption system, to put our stories out there for a younger generation of adoptees coming up behind us so they have something we never did, but mostly it’s to educate society and adoptive parents about what it’s like to be an adopted person. It’s only through the voices of adoptees that society will finally understand.
From a very young age teachers told me I had a gift for writing. I’ve always loved to write. In high school I was on the yearbook and newspaper. My dream was to study journalism. Later, after becoming a divorced single mom, I went back to college as an English major with aspirations of becoming a high school English teacher. I never became a journalist or an English teacher. I became a blogger writing about the very things I had always kept locked away in the recesses of my soul finding purpose in the pain.
Telling our stories isn’t about our writing skills and if we are a good writer or not. It’s about telling a story that needs to be told.
Like most endeavors when you begin to realize this is actually going somewhere you start trying to improve your skills. You begin going back and relearning those grammar and punctuation rules long forgotten and develop the craft of writing, but in the beginning it’s not about that. Don’t worry about that. Just free write!
I was reading an article recently where the person talked about how you know when you are a writer.
You are a writer when you decide you are a writer!
You are a writer when you have a compelling story that has to be told.
You are a writer when you have a story that might help someone else.
You are a writer when you have a story that might effect change.
You are a writer when the story is bigger than just you and your personal story.
Get out that pen and paper. Start that adoption blog you have always wanted to start.
This is a call for all hands on deck.
If we are really going to change adoption in our society then all of our voices are needed. The clang on one cymbal might be easy to ignore, but the sound of thousands is impossible to ignore.
This is no longer about me and my story. This is bigger than my story.
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