by Iris Hubbard and Saige Wilde “Identity is not something that is fixed. It changes over time and place” (Dwyer and Gidluck 68). While every adoptee is unique and what they might want their parents to do for and with them is going to be different, here are a few things that really resonated with both of us. These come from our own personal experiences growing up as well as the thoughts we have heard from fellow adoptees. This is by no means meant to be taken as fact, but instead we hope it can shed some light on ideas that adoptive parents may or may not have considered yet. Saige’s thoughts: After talking with fellow young adult adoptees, it appears that it is fairly uncommon for there to be a free and open dialogue about adoption in the home. I have had the fortunate opportunity to speak on an Adult Adoptee panel at an adoption camp and after talking to a lot of parents, the impression I have gotten is that it is more common for parents wait until their kids bring up the topic of adoption. This is usually done to avoid pressuring the child. However, being a kid, it can be difficult to even know what to ask about. As a young child, starting a conversation with your parents can seem daunting and feel really awkward. There can be a fear that seeking out answers means that your parents will think that the life they provided you wasn’t good enough. It wasn’t until my teen years that I really began to think more about how my adoption defined who I am as a person. During this time, I was also just trying to figure out who I was in general. Growing up, my mother always made a point to talk openly about adoption with me, and she would even ask me what thoughts I had about my birth parents, and it turns how that I had a lot of say on this matter. I had a complete image in my head of my birth family living in a one bedroom home and where everything was located. Allowing me to express these thoughts in a relaxed way without the pressure of “how are you feeling?” really allowed me to feel comfortable discussing my adoption with my mom and others. Despite all of this, prior to coming to Western, I had never thought critically about how my adoption impacted my life. Attending college and talking with fellow adoptees about how our experiences were growing up helped me really begin to understand how being adopted has shaped me. This newfound awareness and curiosity led me to start asking my mom more questions about what it was like raising me as an adoptee, allowing me to gain new insight. Iris’s thoughts: Thinking back about my own experience, I wish my parents had started the discussion with me about my adoption story maybe as early as 8 or 9. I think if they had continued encouraging me to ask questions as I got older, I might have identified more with my adoptee self growing up. It wasn’t until much later in my life (my college years), that I felt comfortable asking about my adoption and even to this day, I sometimes still don’t know how to approach the subject. Another thing I think is extremely important to transracial adoptees is the opportunity to be immersed in their birth culture. I definitely understand that the opportunities for this can be extremely limited due to many factors. Personally, I wish I had been able to learn more about my Chinese culture and thus felt more connected to my Chinese heritage. I want to point out that when I was younger, I did learn Mandarin and attended a few Chinese cultural summer camps. Unfortunately, as I got older, those cultural related activities ended due to other interests and sadly this has resulted in me feeling as though I lost connection with my heritage. Today, I am looking for ways to reconnect with my culture and embrace my Chinese identity by trying to attend Western’s Chinese Student Association meetings and events. On a more positive note, I will say that my parents made quite an effort to stay in contact with the two other families who adopted girls from the same orphanage as me. While we would all have annual reunions near our adoption or “gotcha day”, it didn’t really feel like enough time with each other. The two other girls both lived in the Seattle area and due to schedules it was really hard to see each other more than once or twice a year. In reality, I feel like we are not super close, however I do value their friendships and maybe as we get older we will find our way back to each other. Our thoughts: Something both of us have greatly appreciated was being able to watch old videos of our initial adoption and look at photos of our young lives. Saige thinks these small, yet powerful opportunities helped her to normalize the whole process. She was able to understood how her family came together and this understanding translated into confidence when meeting other children. In spite of this, even with the videos and pictures, Saige wonders what questions she would have asked her mother if she had more knowledge about her adoption growing up. Likewise, Iris is so grateful for all of the photos and videos her parents took to document her early life story because everything up until when she was adopted is unknown. Coming to college and trying to figure out her identity has made her more curious to learn about her past. Iris is extremely fortunate to have the opportunity and resources to try and start this process of self discovery. Through this senior project of creating a resource for parents, families and fellow adoptees, we both been able to begin the process of unpacking their adoptee experiences in deeper ways than we have before. This is what we found... One study we read was called, The Adoption Triangle Revisited and it is based on research done about open discussions between adoptees and their adoptive parents. From this we learned that “there was a strong relationship between how close the adopted person felt towards their adoptive parents and how openly the subject of adoption was discussed” (Triseliotis et al. 3). Additionally, it seems to follow that the more an adoptee could talk about their adoption and ask questions increased an adoptee’s “sense of belonging and identity, and feeling more complete as a person” (Triseliotis et al. 3). One of the main reasons for not talking about adoption with children was because the child was not the initiator so the parent(s) did not think there was a need, and even when questions were answered, there were still adoptees who “felt uncomfortable and awkward talking to their parents...because they were concerned that asking questions might upset them” (Triseliotis et al. 4). Another great resource we found was a book called, Talking with Young Children about Adoption by Mary Watkins and Susan Fisher. While it is a little dated, the information is quite insightful and there were many anecdotal examples that supported the text. The first quote that we wanted to share was simply, “Talking about adoption is no different from talking about other important issues parents and children live through together” (Watkins and Fisher 7). Adoption is a reality adoptive families live, therefore parents and children alike should feel able to express their feelings and thoughts openly with one another. The question is how can families create this openness? Watkins and Fisher explain that in order to begin the open dialogue, a “comfortable, accepting atmosphere”, including in-between spaces for wonderings about adoption must be in-place, and parents should try to answer questions that are meaningful to their child (Watkins and Fisher 57). That seems simple enough, however, this may be difficult as children might struggle to communicate what they want to ask. Therefore, parents can help their children articulate their questions, while “refraining from projecting an adult way of understanding onto them or from overwhelming them with a parent’s agenda of what should be discussed and understood” (Watkins and Fisher 57-58). While conversations about a one’s adoption may seem too mature for children, the authors remind us that “most young children are remarkably adept at abandoning a conversation when they have gotten what they need or can handle”, so parents shouldn’t be afraid to talk about adoption with their children (Watkins and Fisher 58). Once again, it is mentioned that understanding one’s adoption is an “integral part of understanding oneself” (Watkins and Fisher 58). Now for the topic of cultural space and cultural identity, Iris learned a new term called the transracial adoption paradox. Dwyer and Gidluck describe it as, “living in between two worlds: ‘[She] can't live on the White side and she can't live on the Chinese side’. Children were viewed as White by some people in the Asian community and were viewed as Asian by the White majority” (Dwyer and Gidluck 68). This is something we have both experienced at some point in our lives and so what can we do about this? Well, we have learned that many adoptees struggle with identifying with their adopted culture while still trying to connect to their birth culture. Another term that may help us unpack this challenge is something Baden, Treweeke and Ahluwalia call this reculturation which is the “process by which adult adoptees have cultural losses and gains. This construct also aids in understanding how individuals must assimilate when they are adopted and how they may make the choice, conscious or unconscious, to reclaim their birth culture at some point in their lives” (Baden et al. 12). In summary, the best way to help adoptees construct their cultural identity is by allowing them to connect with their birth culture and ethnic cultural heritage, and be a “bridge to the culture your child needs to be a part of” and allow children to “negotiate the space in between the two cultures by exploring the space as a place of possibilities, not of limitations and constraints” (Dwyer and Gidluck 68). There has been much research on this topic and it is called “racial socialization.” This is discussed more in-depth in the blog post “The Value of Having a Community.” What is emphasized repeatedly in studies is how important it is for adoptive parents to socialize themselves with a child’s birth culture and to have those discussions about race with their child. Exposing an adoptee to their birth culture, often through various support groups or events, can have long-term beneficial impacts on the adoptees’ self-identity. Finally, it was difficult to find any research about adoptive parents sharing videos and/or photos with their children that depict their children’s adoption and early years. Nonetheless, as we have both mentioned from personal experience, we have both greatly appreciated being able to see ourselves growing up and surrounded by families who love us. Seeing ourselves with our families has helped us understand what it means to be part of a family and that all families matter. Ultimately, not knowing about one’s past can make it difficult to accept one’s identity, but by engaging in open dialogue with parents, exploring birth and adopted cultural spaces, and by being grounded in what is known such as seeing one’s physical self in digital or print documentation, adoptees will believe that they are valued and loved. In the end, adoptees’ identities will continue to be shaped and changed throughout their lives. *Helpful charts explaining the concept of reculturation as described by Baden, Treweeke and Ahluwalia have been provided. They show three approaches as well as outcomes of the reculturation process and here is the link the Asian Adult Adoptees of Washington Website: http://aaawashington.org/?fbclid=IwAR2KEsgt2Tkdmbu85jwF4B426Qy-9bHkq5a-aCWE7hYtqYuEP4VLKSGjfB0 Sources: Baden, Amanda L., et al. “Reclaiming Culture: Reculturation of Transracial and International Adoptees.” Journal of Counseling & Development, vol. 90, no. 4, 2012, pp. 387–399., doi:10.1002/j.1556-6676.2012.00049.x. Dwyer, Sonya Corbin, and Lynn Gidluck. “Talking about Adoption: Considerations for Multicultural Counsellors When Working with Transracial Families.” Asia Pacific Journal of Counselling and Psychotherapy, vol. 3, no. 1, 2012, pp. 61–71., doi:10.1080/21507686.2011.633214. Triseliotis, John, et al. “The Adoption Triangle Revisited: A Study of Adoption, Search and Reunion Experiences Summary.” The Adoption Triangle Revisited: A Study of Adoption, Search and Reunion Experiences Summary, British Association for Adoption and Fostering, 2005, www.researchgate.net/publication/265047307_The_Adoption_Triangle_Revisited/download. Watkins, Mary, and Susan M Fisher. Talking with Young Children about Adoption. Yale University Press, 1993.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorsWWU Adoptees Archives
February 2019
Categories |