Our family forms outpace our language.—Judy Osborne, Wisdom for Separated Parents When I was preparing for a career teaching and studying philosophy, I was preoccupied with meaning. I wanted to understand how the meanings of words are related to their use. I was guided by the conviction that words do not contain instructions for their application in new circumstances. All sorts of factors mediate the connection between a word’s meaning and the ways we apply it: history, social expectations, our conversation partner’s background knowledge. And meanings are not neutral. When we are debating things that matter deeply to us, and we seem to disagree about what should be said, it isn’t always enough to point out that you and I are using a given word in different senses—even if we are. That meaning is both
For most of these past 49 years since bring reunited with blood kin, I’ve tried to find the words to describe my experiences. The more I tried to make sense of my life, and to explain it to others, the more confused I became when non-adopted did not comprehend the facts of my life.
I, too, have been humiliated, not only by being relegated to sitting at a non-family table, I’ve been shunned, rejected, pushed aside, mocked, belittled, and verbally and physically attacked not only by extended adoptive family members, or even blood kin (who can’t and won’t comprehend my relationships with both families), but also by the general public. Non-adopted people and people who have not relinquished a child to adoption often see an adoptee’s life as either black or white, or either-or. I am a threat to their pre-conceived notions of what “family” means to them vs. my reality of having two sets of very real parents, and family in both of these families.
Yes, I do see my life experiences as an adopted person as existential, very much so. The non-adopted public doesn’t like it that I am a writer for dispelling the myths and taboos of adoption. I refuse to live in magical thinking, as so many people do, which is why I am a target of abuse, as are many thousands of adoptees worldwide, like you, who write to educate the masses.
"Adoptees are free, but also burdened, to decide who counts as family" is the truest description I've seen from my aparent perspective of what my grown children continue to sort out, both with the birth family they've known since childhood and the relatives they've met as adults.
From another viewpoint, their great-grandmother told me once that she used to describe me to acquaintances as her daughter, by the logic that I was mom to some of her grandchildren. She said that got too complicated since I'm a different race and not actually related, so she switched to daughter-in-law. To me she felt like a wise and beloved aunt, not a role that was filled in my own family of origin.
I was a cultural anthropology major those many years ago, and my interest in this covers both emotional and intellectual ground.
This is so brilliantly put.
Exactly what I needed to read today!
For most of these past 49 years since bring reunited with blood kin, I’ve tried to find the words to describe my experiences. The more I tried to make sense of my life, and to explain it to others, the more confused I became when non-adopted did not comprehend the facts of my life.
I, too, have been humiliated, not only by being relegated to sitting at a non-family table, I’ve been shunned, rejected, pushed aside, mocked, belittled, and verbally and physically attacked not only by extended adoptive family members, or even blood kin (who can’t and won’t comprehend my relationships with both families), but also by the general public. Non-adopted people and people who have not relinquished a child to adoption often see an adoptee’s life as either black or white, or either-or. I am a threat to their pre-conceived notions of what “family” means to them vs. my reality of having two sets of very real parents, and family in both of these families.
Yes, I do see my life experiences as an adopted person as existential, very much so. The non-adopted public doesn’t like it that I am a writer for dispelling the myths and taboos of adoption. I refuse to live in magical thinking, as so many people do, which is why I am a target of abuse, as are many thousands of adoptees worldwide, like you, who write to educate the masses.
Thank you, Tony, for your excellent piece today.
Reminds me of a conversation I recently had with my spouse’s stepmother concerning my birth mother:
Her: what do your kids know her as - an older lady that their mom knows?
me: Grandma.
her: oh. So she’s Grandma and your mom is Granny.
me: Yes
"Adoptees are free, but also burdened, to decide who counts as family" is the truest description I've seen from my aparent perspective of what my grown children continue to sort out, both with the birth family they've known since childhood and the relatives they've met as adults.
From another viewpoint, their great-grandmother told me once that she used to describe me to acquaintances as her daughter, by the logic that I was mom to some of her grandchildren. She said that got too complicated since I'm a different race and not actually related, so she switched to daughter-in-law. To me she felt like a wise and beloved aunt, not a role that was filled in my own family of origin.
I was a cultural anthropology major those many years ago, and my interest in this covers both emotional and intellectual ground.