Adoptee Journal

My Really Insecure (Adoptive) Father

2008-06-08T16:47:00.000-07:00

For reasons I can't fully explain, I just needed to stop thinking of myself as an adopted person.

After coming to grips with decades of denial, and thinking about it 24/7, I kind of overdosed.

My adoptive mother is ten years dead. At 81, my adoptive father is growing weaker as Lewy Body dementia continues to destroy his body and mind.

There's also something slightly silly about being middle aged and thinking of yourself as an adopted child. So I've put it aside. As some of you know, I've shifted to blogging about dealing with narcissistic parents.

But last night, adoption as an issue resurfaced.

N-Dad (narcissistic dad) has taken to reminding me, daily, that father's day is coming up.

Yes, I know, I said.

Then we had a replay of the conversation that we've had for as long as I could remember....when he was of sound mind, if you overlook the narcissistic part.

"Well, you better not foget about it," he warned me.

"Have I ever forgotten?" I ask.

"No," he reluctantly admits. "And you better not this year."

"I won't," I promise.

"I'm your father you know," he says.

"Yes. I know," I admit reluctantly.

"I'm your father and don't you forget it," he concludes aggresively.

What he's really thinking (I suspect) is that he's not my biological father and that there's some man running around out there who is, technically. And it makes him angry and he has to take it out on me. The few times I did ask what he knew about this mystery man, n-dad referred to him, creepily, as "the man who made you."

What I'm thinking is...no...your not my father. I've never had one. I may have got stuck with you and I may have acted as your mother and daughter, but you've never acted like a real father. Real fathers don't act like children and make their only kid an emotional caretaker.

I, by the way, have RARELY mentioned my adoption at all to my adoptive parents. No surprise, considering the reaction my basic questions got.

Apparently, n-dad still has some major insecurities and, apparently, it's my job to reassure him that he is who he says he is. I can't imagine my husband every saying anything so bizarrely obvious to my daughters.

Crushing on Albee

2008-03-24T09:00:00.000-07:00

Recently heard a radio interview with playwright Edward Albee.

When he started talking about the way he felt about his adoption, I pulled over to listen.

He talked in a very unemotional, straightforward way.

He explained he didn't feel like it was a good fit...that he didn't feel like he belonged in the family...and he didn't much like his adoptive parents. (Ah, the Ding of familiarity!)

As simple as that.

He didn't seem bogged down by Guilt nor twisted by inner conflict.

This is the way it was, he seemed to be saying. No big deal.

How refreshing.

How liberating.

If only I could begin to look at my own adoption placement like that, expressed in no-nonsense sentences.

Now I'm fascinated. I'm not very familiar with his work. I know he's a famous adoptee. The fact that he's not a Cheerleader Adoptee is a big, fat relief.

In my head, adoption is endlessly exhausting and complicated. If I could just get some clarity. Must do some reading about Albee. Must read him. He must save all his adoption-related demons for his work.

Spell Check This

2008-03-10T16:49:00.000-07:00

Hah!

Was spell checking an email on Yahoo mail today.

It kept highlighting the word, "adoptee."

No such word exists. Or so it implied.

The spell checker gave me some nifty options:

Adopter
Adopt
Adaptee

Oh, the irony. I was feeling a little invisible today. (I swear, adopters are always well represented...in media, as lawmakers, as spokespersons for adoptees and now...on spell check)

Well, shoot. Maybe I'd misunderstood. Maybe that's what I was supposed to be all this time.

An adaptee. (And no, I'm not anti-adoption. Just anti-adoption-is-wunnerful-no-biggie-pretense)

Why I Hate Charades

2008-03-04T11:05:00.000-08:00

If there's one game I loathe and despise, it's charades.

A couple times, I've been invited to play at a party as an adult and I flat out refused.

I was watching the movie, The Family Stone in which the uptight character played by Sarah Jessica Parker was forced to join in the merriment of a game of charades. And while she wasn't a particularly sympathetic character at that point in the movie, I was immediately on her side.

Since the movie always seems to be on HBO, I always seem to click on the channel just as the charade scene begins and every time it makes me squirm. I can't find the remote fast enough to turn the damn thing off. (I actually like the movie). So I got to wondering...why? Why does that scene make me so uncomfortable.

Charades, in my opinion, has got to be most embarrassing, exasperating, downright stupid and pointless game to ever be played by grown-ups.

I think I just figured out why.

It's because I spent most of my life pretending.

Pretending to be the biological child of my adoptive parents.

Pretending I didn't mind being adopted.

Pretending I didn't wonder about the woman who gave me away.

Pretending adoption was no big deal.

Pretending I was grateful.

Pretending to be the daughter my adoptive parents needed me to be instead of the person I actually was.

If you earn your living by Pretending then you have zero patience for fun and games pretending. When you've been turned into a pro by Closed Era Adoption practices, you don't want to play with amateurs.

Really Bad Parents

2008-02-29T17:29:00.000-08:00

Had another episode with my narcissistic adoptive father.

I wrote about it at my other blog, www.narcissisticparents.blogspot.com.

And I was just picking myself up and dusting myself off...preparing to work on a project...when he calls and complains that I'd goofed by sending him the wrong brand of chocolate covered raisins. He was pretty steamed.

I have to be honest.

If I just hear the words, "chocolate covered raisins," one more time I'm gonna scream. The man has me sending him candy shipments almost every week. If I wasn't afraid of taking the express elevator to hell, I'd wish he'd choke on a fucking chocolate raisin and release me from my misery.

William F. Buckley just died and he didn't have half of what ails my adad. Why do all the mean people live so darned long?

But here's the deal.

After that encounter, I felt worthless. I'd just been taken out by a parental figure of authority and told off. Doesn't matter if I'm middle aged. Doesn't matter if he's losing it and over 80. It's the father-daughter dynamic and he's once again just told me how useless I am.

No surprise. I then felt useless. And I couldn't work on my project. I slumped into a depressive episode and took a nap. It zapped the life out of me. And this is after therapy. I'm aware of the triggers and I do my darned best to emotionally detach. But this stuff is hard.

And, by the way, I'm fully aware of the repetition of this theme in my posts.

As you can read, it just keeps happening! Today I made the mistake by returning his agitated call...just wanting to get it over with. In retrospect, I should have called AFTER my work was done. Or not have called back at all. Maybe there's a masochistic, martyr element to being the adult child of a narcissist. The adaptive role of enabler?

Having a narcissistic parent is a lifelong nightmare.

Being handed over to a narcissistic adoptive parent is like handing over a sacrificial lamb to a monster with an insatiable appetite for braised shanks. I was handed over 47 years ago and I'm still paying the price. Thanks social worker!

Honestly, testing for narcissistic traits should be one of the first things that social workers do when checking out prospective adoptive parents. Besides making sure they aren't criminals.

Word of the Day: Altered

2008-02-27T09:04:00.000-08:00

Here's a word I don't think I've ever used in trying to describe what it's like to be adopted: ALTERED.

Hopewaits left a comment, in which she wrote, "I believe all of us who were adopted have been so altered (even if you don't know it and think everything is O.K.)"

What an awesome, perfect word!!! (Thanks, Hopewaits!)

Besides, "to change or to make different," altered also means, "to adjust for a better bit."

And that, folks, is exactly what happened.

I simply did not fit in with my adoptive family. In looks, temperament, intellect, disposition.

My adoptive mother kept trying to make me fit. She gave me haircuts that did not suit me in an attempt to make me "match" her. She dressed us in matching outfits until I was nearly thirteen. She even tried to tell me what to feel. Clearly, whatever I was and felt were not acceptable.

With no other options - where else would I go? - I also made painful adjustments in an attempt to fit in. I pretended to be a party girl because my adoptive mother was a determined anti-intellectual. In high school, I became fashionable because she cared, greatly, about make-up and clothes. I never discussed the books I read or what I'd learned because, she complained, these topics were boooring and I was acting,"all snobby." (Using a big word in a sentence got me a mocking at the dinner table)

Pretending to be something you are not leaves little time for discovering who you are.

Not all adoptees have adoptive parents as woefully undereducated, ignorant or self-centered or insecure as mine. Of course. But, faced with an entire cohesive family system, the adoptee stands alone. And tries to fit in. What other choice does she have? All of her energy, most of it subconcious, will go into making tweaks and adjustments because the fit needs to be improved. She is out of sync, even if nobody else notices it.

And when, finally, she leaves the adoptive family system and strikes out on her own...that's when things can get tough. What does she do with all these quirks of character that she may no longer need? Who is she without these modifications? Who is she when she meets her first family and sees the bits and pieces of herself that she may have had to deny or suppress? How does she go about reassembling herself? How does she know what parts are real or fake?

The good thing is, if you had controlling adoptive parents and have left them and the pretense behind, you have more time to figure out who you actually are.

But there's no getting away from the fact that adoption alters the adoptee in a way that does not impact the adoptive parents or the first mother. And I'm not talking about pain or suffering or loss. I'm talking about the identity development of the adopted individual. It's like trying to make a rich soup without broth.

Reframing the Past

2008-02-21T08:54:00.001-08:00

When I started blogging, I didn't imagine I'd stick with it for long.

My ability to commit to long term projects is pretty weak. Many times I've vowed to stop blogging because it's taking away time from working on my novel which, no surprise, is about family secrets and the Closed Era of adoption.

But blogging has proved powerfully irresitable and the readers amazingly supportive. The best part is reading a comment that says...hey...something like that happened to me, too! And I know I'm not alone. That my experience as an adoptee is both extremely personal, yet aspects of it more sadly common than I'd once imagined.

I was reading a review in the SF Chronicle today about Carrie Fisher's solo show, Wishful Drinking, in which the funny Fisher tells us her (sex-drugs-booze-bipolar-disorder-fame-family) life story. "What she wants to do, she tells us, is take control of her life by framing her own narrative."

I guess that's what I've been trying to do. Slogging away at blogging about growing up as an adoptee who had to pretend she was her aparent's bio child.

I had no control. Over anything. Whether I was given away. With what sort of people I would be tied to, forever, by a document I didn't get to sign. What sort of questions I was allowed to ask about my family of origin (none). Even what I felt about adoption. Telling you, in great detail, how you should feel about being adopted is something not limited to adoptive family members. The non-adopted, who have no idea what it's like, are experts on the subject and are more than happy to tell you to buck up, get over it and, their favorite refrain, be grateful (you weren't aborted/at least somebody wanted you/you could have been raised in an orphanage).

So this is where we finally, finally, get to make sense of all OUR mixed feelings and emotions about something that happened to us. Because if you are adoptee, adoption is something that HAPPENS to you.

I like the control I feel when I get to talk about all this adoption stuff.

I'm finally getting to tell my own story.

It's a powerful step among many. Reclaiming ownership. Some have said more adoptees should spend their time trying to reform adoption instead of whining on blogs. Not everybody is cut out to be an activisit. Some are and are damned good at it. Others, well, aren't. But reframing our own life stories, whining included, is especially important to us: a subgroup of citizens denied their original birth certificates...and so much else.

Settling an Old Score?

2008-02-15T09:42:00.000-08:00

A heartfelt thanks to those who left such amazingly understanding and supportive comments to my last post about my mixed feelings toward my first mother's placement in a nursing home. And her wish to talk with me. Not that we haven't talked before. And I don't think she has anything special she'd like to say. But who knows.

Every day I vow to call her.

And then I don't.

I'm just not ready. Not yet. If I do call in the mood I'm in, I'd call out of guilt. I want to call because I want to. I'm tired of having guilt as the main driver behind all parental encounters. (Honestly, I have no idea of what it's like to actually want to be around one's parents, because I've always dreaded any sort of contact with my adoptive parents. And like my aparents, after I've spoken with my mother, I nearly always feel stirred up and diminished because she's more than a little self-centered, too.)

There's something else that bothers me. Maybe it's something that should give me comfort. But it doesn't.

My non-identifying info. says that it took my then 37-year old mother several weeks to sign the relinquishment papers because she felt terribly guilty about her decision, against family pressure to keep me. That's what the papers said. That my mother was consumed with guilt.

I think that is at the root of what's bothering me. What has bothered me. That she knew giving me away was wrong, but she was determined to do it anyway because she needed to. For herself. Which means, putting it baldly, that the both of us can't blame anyone else. We do not have the comfort of pinning this decision on coercive practices, unsupportive grandparents or other family members or an abusive husband. (Maybe we could just blame the times?) My mother cited her sickly teenager as one reason. That it wouldn't be fair to my half-sib or me to bring me into that situation. But my half-sib was living with an aunt and not my mother. My mother would marry, up, less than two years after placing me for adoption.

During those two weeks of feeling guilty, my mother did not question where I was during this time. Bizarrely, the non-id says this, too. Where was I? I do know that at one point I spent a month in a foster care.

So what's the point of fretting over this now? After all these years? What possible difference could it make to me in middle age? Because I see babies all the time, being toted around like precious bundles of gold, being fussed over by the mothers. And I know my mother had no idea where I was or who was caring for me and didn't inquire. Maybe she thought she had no right to know.

But I'm now beginning to suspect I'm waiting for several symbolic weeks to pass before I call my mother. That this tidbit of information has stuck in my head and heart and now I'm making her wait for me, in some sort of (before unconscious) tit for tat.

As Elizabeth oh so wisely wrote, adoption is a mindfuck.

Now She Wants Me

2008-02-08T08:52:00.000-08:00

I knew this day would come.

I suspected it might be triggering.

And it is.

My over eighty first mother was put in a nursing home.

A bio-relative kindly called to let me know and to say my mother was looking forward to talking with me. Which is nice.

I will call her.

After I'm over having my mini fit. When I've finished having my baby temper tantrum.

Oh sure, now she wants me. Now that she's alone and scared in some new institutional type of place.

The same woman who didn't want to see or hold me when I was born because she didn't, "want to get attached." The same 37-year old woman who had no idea I was placed in foster care for a whole month. Where was she when I needed her? When I was helpless and scared and wanted my mother?

Now she wants me?

On the one hand, it's very nice that she's worried I'd call and get a disconnected number. It's nice she wanted me to know where she was. Of course. But my half-sister isn't all that sympathetic with our shared mother. I know what my mother is looking for. A sympathetic ear.

Here's the trouble. After a lifetime of being the emotional caretaker of my narcissistic adad and garden variety self-centered amom, I'm all worn out. And I'm suspicious. Is my mother reaching out because she values ME or because she needs someone. Anyone?

Sheesh. I just reread this entry. It's quite a nasty, spiteful little post, but I'm committed to being honest so I'm going to let it stand.

The Powerlessness of Adoptees

2008-02-03T19:20:00.000-08:00

This evening, I had one of those moments.

As usual, it was triggered by talking to my (narcissistic) adoptive father. Actually, he does all the talking. I do the listening.

And while I've learned to emotionally detach, mostly, I was suddenly overcome by a feeling of helplessness. Powerlessness.

My mother gave me up. I had no voice. A social worker placed me with a totally unsuitable couple so desperate for their very own baby that they made me pretend I wasn't adopted. I had no choice. I had no choice but to play along with the whole I'm not adopted sham.

And here I am, in middle age, still pretending to be the good, dutiful daughter when I feel like an abductee and not an adoptee.

I call the shots in the rest of my life. I'm a take charge kind of gal, maybe to make up for the fact that I was never really in charge of the big stuff. Being transferred. Ending up in a home I didn't like, where I felt like an outsider. Pretending to love parents I secretly couldn't stand. Smiling all the way. What other choice do you have when you're a kid? Where else can you go? It's survival. When I hear of other adult adoptees who've drifted away from their aparents, I wonder, what happened to them? Did they feel like that, too? Do these intermittent, yet powerful feelings of powerlessness ever fade?

Juno

2008-01-28T07:40:00.000-08:00

As painful as it was for this adoptee to watch, I actually liked Juno.

I liked it because it was a big fat reminder of what adoption actually is: a solution for a girl/woman who does not want a baby and the people who want one. (Clarification based on Anonymous comments: I am not talking about young women who were coerced or tricked into signing over their babies).

The baby is just a big bump. Something that gives her heartburn but not heartache. A moving image on an ultrasound that moves the stepmother, but never stirs Juno enough to rethink her decision. Once Juno has made up her mind to give away her baby, she emotionally detaches. She cracks witty jokes. She's fixed on an old-school Closed Adoption and has no interest in updates or pictures. She's determined to hand over the kid and get it behind her. Sure she rubs her belly with a flower, but she spends more time burning CDs than wallowing in angst ridden moments.

So why do I like Juno?

Because there was some truth in it. Some ugly, harsh truth.

Juno reminds me of my own mother. Ever cheerful, determined on her plan of adoption from the first and emotionally detached. Like Juno, my mother also never wanted to see me. She, "didn't want to get attached."

I liked it because it confirmed that society sees adoption as a nifty solution, with little or no thought to what that separation will mean for the baby.

Yeah, don't get bent out of shape because, "it's just a comedy," some will argue. Well, it wouldn't be funny if it didn't ring-a-ding true. (What did not ring true is Juno as a 16-year old. As my own teenager pointed out, teenagers don't talk or act like that and my daughter just wasn't buying Juno as authentic.)

In Juno, the institution of adoption is only vaguely about the child. It's about a transaction. It's about what is being transferred and the comedy that ensues. As Juno's stepmother points out, the adoptive parents could even be worse than her loser stepdaughter. They could be abusive. And while this is oh-so-true, it never gives Juno any real pause or concern. It's a movie about a pregnant girl, after all. Not what will happen to her baby. The movie ends with Juno and her boyfriend singing together, happily. Without the baby. Problem solved. That's what adoption is for everybody else.

What happens afterward is another movie.

What happens afterward is what we adoptees have to live with the rest of our lives.

2008-01-24T08:25:00.000-08:00

Waiting Too Long to Search

2008-01-24T08:04:00.000-08:00

If there was such a thing as a do-over in adoption reunion, I would absolutely, most definitely have searched earlier. Much, much earlier.

I mean, it's ridiculous to be going through all this I-Want-My-Mommy stuff when you are in your forties and birthmom is four decades past menopause.

In some profound, sad way, it's too late for the both of us. We're too worn out by life to find the energy to do the hard work of working on a new and complicated relationship.

My needy adoptive parents and the demands of their dementia have worn me out. I have little patience, now, for my aging birthmother. ( See? It sounds ridiculous to even call her birthmother or first mother when the woman is over eighty!) The last time we spoke, she spent most of her time talking about her repeated falls (it would help if she cut down on the vicodin, I suspect) and her failing health and it all left me, well, cold.

I can hardly be expected to give of my time and emotional energy to someone who gave me away forty five years ago and not once attempted to find me.

All of this may sound bitter. Maybe things wouldn't have gone any differently if we'd been younger. I just don't know. But reunion, as difficult and disappointing as it's been, has been an amazingly grounding experience. I was born again. It was my second chance. I just wish I'd done it sooner. For me.

The Unwelcome Child, Notes Part 2

2008-01-22T18:17:00.000-08:00

In his 1929 paper, "The Unwelcome Child and His Death Instinct," Sandor Ferenczi (Budapest, originally published in The International Journal of Psycho-analysis) put forward an idea based on observations made during his stint as a doctor in charge of a war hospital.

His observed some patients came into the world as unwelcome guests of the family and that, "All the indications shew that these children had observed the conscious and unconscious signs of the aversion or impatience by the mother, and their desire to live had been broken by this" and that, "Moral and philosophic pessimism, scepticism and mistrust became conspicious character-traits in these patients. One could also note ill-disguised longing for (passive) tenderness, repugnance to work, incapacity for prolonged effort, and thus a certain degree of emotional infantilism, naturally not without attempts at forced character strengthening."

The following is a summary of the rest of his paper:

Ferenczi notes a common theoretical assumption. That the life instinct is strongest at the beginning of life, weakest (to zero) toward the end. He says this may not be quite accurate, pointing out this may be true only under favorable conditions of the infantile protective environment. "The child has to be induced, by means of an immense expenditure of love, tenderness and care, to forgive his parents for having brought him into the world without any intention on his part; otherwise the destructive instincts begin to stir immediately. And this is not really surprising, since the infant is much closer to individual non-being, and not divided from it by so much bitter experience as the adult. Slipping back into this non-being might therefore come much more easily to children. The "life force" which rears itself against the difficulties of life has therefore not really any great innate strength and becomes established only when tactful treatment and upbringing gradually give rise to progressive immunization against physical and psychical injuries."

If I'm reading him right (which I may not, I'm not a psychoanalyst), Ferenczi tries to figure out where to categorize these cases, but proposes they fit into, "the frustration neuroses," and goes on to observe, "there remains of course the task of ascertaining the finer differences in neurotic symptoms between children maltreated from the start, and those who are at first received with enthusiasm, indeed with passionate love, but then dropped."

Ferenczi then talks about he treated such cases. He found he needed to let the patient, "have his way like a child" which would allow him to enjoy the irresponsibility of childhood, "which is the equivalent to the introduction of positive life impulses and motives for his subsequent existence."
I'm not going to bother to summarize the last paragraph because Ferenczi starts talking about Genital Theory and libidinal theory and the "demands of genitality" and suddenly, I have no idea what the hell he's saying. If I had to put my spin on it, Ferenczi was onto something really important and then the shadow of Freud loomed and, well, he found himself on the Oedipus detour.

I'm not going to give my reaction today, mostly because I ran out of time and I don't want to make this post too long. But I did want to share Pt. 2 as I promised to do so last week. But please feel free to leave your reaction.

The Unwelcome Child, Notes Part #1

2008-01-14T09:22:00.000-08:00

In his 1929 paper, "The Unwelcome Child and His Death Instinct," Sandor Ferenczi (Budapest, originally published in The International Journal of Psycho-analysis) put forward an idea based on observations made during his stint as a doctor in charge of a war hospital. This included deciding the fitness of those suffering from epilepsy. The next bit is unclear. At least to me. But it seems Ferenczi also observed patients suffering from "nervous circulatory and respiratory disturbances" such as asthmatics and cases of "complete loss of appetite and emaciation, not explicable anatomically."

Ferenczi then goes on to write that he hoped, "that a wider circle of observers (I am thinking of particularly of children's physicians) will bring forward further material in its support."

The idea is this: His observed patients came into the world as unwelcome guests of the family and that, "All the indications shew that these children had observed the conscious and unconscious signs of the aversion or impatience by the mother, and their desire to live had been broken by this" and that, "Moral and philosophic pessimism, scepticism and mistrust became conspicious character-traits in these patients. One could also note ill-disguised longing for (passive) tenderness, repugnance to work, incapacity for prolonged effort, and thus a certain degree of emotional infantilism, naturally not without attempts at forced character strengthening."

Ferenczi then goes on to talk about a young woman, born an unwanted third girl in a family without boys, who not only brooded about the origins of all living things, but was also alcoholic and frigid with a tendency to colds. But Ferenczi wanted to make clear it wasn't his task to exhaustively explain all the symptoms, but wished to, "point to the probability that children who are received in a harsh and disagreeable way die easily and willingly. Either they make use of the many proffered organic possibilities for a quick exit, or if they escape this fate, they keep a streak of pessismism and of aversion to life."

Ferenczi wasn't talking about those given up for adoption. 1929 was long before adoption became big business. But I think it most definitely applies to those of us adoptees whose mothers cut themselves off from their babies in order to give them away.

While I have never been suicidal, I've had the persistent feeling that I'm not fully a part of the world. It's more than not fitting in. It's more than feeling you're on the outside looking in. It's like you're not quite real. Like you don't deserve to be here.

Then there are those things - big things - that I've struggled with and against all my life. Such as the inability to meet long term goals that are important to me. It's telling that I chose television news production (then radio) as a career. It's highly structured. In an eight hour shift, you can produce a newscast seen by many people. This I can do. I can also produce a radio story and finish articles of 1,200 or so words. What I can't do are long term projects, such as long feature stories and books. I'm not lazy. I just can't finish. In my basement are stacks of drafts of half-written and discarded novels. At some point, I reach the point where I say, it's useless. This is ridiculous. Nobody will want to read what I write. Who do I think I am? I'm nobody. I'll never be Margaret Atwood or Ruth Rendell or Joanna Trollope, who have so many interesting things to say. I'm unworthy.

This is more than writer's block. When I'm around other people, they seem more real, more solid. By comparison, I feel vaporous.

Ferenczi was onto something, as commenter Anonymous Bob pointed out. (He alerted me to the existence of this paper) I was an unwelcome child and knew it. Felt it. Probably in utero. My mother, who at 37 had already raised three children, decided as soon she learned she was pregnant that she would not keep me. It was never a possibility. She told me so. She also told me she never held me. Not once. She peeked at me, mostly because the nurse badgered her. Because, she said, she "didn't want to get attached."

While I do know I was fostered until I was placed in my adoptive home, I have no idea where I spent the first month of my life. Was it in a private home? An institution? Left at the county hospital? Was I picked up and cuddled? Or left in a cot and drugged to keep quiet?

My earliest baby pictures show me stiff as a board, looking away from my adoptive parents. I'm told I never cried as a baby. The aparents didn't think this was unusual. They just thought I was a "good baby." I was acting like a half-dead one.

I also think Ferenczi had it right because all those strange feelings of not belonging and being unwelcome are most pronounced when I'm in contact with my (birth) mother. I feel like I'm fading away. That she is real and I am not. Suddenly, it's almost hard to talk. To form full sentences. My voice feels weak. I'm devoid of thought and opinion and determination. And while she sometimes says untentionally hurtful things, she is friendly enough. But I don't feel welcome. I feel unwelcome. And totally unsafe. It's like it's her or me. I can only exist away from her.

Will summarize the rest of Ferenczi's (short!) paper soon.

My Other, New Blog

2008-01-11T11:20:00.000-08:00

Decided it was time to spin-off a new blog. This one about dealing with narcissistic parents.

Why? Because more than half of you who stop by do so after Googling, "narcissistic parents" and, increasingly, "elderly narcissistic parents."

I figure these poor people don't have time to wade through adoption related issues although, as some of you have revealed, you're dealing with the double whammy of being adopted and having narcissistic adoptive parents. And then there are those with a trifecta of misfortune. Adoption plus self-centered aparent plus self-absorbed birthparent. And yeah, those people exist. (Besides me)

I'll probably be posting here less while I get the other blog going. You can find it at www.narcissisticparents.blogspot.com.

I'm still waiting for my copy of psychoanalyst Sandor Ferenczii's, "The Unwelcome Child and His Death Instinct" paper. I'll be sure to blog about it and post as much of it here as is relevant.

The Plight of the Aging Narcissist

2008-01-08T09:57:00.001-08:00

Soon, when I have some extra time, I'm going to spin-off a new blog about dealing with narcissists. Until then...

My adoptive dad called the other day from the assisted living facility I forced him into two years ago.

The people he called his friends, mostly made at church after amom died, quickly stopped calling him. None visited. An old friend of amom used to call him, but he gave her the brush off because, he said nastily, she talked about herself too much. I know what this means. She was either not sympathetic enough or she insisted on having her fair share of the conversation. This is intolerable to him.

I am now his only contact with the outside world.

Having distanced or discarded or infuriated most of the people he's come into contact with, the aging narcissist is a very lonely person.

I can sense adad's loneliness snaking across the phone lines, but there's nothing I can do about it.

When he calls, I imagine dialogue on a page.

Adad: Nina? The reason I sound so sleepy is that damned nurse keeps waking me up to give me my medicine. I have no idea why she can't give it to me earlier like a normal person. But she hates me and has it out for me. I have no idea why.....

Nina: (I resist pointing out that it's because he called her a fat assed, ugly, lazy fool) Oh, that's too bad-

Adad: (interrupts) This place is going downhill. The food is terrible and all they've got now is second class workers....(and so on)

Nina: That's too bad. Do you think-

Adad: (interrupts) It rained all night here. I really loved listening to the rain. It didn't thunder, though. We finally got the rain. I didn't think we were going to get it. Those weathermen always exaggerate. They kept talking about a big storm. But it was no storm. Just some rain.

--Silence--I'm waiting for him to finish. He's run out of things to say.

Adad (peevishly/aggressively): Well? How are you? How is Bob? How are the girls?

Nina: Everybody is good. The storm hit really hard here. Poor Bob got stuck-

Adad (interrupts): That's nice. Some idiots here decided to run out in the rain and they all got wet....(and so on)

That was an actual conversation by the way. I thought I'd entertain him with the story of my husband nearly getting blown off a train platform, but nope.

Sometimes, adad will pause, then say, "Tell me something!" because I've given up talking and I'm just waiting for him to start up again. I gave up talking years ago. Maybe it's more accurate to say I never talked at all. This is what my husband says. That adad dominated every conversation and I just sat there and nodded. When he visited, I had to shut myself in my bedroom with a pretend headache just to get away from his constant chatter.

So now there he is, lonely, practically begging for me to talk, but I can't...because even when I do, he'll interrupt and not let me finish. Yet he longs for contact. Some reassurance there is another warm body on the other end of the line. Reassurance that he is not alone. So to keep the conversation going he'll say, "Tell me something! Anything!" But he's incapable of listening. He's incapable of connecting to others in the most basic, human way.

The best thing about putting him into the assisted living facility is confirmation that he is an extremely difficult, self-centered person. The head nurse says he's one of neediest, demanding residents they have. To boot, he's a troublemaker. And a loner. If he can't be the center of attention, he retreats in childlike fury to his room. This was all music to my ears. I was not the crazy one!

Talking to Mother and Fading Away

2008-01-02T11:05:00.000-08:00

After the shock of meeting my first mother for the first time ten months ago, I called her.

It was a pleasant conversation. She always seems very happy to hear from me.

I'm now mostly over the intense feelings of grief (and anger) I finally allowed myself to have over being given up for adoption by a 37-year old woman who'd already raised three children.

So now I'm a bit more detached. In a good way. That emotional detachment allows me to be a better observer of the dynamics of our relationship. Mostly, she does the talking. Sometimes, she (unintentionally) says things I find hurtful. For example, she likes to recount with pride her determination to give me up for a better life, against family pressure to keep me. It's the language of martrys. Except she seems to forget I didn't get a "better life," just a different "bad" one as I was placed into an extremely dysfunctional, emtionally neglectful home. In our most recent chat, she said she'd always wanted girls (not boys) because girls are so cute. Obviously, being a girl wasn't incentive enough for her to keep me.

So for the last year or so, I've been saying I don't feel "safe" around my mother. I just don't.

I get very nervous when I think of talking to her. I get all cold and clammy, as if it's possible I might just pass out. Sometimes, in the middle of the night, I'll wake up and the first thing that pops into my head is, "I can't believe she gave me up!"

And here's what I just noticed. When I was talking to her, I felt like I was fading away. Like my voice was getting weaker and that if I held up my hand, I might to able to see right through it. Suddenly, I wasn't myself. She'd ask me a question and I wouldn't have an answer. All I could do was listen, passively. It was like she existed, fully, and I did, but weakly. Just hanging in there. When I am in contact with her, I am diminished.

This is a sensation that I have, in the past, blamed on her being self-centered. It's sort of like the feeling I get around my full blown narcissistic adoptive father. But it's worse. Much worse. It's a horrible, terrible feeling...that I might just disappear.

Before I called her, I blogged about this and Anonymous Bob left a comment telling me about psychoanalyst Sandor Ferenczi's paper entitled, "The Unwelcome Child and His Death Instinct (or Drive)" and suddenly, the lights went off.

Is THIS what is behind the sensation that I am there-but-not-there when I am with my first mother? That I am reliving not being wanted? That after 47 years, I can feel what I felt in utero? That I can only respond to her, not as an adult, but as an unborn baby incapable of speech or thought or opinion?

I am NOT looking for sympathy. I am trying to understand not only this feeling, but my lifelong struggle with not feeling fully a part of this world. I'm trying to understand my past struggle with psychosomatic ailments. I'm trying to understand my lack of sustained motivation and inability to meet long-term personal goals. Why I'm terrified of rejection. Why if when I do encounter rejection, it feels like annihilation.

Many of these "issues" can be attributed to being raised (or trained) by narcissistic parents. But they could have started with something else. (And made worse) With not being wanted.

Today, I'm going to the library to see if I can track down Ferenczi's paper.

More later.

My Mother: That Unwanted Feeling

2007-12-31T14:49:00.000-08:00

I started a thread on this on AAAFC, but decided to duplicate it here because some readers aren't forum members.

My mother called on Christmas and left a lovely message. She said something like, "You're such a nice person and you deserve the best and to be happy."

So I've tried to call her several times, but couldn't bring myself to do it. It's like I suddenly feel all clammy and I start to breathe fast and I feel slightly dizzy. And then it pops into my head, "I can't believe she gave me away!" Sometimes, I'll wake up in the middle of the night and that's the first thing I think. Out of the blue.

In the past, I've said that I don't feel safe around my mother. She unintentionally says things that are crushing. But I'm wondering if there's something more to this. I wonder if I can sense that she really never wanted me...back to in utero. She was 37 and by her own admission determined on adoption from the start, against family pressure to keep me. She's even said that her mother and sisters called her "heartless" for doing so.

An AAAFC member said that unwanted feeling - or knowledge - is deeply imprinted upon those of us whose mothers really did not want to keep us. I'm thinking she's absolutely right.

The Narcissistic Parent: Sometimes, You Gotta Stand Up

2007-12-28T13:31:00.000-08:00

Most of the professional advice about dealing with a narcissistic parent centers around emotionally detaching. If the parent is toxic enough, the advice is often cutting them off entirely. As a way to save oneself.

So it was with some surprise when I heard my new therapist say, "Say something. Don't let him get away with it. Stick up for yourself. Tell him that behavior isn't okay and that you'll stop calling him if he tries that again."

He said I'd feel better. But my (adoptive) father has got some dementia now, I pointed out. The poor guy. Then my therapist pointed out that while that was true, his behavior toward me hadn't changed at all. It was same old, same old. And it wasn't about correcting my a-dad's behavior, but how I saw and treated myself. Just letting a-dad spout off and not standing up to him reinforced my image as a passive nothing. A receptacle.

While this made sense, I've been reluctant to do this. I've done it once. Maybe twice.

But I did it today. Big time. And if the goal was to make ME feel better, more empowered, it worked!

I'm having a nuclear family problem. Not the end of the world, but it is - rightly - taking all of time and mental effort. It is my primary focus and I missed a day or two calling my a-dad at the assisted living facility.

So he just called and he was extremely peevish and said, "Why haven't you called to check on me? I'm all alone and..."

I'd had it. Absolutely had it. It's never occurred to him - ever - that I have problems of my own. That I've had to deal with children or work or the plumbing. That I've been sick. And I've never asked for special consideration or sympathy or any sort of help. It never occurred to him that I hadn't called because something had happened to me. That he could have said, "How are you? I just wanted to make sure everything was okay." But he's only capable of starting out from a place that starts with him.

So I said, "I haven't called because I have some problems I'm dealing with and I can't talk right now. I'll call you later." And hung up.

And you know what? It felt fantastic. I was taking care of myself. It sounds silly, but it validated my priorities. That I'm a real person with real needs and concerns and worries. I said it not just for today...but for all those yesterdays.

Oh Come Ye Children of Narcissists

2007-12-24T10:48:00.000-08:00

Just in time for the holidays!

Another post about dealing with a narcissistic parent.

After lots of therapy and endless intensive effort to emotionally detach from my toxic, elderly, narcissistic adoptive father, I'd like to report even more progress. If you have come here searching for information, I want to tell you it is possible to escape from their clutches.

I can now listen to one of his disturbing phone messages and giggle. A year ago, an abusive, demanding phone call would have left me sputtering with rage. I'd replay what he said over and over in my head. A single phone call could ruin my day. Several days.

Most recent example: He asked that I send him a new pair of slippers. The old slippers I gave him were not only falling apart, he said, but were making him fall down. (He falls down because he has Lewy Body dementia...different from Alzheimers. This frontal lobe disease means he lacks judgment and inhibition...which he had little of before. But basically, he's the same as he always was, just worse).

I also got the blame for his rapid decline in health because I stuck him in an assisted living facility. The fact that he is 81 and has heart disease and dementia had nothing to do with it.

I also got the blame for choosing a doctor who won't take his complaints about his aches and pains seriously and give him medicine to "cure" him. The fact that there is no cure for old age also escapes him. (I also got the blame for making him sick and sending him to the hospital when I was selfish enough to go away to college).

So I sent him some new slippers. He calls to say he got them and that they fit perfectly. And you know what he said? "Finally! You did something right for a change."

I laughed. I actually laughed.

I spent my life doing stuff for him. And my adoptive mother. And it was never enough. Or right. After them not doing much for me. The bare minimum. I mean, my adoptive mom thought driving me to school or taking me to the park (twice) were enough to qualify her for sainthood. Such amazing feats of selflessness required my undying gratitude and lifelong servitude.

Because it's Christmas time and with all the gift buying going on, I got to thinking. As soon as I started earning money, I bought them nice gifts. Thoughtful ones. I got a card with a little money. I can't remember a single gift they ever gave me. Because they never gave me anything, except when I was a little kid. My husband says it's because they didn't really know me and that if you aren't close to someone, you have no idea what they like. He said they were always too busy talking about themselves to learn anything about me. Which is true. They always blamed me for not being close to them, but how can you get close to someone who won't let you finish a sentence? I worked for years in television news production and they would tell people they had no idea what I did for a living. Writing, something like that. I told them a hundred times - desperate for attention and approval. My kids are smarter. They don't even bother trying to talk to my adoptive father. They just sit there and nod politely and then leave the room as soon as possible.

Anyway!

If you are in the process of trying to emotionally detach from a narcissistic parent, but haven't yet done so, and find yourself thrown together during the holiday season or are upset about something that parent is sure to do and worried that you may finally flip out and lose it, you have my sympathy. The holidays are already stressful enough. Try visualizing zipping yourself into an invisible full body shield that will deflect all the crap that is sure to be flung. And if you want to whine about anything, please feel free to leave a comment. Whiners are more than welcome here.

Adoptee Third Option: Escape!!!

2007-12-21T10:07:00.000-08:00

When your adoptive parents can't - won't - allow you to ask questions about your adoption, you are being denied the most fundamental thing about you. Where you come from. Denied this most basic of information, your very reality, you can't be real. So you fake it. As best you can. A sort-of person. Not like the rest. The only way to deal with that is what I did for decades. To tell yourself and anybody who asks, "It's okay. I don't really want to know, anyway. My adoptive parents are my real parents. Actually, I'm happy to be adopted! " This is commonly referred to as, "the fog." I've also called it brainwashing. Maybe it's self-preservation.

But this state of repression is so difficult to sustain, especially around adoptive parents who insist you be something you are not, that there is a third option: Getting away. As far as you can.

The minute my feet touched down in Berkeley, 400 miles away from my adoptive family, I found freedom. To be somebody who may not have yet been authentic, but at least I didn't have the burden of playing the dutiful, passive only child who was forced to caretake her emotionally needy adoptive parents, who's only accepted role was to listen and provide support, without expressing any opinion or needs of her own.

The danger in getting away, after being the prisoner of such controlling parents, is that it's all too easy to fall into the clutches of other controlling people, like boyfriends and friends. And I did. It was the only kind of relationship I knew. Still, I was free to experiment with relationships. And myself. To explore the who and why of me. This isn't easy to do when you don't know much about your first family and what you were told was a bunch of lies.

It's only after finding my first mother and getting my backstory 1.75 years ago that I finally feel like I'm a real, bonified person with two feet on the ground instead of hovering, ghostlike, several feet above the surface.

But getting away was the third option. That state in between staying away from my adoptive parents and running away from searching for my first family. In between, I moved seven times and lived in five different states. My adoptive dad would shake his head and call me a, "gypsy."

I have lived in the same house for seven years, which is a record. I've been thinking back to that time of moving, moving, moving. It was much better than playing Obedient Daughter to an unappreciative audience. It was less, well, foggy. I wasn't thinking much about adoption back then. Hardly at all. Still, it was nowhere near as good as life after finding my first mother, as painful as it has sometimes been. Our reunion is far from fabulous. Although, it's better than some. She was thrilled I'd found her!

I am really amazed at how utterly empowering search and reunion is, even when you end up not liking your first mom all that much. It's hard to explain to somebody who isn't adopted just how fulfilling it is to finally, finally, get some facts about where you come from. To see the woman who gave to birth to you, at least once. Not that it's easy. I'm still reeling from the shock of it ten months ago!

Before reunion, I was starting to feel restless again. Like I wanted to pick up and move. (Although I wouldn't, my kids were becoming teens). But since reunion, I am happy where I am. Perfectly content. That's saying a lot, because for those of you who've read my older posts, my poor mother carries major baggage and I've done my fair share of moaning and groaning. But as the Holidays approach, I'm celebrating I found her. Baggage and all.

The Angry Adoptee

2007-12-17T21:35:00.001-08:00

You know what pisses me off?

That we adoptees are only allowed to express a limited range of emotions. And opinions.

If I were my teenage daughters, I might put it this way: "Anger really freaks people out."

I'm angry about my adoption, but not an angry person in general. I have got on with my life despite getting stuck with narcissistic adoptive parents whom I had to caretake.

I'm concerned there seems to be a weird love affair going on with adoption. Which is not going to last. We're going through a phase. Several more distraught, woefully unprepared and undereducated adoptive moms who kill their international adoptees is bound to throw the spotlight on the fact that adopting a kid from another country isn't all about bunny slippers and finally getting invited to playdates.

ANYWAY...back to anger.

I can only speak for myself. Not all adoptees are angry. And those of us who are, aren't angry about the same things.

But I'll tell you what makes me angry: Not being listened to. Never. Not once. Not at home. Not in my family. Not amongst friends. Not even now. In 2007. (Except here. And on AAAFC).

It's enough to make you absolutely crazy.

There you are, a bonified SOCIAL EXPERIMENT...the subject of books written by experts, the topic of radio call-in shows and newspaper articles and morning television show segments. But nobody ever wants to hear what it's like to live life as an adoptee. Not if the script doesn't include the words, "happy" or "grateful." Sometimes, a carefully screened adoptee gets to admit to a dollop of ambivalence, in a perfectly pleasant tone of voice that shows she is not in the least bit angry. A little confused, maybe. Wistful is okay, too. She can be wistful. Maybe she'd like some things about adoption to change. But just a little. Nothing scary. Because she's grateful to have been adopted and she just adores her adoptive parents.

The rest of us are ignored. Or dismissed. We're crybaby whiners who should just get on with our lives.

Being an adoptee often means this: Having a lifetime of experience to share and few people to share it with. It's just not something people want to hear about. Unless they are discussing it. Then you can't get them to shut up because they're experts and want to tell you how to deal with something you've lived with every single minute of your life. As a social experiment.

That's what people don't get. Adoption is not just another way to form a family. It's something entirely different. Oh, it's a way. Way different. Definitely. Necessary sometimes. Like in my case. But proceed with caution. It's tricky. Like all experiments.

Talking about the Adoption Experience

2007-12-13T16:50:00.000-08:00

It's practically the middle of December and I'm still reeling from the onslaught of articles about adoption published to coincide with November is National Adoption Month.

And you know what?

There was a whole lot of talking going on about the adoption experience and, once again, it was the adoptive parents doing most of the talking. Sure, there were some notable and carefully chosen exceptions, but overall, the adoptive parents hogged the show.

And you know what else?

Only those of us who are adopted know what it's really like. Sure, AP's can talk about what it's like to build a family through adoption. But not the actual adoption experience.

Only we are qualified to talk about the adoption experience. All of us adoptees. Domestic and international product. Closed Era and Open. Transracial. The formerly fostered and now adopted. Oh sure, adoptive parents can talk longer and louder, but in the end, they aren't adopted. We are.

What if....

What if...

adoptees got to do all the talking? Just for once. Maybe National Adoptee Month. Maybe that's what it would take. Just so we could talk without somebody handing the microphone to an adoptive parent to explain it all. Just so we could finally have some dignity and be treated like bonified grown-ups.

Would I, Could I....Adopt

2007-12-10T08:20:00.000-08:00

A brave reader asked if I would adopt. She asked because she's thinking about it and knows I'm an adoptee. I call her brave because, I suspect, most Prospective Adoptive Parents would have an inkling of what I might say and not want to hear it.

After the trauma of infertility, the red tape, the disappointment, the effort, the money, the expectations, the sheer magnitude of the whole adoption process, the last thing a PAP wants to hear is some adult adoptee bursting any balloons by telling them that more hard work is ahead. It's like running a marathon and just when you think you've won some guy tells you there's another 26 miles and a mountain to go. Who wants to hear that?

This is a long way of saying, that's what I meant by bravery for asking.

The answer?

No. At least not a newborn from a birthmother. As an adoptee, there's no way I could take the smallest part of promoting this sector of the adoption industry. It's simply out of control in this country.

Would I adopt an orphan from a foreign country? Again, no. Not after learning about corrupt practices and the way the demand for babies is actually creating supply in third world countries. And while there are legitimate orphans, I would be too terrified that the one I would receive would be stolen or sold or something equally awful.

Before I admitted that adoption did have an enormous (negative) impact on my life, I could see myself adopting in an unconscious repetition of my abandonment complex. Basically, I'd be trying to rescue my baby self and be the kind of adoptive mother my adoptive mother could not be.

But now that I'm out of the fog and realize just how traumatizing adoption is, no. I have finally reached the point of being able to deal with my own issues. I'm so worn out and tired by my own ongoing struggle that I'm simply not equipped to take on the ongoing struggle of another adoptee.

How about adopting a child from foster care? Now there's something I would consider. There are so many kids in the system who desperately need homes. But not even at this stage because I have two teenagers...so trying to attend to their needs while attending to my own and that of an aging narcissistic adoptive father take all the physical and psychological energy I can muster in middle age.

Now remember, the question was would I adopt. This is not advice to anyone considering adoption. My only advice is to take off the rose colored glasses if you're wearing them and make sure you are strong because it's a marathon...not a sprint.

Bad Adoptions

2007-12-03T08:06:00.000-08:00

What draws people to obscure blogs like mine is a fascinating question.

Some find me by Googling, "elderly narcissistic parent," and the first thing that pops into my head is, "That poor person." Because I know they are stricken with guilt or overburdened with making all the tough decisions because their parent made no advance plans or "Mom" or "Dad" is generally being a giant pain in the ass after being a thorn in the side of the adult children ever since they were kids.

Others find me by Googling, "Bad Adoptions."

And I'm wondering, what does that mean? I guess it all depends on who's searching.

If it's a prospective adoptive parent, it probably means they chose an agency that disappointed or the birth mother changed her mind or they flew all the way to Guatamala or China or some other third world exporter of babies and was forced to return home empty handed, for whatever reason.

If it's an adoptive parent, it probably means major disappointment of the staggering kind. Just the idea of this makes me cringe. Do bio parents Google, "Bad Biological Kids?" Probably not. They complain to their friends, read a lot of self-help parenting books, eventually become estranged or cut them out of their will. But they don't have the excuse of a, "bad adoption" to fall back on nor do they "disrupt an adoption," also known as giving back the kid.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, some adoptive parents were lied to or half-lied to and the child they brought home is a walking disaster or attachment disordered and this wasn't what they signed up for. They expected what everybody else expected when they read, "What To Expect When You're Expecting." A cozy bundle of joy, not a nightmare. Or if the child was older, maybe they wanted compliance and gratitude. But preceding any adoption is expectation. But because most people decide on adoption as a last resort, they're already emotionally strung out and the stakes have gone way, way up. It's like losing all but ten bucks in Vegas and you hit the giant spinney wheel thingy and throw your money down, muttering a prayer.

So what am I saying?

Adoption is not for the weak and fragile. (Which is kinda funny, if you think about it, because most of the infertile couples have been through a lot of trauma, so are understandably wrung out).

It's far more serious and difficult than many desperate, prospective adoptive parents would like to believe or can afford to believe. It takes a giant leap of faith to raise somebody else's kid and to deal with the disappointment they must feel deep inside when their adoptee turns out differently from whatever they had in mind. I oughta know. I could feel my adoptive mother's profound sadness and disappointment that I did not turn out to be the loving, dutiful Mexican daughter who stayed by her side. (And occasionally, I heard about it, too).

Every prospective adoptive parent has expectations. My advice? Best to be honest about it. If you can admit what you're expecting, then you can expect not to be so disappointed when you get served up a child you didn't quite expect. Kids are like that. Even biological ones. But I know raising an adopted child is harder than raising a biological one. Because being an adopted child is harder than being a biological one. There's just more layers of stuff.

Adoptees and the Extended Family

2007-11-29T08:42:00.003-08:00

Much has been said about some adoptees feeling like they don't fit in with their adoptive families.

At least, that's what I've said.

That said, oddly enough, I always felt like I was a member of the family.

My aunts fussed over me. So did my maternal grandmother who always cooked something special when I visited. My paternal grandmother got stuck with me almost every weekend and she was always sweet. Maybe they knew just how lousy I had it with my self-centered adoptive parents and were trying to make up for it.

But now that I look back on it, I don't think that even these kind folk saw me as one of them. I was just too different. Now that I'm an adult, I suspect they felt sorry for me. I also believe there was a lot of talking amongst themselves about me and my quirks and why I was the way I was.

Why do I suspect this?

First, my adoptive family was a closed family system. Suspicious of outsiders.

Second, since I don't run around with "Adoptee!" stamped on my forehead, I pass for regular folk in the community. So at parties people tell me about me about the (usually weird) adopted kid in their family or at my local bookstore the owner tells me about the quirks of her adopted grandchild and the other day at Starbucks, I overheard a woman (loudly) discussing her Guatling niece and attachment or the lack of it and the trouble the little girl was having at pre-school and how, well, quirky she is.

See what I'm getting at?

Despite all this adoption is wonderful business, when you bring a kid into a nuclear family, the extended family is going to have their own opinion. While few dare say anything to the adopted family's face, they say it behind their backs. I've heard it. Believe me.

So that's what I think went on in my family.

And I can prove it.

Besides a cousin telling me I didn't belong to the family and that's why I was so weird, there also seemed to be a lot of whispering and sideways glances. And when I'd look up, they'd have that guilty look on their face people get when they've just said something bad about you. Plus, after my adoptive mother died, her side of the family just sort of drifted off, probably because they no longer had to pretend they liked me. (For the record, I am very close to one cousin because her mother is a narcissist, too, so we've bonded)

Of course, not all adoptess have this experience. Some do. For those of us who do, we're like poor Fanny in Jane Austen's Mansfield Park. Somebody to take pity on and help, but not the same as the primary children, her quirks of character to be examined and noted.

There's that word again. Quirk. Quirkish. Quirky.

In our adoptive families, we're quirky. But when I met my first family, I was just like them. Or at least parts of me were. This has nothing to do with how I feel about them. But at least I'm finally not quirky.

Hah. A word could not describe us better!

Quirk: 1) a pecularity of behavior;

2) A TRICK OF FATE.

And that is exactly what happened!

Fate has tricked me.

The Aging Narcissistic Parent, Now With Dementia!

2007-11-27T20:13:00.000-08:00

Face it. Your lifelong nightmare just got worse.

The parent who neglected you or mocked you or controlled you or made you perform in front of strangers has developed dementia and that, as you must have noticed, has made your self-absorbed parent even more self-absorbed.

So why am I writing about this subject again, when this is a blog about being a Closed Era adoptee?

Because that, my dear reader, is apparently what draws at least half of you here. Specifically, Googling, "aging narcissistic parent" or some other variation.

How to deal or handle them is one issue.

What to do with them is another.

Presumably, some of you are in search of expert advice. Well, I'm no expert, but I am a survivor of two narcissistic parents, both of whom developed dementia. Technically, one's not dead yet, but I'm still standing.

1) Just what kind of dementia are we talking? Alzheimers? The frontal lobe variety called, "Lewy Body?

Both are bad. My adoptive mother had Alzheimers. The good thing was she went from being mostly mean and controlling to nice and compliant. So it made it easier to find and keep an in-home caregiver. The bad thing was my mother lived eight years with this horrible disease. We used all of her personal savings on her care. (She insisted on a separate account from my father)

If you have the extremely bad luck of having your narcissistic parent develop Lewy Body dementia, well, stockpile the Xanax and grow an ever thicker hide.

This frontal lobe dementia basically strips them of their inhibition. Whatever little they had that protected you from hearing the glorious details of their sex life or the wondrous size of their penis or kept them from telling so-and-so they have a fat ass and need lipo, it's all going to come spilling out. There's nothing to stop them now. They want to talk about themselves and act like Simon on American Idol.

2) IF said narcissistic parent develops Lewy Body dementia, start looking for an assisted living facility. It's gonna take an entire team of somewhat professional, emotionally detached staff to deal with them. One single caregiver is probably not a good idea. In fact, the doctor who diagnosed my adoptive father just came out and said it. People like this are at higher risk for elder abuse. You'll have trouble keeping anybody who wants to look after him. They'll quit after a couple days. My Dad was so offensive to this doctor, who had the misfortune of being short, bald and Mexican (resulting in a bonanza of insults!) , the doctor said he couldn't accept him as a continuing patient.

3) The aging narcissist, even pre-dementia, does not deal well with the challenges of aging. Everything is a drama. Everything is harder than it should be. If they opt for an elective surgery against your well-researched advice, you're still going to get blamed. In fact, you will be blamed for everything. They will take no responsibility in planning for their future care and will fight you every step of the way. When they keep falling down or become incontinent, they will blame you for ruining their lives by sticking them in an assisted living facility.

4) The aging narcissist with dementia is STILL capable of trying to control you. It's amazing how this behavior somehow survives. In my mom's third year with Alzheimers, she'd get angry with me and then give me the cold, silent treatment for weeks, months, just like she used to when I was a kid. And my Dad, who even surpassed my mother's skill at The Guilt Trip, can still play the victim like nobody's business.

I'm sorry I don't have better news.

But it's not like we were talking about loving, caring, emotionally nuturing parents in the first place. Still, we can try to do the right thing and be moral, responsible citizens and arrange for the best of care possible, if we can afford it. (Sell their house. Not all of us are cut out to change adult diapers 15X a day). We can still check on them and make sure they are being treated well. And take satisfaction in that.

Revenge is Mine

2007-11-26T17:01:00.000-08:00

This is a cautionary tale. Don't piss off an adopted relative. You may need their help one of these days.

My adoption was practically a state secret. An older cousin told me he and the rest of the teenagers in the family were ORDERED never to discuss my adoption with outsiders (and to deny it if asked), amongst themselves and never, ever with me.

Hah!

They must have discussed it because somehow, the second cousins knew. They were just a little younger than me so I mostly hung out with them.

Well, several years ago, one of these second cousins asked for a hefty loan. At the time, we were on pretty good terms. But the first thing that popped into my head was a fight we had when we were young teens. She settled it by screaming, "And you don't even belong to this family! You're adopted. That's why you're so weird."

She may have called me a freak. I can't remember.

Still, I gave her the money. Like $700. Told her it was an early Xmas gift. We never discussed it again. Not that we talked much since then.

So a few weeks ago I get an email marked "URGENT! REPLY IMMEDIATELY!!!" in the subject line from the same cousin. Pleading for another hefty loan. It also included an apology for not being nicer to me, etc.

And I got to wondering. Did she mean the time she called me a weirdo or a freak or whatever? Or for not doing a better job keeping in contact with the un-family member who helped her out in her time of need?

I turned her down. Nicely, of course. With regrets and all that.

But the thing is, I don't really regret it.

Not all that long ago, when I was still in people pleasing mode, I might have said "yes" and resented the hell out of her. Or I would have felt guilty for saying no. Or I would have been uncertain and called my husband a hundred times asking for advice on how to handle this delicate situation.

This time, I took a trip down memory lane and, for the first time, noticed just how barren that lane actually was.

And you know what?

I spent a lot of time crafting a kind reply, without ever once referring to the original sum given without any expectation of repayment. And guess what? Nada. No acknowledgement of any sort. I'm family when she needs something. I'm un-family when I serve no purpose.

And you know what else?

I don't care. I mean, I'm slightly miffed, but I'm not hurting. I'm not devastated. Now that's progress.

Surviving Adoption

2007-11-21T18:19:00.000-08:00

For me, adoption has long meant shame and secrecy and pretend games I didn't fully understand, yet played along anyway under adoptive parental duress.

That I had suffered pain and loss as an adoptee never occurred to my adoptive parents. For whatever reason.

That an adoptive parent would acknowledge that her child had something of value to lose and not everything to gain is, well, hard to fathom. My adoptive mother couldn't even admit that I was adopted because she hated to, "think of me that way" and, "liked to pretend I was hers." This meant that any questions about my adoption and my first mother were about as welcome as a request for a giant dildo.

Yet, there are adoptive parents out there today who a) acknowledge their adopted children had a first mother; b) acknowledge their child's loss; c) encourage their children to talk about their feelings about adoption. Of course, this new breed of adoptive parents do many other things that my adoptive parents did not, could not, would not.

One adoptive mom's blog really got me. Okay, I blubbered. You can check her out for yourself at www.allmychildren-christine.blogspot.com.

Christine talks honestly about her worries as an adoptive mom. She's also a keen observer of her daughter's often painful struggle with being an international adoptee. When I read about what her little girl is going through - with the support of her adoptive mother - I can see it all there, the pain, the loneliness, the unanswered questions and the uncertainty of my own struggle. Yet, many of us from the Closed Era had to wander The Labyrinth completely alone.

And some idiots have the nerve to call us maladjusted. It's a wonder we all didn't end up institutionalized.

Being adopted isn't easy. It's damn hard. It takes an empathetic, emotionally honest adoptive parent who puts their child's needs first. Narcissists need not apply for the job. People who feel cosmically entitled to a child because they're infertile or because they've left things too long and they're past their sell-by date, they're not such a good idea either. Because an entitled prospective parent is going to have expectations that one little baby can't meet. That's where we end up with all these weird notions and justifications about "saving children" and gratitude and all that other adoption nonsense.

Besides, The Labyrinth is like a really bad amusement park ride that severed limbs and decapitated heads before finally getting shut down. Okay, it's still up and running except it's been tweaked and renamed The Open Adoption Not-So-Fun Slide and, in the case of international adoptees, The Chair-O-Plane swing ride. I think you get my point. When adoption is finally making some progress, why go backward?

(Not that I promote adoption. In fact, it's out of control. But in cases where it can't be avoided and where children need homes, at least let them be loving, caring and capable homes)

Depressive Slumps and Other Setbacks

2007-11-19T13:03:00.000-08:00

Snapped out of a week long depressive slump. A combination of National Adoption Month and my narcissistic adoptive father got me down. Felt fatigued for no good reason. Took naps. Had a root canal. Writing project suffered a bit. Wanted to disappear.

And then today, much better. Even though it's dreary outside. Spent the morning figuring out a-dad's latest medical bills and writing checks. Assuming responsibility for an elderly parent, even when in an assisted living facility, is more than a part time job.

Today's thoughts, in bullet points, because who has time?

1) I wouldn't wish adoption on my enemy (not that I have any).

2) What's gonna happen to all those aging narcissists who are gonna need help with care (and money) when the time comes? After a lifetime of neglect and emotional abuse, are their child(ren) available, willing or able to step up to the plate? It's not like adult children of narcissists have happy memories to fall back on to get them through the tough times. It's not like their narcissistic parents were ever lovely and giving and nuturing and now they're old and needy and crotchety. They were young, needy and crotchety. This is where the Living Longer trend becomes worrisome. Who wants to shoulder the burden of an aging narcissistic parent for - gasp - 10, 15, 20 years? I've just entered my FIFTEENTH year of being responsible for aging narcissistic parents. You've read my blog. You've seen what a mess I am.

3) Why don't I feel more like a bonified grown-up even though I'm in my mid-forties? Is this because there's something about being forever branded and treated as an "adopted child" (without the same rights as everybody else) or does it also have something to do with being the adult child of a narcissist? We weren't allowed to individuate. Well, I did, but it was like losing several limbs in the process. Basically, like a scene out of Saw.

4) Now that I've spent so much time "unrepressing" myself and finally admitting - yes, adoption sucks - is it time to put adoption back in The Box? Maybe pretend I'm not adopted? Stop thinking about it. Think about other things. Wait. That's what I did before and I was a raging hypochondriac and stricken with anxiety. But now that I've dealt with "it," would I start to have those problems again?

5) Making my way through Nick Hornby books. First time. Some reviewers have described him as a "manly writer" and I thought that meant, you know, Fight Club stuff. So opposite that. Crediting Mr. Hornby for helping me laugh my way out of my latest depressive slump.

When I was Jewish

2007-11-15T17:51:00.000-08:00

As you probably know, I'm 100% Mexican.

For ten years, I thought I was Jewish.

No kidding.

My adoptive dad told me my birth mother was Jewish. Then he changed the story and said she was Latina, but my father was a German Jew.

When I did well in school, he whispered it was because I had Jewish blood.

Whispered because adoption was a taboo subject. Plus, he's an anti-semite.

So for an entire decade, I began to explore what it meant to be Jewish while raised as a Mexican Catholic.

Then I began to ask, "how did this happen?" I was told that I should have been placed in a Jewish home. And then I got angry. If I had gone to a Jewish family, I could have had a lovely bat-mizvah and been raised around books and my plan to go to college would have been encouraged, not sabotaged. During that time I had kids. So I sent them to Jewish pre-schools. Gosh, I even learned how to make those little triangle pastries and a killer brisket. Okay, a somewhat superficial exploration of my Jewish side, but stilll. You get the idea. A whole lot of time and effort was spent thinking of myself as a Jew. Or part Jewish. A big deal if you're raised with saints on alters and St. Jude on the dashboard. A personal paradigm shift. I LOVED it.

And then in a day, I was no longer Jewish.

My non-identifying information had arrived.

Mother? Mexican. Father? Mexican national of German ancestry.

Confused and furious, I called my adoptive father. "Why did you tell me I was Jewish, for Christ's sake?"

"That's what the social worker told us," he replied. "That your mother was a German Jew."

The lights went off. My narcissistic adoptive father doesn't listen. He can't attend to a conversation like most folks. When somebody is talking about something that doesn't interest him, his mind wanders.

"You mean my father was a German Jew?" I asked, thinking of the German ancestry reference.

"I guess," he said.

More prodding revealed that my adoptive father had added one and one and came up with five. He ASSUMED that my adoptive father was a German Jew who'd escaped to Mexico during WWII. Wrongo.

When I finished scolding him for his error, he said he didn't know what the fuss was about. It didn't matter to him whether I was a Jew or not.

"Gee thanks," I snarked. "That's big of you."

This is the problem with adoption. We adoptees are at the mercy of adoptive parents and others who hold the key to our identity. Obviously, some of them (like my adoptive parents) are not capable of acting in a responsible manner. Either heritage is important. Or it isn't. Society can't have it both ways. You can't have the whole genealogy craze AND simultaneously argue genealogy is no big deal and quit obsessing about it. You can't say, as odious Thomas Atwood did on NPR the other day, that the adoptive family is adequate to the formation of an adoptee's identity, when the adoptive family is sometimes INADEQUATE.

Guilt...and More Guilt

2007-11-12T19:30:00.000-08:00

Here's one of the challenges of dealing with a narcissistic parent.

Even after you've read every book on the subject.

Even after setting up boundaries big enough to contain T-Rex himself.

Even after putting yourself and your loved ones first for a change.

Even after lots of therapy and remembering just how many times you got the short and sharp end of the stick.

Even after making progress at taking control of your life.

(Even after futilely complaining to your Post Adoption Social Worker about getting placed with two narcissists four decades after the fact, har)

They still manage to lob one over the perimeter.

And whammo, the sirens are blaring and you find yourself defenseless and suddenly feeling...GUILTY...again!!!

I called my (badly) aging narcissistic father after taking a day off. I asked after his health. He said he was not doing so good. In fact, his stomach was hurting. He'd skipped dinner. He was feeling depressed and lonely because he missed me and the grandkids and nobody ever visited him. Then he said he needed to go because he just wanted to go back to sleep.

So I mope around feeling like crap and the world's worst daughter and then I tell my husband what happened and he looks at me like I'm, well, an idiot.

"He's...manipulating...you," my husband said slowly and clearly, like I was slow (which I am). "He's trying to make you feel guilty. Remember? He always does this."

And that's the thing.

The response is sooo ingrained that every time it does happen, it feels like it's the first time and not the thousandth.

Damn.

Adoption, Adoption....Everywhere

2007-11-10T18:52:00.001-08:00

It's beginning to happen so often, my husband joked today that I am an "adoption magnet."

No kidding.

We were in a local store and the owner was telling me about her grandson when her tale took an unexpected turn. Suddenly, she was talking about her daughter's infertility and miscarriage and how her daughter just happened to meet a distraught pregnant woman who'd just been dumped by prospective adoptive parents. So it was like this adoption was "meant to be," etc., etc.

And then, I was at a business dinner and sat down next to a man who told me he and his wife had privately adopted an in-family baby from another country. He and his wife were toying with the idea of NOT telling the child she was adopted. It was clear this man had never read one single book about adoption. Of course, I politely explained why that wouldn't be such a good idea and how it could backfire.

At a friend's party, I sat next to elderly couple. Guess what they wanted to talk about? Their adopted grandson, now a teenager.

In each case, the happiness and merits of the parents were touted...and so were the awful circumstances or unworthiness of the first mothers....and the fact that it was meant to be...and what a win-win it was...and what a good job the parents had done because the children were so wonderful...and so lucky.

And whew. Those conversations wipe me out. And make me sad.

I understand that the above mentioned bio mothers did not want their children or at least act like they wanted them. I'm glad the parents are happy. They are thrilled to be raising these children. On the flip side, I know the inner turmoil these kids will experience. Love is NOT enough to spare them the pain of being given away by one's own mother.

The teenager is hurting and trying to express it. But he's constantly reminded by his well meaning grandparents how lucky he is, because his mom was a loser and an addict. The grandparents were sweet. Really. It just never dawned on them that telling the kid to be happy and grateful was like throwing gas on flames. They seemed to get it after I set them straight, nicely. They seemed quite astonished that there was another POV on this.

At least they listened.

My husband wondered if there's something about me that causes people to tell me intimate stuff. I think there's something to that. (I could talk to a rock and it would probably complain about the dirt it's sitting on.) But then we wondered if it's because there's so many kids being adopted these days and it's way more common than we think. That, too. Definitely.

What's funny about these stories is the absolute belief that these adoptions were meant to be, destined. I know this is just a random sampling. But it doesn't make adoption easier. For the adoptee. Just for other people who can experience it, from the outside.

Smacked by a Narcissistic Parent: The Aftermath

2007-11-09T07:46:00.000-08:00

I'm figuring out how this works. Finally.

There's a direct connection between my narcissistic parents, bouts of depression and acute low motivation.

I can look back at my life and say....oh, that's what was going on.

School years? Low achiever.

Finally, college....hit or miss.

Professional career....much better. Then again, I lived far, far away from my adoptive, narcissistic parents so their toxic impact was diluted.

Now....near daily doses of surviving narcissistic a-dad.

So the other day he said something I found VERY triggering. He told me he had no idea I was a month old when I was adopted or that I'd been fostered. He said he didn't care where I'd been during that time because the important thing was, they had a pretty newborn baby of their very own who hardly cried at all.

I'll spell it out.

Once again, a-dad had made me feel invisible. That me as an individual did not count. That if I'd been stuck in an orphanage as a newborn, it was of no interest to him. There was no acknowledgment of my concern over this unexpected information. He's always done this. There is only him. There is no me. A-dad has always talked endlessly. I was hardly ever allowed to talk at all. He'd interrupt constantly. My adoptive mother was also narcissistic. Of the "you are an extension of me" variety. The kind who feared her daughter's growing independence and controlled me with extended punishing silences and, finally, stopped talking to me for years when I went away to college because I'd betrayed her by leaving.

So after a-dad said this the other day, I suddenly felt fatigued. Zapped of all motivation. I couldn't work on my book project. I just couldn't, even though I knew it would make me feel better. I was suddenly thinking, "this is a waste of time," "who do I am think I am?," "who is gonna want to read this crap?,." This depressive sink hole lasted 24-hours. Like a flu.

You can't do something that is important to you when you feel worthless. When you've been reminded that YOU are inconsequential. To my narcissistic father, the only thing that matters is that he's listened to. Preferably by me because I was trained to do so. When I managed to insert an opinion of my own, I was mocked. "Oh, really, little Miss Smarty Pants?" or "Oh, you think you're so smart just because you went to college, but you don't know anything." It's those voices that play in my head when I sit at the computer to write. Which makes my goal of trying to finish a book nearly perverse.

So now that I've figured out precisely how this dynamic works, the challenge is to figure out how to avoid such triggering conversations. I've made a start by not being such a passive doormat in our phone calls, which I've cut back to protect myself. I guess I'll stop asking a-dad any more questions about my adoption. It's always been a taboo subject anyway.

Asking a Narcissistic Parent a Question

2007-11-07T16:13:00.000-08:00

Asking a narcissistic parent a really important question is like.....well, I don't know what it's like. It's not like asking a normal person a question, that's for damn sure.

In fact, I don't advise it.

In my case, I had no other choice.

L.A. County won't tell me where I spent the first month of my life. While the social worker confirmed that I'd been in foster care, she wouldn't elaborate, saying this was confidential information. Was I placed in some sort of institution? A private home?

So I just asked my Dad.

He and my adoptive mother had NO IDEA I'd been fostered.

They thought I was a newborn when they "got me."

They had no idea I was a month old, even though they picked me up one month after my birthday.

The information is right there on my adoption paperwork.

They were just so excited to have a beautiful new baby.

He said I hardly ever cried at all.

The next day, my adoptive mother took me to her former place of work to show me off. The ladies there admired me and said they had no idea my a-mom had been pregnant. Of course, she pretended I was biologically hers and pointed out our similar features. My a-dad just told me this. (His long term memory is excellent. What he had for breakfast is a problem).

When I asked him how he couldn't have known that I was a (whole fucking) month old when they picked me up, he said knowing this wouldn't have made any difference. That where I spent that time didn't matter. But it's important to me, I said (in a futile effort to remind him that I am a human being and not merely narcissistic supply.) But he insisted it made no difference at all. To him.

As the now adult child of a narcissist - one who has had lots of therapy - I wanted to scream and shout and say, "IT WAS THE FIRST MONTH OF MY LIFE. I WANT TO KNOW WHERE I WAS!"

Instead, I said nothing.

He said, "You were such a beautiful baby. Just like your mother. And nobody could take you away from us."

I wish SOMEBODY had.

So there.

(This is me having the last word. Something that will never happen in a conversation with a narcissistic parent.)

Really Bad Adoption Stories

2007-11-05T07:46:00.000-08:00

In the old days, it was that awful Chosen Baby story.

Or hearing that you were "special" (another way of calling somebody retarded, even back then. For a while, I actually thought I was "special" in that way).

Either way, it placed an uncomfortable emphasis on the fact that you were different. And who wants to be different when you're a kid? You just want to fit in. It was also confusing. The whole Chosen Baby tale conjured up images of one's adopters sauntering past rows and rows of cribs filled with babies holding out their chubby arms, begging to be picked.

And now, I've read, some adopted kids are being told by well meaning adoptive parents that they "grew in their mommies heart."

In my opinion, not such a good idea.

In fact, a really BAD idea.

First, think back. Kids are pretty literal minded. I was no dummy, but if I'd been told that when I was young, I definitely would have thought I developed in my adoptive mom's heart. And that was the difference between being adopted and not. Biological kids grow in their mommies tummies. Adopted kids grow in their mommie's heart. Also knowing me, I wouldn't have asked follow-up questions to clarify this alarming news. I asked few questions. Many kids don't ask questions. After all, they haven't yet developed interviewing skills and pretty much accept what they're told.

Also, I just watched Alien Resurrection. And guess what happens? Some evil-doers decide to recreate Ripley from her 200 year old blood and then use her as a surrogate and implant an alien fetus in her chest. Imagine her horror when she figures out the irony of her situation (old Ripley hating aliens as much as she did, she is technically the mother of an alien) while grappling with some pretty serious identity issues, like is she Ripley...or not. Well, anyway, Baby Alien is surgically removed from Reconstituted Ripley's chest cavity.

You know the FIRST thing I thought of?

That "You Grew In My Heart" adoption story. (Actually, I alarmed my teenagers by screaming "Oh No!")

If something grows in your heart, at some point, it's gotta be removed. Otherwise the heart is gonna burst. Analogies are pretty much lost on kids.

I totally understand the desire to explain adoption in as painless and positive a way as possible to one's adoptee. Honest. But it doesn't take forced and painful analogies. One doesn't have to make potentially misleading statements. One doesn't have to say God spent a lot of time getting rid of one set of parents just so another could benefit. One doesn't have to call the kid a Blessing...which is just as burdensome as being Chosen. The adoptee just needs a simple, clear, no frills explanation and, of course, lots of empathy and gentle answers to questions as they arise.

Being told you are adopted is an unpleasant experience. Okay, it's traumatic. There's no way around it. It's like the kid is staring at a really disturbing picture by Picasso - trying to make sense of it - and being repeatedly told how pretty it is. I argue it's the beginning of our disconnection from ourselves and reality. We know how bad it feels. Everybody else insists it's wonderful.

Attaching to the Narcissistic Parent

2007-11-02T07:47:00.000-07:00

My aging narcissistic a-father called to ask that I send him more of his favorite candy. Immediately. So there it sits on my kitchen counter. I may get around to mailing it today. Or maybe not. It's my little act of revenge for what happened when I was ten. And basically, for ruining my third decade.

Let's start with my thirties and work backward...in bullet points...because who has time?

--after emotionally and financially cutting me off because I decided to go away to college instead of staying home, a-mom develops Alzheimers when I'm 30;
--a-dad and family try to pressure me into personally caretaking rapidly declining a-mom (while also caring for toddlers?); I refuse but manage a-mom's care and find caretaker;
--massive guilt sets-in; I develop severe hypochondria and suffer from anxiety attacks
--a-mom dies; I now become a-dad's caretaker, which really isn't any different from before because he's a flaming narcissist
--a-dad develops dementia; the beginning of my (fucked) forties

So here's where the damned candy comes in.

When I was ten, I stayed in the hospital after doctors removed a suspicious cyst on my forehead. I stayed alone. A-mom was upset and worried and "couldn't take it" and it was more relaxing with her out of the picture.

But here's the new information: a-dad told me that he and a-mom ARGUED over this. The nurse invited a-mom to stay overnight in the extra bed and a-mom REFUSED, saying there was no way she was going to spend the night in a hospital because it was too uncomfortable, boring, etc., and that he could stay if he wanted to. (He didn't) Then she left in a huff.

Now this may not sound like that big of a deal.

But it is.

Obviously, my self-absorbed mother wasn't all that attached to me because otherwise wild horses couldn't have dragged her from my side. Looking back, her comfort and convenience pretty much trumped my needs every time. It was my job to make her happy, not the other way around. She did a lot of fussing over my selfish ways, ingratitude, cold heart, failure to pay homage to the Maternal Goddess, but her expectations far exceeded my ability to produce the necessary demonstrations of affection.

Because it's hard to love a parent when you know, deep in your heart, that they don't love you. Not really. They love the idea of you.

When I was young, I got little.

Then I was expected to give and give and give.

And now that I figured this out, I can't believe I wasted an ENTIRE DECADE feeling guilty for not giving more of myself when my a-mom really, truly didn't care much about me. This realization is pretty awful. So horrible and terrible that when I figured it out, I just sort of fell apart earlier this week. But it's what I always suspected.

I wish people like my a-mom would just remain childless and not try to adopt and make the lives of already once abandoned children a misery...subjecting them to the double whammy of a two mother abandonment.

The Inner World of Adoptees

2007-10-30T15:36:00.001-07:00

Caught part of the movie, "A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries," based on the family life of writer James Jones. It stars Kris Kristofferson, Barbara Hershey and Leelee Sobieski.

This isn't a movie review.

But some thoughts about adoption.

First, even though it's about the writer's family life...the actor who plays the adopted son got left out of the movie poster. I mean, there's only four people in the family and the dad, mom and bio daughter - or the actors who play them - are featured prominently. What happened to the adopted kid?

Leelee got most of the dialogue and action while the actor who played her adopted brother struggled with inner turmoil. This is hard to show on film. Which means he hardly talks and looks stricken or mortified half the time. Once, he threw himself on his adoptive mother's stomach after she had a miscarriage when he was a teenager. He mumbled his few lines so I have no idea what he said.

So my point is...that's the trouble. Or the challenge.

Being adopted is an inner struggle. A lifelong inner struggle. Just like characters in the movie, nobody seems to take much notice of the adopted kid and how he's reacting or coping. At least in the first half of the movie. Maybe he spontaneously combusts at the end. I have no idea.

But back to the the whole inner struggle. If you're adopted, you know what I'm talking about. Trying to explain what it's like is a frustrating experience because you're likely to hear that it's no big deal and you should just move past it, like it's a big piece of ugly furniture. On the outside, we look okay, seem fairly normal, if we're not trying to commit suicide or hittin' the bottle too hard. I'm not talking about how adoptive parents respond - or not - to their kids. I'm talking about the way society does. All those people in the U.S. who seem to think adoption is so wonderful and a blessing and a great way to raise a family, when many of adoptees say, wait, it ain't so great and let me tell you why. But because we don't look or present like failed social experiments that many of us feel like inside, well, we're dismissed. This is usually where people say how normal we seem, etc., when we feel like three eyed spotted aliens.

The whole inner struggle aspect is nearly impossible to explain.

But this is it.

To me. It just doesn't seem right. There's something not normal about the way I feel or connect to the world, probably because a primary connection was broken off shortly after I was born. And then there's that whole disorienting experience of being raised by genetic strangers aspect to adoption, as if Barbies and Beanie Babies were interchangeable when we know they are not. There's something...off.

Cumulative Adoption Trauma

2007-10-24T16:56:00.000-07:00

For your viewing pleasure...or discomfort, please check out this commercial about Cumulative Adoption Trauma.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bf42T1sbP8U

It pretty much nails the experience.

One of the reasons I'm not posting so much is I'm working on a semi-autobiographical novel about the dark side of adoption. I just finished a draft chapter about the day when one of the main characters finds out she's adopted and questions her adoptive mom. That chapter pretty much wiped me out. It brought it all back. The day when I finally got up the nerve to ask about my first mom and my a-mom fell apart. We fell apart. Like two pieces to a badly designed puzzle. Nothing and nobody could ever make us fit. Not after that. Not after I betrayed her with my questions. Not after she proved herself untrustworthy.

Let me know what you think of the video.

Sleeping to Avoid Pain

2007-10-14T20:11:00.001-07:00

I recently started a thread about this on my favorite forum and many adoptees responded saying they do this, too...or something like it.

It's been pretty hectic lately (house guests, teenagers and trying to stick to a writing schedule), so some of you may have seen this at AAAFC. If so, sorry for the repeat.

Was just reading, "The Needs of the Newborn in the First Hours of Life" that I found on Julie's blog. (Thank you, Julie. Again!)

This is the part that made my eyes pop out:

The baby has no way of interpreting what is happening to it, or of knowing that the separation and abandonment it is experiencing are ever going to end. The only way the baby can shut off the pain of the long hours without its mother, is by using sleep as a defense. Primal patients who have relived this particular trauma have often gained insights into the fact that this became a prototypic defense for them and that they continued to use sleep as an escape whenever reality became too painful.

When the going gets tough? I conk out. It's the weirdest thing. If something happens that upsets me, not long afterward I feel like I'm crashing. And then I get really sleepy. Sometimes, if I can't fight it, I take a nap. This is embarrassing to admit, but I never made the connection between a triggering event and my sudden sleepiness, but I've always thought it was odd and have wondered about it. Lots! And then I stumbled across that article. As a newborn, my mother never held me (her choice, she admitted, didn't want to get attached) and so I was left in the nursery for an entire week while she made up her mind whether to relinquish. And like so many of you, then it was off to Mystery Foster Care and Who-the-Hell-Knows-What-Happened! So the above makes sense.

My So-Called Adopted Self

2007-10-01T09:30:00.000-07:00

One thing about finally coming to grips with being adopted and what that means and how it's impacted my life amazes me: the continuous discoveries.

It's like digging in a really deep archaeological site.

The finds just keep coming.

Some of them are little bits and pieces that are covered with crud, so you gotta brush 'em off and tag them and later, examine them together.

Occasionally, you make a really significant discovery, just when you thought you'd found everything there was to find.

Which happened last week.

Don't have time to write about it now, but will. This one totally took me by surprise. I would NEVER have linked it to adoption, but it sooooo makes sense. And not only that, I found some other adoptees experience it, too.

To borrow the title to Betty Jean Lifton's took, the Journey of the Adopted Self...once you begin that journey, it's surprising what you'll find.

The Narcissistic Parent Guilt Trap: Don't Fall In

2007-09-27T08:46:00.000-07:00

Anonymous Bob left a comment that got me thinking.

Here's a quote:

"But seriously, are u *absolutely sure* that the moral obligation, the guilt and the power of attorney is not just another word for the pathological bonding of children to their narcissist caregivers? The same old same old?"

Yeah. Definitely. I suspect there is no other way to bond with a narcissist. It's just not possible.

When we're children, we don't know any better. Our entire world is controlled by our parents.

When we grow-up, the attachment is, by nature, dysfunctional because our parents are.

In my case, the only reason I have any contact with my adoptive father is out of guilt.

Not because I want to. But the voice in my head says, he's all alone. He's old. He's sick. I am his only connection to the wider world. Without me, he is utterly alone.

Dumping the guilt is easier said than done, which makes the EFFORT to free ourselves critical. We were TRAINED to put the needs of the parent first. Repeatedly told that, as an adoptee, we owe our adopters gratitude. We owe them our very lives.

Of course, the aging narcissist - having no social charms or empathy to attract companionship - relies on making his children feel guilty to reel them back in, with such ploys as: "If you don't send me that candy right away I'm going to go into a diabetic coma," and "I am so glad to hear your voice! You didn't call last night and I get so lonely. I need you so much," and, like the other night (encouraged by your comments) when I told him I couldn't call for a bit? The next day he had chest pains and begged to go the hospital, a decision he knows requires my involvement. The nurse said was sure he was faking for attention.

The guilt thing? It's like a noose around your neck. It just gets tighter and tighter the more you struggle and pull.

What scares me is, now that so much of my life has been given over to being responsible for (badly) aging parents, how much of my identity is tied up in it? The Good Daughter? (Of course, my adoptive family believes I'm the Bad, Ungrateful Adoptee. Good Mexican daughters - especially those rescued - do not put their parents in assisted living facilities. Of course, now that he's there, not one of those relatives who scolded me have called or visited him once.)

And Anonymous Bob...it's like totally dysfunctional.

The DOWNSIDE to the Art of Not Feeling

2007-09-25T07:56:00.001-07:00

Everything has its price.

Even emotionally detaching from a seriously toxic parent (in my case, a narcissistic adoptive one).

Last week, when a-dad rendered me invisible for the zillionith time I went into emotional detachment mode. This involves imagining myself in a giant ziplock baggy to ward off the hurt, all the while mumbling, "Let it go. Don't let him ruin another evening."

Well, it worked. By evening, I was able to forget about a-Dad.

Until the next morning.

Woke up feeling like I was coming down with something. Achy and painy with a slight sore throat and really tired and dragged out. I was feeling so lousy, in fact, I couldn't work on the first draft of the book I'm trying to write. For the last month or so, the writing was going very well.

But no, I simply was not feeling strong enough to write. I had no energy. None.

And then I started feeling worthless. Writing makes me feel good. Productive. Now I didn't even have that outlet.

In the meantime, the phone calls with him suddenly started to bother me again. Where before I was able to chat without really engaging, now everything he said hit my last nerve. While he talked, I thought about how much I couldn't stand him. A weird sort of claustrophobia sets in. That's probably due to his narcissism because narcissists are all-consuming and left unchecked, will devour you alive. I've always found him physically repulsive and when I'm near him, I want to run away.

This is my father I'm talking about so all these feelings make me feel horrible and guilty.

Try as I might, all this loathing began to emerge last Friday and continued to seep out over the weekend and by Sunday, no more aches and pains.

Coincidentally, I stumbled across a book by Dr. John Sarno called, "The Divided Mind" which is about psychosomatic pain. Real pain that is triggered by our repressed emotions to divert us from whatever is threatening to bubble up into our conscious mind.

I was so busy emotionally detaching and NOT feeling/numbing and suppressing my rage I suspect I was literally making myself sick. The book seems to confirm my suspicion.

So now what?

My a-dad, by making me invisible, also makes me feel worthless. Like my voice is not important. I get that. But I need a voice to write. Voice and truth are the tools of a writer. So how do I pole vault across this big and boggy ditch?

More later.

The Art of NOT Feeling

2007-09-19T20:47:00.000-07:00

Got a call from my narcissistic a-dad.

Not all that long ago, such a call would have been upsetting and triggering and would have left me churned up and tossing and turning all night.

I've hardly thought about it all.

Tonight, I experienced that phone call in a totally detached manner. I was able to roll my eyes and hang up the phone.

I'm trying to analyze this a bit because it goes to the very root of the issues I still struggle with today, in middle age, which are: feeling invisible and not taking myself seriously or respecting myself.

Here's how the call went:

A-Dad: Is that you, Nina? Did you send that candy I asked for?
Me: No, not yet. I had to go-
A-Dad: But I asked for that candy yesterday. Why haven't you sent it?
Me: Well, it's because I-
A-Dad: I really need it soon. When can you send it? Oh, did I tell you that my shoulder is....(goes on about the agony he is in)
Me: Oh, that's too bad, okay, I'll call your doctor tomorrow to see if....etc.
A-Dad: How are the girls?
Me: Fine, they-
A-Dad: (interrupts) How's Butchie? There's a disease that's going around killing dogs, etc. How's ______ (my husband)?
Me: Oh, he's fine too, but he's-
A-Dad: (interrupts) Well, about my shoulder, let me tell you (goes on again)...and when are you going to send that candy?
Me: Maybe tomorrow. I went to the dentist today and I'm...
A-Dad: Well, I really need that candy so don't forget. And don't forget to call the doctor about...You know, I really love hearing your voice. I get so lonely.

What I was TRYING to tell him, over and over again, was that I'd gone to the dentist and could hardly talk. At the end of the call, I practically had to shout that I was in such pain I had to go. I needn't have bothered. He totally ignored it. And before anybody reminds me that my a-dad has some dementia...yes he does, but this is the same treatment I got when I was a kid. I remember is clearly. Desperately trying to tell him something that happened to me at school or about my big plans for the future and he'd interrupt and talk about something somebody had done to him that had pissed him off, then get angry that I wasn't sympathetic enough. I was probably twelve.

By cutting me off and failing to let me finish a sentence or acknowledge what I just said or express any sort of empathy is....horrible. But I'm an adult. A grown-up who's lived in the wider world and had lots of therapy.

But to treat a CHILD that way? It's monstrous. How frightening for any child to remain so thoroughly unacknowledged.

No wonder I had no idea of how I felt...about anything. I was treated like I didn't exist...except to serve. I am only "loved"...not because of MY voice but because of my ability to listen and support and because I do things for him.

Was skimming through Alice Miller's The Drama of the Gifted Child and came across this quote: "They have all developed the art of not experiencing feelings, for a child can only experience his feelings when there is somebody there, who accepts him fully, understands and supports him."

Miller was actually talking about mothers. My mother was self-absorbed, too, in a different way. She was threatened by any emotion other than happy. A sad Nina was NOT allowed. She slapped me once for crying over a boyfriend because I'd scared her.

So I didn't feel. Not for the longest time. At least not true feelings. About many things, including my adoption.

If you have parents like these, adopted or not, read every book you can about emotionally detaching from them. If you can afford it, find a therapist who specializes in the aftermath of narcissistic parents. If they are destroying you and making a misery of your life, cut them out of your life or, at least, put up some very big boundaries that look like the fences in Jurassic Park to contain the T-Rex. But see? In the end, even that fence wasn't even strong enough.

The Irony of Reunion

2007-09-18T07:38:00.000-07:00

Why is it that the scars we bear from our adoption make reunion even harder?

It seems most of us adoptees, despite our different experiences with our adoptive families and difference in temperament and disposition, have many of the same issues: fear of abandonment, a wobbly sense of self, feeling like we don't fit in anywhere, anxiety, depression? Just to name a few.

Was catching up on adoptee blogs. Some are going through a tough time with their first mothers. I can sympathize. Totally.

To heal, we need to search for our first families. Or at least get as much information as we can. But the VERY ISSUES THAT STEM FROM BEING ADOPTED CAN MAKE REUNION DAMNED HARD.

We want to get to know and get along with our first mother, but we fear abandonment. Not a good mix.

With a wobby sense of self, it's easy to get emeshed, especially with such a powerful figure.

Suddenly presented with two families, some of us find we don't fit into either, only adding to our feelings of alienation.

And as nerve wrecking as reunion is, the ups and downs of it all can add to our ever present anxiety.

But many of us want to search and find our families. Need to. But it's like somebody strapped a backpack of explosives on us and pushed us out the door and said, "Go ahead, I dare you to find your first family. See what happens."

And we toddle ahead...dupety, dupety, do. Then, Bang!

Well, of course we survive. The pieces may be all scrambled up. We may look like one of those figures in a Picasso painting until we can reassemble ourselves. And in the end, it's more worth it than not.

But wearing that backpack while tiptoeing through the minefield of Reunion is a BITCH.

My Former Compliant Self

2007-09-16T10:08:00.001-07:00

My own little notes to my adoptive parents have come back to haunt me.

I inherited their box of photos and I spent the evening sorting them out.

It was painful to see what I most often looked like in pictures. A huge, nervous fakey smile pasted on my face. One of those "appeasement" expressions worn by submissive chimps.

And then there were those carefully written notes to my a-parents over the years, some as recent as six years ago.

Those are even more interesting. And telling.

I tried so desperately hard to please them. To be the dutiful daughter. To be happy, happy, happy. I'd write how much I missed them. When I didn't. I moved as far away as I could because I couldn't stand to be around them. I'd write how much I was looking forward to seeing them again. When I dreaded it. And when we were finally together, what a misery it was.

For those of you new to my blog, my a-mother used cold punishing silences to get her way, called my first mother a "whore" and made me pretend I was biologically theirs and refused to answer questions about my past. My a-parents were ignorant and unintentionally cruel, both self-absorbed, my a-dad pathologically narcissistic. He is in an assisted living facility now and I'm told he talks non-stop, alienates everybody he meets almost immediately and is verbally abusive to the staff. This isn't just because he's old and has some dementia. He's always been that way. He never allowed me to finish a sentence. I was their emotional caretaker, not a daughter.

And yet, all those notes. Pretending to be the good, grateful, loving daughter.

The cost was mighty high. I paid for it in occasional bouts of depression, anxiety and hypochondria. And people pleasing. Oh God, the people pleasing. Just keeping THAT up is more exhausting than running a marathon. And useless, too.

It's been a long time now since I've written a note like that. Almost two years now. It's sad, but when I send my a-dad something, I don't even write a note. When I do, I leave out the "I miss you so much" part. It's not the truth. And he doesn't deserve it. He never did. Their "love" was purely conditional.

What is so weird to see is the HUGE difference between what I felt on the inside and what I tried to show to the world...my compliant, people pleasing, desperate self. I'm glad I buried her.

Found! One Mexican Adoptee

2007-09-11T18:58:00.000-07:00

Okay, I found another one.

A Mexican adoptee from the failed social experiment that was the Closed Era.

I can't say too much about her except she is highly educated, successful and...was placed with a middle-class white couple thanks to an arrangement made by her birthmother and her doctor.

In other words, this Mexican adoptee managed to avoid the pitfalls of "matching."

Of course, she had nothing to do with it. Like the rest of us adoptees, others decided her fate. We just deal - happily, gratefully, ambivalently or otherwise - with the consequences.

Instead of being placed with an equally poor Mexican family, she landed several rungs higher on the socioeconomic ladder. And from what she has said publicly about her adoption, her adoptive parents were loving, supportive and - THANK GOD - not narcissists.

At one point, she was entered into a bilingual school.

Have been mulling this one over.

For all that I have moaned and groaned about the utter agony and hell of being raised by narcissistic adoptive parents who were ignorant and poor, at least I was not separated from my culture. Being separated from my first mother is tough enough.

I was raised within 1.5 miles of my first mother. We probably hit the same grocery stores. So I grew up eating pretty much the same Mexican foods, listening to the same Spanglish and went to the same sort of schools...hanging out with the same kinds of kids...that I would have if she'd decided to keep me.

While it would have been undoubtedly an improvement if the social worker had skipped over my a-parents file to the next waiting Mexican-American couple, it hit me after reading the other adoptee's story that I felt sorry for her, despite her obvious advantages. I'm almost sure she doesn't feel the least bit sorry for herself.

Still, I had the benefit of being raised in my own culture. My grandmother told me about her sister turning into a dog after a withdoctor hexed her. Then she followed it up with stories about The Llorna and dragged me to her little church in East L.A. where the mass was said in Spanish and the congregants swore the Virgin de Guadelupe shed tears of blood. On Sundays, I watched my uncle made menudo and on Christmas, my aunts made tamales and taught me to roll out the masa. Sure, I had to put up with their derision of my aspirations for a higher education, but at least I knew what it felt like to be raised in a real Mexican family...even if that family was technically not my own.

I have absolutely no idea how much more LOST I would feel if I did not have that enriching experience.

When I read about the other Mexican adoptee and tried to imagine myself being raised outside my culture, it hit me that this is the plight of the transracial adoptee. Of course it is. I knew that! I read their stories and feel sad. But I felt it like a sucker punch in the gut. Ouch.

I really HATE being asked what I'm grateful for when it comes to my adoption.

Well, I'm finally grateful for one thing.

Being raised as a Mexican-American. At least the social worker got that right.

The Mexican Adoptee

2007-09-07T08:13:00.000-07:00

Not looking for sympathy.

Just for proof of another Mexican-American adoptee.

Not a "half-breed." With a white mother and a Mexican father.

But the child of a Mexican mother with one of those big, extended Mexican families that, but rarely, give their children away because of close knit family ties, etc.

I have an adoptive cousin who is Mexican. He doesn't know who is mother is, but apparently he didn't leave the family. A childless couple in the clan raised him. So that doesn't count.

It really drives me crazy when somebody points out that Latino's don't give away their kids. I'm not arguing with this "rule." I believe it. Because, it appears, I'm the exception. My mother gave me away despite family pressure to keep me. She was Mexican. According to cultural tradition, she should have kept me. I'll give her this. She was a rebel.

It drives me nuts because it FEELS like I'm only the Mexican adoptee of early 1960's vintage. Which only adds to feeling like the damaged product of a really bad experiment, otherwise known as the Closed Era.

PLUS!...

The double whammy of knowing that the social worker must have sized up my mother: poor, minimally educated and, of course, Mexican. Never mind she was a Mexican of European descent with fair skin. A Mexican, she must have thought, was a Mexican. What difference could there be?

So much to my mother's HORROR (as revealed in reunion), I was placed with DARK Mexicans of Indian ancestry. Raised just as poor as my mother, complete with major family dysfunction, and who had achieved one slim rung higher on the socioeconomic scale. While the difference in skin color was disorienting (me being the only "light" one in my adoptive home), the difference in temperament and - what the hell? - intellect was profound. My adoptive parents were hard working and street smart, but without one bit of intellectual curiosity. They never read a single book and preferred television. They mocked anything smacking of culture, calling museums boring and going to college "a waste of time." They did not wonder about how other people live. I, on the other hand, wanted a life beyond the closed family system. I wanted to live in the world. As did my mother. THIS is what she'd WANTED for me when I was born. To live, as she dreamed, in the "white" world.

Hah! She had no idea that the practice of the time was "matching" and that I was not destined for "better," but the same. A lateral move. Because my a-father was and is a narcissist, I argue, worse off.

But time is funny.

Without me to tie her down, my mother was free to move UP and UP she did...the old fashioned way: a financially successful marriage. Never mind that the man turned out to be, well, a pervert. She traveled around the world. Read non-fiction. Is able to talk about all sorts of things, places and ideas.

I have a picture of myself at 12 in 1972 and my mother in the same year, after achieving her "dream" of upward mobility.

God, I hate looking at that picture. We look so much alike. But I'm not with her. She is posed, still very youthful, with her two grandchildren. I'm sitting in the middle of two people of no relation, a human sacrifice to the hopes and dreams of three people.

Some days, this being the lone exception to the "fact" that Mexicans don't give away their babies for adoption, is a real downer.

Becoming Real

2007-08-30T20:59:00.000-07:00

I can't believe it.

I just can't believe it.

I am living proof that living a lie makes you sick.

Talking about...

Minimizing the impact adoption has had on my life;

being forced to pretend that I wasn't adopted to make my adopters happy;

being trained to become my adopters emotional caretakers;

not being allowed to finish a sentence or more than eight words put together, ever, to this very day by my a-dad;

being mocked for having different ideas or opinions;

and...being denied my history.

What do I mean by "sick?"

Since getting real, facing the truth, getting into therapy, finding my first mother, lots of reading, tons of reflection, I am no longer.....

Depressed; I realize now that the occasional lack of focus and unexplainable fatigue that mysteriously came and went was depression and that I'm much, much, much better now;

Anxious; Anxiety was my biggest challenge, taking the form of hypochondria, which is a particular type of hell;

A Pathetic People Pleaser; I've had to work very hard on this one;

Inauthentic; I really had to dig deep to find me; it took lots and lots of practice; What do I think about____? What do I want to do? How do I feel? Instead of...how SHOULD I think or behave or feel because it's what someone else expects. It sounds absolutely ridiculous to be in one's forties and not have any idea of how you truly feel about anything, but it's both possible and true, especially if you've been raised by someone with NPD (narcissistic personality disorder);

and all because I'm no longer IN DENIAL. I wasn't a real person. Nope. I was a walking-talking bundle of Coping Strategies.

To whom do I owe my progress?

Time to roll the credits:

Me, myself and I! For finally, FINALLY, saying...I've had enough; I deserve to find my history, my story, my mother;

Fellow adoptees like Joy and Julie and Elizabeth and Mia and Marlee and Possum and others too numerous to mention;

My first mother; a bit of a disappointment, but she's still my mother and I have a right to know her name and her face;

My lovely therapists;

My amazing, supportive husband;

And finally, author Alice Miller...for her books like "Drama of the Gifted Child," which I highly recommend to anyone with the burden of being raised by a narcissistic parent.

The Adoption Cage: An Adoption Poem

2007-08-20T09:45:00.000-07:00

Elizabeth is one of the first adoptees I encountered online. Her link is http://www.ihateadoption.com/. As I wobbled toward comprehension in those early days, after a lifetime of repressed feelings toward my own adoption, I was shocked by her clarity. She understood how she felt and she used just right words to express it.

She wasn't "surrendered" or "relinquished" or "given away." She was "abandoned."

She's "angry."

She hates the Adoption Machine and makes no excuses.

I respect that.

At least she's dealing with it. She's not burying it. This is the way she feels. It makes her real. Authentic. She's not cut off from herself.

Elizabeth is in very good company. There are many other remarkable brave souls out there in BlogLand, where we have found each other. Where we've discovered we're not freaks and we're not alone. The importance of their voices, to those of us who are still trying to find our true image in the distorted mirror of adoption, is profound.

Clarity about adoption and what it does and does not do for you is critical. While we had nothing to do with it, played no active role, but are forever left to deal with its consequences, clarity is our only tool. Our only hope. Without it, we are trying to navigate in a thick fog. And for the sake of clarity, by clarity I mean whatever is YOUR honest experience of adoption. Forget everything you've ever heard and were TOLD or EXPECTED to feel.

If you are one of those adoptees who haven't reflected on what it means to given away by your mother - for whatever reason - and what it means to be raised by strangers, then please, do that.

And then write your own poem about it and let me know when you do so I can link or post to it.

Elizabeth has given me permission to post her poem here. I love it. Like I "lurv" her for her honesty.

Dedicated to a really ungrateful bastard

Some of us scrape the crumbs off the floor
And some of us look for an open door
Some of us cry long into the night
And some of us fight for what is our right
Some of us are lost
And some of us are found
Some of us ache
And pick our hearts up off the ground
Some of us are denied
And some of us rage
But we won’t be silenced
In the adoption cage.

Tackling the Narcissistic Parent's Legacy

2007-08-14T12:43:00.000-07:00

Spent several weeks trying to tease apart "my issues" caused by the secrecy surrounding my adoption and those caused by my narcissistic parents.

Fear of abandonment? The adoption column. Definitely.

Genealogical bewilderment? Ditto.

Not feeling like I fit in? Ditto again.

The people pleasing? The inclination to rescue people? Putting the needs of other's before my own? Feeling overly responsible for the happiness and welfare of others?

Less clear. For a long time, I thought my adoption was the root cause.

And in a way, it was. If I hadn't been given away, I wouldn't have needed a replacement set of parents and I wouldn't have got stuck with the Incapable Duo.

And maybe there is no way of knowing HOW or exactly WHY I got to be the way I'm trying NOT to be.

It seems so many of my fellow adult adoptees seem to have the same set of traits mentioned above. Did we develop them because our a-parents were self-centered? Because we grew up feeling invisibile and like we really didn't matter as individuals...because it was what we could do for others that counted...not who we were.

Spent 1.5 years in therapy and have made much progress.

But one thing still bothered me.

WHY can't I finish writing a book? I'm not lazy. It just seems I stall out after 350 pages. Lazy people don't write that much. I have STACKS of rewrites. It seems that, at some point, I lose all faith in myself. Who am I to think I can write? Who would possibly want to read something I have to say? How silly of me. I'm a nobody. Then I stop. Take a break. And start on a new project. Except I haven't addressed the old, fundamental question. What's REALLY wrong?

It's that voice in my head. The one that tells me that I am not worthy enough to write.

So I booked a session with a psychologist somebody described as "famous" for his contributions on narcissistic parents.

I explained my issue. My burning desire to finish a project and my failure to do so.

"Could they be related?" I asked. "That voice in my head and the whole narcissistic parent thing?"

And you know what he said?

Of course.

Won't bore you with the details...but, in short...how can I finish a book when I wasn't allowed to finish a sentence in my own home? If what I had to say wasn't important to my "own" parents, then why would I think anybody else would care? Of course, he said it MUCH more eloquently than that, but it's my take on it and it was like stars shot across the sky and the music soared.

"Can it be fixed?" I asked.

Yes, he promised. Just being able to ARTICULATE the cause and effect of extremely self-centered parents will free me from the heavy chains that drag me back from accomplishing MY goals.

All of this is VERY hopeful!!!

Narcissists: Big Fat Blamers

2007-08-06T10:42:00.000-07:00

I'd like to write about one of the traits of a narcissist: not taking responsibility.

Besides the constant need for attention. Besides the lack of empathy. Besides the emotional manipulation and lying, blaming others for the problems they created is maddening to deal with, especially when YOU are the one being blamed.

The other day, my narcissistic adoptive father cursed out the lady across the hall in his assisted living facility because she's old and ugly and mean and doesn't like him.

He was scolded by the nurses.

When I asked him if he had cussed at his neighbor, he said yes, but she deserved it and then he acted hang-dog and said the nurses were all against him, were picking on him and he couldn't do anything right and that's the way it was his whole life...people picked on him for no good reason.

He may have dementia now, but he's played the blame game for as long as I can remember.

Everything is always somebody else's fault.

When HE opted for elective surgery against the surgeon's advice and things went badly, it was the surgeon's fault and then mine;

When HE says something insulting, it's their fault for being so sensitive because he was just telling the truth;

When HE refused to take my well-researched advice about preserving my grandmother's estate, the world was against him when he lost her house;

When HE talked non-stop and alienated the few friends he had, it was their fault for being awful people;

When my adoptive mother had Alzheimers and my children were toddlers and HE refused outside help, it was MY fault for not taking care of mother myself;

No matter what he says or does, he will NEVER apologize. The closest he will ever say is, "I can never do anything right," to gain sympathy.

There is never any direct connection between what he says and does or doesn't do and the events that follow.

And forget trying to point out the obvious. That they brought "it" on themselves. It's useless. You're just giving them a chance to play the coveted role of victim...the center of attention...again.

We experience much of our narcissistic parent's behavior before we even know what the term means and long before we can even pronounce it. So we spend much of our lives, captive.

And you know what REALLY bugs me?

When I asked the Post Adoption Services social worker with the public agency with which I was placed as an infant if they had screened my a-dad and why hadn't they picked up that there was something really off about him, she sort of hesitated and said...well, they couldn't deny him the pleasure of becoming a father, that almost everybody has a right to raise a child if they can afford to do so.

Oh really?

And what about the so-called best interests of the child?

So a-dad's right to parent trumped mine to having a father capable of parenting?

It seems so. And, I suspect, the same damned thing happens today.

What It Feels Like To Be Adopted

2007-08-04T11:38:00.000-07:00

Watched the British comedy movie Hot Fuzz, now on DVD.

While not as funny as the director's other hit, Shaun of the Dead, it did manage to capture what it's like to be adopted.

Of course, there was absolutely nothing about adoption in Hot Fuzz.

BUT!...

The main character, a cop, finds himself stuck working in a small village where his fellow police officers fail to recognize that murder most foul has struck. They insist the deaths were accidents. His colleagues make endless fun of him for overreacting to what are nothing more than a bunch of no big deal accidents.

The main character was clearly right. Something was wrong, but not one person acknowledged it. His viewpoint was marginalized. He was made to feel crazy. He was isolated.

During this stretch of the movie, I felt uncomfortable. Restless. At one point, when the main character was being ridiculed, I nearly hyperventilated.

It was just too much like certain real-life experiences as an adoptee. When you KNOW what's happened to you IS a trauma and you're surrounded by people who tell you it was hardly anything at all and to "just get on with your life" and "be grateful you didn't end up in an orphanage" and, "you were chosen!"

The difference between what most Non-Adoptees think about Being Adopted is so vast that the reality of our life-long "situation" can hardly be explained. So we're stuck living in Crazy Town, going slightly crazy. Or in a continual state of Adoption Fog as a survival tactic.

And then there was the internet.

It allowed us to find each other.

And we're not crazy after all.

Blog Update

2007-08-02T09:58:00.000-07:00

Time to do some badly needed blog maintenance.

In the meantime, as an adoptee handed over to narcissists, I highly recommend Julie's post entitled, Psychologically Challenged Adopters at www.lizardchronicles.blogspot.com

Am working on updating LINKS. This may take several days. If you read my blog and would like to be added, please leave your informacion as a comment. This means adoptees, first mothers/fathers, adoptive parents and adult children of narcissists (www.houseofbonsai.blogspot.com being an excellent one!)

And speaking of narcissistic parents, several thoughts. Had the pleasure of meeting an 84-year old woman the other day. My exposure to the over-80 crowd without either dementia or narcissism is zip. She was funny and delightful. Actually, she bought a used car from me. We actually had a conversation. You know, where she talks and then you get to talk and there's some back and forth. And My God!, she complained not at all!

Later that day, I had to call my narcissistic elderly father. The contrast was shocking. Okay, a-dad has dementia, but certain behaviors are as old as I am.

Dealing with the 84-year old lady from San Francisco was dealing with an adult. Although short, it was a meaningful connection.

Dealing with my NPD father is dealing with a child. There is no meaningful connection. It is an ENCOUNTER. It is hard work. Is is draining. And above all, it's very, very sad.

Acceptance...or Avoidance?

2007-07-31T13:01:00.000-07:00

Have reached an interesting phase in dealing with my adoption:

Calm, yet detached.

Grateful for the life I've built for myself, despite odious adoptive parents.

No longer feeling guilty about not calling my first mother. I just don't want to. It's simply not safe.

Spent 1.4 years dredging up the past, dealing with it, writing about it, met my mother, dealt with what that meant...and then lots of grief and anger.

No longer have anxiety attacks.

No longer people please. As much.

Insecurity and abandonment issues are much improved.

Actually go days without thinking about adoption. A sort of numbness has set in. Am not feeling much about it at all.

Was it all just getting too much to handle so I'm pushing it down? A new coping mechanism?

Or is it - finally - acceptance?

1.4 years After Adoption Fog Lift is a rather short time.

If you've been dealing with it longer and recognize these "symptoms," please comment!

And the Narcissist Said....

2007-07-24T19:41:00.001-07:00

Interesting!

This blog may have started out as a way to explore my experience as an adoptee, but it seems what draws many visitors is the grim subject of dealing with a narcissistic parent.

This according to Blog Patrol.

While being given away by your own mother blows, the wind blows just as hard for those raised by a narcissist.

I know at least one person whose first mother not only relinquished her, but in reunion, revealed herself to be a narcissist to boot.

Then there are adoptees like me, who were given away as infants, only to land in the clutches of a narcissistic adoptive parent. Being an adoptee makes it even harder to escape or detach from the narcissistic parent because of all the traits we adoptees collect as we grow up among genetic strangers: the people pleasing, the false self and the ever-present expectation, subtle or not, that we be grateful to our new set of parents, capable or incapable.

Did Christina Crawford, that most famous of adoptees, describe her adoptive mother as a narcissist? Or just as a disturbed, lonely, alcoholic actress? I must go back and reread it.

Which raises the issue of celebrities adopting today. It seems to me that they didn't get that way because they were simply artistic, self-effacing people. Sure, some of them wanted to act or sing or perform. But some were driven by the need to be the center of attention. One way to get it is to bask in the glow of the public's approval of the celebrity adopter who has "saved" an orphan. Another way is to turn that child into narcissistic supply. No doubt some of these adoptees - when grown up - will discover the work of Alice Miller and declare themselves to be prisoners of their own childhoods. No doubt we can expect to spend future decades reading and weeping over the tell-all autobiographies of these "rescued" children.

But back to the garden variety narcissist.

I must admit I'm FASCINATED by the things they say and do.

They are not quite human. Or maybe just too human.

It's a good thing I'm not so angry lately because my a-Dad's most recent comment would have really upset me. It just stings a little. But it's so revealing. So I'll share it.

He called asking me to send him something. ASAP as usual. I agreed.

Then he said, "I really depend on you. I guess I have to be nice to you."

True. I'm an only child and the only person in his life.

He COULD have said any number of things, like: "I appreciate all you do for me," "I'm lucky to have such a good daughter," or, simply, "Thank you."

But no. Just a gruding admission that circumstances are forcing him to be nice. Which also means he wouldn't be nice if he didn't have to rely on me. The manipulation is revealed in this simple statement. It sums up our entire relationship. A narcissist isn't completely stupid. They can't afford to alienate everybody.

As I mulled this over last night, driving in my car, I listened to a new song by Nick Lowe, "I Trained Her to Love Me." I found it profoundly upsetting. In an interview, he said he intended it to be provocative. Lowe succeeded by that measure. I wonder....did he unintentionally compose an anthem for narcissists everywhere?

After Anger...the Calm

2007-07-23T10:00:00.001-07:00

Message for the person who Googled "frontal lobe dementia assisted living facilities in Southern California:" look into Front Porch, a Lutheran non-profit. It has several locations operating under various names. Highly recommend. As you know, frontal lobe dementia progresses quite differently and wandering, etc. is less of an issue than repeated falls, loss of mobility, incontinence and challenging, unpleasant behaviors. Please feel free to email me at ninadlf@yahoo.com.

Just got back from a one week vacation feeling calm, relaxed and, most importantly, much less angry. This vacation was a bit of a test. Before I left, I did everything I could to make sure my narcissistic father would not ruin this vacation...as he did the last one. Sure, he left TEN highly emotional phone messages begging for a fix of narcissistic supply (me). I even listened to the messages before heading out for the beach. Which I quickly forgot about as he was in no real distress.

Progress!!!

It's taken more than a long year of dealing with my adoption related issues and the Deep Impact of being raised by a narcissistic adoptive father...after four decades of minimizing their consequences.

Working through these issues have meant some trade-offs. People-pleasing and anxiety attacks have been replaced by grief and anger. At least the last two are real, authentic emotions and not by-products of denial.

Which brings me to this comment...left by Julie (aka Celera):

"You don't have to dwell on anger or grief or pain -- you don't have to nurture it and hide in it and make your whole life about it. Some people make that mistake. You have to let it run through you so you can come out the other side eventually."

Very well put. I came back no longer angry. Maybe I've reached the acceptance phase. But I couldn't have got to this point without digging it all up, examining it and taking it seriously, and certainly not without blogging and the support and validation of fellow bloggers and a steady diet of Alice Miller.

An entire year of grief and anger is a long time. To be honest, I was getting tired of being all stirred up. It was getting exhausting. All consuming. No doubt I'll dip back into anger the next time I'm "triggered" by an adoptee related issue I haven't dealt with yet...or by some new manipulation of my narcissistic a-dad.

But for now...I'm going to enjoy the Calm. For however long it lasts. Besides, it's an incredibly beautiful summer day outside in Northern California and the dog needs walking.

Phone Message From A Narcissist

2007-07-11T09:32:00.000-07:00

My therapist was onto something.

I'd been so busy reading self-help books on HOW to emotionally detach from my demanding narcissistic parent (adoptive father) that I'd skipped an important step: the grief stage.

Added to the fact that my a-dad IS a narcissist is the knowledge that some social worker actually PLACED me in his home. (Almost everybody notices there's something OFF about him from the start...you can watch them back away). Once there, I was fed and sheltered until I was old enough to become his new narcissistic supply. I suspect my a-dad tried this out on a-mom, but failed to understand that she was both domineering and self-absorbed, so she won that battle.

When I woke up from my Happy Adoptee Fog, I woke up to lots of other things, too.

It was like opening your eyes one morning, hung-over, only to discover lots of really ugly guys in your bed.

One of them was the realization that I'd spent most of my life in quiet, compliant service to my narcissistic father. That, in four decades, it was possible that I'd never been allowed to finish one sentence, one thought. That, in his eyes, I existed not as a unique individual, but as just a warm body with a set of very patient ears.

Upon waking up, I went straight to anger.

Then read like mad about narcissism until it became an obsession.

And after all that, I'm feeling a bit frustrated why I haven't made more progress.

Why can't I find true emotional detachment? Why can't I let go? I'm better. Lots. But not quite there yet.

Could it be that I missed a step? Like my therapist suggested? My therapist said the reason I often feel so churned up, unsettled and, well, utterly chaotic after an encounter with a-dad is that it probably triggers feelings I had as an isolated, only child, when my needs were not being met and I had no idea why, and that there I was, imprisoned with this incapable person. Which is scary.

And then she said I get to feel sorry about that. To allow myself to "grieve the loss." Instead of repeating, "I do not care" a hundred times after I hang up the phone, drained, to sit down and let myself feel the pain. So I did. And it was sad. And so pathetic.

As part of this exercise, I thought I'd transcribe and post a phone message a-dad left some time ago. Today, it's almost funny. (Equally funny, I actually SAVED it).

"Nina, this is Dad.
I was in the bathroom when you called and when I finally got out, you hanged up on me.
I can't get to the phone because you call TOO DAMN EARLY!
Six O'clock! MY GOD! Call about Seven O'clock. That would be more like it!
I'm trying to call you to get things straight with these damned phone calls.
You call too damn early. My God. I'm still in the bathroom when you call. For God's sake.
Call at seven like you used to do it.
Bye.
Dad. "

Never mind that over the years I've tried to tell him that seven o'clock in the evening is a bad time for me because I'm cooking dinner or I'm driving the girls around or on homework patrol or going out with my husband or seeing a movie. He doesn't get it. God forbid I disrupt his bathroom schedule. My schedule doesn't matter. His granddaughters don't matter.

Only the narcissist matters.

And I'll tell you one thing the narcissist does EXTREMELY well.

Train their children.

2007-07-09T12:33:00.001-07:00

There's something finally wrong with my aging, narcissistic adoptive father.

After twenty five years of quarterly trips to the emergency room for a variety of imaginary ailments, he's actually sick: all the most important arteries to the heart are more than 70% blocked and he's too old for surgery. So that explains the chest pains.

I'd always wondered, would I have any sympathy left if he were truly sick?

And it turned out I did. Turns out there were a couple ounces of untapped sympathy left...but the reserves are getting low, folks. Vapors.

I actually thought...Gee, now that things aren't looking so good...he actually seems nicer and we're getting along a wee bit better and ain't that nice.

Hah!

Now that things have calmed down and he's out of the hospital and out of the woods (for now)...and I'm slightly less solicitious...BAM...he's getting nasty.

And that's when I realized I'd fallen into the narcissistic web. Again!

IF he's getting lots of attention...
IF he's getting lots of sympathy...
IF I listen and do not attempt to impose any bit of myself, my views or my life...
IF I just make every conversation about him....

HE'S HAPPY. HE'S NICE. HE ACTS APPRECIATIVE AND LIKE HE LOVES ME.

But the moment - like last night - that I act the least bit distracted because I'm dealing with other stuff, he immediately turns on me.

Age does not soften the die-hard narcissist.

Repeat.

Emotional detachment still required.

And the nagging question that STILL won't go away.

Is someone like my a-dad capable of love? Did he love me? Or did he just NEED me? He could never SEE me...acknowledge me and my needs. And if a person can't do that, do they really love you or are you just being drained or cathected or whatever that scary word is?

ROOTS

2007-06-25T11:13:00.000-07:00

Okay, I'm back. Got totally carried away on another forum I'm totally in love with because, yes!, it's adoptee-centric and it's just what the doctor ordered.

Also, after decades of hypochondria, my narcissistic a-dad finally has something really wrong with him and that's been diverting and a challenge b/c I've had to drudge up some compassion. Which is hard. Because just when he needs me most, it's hard not to think of the one single time I ever asked him for anything as an adult ($50 to tide me over b/t jobs) and he not only let me down, he didn't even have the guts to tell me he hadn't sent the money after saying he would. And the time he left me in the hospital alone after minor surgery/biopsy when I was 10 because his nerves, "just couldn't take it."

So I'm cheating a bit. I'm posting something I put on a forum, but I'm short of time today and really wanted to update.

Was at Costco and spotted a paperback of Roots...strategically placed next to a stack of how-to-trace-your-roots-genealogy books. Heard on NPR recently about renewed interested in genealogy and some new online sites to help and the sound bites were all about the importance of knowing where you come from and why people are fascinated, etc.

And it really pissed me off. Society wants it both ways. Your ancestry really matters. Unless you're adopted. Then it's no big deal and you shouldn't be interested. It's maddening. And this is in our faces all the time. The hypocrisy. But no one else seems to see it.

My adoptive mother comes from a Mexican village called Chavez Ravine, where Dodger Stadium in L.A. now stands and for the longest time, I was FASCINATED by its sad story and all the old sepia pictures. Almost my entire adoptive family comes from that area. Then I woke up from my Fog and realized it has nothing to do with me. So I lost that, too. My first mom was really good about telling me as much as she could about my roots, but I feel so disconnected from that. It doesn't feel like mine, either. Maybe some day it will when I "incorporate" it.

Surrounded by Adoption

2007-06-11T15:17:00.000-07:00

To borrow a bit from Jane Austen, "I am all amazement."

How DID I manage to repress all those feelings about my adoption? And for soooo long?

There is so much to process.

I can't believe the mental work it takes to sort through it all.

Over the weekend, a friend told me about her grandmother who had eleven children. She gave three of the youngest up for adoption because she was so poor. Two of the boys grew up knowing their mother and first families. The girl did not want anything to do with her first mother although, my friend insisted, this girl did not grow up "bitter" and "angry" and went on to be highly successful in the field of education. Then my friend (who knows I'm adopted) said something like, "Oh well, we're all dealt problems and we just have to get over it the best we can."

I had no energy to even explode. Was she trying to tell me something? I've only spoken to her - briefly - about my status as an adoptee.

Adoption is all around us and only the adoptees really know what it's like. The inner life we lead. The complicated emotions. I got to thinking about this woman who was one of three children given away by her mother. Only she knows what she feels about this. Why did my friend, who only knows about her, insist this adoptee wasn't bitter and angry? Because the adoptee was ambitious and successful? Maybe she spent her entire life trying to prove to her first mother, "You were wrong to give me away! Look how valuable I am!"

Conversation with a Narcissist

2007-06-11T12:52:00.000-07:00

If you are sick and tired of reading about my ongoing struggle to emotionally detach from my narcissistic adoptive father, STOP! Warning!

Try as you might to keep the conversation short, chances are, you still walk away feeling upset and churned up and wondering what the hell just happened.

It's worth trying to analyze my most recent encounter, so here I go.

First, I tell my NAD (narcissistic adoptive father) that I'm going camping with my husband and girls and will be out of cell phone range for two days.

The minute I walk into the house, the phone starts ringing.

It's NAD. I don't answer because I'm relaxed and happy and I'll talk to him later. Fifteen minutes later, he calls again. He calls every half hour or so for the next several hours and I'm tempted to unplug the phone, but by this time I'm now stressed out and feel like I'm being stalked. So I answer.

"Thank God you're back!" he says. "I've been watching TV and there are so many wrecks and I thought something had happened to you."

"No. We're fine. I just walked in the door."

"You don't know what you've put me through. Thank God you're back. Now I can relax. I'm just exhausted."

(Trying hard not to feel guilty for taking couple days off from calling him and for causing such misery--which is ridiculous)

Then I make a joke about him being a worrier and he says angrily, "Well, you're my only daughter and the only person I have left in the world and what would I do if something happened to you and I'd be all alone and have nobody and I've been feeling so lonely and you don't know what I'm going through."

And then I'm furious.

Once again, he's not really worried about ME as an individual. He's worried that something may happen to his sole source of narcissistic supply. And yes he has dementia and is a lonely old man stuck in an assisted living facility. But he's always talked this way and it's only recently that I've realized how diminishing it is. How manipulative. There's this picture of us together when I was around five. I'm not smiling and I'm desperately trying to stand as far away from him as possible and still be in the frame. I look miserable and stunned. NAD is laughing at the camera. That picture says it all. I've been trying to get away from him as long as I can remember.

Psychological Suicide

2007-06-05T11:55:00.000-07:00

When I decided to search for my first mother last year, I hoped she would still be alive.

By my calculation, she'd be over 80. Being a hypochondriac, I imagined all sorts of things would have killed her. Like cancer which I was sure had devastated both sides of my birth family. Or complications due to adult onset diabetes that I was sure would crop up at the next doctor's appointment. Or some rare genetic disorder of mysterious origins. Or, worst, she'd have dementia like both my adoptive parents.

But no. She was alive and mostly well.

So focused was I on the finding her before it was too late that I gave little thought to the relationship that we might have. Or not.

Four months have passed since we met in person for the first time.

We haven't tried calling each other.

I just can't bring myself to do it. I don't want to- can't - talk to her. (At least not now)

Oddly, if I'd met her before the Adoption Fog induced by Never-Discuss-Adoption- Brainwashing, I'd probably be calling her every week because of my pre-therapy People Pleasing tendencies. I'd call and listen to her talk and talk and hang up and have no clue why I felt unsettled. I'd have no idea that she's self-absorbed due to the neglect she suffered in childhood and, as a result, needs constant attention. I wouldn't have been able to observe that she's an awful lot like my adoptive dad. I wouldn't have been able to laugh at the irony of it all. That the social worker managed to find parents as dysfunctional as the one I would have had if she hadn't abandoned me at the hospital much like the stray kittens she rescued, then tired of a week later and called animal control to haul them away. (Another story she tells with pride).

Speaking of control, I am no longer willing to be controlled by guilt. It's one of the positive things to come out of A Year in Therapy. I am no longer willing to be emeshed or coerced or any of the other things that used to make my life chaotic and inauthentic and shallow.

Many, many things can impact the quality and sustainability of Adoption Reunion.

I am beginning to suspect that I COULD have had a relationship with my first mother IF I had remained in my Adoption Fog and was willing to play my often requested role of listener/supporter. But I want something more. A reciprocal relationship. But from personal experience and from what my birth family says, she's just not capable.

As my mother, she has enormous power. I try and not give it to her - try and think of her as just a woman I'm getting to know - but it's there. This thing between us. Me the daughter. She the mother. The power to make me feel small and invisible. She has the power to send me back to that scary place where her needs are first and mine are, well, whatever she decides. When she doesn't give me the chance to speak, when she interrupts after my sixth consequtive word, when she abruptly changes the subject after I've said something that's important (to me), she's erasing me all over again.

This time, I just can't let that happen. It's psychological suicide.

SOCIALLY ENGINEERED

2007-05-30T12:22:00.000-07:00

It was something Elizabeth said. About not thinking of her a-arents as her parents. Not because they didn't try or that she's angry at them. She's not. Just because it didn't work out.

And the lights went off.

Just because my first mother decided to give me away, just because some social worker picked out one set of strangers over another, just because the couple who would eventually "get me" wanted a baby when one was available, doesn't mean that I'm stuck with the burden of thinking of these people as my parents.

If they'd ACTED like parents, now that would be something else.

My a-parents were totally incapable of unconditional love. They NEEDED a baby. They wanted a girl to grow up and keep them company and take care of them when they got old. They were self-centered.

I am not obliged to LOVE them.

They aren't my parents.

I am a product of social engineering. Too bad it didn't work out better. But what can you expect? Without blood ties, without empathy or understanding or real love, is it any surprise? Any relationship that depends on NEEDS instead of LOVE is doomed to fail.

Some lady I can't remember waved her wand over the paperwork, but that doesn't mean I have to continue following orders 40-some years later.

Thank you, Elizabeth.

Thinking about things THIS way helps to emotionally distance myself from my narcissistic adoptive dad.

Whine Away. Or Not.

2007-05-21T20:12:00.000-07:00

Another blogging adoptee got me thinking. She's annoyed by adoptees who don't like adoption or their a-parents or adoptees who blame adoption for ruining their lives.

While I have whined and complained aplenty, I don't think it ruined my life.

The social worker did that by placing me with an undereducated, self-absorbed couple incapable of acting like parents, adoptive or otherwise.

Just kidding!

Sort of.

Today I am happy. Mostly. Despite my bad placement, I have been 100% financially independent since the age of 17. I've taken responsibility for my education and my life and blame no one. That said, it would be shallow not to explore the enormous impact that Closed Adoption, especially as practiced by the wrong sort of people (ignorant) can have on a human life.

Whether we like it or not, some of us were part of a social experiment. A part of history. We must try to make sense of it as best we can. For those who fared well, tell us why. What made it work for you. For those of us who fared badly, why? What made it a failure? I see these blogs as not simply confessional and therapeutic, but as an aggregator of adoption experiences across a broad spectrum...from wonderful to good to the opposite end of bad to miserable.

One of the most fascinating things to learn is that so many of us adoptees, including those who were placed with empathetic, capable and loving a-parents, also share many of the same adoptee issues. People pleasing seems to be a big one.

Don't Try THIS at Home!

2007-05-16T13:00:00.000-07:00

Faults are thick
where love is thin

Don't ask me who first said this. Saw it on one of those church billboards.

Then, I was struck by Joy's most recent comment. Yesterday, I was unglued because I found out my NAD (narcissistic a-dad) was bad mouthing me to his psychologist. Joy mentioned "traumatic attachment disorder" as discussed by fellow adoptee Julie Rist (I love those two). So I looked it up. That, plus reread some articles on adoption and attachment (or is reattachment more appropriate?).

Anyway, there's a WHOLE lot written on getting babies to attach to their adoptive parents and there's much written about kids who didn't/couldn't attach and the horror show that follows.

What does it look like when that child who failed to attach is all grown up?

Read my blog, folks. I think she looks like ME.

Yes, I have all the usual adoptee related issues PLUS. Like I couldn't trust them. Ever. Because all they ever did was lie to me. And when they weren't lying, they were controlling or withholding.

The only thing that bound us together as a family was, first, brainwashing followed by loads of guilt.

Anyway, if you're an adoptive parent with a young child or a prospective adoptive parent, do NOT try this at home or you're gonna end up with someone like me: A-failed-to-attach-adult-daughter-or-son:

--Do not tell her she is chosen or picked or special

--Do not call her mother bad names

--Do not withhold information about her first family or forget important details about them

--Do not cry or have a temper tantrum if she asks about her first family

--Do not pretend to third parties she is your biological child

--Do not call her ungrateful if she acts like a typical teenager who wants a little independence

--Do not use terms like "rescue" because that's about YOU...not her

--Do not make adoption about YOU

--Do not minimize her losses and discourage her from discussing adoption on her terms

Well, I can go on and on, couldn't I?

But I won't.

My fingers are cramping up.

BACKSLIDE

2007-05-15T17:26:00.000-07:00

Just got off the phone w/my narcissistic a-dad's psychologist.

He told me my NAD (narcissistic a-dad) was complaining - bitterly - that I never came to visit and instead visited my in-laws.

Untrue. Hard to know if he's lying. Again. For pity. Or maybe it's the dementia and he can't remember. Even in the old days, NAD used to lie lie lie about all sorts of things, mostly to get what he wanted or to make others look bad and position himself as a victim.

He...the withholder of information about my adoption particulars. He...the person who told me I was Jewish (wrong) and who was so ashamed of my status as an adoptee he lied about it to everybody and made me lie, too.

Why do I care?

What happened to my hard-achieved emotional detachment?

Really, it was probably more about NAD'S misery at being stuck in an assisted living facility and getting old in such an awful way than it was about ME. Aiming for perspective and emotional detachment. I DESPERATELY want and need to do. It's survival. But it's like trying to finish a race wearing a wool sweater. The sweater being the old adoptee people-pleasing-can't-stand-disapproval-doormat-inner-me that resurfaces with certain TRIGGERS and suddenly, I'm sputtering and sinking fast and people are standing by the dock, scratching their heads saying, "Why's she wearing that to go swimming?"

Narcissism and Adoption

2007-05-11T11:02:00.000-07:00

In a recent comment, fellow adoptee and newbie blogger (welcome!) Mary Ann said she'd always wondered what role adoption played in parents with NPD.

Well, Mary Ann. I think adoption PLAYS INTO the hands of prospective a-parents with NPD. Maybe their efforts to find a narcissistic supply source have been thwarted elsewhere. Maybe their spouse won't cooperate or being a celebrity just isn't enough or maybe their "friends" have caught on and fled the scene. Maybe everybody with an ounce of sense has abandoned them.

But a child can't flee. It doesn't know better.

Mary Ann asked an important question.

Not just because we're trying to make sense of our lives but, it seems to me, that there's a lot of self-centeredness going on in adoptions today.

Just look at what some prospective a-parents and a-parents say, on the record, for all to hear. A stream of noxious justification and self-promotion about rescuing children and giving them a better life in the U.S. of A. A throwback to the days of Loring Brace's orphan trains and the reckless child placement practices of his making...when poor (as in no money) biological families were intentionally broken up in order to "save" the children. Today, it's orphan planes and a sense of entitlement to foreign babies often cloaked in the language of martrys.

Sure, there's TALK about the love and time and money spent on these abandoned children, but sometimes, the apparent lack of EMPATHY for the inner world of these children is troubling.

But back to Mary Ann's question. Narcissism and adoption.

Well, here goes.

Imagine a voracious beast of some sort. My favorite is the vampire. Send it a baby who grows into a child desperate to please and you've just fed the beast. The vampire will continue to feed off the child, stunting its growth, holding it back, making it impossible to leave the vampiric nest in a natural way. No, the teen or the young adult must take drastic action to escape. In my case, escaping to college 450 miles away. Then, because that wasn't far enough, took a job even further away.

This kind of adoptive parent does not want a child. It wants an audience. It wants attention. It does not want to love and raise the child. It wants to be loved. It wants to control, not parent.
Because a narcissist is incapable of being a parent. It can't be in tune with their child. It can't put their interests first.

As if being adopted wasn't hard enough.

I think we can't help asking: "How did I end up with her?" (or him) and "Which idiot is responsible for sticking me there?" and "What would my life have been like if they'd placed me with nice, caring people instead?" (better!!!) and "What would I think of adoption if I hadn't had such loser a-parents?"

But I don't think I answered the question. Not really. It just seems to me that quite a few of us ended up with at least one narcissistic (parasitic) parent and that there's still a disturbing number of self-centered a-parents still getting babies except, this time, they've wrapped their disfigured egos in fancy Martyr Cloaks.

What Adoptive Parents REALLY Think???

2007-05-07T08:38:00.000-07:00

Now that I'm the mother of two teenage daughters and all THAT means, I think back to my adoptive mother and feel almost sorry for her.

Adoption was the elephant in the room. The idea that I was born to someone else was so loathesome that she threatened to divorce my a-dad if he ever raised the issue. She went to her grave never having discussed it with her closest friends.

But she must have been terrified.

I KNOW she was. When I became less compliant, more rebellious, the more tense our relationship. What WASN'T discussed hung over our heads like a dark cloud. Every instance of typical teenage separation was seen as a personal rejection. If I closed my door, I was closing it against HER. If I wanted to hang out with friends, I didn't want to be with HER. If I came home late from a date, I was a slut destined for pregnancy and ruin.

Here's the "let's be honest" part.

When my girls act up, I don't carry the extra baggage of wondering about such unknowns as genetic predispositions. When I toss and turn at night, that's ONE thing I don't think of. I WOULD if I were dealing with a teenager I didn't give birth to. In fact, I think it's NATURAL to do so. How could one not? I'd wonder, was her mother temperamental like that? Did her mother have extreme PMS, too? When did her mother begin to acquire abstract thought? At 15 or was she a late bloomer?

I have a map. It's not always reliable and often, the roads I thought were leading somewhere are misleading, dead ends. But I HAVE a map. I think raising an adoptive child/teenager must be like driving without one. You don't always NEED a map to navigate, you've got personal experience to rely upon, but it IS nice to have one in the glove compartment just in case.

Sometimes I wonder...what DOES an adoptive parent think of when the child-rearing gets tough? Secretly. At night.

It's Knowing Where You're From

2007-05-03T19:41:00.000-07:00

NPR's All Things Considered ran a lovely commentary by Laura Lorson about The Kentucy Derby. She's a native Louisvillan and talked about what the Derby means to her. It ended with, "It's about knowing where you're from."

Do you know how many pieces/stories end this way?

The template looks something like this:

a) Introduce significant historical event or place
b) Sprinkle memorable details of its quirkiness/uniqueness
c) Describe impact of such event/place on your life/development
d) End with, "It's about knowing where you're from/who you are/your place in the world.

In no way am I picking on Lorson's commentary or criticizing it as formulaic. I greatly enjoyed it. Just pointing out the very basic human desire for connectedness to a sense of place, a people. That we are part of a tribe, a culture. That in our blood we wear funny hats during a Spring ritual of horse racing or, mmmm, still crave Menudo on Sunday mornings even if we know it's filled with tripe.

We just want to know where we come from, folks.

It's that simple.

We just want what you (the non-adopted) have.

FABULOUS FORUM FOR ADOPTEES (and Leroy)

2007-04-28T18:42:00.000-07:00

A new adoptee-centered support forum is up and running and if you're not already a registered member, please link over to Advocating for Change http://afc.smfforfree2.com/index.php

Of course, some cool a-parents have joined as well as other members of the Adoption Triad which, I learned from some posters who argued (in summary) it's actually more like a beast with four legs...the fourth leg being the INDUSTRY. Which is soooo right because, somehow, adoption has evolved in concept as an institution devoted to finding good homes for children who need them to finding (and creating supply) babies for people who want them.

The well designed forum captures the complexity and range of adoptee experiences. Transracial? Gotcha (okay, okay...got carried away). Transcultural? Got that covered, too. There's also a place for Late Discovery Adoptees (and for those who survived THAT shock, I SALUTE you and am in awe of your resilience). Was finally able to ask the question: Are there any other Beaners Out There? and got some great answers. (No. It appears I am a lone Bean).

And, of course, since Joy and Addie are involved in creating the forum and those two being (spank!) refreshingly naughty adoptees...for our LINKING PLEASURE...."As If Being Adopted Wasn't Bad Enough: Crazy A-Parents!" Yes! Yes! I'm not alone! I never was! Thank you, thank you, Joy and Addie!

Hope to read you there. Especially if you're a Beaner.

The Matching Game

2007-04-22T19:26:00.000-07:00

"During much of the twentieth century, matching was the philosophy that governed non-relative adoption. It's goal was to make families socially that would "match" families made naturally.... What this meant in practice was that physical resemblance, intellectual similarity, and racial and religious continuity between parents and children were preferred goals in adoptive families. Matching was the technique that could inject naturalness and realness into a family form stigmatized as artificial and less real than the "real thing." Matching stood for safety and security. Difference spelled trouble." (source: The Adoption History Project: www.darkwing.uoregon.edu)

The irony? Measured by the standards of matching, called "optimistic, arrogant and historically novel" by the Adoption History Project, the social worker who matched me to my adoptive parents did a damn good job.

Amazing, really.

Not that matching is a good thing from the adoptee's perspective.

It all depends.

There's often this notion that adoptive couples have more education, more money, better parenting skills and, because they're usually older, will have more time and attention to give the child.

Not always. At least, not back in the heydey of Closed Adoption when there were as many or slightly more babies than couples wanting to adopt.

Also, if you were born to an undereducated, slightly troubled, low income Mexican-American woman, your chances of trading up to a better life was nixed from the beginning. You got as good as you were destined to get.

In other words, the social worker employed by the L.A. County Bureau of Adoptions who had my entire future in her hands picked at least one adoptive parent almost exactly like my first mother. Really, the similarities are shocking.

The more I learn about my still poor mother, the more I realize that in many ways, she's just a female version of my self-absorbed adoptive father, just not as bad. Both were abused and neglected as children. Both have narcissistic wounds big enough to swallow their children whole. Both have exactly the same level of education: half of tenth grade, and that's stretching it. Both like to talk. Nonstop. Indiscriminately. "Loquacious," is the term the social worker used to describe my mother in my non-identifying packet. Both a-father and mother have entered old age not much wiser than they were at thirty seven...the age of both at the time of my birth.

Well, there's nothing I can do about THAT.

But are there lessons to be learned from that nasty little experiment called Matching that we can apply to today's adoptions?

Money - and lots of it - seems to play such a big part of current practices, especially as it requires trips around the world looking for babies, that the concern of a highly desirable commodity such as a healthy infant being placed in a low income home with limited opportunities is pretty much eliminated. Hopefully.

With today's low supply and high demand, we can hope that any baby available for parental substitution can expect far, far better adoptive parent material. God, I hope so. I mean, the kind of parents you get is a really big deal. (Recently, I read about a Japanese-American adoptee from my old neighborhood and she adored her a-parents, still does, and still enjoys a loving relationship with them. Her questions about her background were always treated openly and with respect.)

But with so much money and, presumably, the education to go along with it, does it mean that these more highly qualified adoptive parent candidates are adequately screened? Will money and education mean they will be more empathetic, more psychologically healthy? Are they better able to understand the loss and issues the baby-child-teenager-young adult-adult will face over time? It seems that the information they want and receive is limited to the "positive" stories of happy adoptees who express their gratitude, not their ambivalence or misgivings.

Without little regulation, without controls, who's watching out for the best interests of today's adopted child, mostly likely flown in from another country?

What's changed - it strikes me - is that many adopted babies are no longer "placed," they are "got" and the babies being obtained are just as subject to the Ultimate Crapshoot except, this time, the all-powerful social worker is played by a lawyer, a "facilitator" and sometimes, those involved with charity/church maternity homes. The adoption "middleman" may be a different sort of beast, but he/she still exists and their power over the lives of the current batch of adoptees is still as huge and powerful as it ever was.

That Was Then...

2007-04-19T08:09:00.000-07:00

....this is now. And what an improvement!

One year ago, experienced a freak-out triggered by an insensitive, clueless relative of the in-law variety.

One year ago, I had no idea I had major abandonment issues.

One year ago, I had no idea Isuffered anxiety, low self-esteem, writer's block due to feelings of unworthiness, identity confusion and repressed grief and rage that my mother had given me away to strangers.

One year ago, I had no idea my adoptive parents weren't so nice. That, in fact, they were ignorant and cruel and needy.

One year ago, I hauled my quivering ass into a therapist's office and began the search for my mother.

Last year, I found blogs written by fellow adoptees Joy and Elizabeth and saw the possibility, that there was a different way to live as an adoptee: conscious and mindful. Elizabeth, at first, seemed so SCANDALOUS. She actually wrote, "I hate adoption." This simple declaration made me shiver and laugh. It got me thinking, Well, what do I feel about it?

One year ago, I took control of my life.

For the last month, I've worked on character analysis and plot outline in preparation for what I hope will one day be a published novel. This time, I'm allowing myself to enjoy the process. I am taking myself seriously. I have something to say. It's about, of course, adoption. It begins during the last gasp of the Closed Era. It's about loss and Latino culture and narcissism and the myth of matriarchy. Yesterday, I wrote 1000 words. I think I found my voice.

Last year's crisis was probably the best thing that could have ever happened to me.

Was rearranging all my adoption books and noticed something. The covers are ripped off or the faded titles are obscured with marker. Then I remembered. Whenever I bought one, I'd try to hide what it was just in case an adoptive family member saw it lying around. I didn't want to hurt their feelings. Or, more likely, I was afraid that they would be angry. A grown woman. Ripping the covers off her books. HOW PATHETIC! WHAT A SCARED LITTLE TOAD!

Bijou posted about finding her adoption story books that were read to her as a child and when I looked at the picture, I flipped out. They were mine, too. So now I'm anxiously awaiting them and when I get them, hopefully today, I'm not gonna rip off the cover because......everything is so wonderfully different and better and positive in more ways than I can even begin to list!

The False Self Challenge

2007-04-17T08:08:00.000-07:00

[[BB Church offered an excellent analysis of , "the unethical (and quite possibly criminal) conspiracy of the "A Child is Waiting Adoption Agency" to deprive Stephanie Bennett of her daughter Evelyn. You can find it at www.bbchurch.blogspot.com. ]]

What, exactly, is the False Self?

Sure, I understood it in a theorectical way, but I couldn't quite figure out what kind of False Self I'd created in response to being adopted and raised by a controlling adoptive mother and a narcissistic a-father. This bothered me. Until I could identify the contours of my False Self, I couldn't discover the Real Me trapped inside.

Until last night. I was rereading Alice Miller's, "The Drama of the Gifted Child."

This is the quote:

"With two exceptions, the mothers of all my patients had a narcissistic disturbance, were extremely insecure, and often suffered from depression. The child, an only one or often the first-born, was the narcissistically cathected object. What these mothers had once failed to find in their own mothers they were able to find in their children: someone at their disposal who can be used as an echo, who can be controlled, is completely centered on them, will never desert them, and offers full attention and admiration."

Bingo.

In that one neat paragraph, Alice Miller summed up my adoptive mother. When I was a young child, she was happy. I was compliant and cuddly. At the advanced age of 13, no doubt terrified at the looming prospect of my independence, she bought us matching outfits. Later, when I expressed more of a preference for hanging out with friends and boyfriend, she reacted with fury. This became a period of bitter recrimination: "After all I've done for you," and "You are so ungrateful," and finally, when I announced I was leaving for college, "Good luck. Don't bother asking for a single dime because you're not going to get it."

But what of The False Self?

It isn't exactly what I imagined. It's more of what I hold back. What I couldn't or dared not express to my adoptive parents. So much was taboo. Opinions. Feelings. Expression was extremely limited. So much was threatening. Strange things. Even my preference in cars.

I never realized, until the other day, the stilted pattern of conversation that took place between us. If I said anything they didn't like, they resorted to either ignoring me or, worst, mocking.

For example, I had a chat recently with my a-Dad, which is a repeat of of talks we've had over the years, just swap out the car models. It goes like this:

Dad: "Did you know your big car (Ford Explorer) is a gas guzzler?"

Me: "Oh yeah. It's a guzzler all right. But I don't drive it much. We just use it for camping and hauling stuff to the dump."

Dad: "You should sell it."

Me: "No. We still need it."

Dad: "You should trade it in for a Focus."

Me: "No, I don't think so."

Dad: (Bristling w/indignation). Hey. I had a Focus and it was a great little car. (Mocking tone now). Oh, that's not good enough for me. I'm so special."

Me: "I didn't say that. We just don't need a new car. That's all."

Dad: "How about a Suburu?"

Me: "No. I don't want one of those either."

Dad: "Then what the hell do you want? Oh, I know. A Mersaydeeeze. --mocking in girly voice--Oh, look everybody, I'm driving a Mercedes. Oh brother, you women are all alike."

That pretty much sums up every conversation I've ever had with my parents, whether it be cars, politics or my feelings. Say something they don't like or are uncomfortable with and one is likely to get the roll of the eyes, the mocking tone, the long, cold silences and, in the case of my mother, refusal to talk to me for weeks and once, several years.

So this False Self? It's not what I thought. I became a Yes Girl. Sometime long ago, I learned that all I could do was to be there, smile, listen, nod and ocassionally say, "Huh Huh." I basically stopped talking. Oddly, they didn't seem to notice much. I became a Living Ghost of Myself. Luckily, I was free to talk at the law firm where I found my first job out of high school and later, at college. But this Not Talking set me back. It takes much, much longer to find your True Voice/Self and when you finally do, you feel Guilty. Major delayed development.

So that's my False Self, a sort of negation. Would love to hear what yours is like.

And to those of you who've been so supportive in what seems my never-ending struggle w/my narcissistic a-father, your advice has finally given me the courage to take a break from him. I didn't talk to him all of Monday and I feel calmer and much more myself today. The experts are right. The only way to survive such a self-absorbed parent is with distance.

The Churning

2007-04-14T19:00:00.000-07:00

Once again, the topic is my narcissistic adoptive father.

(One of these days, I'm going to get back to the subject of my first mother, post reunion. By the way, I'm liking the term "first mom" more and more because I ended up with a second mother picked out by a social worker who spent all of twenty minutes with my a-parents, more concerned about proper ventilation of the house rather than the psychological health of its occupants.)

Specifically, my reaction to my a-father.

Try as I might to set boundaries, they are hard to enforce. Mostly because I feel GUILTY. Then I seethe with resentment. Finally recognizing the pattern, I set out to change it. A simple phone call with him makes me feel invisible and bad in ways too numerous to list. I decide I can't talk to him every day, even if we do keep our chats short. All day I dread the phone call, then afterward feel upset and churned up despite my best efforts to emotionally detach.

My husband and therapist (two separate people) strongly suggested to talk to my a-father every other day or several times a week to give myself time to recharge. (He's 80, has frontal lobe dementia which doesn't really impact his memory and my husband says he not much stranger or self-centered than before he became demented).

So I try it. I manage a (wonderful!) one day break and then, sure enough, he thinks he's having a heart attack and the phone starts ringing. I let the assisted living facility handle it, as the head nurse suggested. He's had these anxiety/fake medical emergencies for as long as I remember...mostly for attention or because things haven't gone his way. The next day, he catches me offguard by calling in the morning. He says, "I just wanted to hear your voice. I'm so lonely. I miss you soooo much. I love you soooo much."

"I just talked to you last night," I say lightly.

"But I love you and I just wanted to hear your voice."

My stomach turns. I feel nauseauted. Claustrophobic. The whole thing smacks of manipulation, mostly because he's never been expressive in that way. There's also something wrong about it. He's using a lover's voice. Or something. I can't get off the phone fast enough. And then the GUILT sets in. He's all alone in the world. I'm his only child. He doesn't know a single other person. Then I think, wait. I didn't ask to be an only child. He's alienated every person he's ever met, including family members. He refuses to take part in any of the assisted living facility (which is very nice; private room w/a garden view) activities because he can't be the center of attention, which makes him furious.

See? Off to the races. The debate plays in my head, an endless loop.

I don't want to deal with him, but it's my (legal) duty and responsibility to do so.

The question? Is that reaction within the realm of dealing w/a narcissistic parent? My therapist has suggested it may indicate something more...that the body sometimes remembers when the mind can't. Or won't. Of course, she's talking about sexual abuse. I can't remember any such thing. But I'm wondering about that nauseated, claustrophic feeling I get when he becomes clingy. Have I mentioned that I hate him to kiss my cheek or hold my hand? I've attributed this to the fact that I don't like him or feel comfortable around him.

Open to any ideas.

Unintentionally Cruel

2007-04-12T10:40:00.000-07:00

For this adoptee with the bad luck of being placed in an extremely dysfunctional family during the evil closed Era, the writings of psychoanalyst Alice Miller are a revelation.

My adoptive parents were unintentionally cruel and abusive.

I spent most of a year blogging, getting it all down, writing about my a-parents behaviors before recently discovering Alice Miller, thanks to an adoptee on the Chosen Baby forum. It has been an enormous relief to chronicle the bits and pieces of my childhood and adolscence that I can remember. There it is, in black and white, for me to reread and for others to comment on, providing the witnesses or neutral third parties that failed to step forward when I was a child. Not one blogger who has so kindly taken the time to comment has ever said, "Oh, but they loved you." Thank God. It is this response that makes me crazy with frustration. "Weren't you listening?" I want to cry. But I don't. It's better not to talk about the past with certain people because of the unquestioned belief that parents always act in the best interests of their children, even when they do not.

So brainwashed was I that I never thought of my adoptive parents as cruel, unintentionally or not. But according to Miller, they were. But what's even more important, my body and all my behaviors and reactions tell me that they were.

My a-mom was only capable of conditional love, as that is the only kind she received by her cold and domineering and deeply unhappy mother. When I did something to make my a-mom unhappy, she would refuse to look at or speak to me for days on end, pretending I wasn't there. Any expressions besides happy and grateful seemed to threaten her very existence. I was once slapped and sent to my room for "scaring" my mother because I cried when my boyfriend broke-up with me. I was not allowed to ask questions about my adoption or my first mother because my a-mom liked to pretend I was biologically hers. I was forced to play this pretend game, too.

My adoptive father is also incapable of empathy. He is a narcissist. I am in my mid-forties and he's never allowed me to talk or express my opinion without mocking me. He is not capable of anything else because he was horribly abused by an alcoholic father and is still tortured by the knowledge that his beloved mother did nothing to prevent the beatings. My a-father could not parent because he was still a child in desperate need of attention. He is still that child. He is 80-years old.

Of course, they were not all bad. They did not beat me or starve me. They laughed, took me to Disneyland, drove me to high school functions, let me choose my favorite take-out. And then reminded me of it all later, as if I owed them for parental duties performed. As if to say, we didn't enjoy any of these things, we just did them because we had to.

I am no longer confused by all this. It's all out in the open now. My adoptive parents were unintentionally cruel. They were ignorant. I no longer wonder why I'm not a better daughter, why I didn't love them more. There is nothing wrong with me. I did the best I could. Under the circumstances. I don't have to feel guilt or shame. I forgive myself. I am working my way toward figuring out to do with all the anger and resentment that has built up over the years. But it is beginning to seep out, to be released. I am not in any rush to do this. It is, I believe, important to experience all those feelings that had to be bottled up.

Alice Miller, your work is a gift.

Official Confirmation: I'm Not Crazy

2007-04-04T08:41:00.000-07:00

For those in the Adoption Triad who read my blog, apologies. This IS off topic, but I feel I need to get this down in order to understand my relationship with my a-father and, more importantly, help me figure out what to DO to deal with him a way that's healthier for ME.

Here's the thing about having a narcissistic parent: You're never quite sure because at the end of a chat you're so twisted around it seems YOU might be the one who's crazy.

A psychologist confirmed that my father is narcissistic, incapable of anything more than shallow feelings. Yet, yet...is he really, honestly and truly? If a scale for narcissism existed, would he be a five? A ten? Just how bad is he? Could there be something else wrong with him that could account for his strange behavior? After four decades of confusion, frustration and denial, these questions are suddenly important.

Thanks to Elizabeth, fellow adoptee and daughter of a narcissist, I FINALLY have the confirmation I've been looking for. And not only that, I now have insight into some of his perplexing behaviors...and what role I've played...and how I've managed to survive his wrath.

Elizabeth (www.ihateadoption.blogspot.com) suggested the following website: www.narc-attack.blogspot.com from which I linked to "How to Recognize a Narcissist" written by Joanna Ashmun who says she writes from personal experience. Her observations were astounding and shockingly familiar. I hope she doesn't mind being quoted:

It's impossible to overemphasize the importance of narcissists' lack of empathy. It colors everything about them. I have observed very closely some narcissists I've loved, and their inability to pay attention when someone else is talking is so striking that it has often seemed to me that they have neurological problems that affect their cognitive functioning

EXACTLY! BINGO! This describes my father PERFECTLY. In fact, over the years, when medical professionals have met my father for the first time they later asked, when we were alone, if he always behaved that way, disturbed but unsure what to make of it. It's like he talking AT someone but not connecting .

From my personal experience, and from what I've seen in the clinical literature, narcissists don't talk about their inner life -- memories, dreams, reflections -- much at all. They rarely recount dreams. They seem not to make typical memory associations -- i.e., in the way one thing leads to another, "That reminds me of something that happened when I was...of something I read...of something somebody said...." They don't tell how they learned something about themselves or the world. They don't share their thoughts or feelings or dreams. They don't say, "I have an idea and need some help," or "There's something I've always wanted to do...did you ever want to do that?" They do not discuss how they've overcome difficulties they've encountered or continuing problems that they're trying to solve (beyond trying to get someone else to do what they want).

Several times, in an attempt to understand what bothered me about my a-dad's communication style, I transcribed our phone conversations. I showed it to my therapist. She said it was very strange, that he seemed to lack to the ability to think abstractly. These chats took place before he had dementia. When I read the above quote, the lights went off. My father has never made typical memory associations. Every bit of what he says begins with the word "I...." and it is all very concrete and limited to a one yard radius with him as Ground Zero. I like this. I don't like that. I have a doctor's appointment. That woman drives me crazy. I don't like this TV show because there's too much blah, blah, blah and no action...a sort of unfiltered, stream of consciousness that is hard to follow.

A striking thing about narcissists that you'll notice if you know them for a long time is that their ideas of themselves and the world don't change with experience; the ones I've known have been stalled at a vision that came to them by the age of sixteen.

Yep. My a-father is the same man he was when I was a child. It's as if he's frozen in time. He did not have a mid-life crisis, never suffered from existential angst. Saddest of all, he failed to gain any new insights or wisdom that comes with age. My sixteen year old daughter is wiser and much more reflective than her grandfather. It is like she is a different species. Or HE is.

It is also essential that you keep emotional distance from narcissists. They're pretty good at maintaining a conventional persona in superficial associations with people who mean absolutely nothing to them, and they'll flatter the hell out of you if you have something they can use or if, for some reason, they perceive you as an authority figure. That is, as long as they think you don't count or they're afraid of you, they'll treat you well enough that you may mistake it for love.

This is the quote that blew me away. I'd always wondered how my father, who alienated everybody he ever met, managed to have a 36-year marriage and never reject me. I think I finally get it. My a-mother was cold and domineering and no doubt an authority figure. Even my a-mom's friends have said he was afraid of her. He was an only child and his mother probably gave him the kind of attention he needed. That is, until I was old enough to become his narcissistic supply. My a-mother would quickly tire of him and order him to talk to me instead. And while all these years I've listened to him and have been compliant and complicit, I've always kept my emotional distance. I suspect he's never rejected me because he knows I'm all he's got and I'm a damn good problem solver and financial planner. He's manipulative. VERY manipulative.

But, as soon as you try to get close to them, they'll say that you are too demanding -- and, if you ever say "I love you," they'll presume that you belong to them as a possession or an appendage, and treat you very very badly right away.

After my mother died, my Dad dated like crazy. He got Viagra and tried to tell me about his sexual exploits and conquests, which I refused to hear. I had to forcefully remind him that I was his daughter and that his behavior was unfatherlike and inappropriate. He'd date intensely, for a bit, then he'd turn against the woman de'jour. One day lovey dovey, the next he loathed and despised her and had to "get rid of her."

If you should be so uppity as to express a mind and heart of your own, then they will cut you off -- just like that, sometimes trashing you and all your friends on the way out the door

I'd seen him turn against his only counsin, someone he'd grown up with, then a succession of "friends." Something always happened, relatively quickly, that ended with my father saying, "He thought he was hot shit," or "She's always talking about how sick she is, blah, blah, blah. What the hell do I care?" I suspect what happened is that the accused tried to talk about themselves for a change and my father could simply not tolerate this.

Which leads me to....whenever I've tried to test the waters and talk a little about one of my experiences say, like the time I was nervous about going in for a scary medical test, he got hostile and aggressive and demanded to know what would happen to him if I died. I asked wouldn't he be worried about his poor granddaughters and he got angry and said, "Forget them. They've got their father. I've only got you."

After a lifetime of neglect, my a-father has become even more emotionally needy and clingy as he ages with dementia. For the first time, he ends every phone conversation with, "I love you so much," (in the way lovers talk-gross) when he's never said it before. It nauseates me. It really does. It's pathetic and transparent, this final attempt at manipulation. Maybe there is a part of him that finally appreciates me - he says he does (also for the first time), but I suspect it's because he knows I'm the one in charge of his care. Just the other day, I once again tested the waters and tried to talk a bit about myself and he immediately got hostile. No wonder I never dared.

Brainwashed

2007-04-03T10:20:00.000-07:00

Social worker Leroy Dissing (and unofficial-therapist&supporter-to-the-Triad) left this comment yesterday that couldn't be more timely or more accurate:

"One thing I have noticed with children of narcissistic parents is that their children, even into adulthood, stay attached to their parents (albeit unhealthfully) as part of a gigantic, impossible effort to please them. I think it is part of a child abuse syndrome because in reality the parents have emotionally neglected/damaged the child into thinking their entire self-worth exists soley on meeting the needs of the parents. This makes creating their own individual identity extremely difficult because they very themselves as so enmeshed with their parents that normal, healthy separation rarely, if ever, occurs. A very sad legacy to leave your children but one they are totally oblivious to and thus, never feel accountable for."

Vowing to emotionally detach from a self-absorbed, using "charent" (child/parent) is easier than actually achieving emotional detachment.

My adoptive father takes up such a big place in my head that I'm sure if an autopsy is ever done the doctor will find that my brain has a special lobe bearing my father's name.

It doesn't matter that I can't STAND the man and have done my best to put as much distance as possible between us. It doesn't matter that I've read piles of self-help books on the subject. It doesn't matter that I've talked to my therapist ad nauseum about the subject. It doesn't matter that I see my a-father with open eyes: an 80-year old man who was physically abused and neglected as a child so that he grew up with an insatiable need for attention that drives away everyone who meets him. Except me. As the only child and as the ONLY person in his life, I am his caretaker now that he has dementia.

Knowing all his faults and how he's negatively impacted my life, every day I call him. If I'm running five minutes late, I begin to fret. He's going to be upset. If I don't call he's going to have one of his retaliatory hypochondrical attacks and the assisted living facility is going to call me every ten minutes until I pick up.

Today, I'm feeling defensive that I haven't rushed out and bought him a razor and chocolate covered raisins that he asked for Sunday night and it's Tuesday morning. The fact that I didn't rush out first thing Monday is a big improvement. Since his request is not an emergency, I'm forcing myself to wait until Wednesday to go the special store some distance away when it's more convenient. The delay makes me nervous. Guilty.

Such is the brainwashing at the hands of narcissistic parents. Them first. Them, them, them. Resisting takes an emormous effort, even when you know you need to do this for yourself. They are always present in your mind, looming. What will it be like when he's dead? Will I feel relieved? My fear is that he's commandeered such a big chunk of ME that I may feel like an amputee. A horrible thought.

Leroy brought up an interesting point.

Separating - individuating - from a narcissistic parent is impossible in the way that healthy young adults separate from healthy parents.

So true!

You escape at the first chance, running for the door, amid accusations that you are abandoning them and predictions that you will fail miserably in your selfish quest for independence. There are no tears of farewell at the dorm room and cautions to be careful, instead there is clinging and high drama. Once, in my college years, I landed an internship that brought me back to L.A. where my-parents lived. I didn't tell them. I pretended I was still up North. Living with or near them meant one thing: I would be at their beck and call or there would be hell to pay: refusal to see them on their terms meant the inevitable, "Don't you see what you're putting us through" Big Scene which usually ended with my a-father having some mysterious ailment that required a trip to the emergency room.

Being the child of a narcissist is like living with a chronic illness. You try to live with the problem, on your terms, and not for it, but it's a daily challenge.

Adoption and Controlling Parents

2007-03-30T08:33:00.000-07:00

Currently zipping through "If You Had Controlling Parents" by Dan Neuharth. Excellent BTW.

Took the test designed to "measure the prevalence and control in childhood and identify whether you may be facing adult-life problems because of it."

Checked "yes" to 49 out of 65. I guess that means I more than qualify. Twenty-two positives means you most likely came from a controlling family of which eight "styles" are listed: Smothering, Depriving, Perfectionist, Cultlike, Chaotic, Using, Abusing and Childlike.

Accordingingly, my adoptive mother was both Smothering and Depriving while my adoptive father was (and still is) Using and Childlike. Both a-parents experienced major trauma as children (alcoholic father, physical abuse, emotionally abusive mother, witnessing the suicide of a parent).

Skipping ahead to the chapter on adult-life legacies of such an unbringing, it seems I'm a strong candidate for the Poster Adult of Growing up Controlled. Sheesh.

Some of the damage I clearly recognize: the splintering of self, numbing out, putting others first (always), difficulty in expressing anger or resentment (okay, in real life, not in this blog where I can safely vent), feeling used, poor self-image, difficulty in developing good emotional and self care habits.

What's interesting is how so many of these "issues" mirror those experienced by so many adoptees. Oh, right. I'm one of those, too.

Which raises an interesting question.

Are adoptive parents more likely to be controlling? While they may not have experienced trauma as children, many experienced a profound trauma as an infertile couple.

What percentage of my "challenges" stem from being adopted? What percentage from having Extreme Controlling Parents?

I'm in my mid-forties and I've yet to utter more than five words put together before my a-father cuts me off and switches the subject back to himself. He whines and complains and babbles on and my job is to listen and give support. He's never acknowledged a single feeling I've ever had. He brought my a-mom to visit when my second daughter was born and didn't tell me my a-mother had developed Alzheimers, then expected me to take care of my a-mom, a 20-month-old toddler and a newborn. Only recently I realized how horrible that was because that sort of disregard for me as a person was, well, standard practice.

Do adoptees who have more "issues" beyond (significant!) identity, development and the Primal Wound (sheesh, aren't those enough!), have them because their adoptive parents were so darned controlling?

Looking for a Witness

2007-03-27T17:55:00.000-07:00

I have this habit. When I finally come across one of the few people still alive who came into contact with one of my adoptive parents, I interview them.

It starts out as a conversation but, at some point, I fall into the role of reporter.
What was my mother like back then? What did you think of my Dad? Did my mother ever talk about my adoption? What was their relationship like?

My adoptive mother went to her grave clutching a treasure chest of secrets, including her private thoughts on my adoption, a subject she refused to discuss. A woman so private she even kept the details of her first marriage secret from her second husband and her only child, me.

If I want the truth, much of which relates to me, I am forced into the odd role of my adoptive mother's biographer.

I find it strange that she never, not even once, discussed my adoption with her closest friends. Maybe if she had, confessed her innermost fears, we would have had a chance at a relationship. Instead, she pretended I was her biological child and our course was set: bound for disaster. Of course, my father pretended, too.

But there's another reason I interview people about the past.

The psychologist Alice Miller gave me the idea in one of her books. She talked about how children who suffer abuse do so behind closed doors, where parents are free to do all sorts of things, from hitting their child because it's their "parental duty" to the mother who doesn't talk to her child for days (or weeks) on end as punishment. (My a-mother did this frequently. It never occurred to me that this was abusive, although at the time, it was confusing and lonely and felt terrible.)

When I talk to people who knew my a-parents, I'm looking for a witness. Some sort of third party confirmation to what happened.

In doing so I've learned that my a-mom's own mother was a cold, domineering woman who publicly belittled my mother. This came as a great surprise. My a-mom idolized her. To me. My grandmother was portrayed as the perfect mother. My a-mom the perfect daughter. Neither could be farther from the truth. Growing up poor and underededucated and ignorant, my a-mom went on to repeat the destructive pattern of the mother who could only love...conditionally. She carried the extra burden of the belief that an adopted child would respond with unconditional love and gratitude.

And then there is my child-like, narcissistic father.

I have learned that people always thought him odd. That's putting it nicely. The few people he called friends were actually not. They were friends of my mother who tolerated him, but barely. A woman I thought was closest to him asked who his friends were because he didn't seem to have any. It appears my a-father went through life practically alone...except for his wife and me, his parentified child he followed around the house, looking for attention. No wonder my adoptive mother wanted me to stay home and not go to college. When I left, she was forced to listen to his nonstop chatter.

The more time that passes, the more "interviews" I do, the less guilty I feel. It used to consume me. Why don't I love my father? Good daughters love their parents.

But real parents, good parents, of the biological or adoptive kind, don't turn their children into their emotional caregivers and behave like energy vampires, sucking the very life out of them.

Looking for a witness to my childhood has been a very, very good thing.

I am Unworthy. Not.

2007-03-25T13:03:00.000-07:00

After I started delving into the subject of adoption and its impact on my life and development, I discovered certain topics I simply didn't "get."

The first is grief. I didn't believe I felt anything like it. How could I be sad about someone I'd never met?

Finally, finally, I realized that it was grief and anger behind my lifelong struggle with anxiety. I've only recently come to understand that my adoptive parents made my mother so taboo that just thinking about her was not only the ultimate betrayal, but probably a mortal sin.

The grief was there alright. A big, shadowy monster covered with cobwebs.

The second is the concept of worthlessness.

I'd read that adoptees feel worthless because our mothers gave us away - but I didn't think it applied to me. I'm too well adjusted for that, I thought. Despite whining and moaning in the safety of my blog, in real life, I'm NOT a complainer. I'm a get-it-done kinda gal. Or I am when it comes to certain tasks. Tasks associated with some sort of external system of rewards, the higher and hotter the pressure the better. Nina leaps over tall buildings and fences topped with razor wire, but she will do the job.

EXCEPT when it's a goal important to just me...like finishing a book.

I actually caught myself all choked up, on the edge of tears and feeling all panicky because I'd just finished Kazuo Ishiguro's When We Were Orphans and thought, I'll never write that way. What's the point of even trying? And then there's Rose Tremain and Margaret Atwood and Jane Smiley and Mo Hayder (author of The Devil of Nanking, which was strange and amazing) and compared to their unique voices, what could I possibly have to say of interest?

I do this all the time. I read other authors and immediately get overwhelmed with toxic feelings of inadequacy and hopelessness and that stops me from finishing what I've started.

Where do those feelings come from?

If I'm really honest...like the other day...it comes from being given away by your own mother. Not a great way to start off life: unwanted.

It's not just a matter of feeling sorry for yourself. One has to acknowledge it's real before you can begin to deal with it...and figure out how to work around it.

Which I plan to do. Dammit. I just need a game plan.

Grab a Barf Bag: A Book Proposal from Hell

2007-03-24T16:14:00.000-07:00

Words do fail on such occasions as this.

Check it out Fellow Members of the Triad, but don't forget the barf bags. ESPECIALLY Elizabeth and Joy if you haven't seen this yet.

It seems - according to this most thorough of book proposals - that we are just a bunch of misguided fools wallowing in our victimhood. Oh. And if you simply can't stand it and bail out, please skip to the end which concludes this way: "This large market of wealthy readers has been under-served in its need for validation of its choice to adopt. The Chosen Child is a book that meets a definite desire and need."

www.novelistador.blogspot.com/2007/03/chosen-child-adoption-book-proposal.html

A New Awareness

2007-03-20T09:28:00.000-07:00

Had to take a bit of time off because I was getting bogged down with all these adoption issues.

Have spent the last ten months or so dealing with all this STUFF....after four decades wandering around in a daze, chanting, "Adoption is no big deal. Adoption is wonderful. I am so grateful."

Bullet pointed Epiphany during mini-mental-break:

--Healing takes an ENORMOUS amount of psychic energy. Even physical energy;

--Waking up from adoption brainwashing leaves one drained, as if recovering from a chronic illness that lasted entire decades;

--On the other hand, REPRESSING the impact that adoption has on one's life also takes enormous energy; it's like spending an eternity with your shoulder shoved against the closet door and you've been warned by society that evil lurks inside

--Productivity after meeting one's mother is SHOT because, no matter how fabu the experience at first, it's gonna hit you and take you down, until you pick yourself up and begin putting together the pieces

--Meeting your first mother, when possible, no matter how terrified you are....goes a long way to making you feel like a real person with a history and not a two-dimensional character with a backstory made up by people playing God.

And speaking of THOSE righteous people playing God with the lives of adoptees, separating us from knowing our mothers and our "particulars" and denying our basic human rights....how dare you? I know almost all there is to know and guess what? I'm still standing. I am not and never have been a piece of nameless property.

What the HELL? Or, Wake Me Up, Puleeze!

2007-03-15T08:25:00.000-07:00

If you take the time to read my blog and make a comment, THANK YOU! I love, read and think about every one. Currently experiencing Adoption Issues Overload (a well known phenomenon, right?) and I'm going to take some time off and check back again next week.

Had a really bad dream last night. This is my attempt to shake it off.

The nightmare? That I was adopted. I mean, that I was stuck in the past when my adoptive mother was still alive and pretending that I was her biological child and I was going along with it. Woke up hyperventilating. It reminded me of that feeling I used to get: confused, claustrophobic.

For adoptees of the (botched) social experiment that was the Closed Era, it's a wonder we didn't go stark, raving mad.

A partial list of what some of us experienced:

1. Mother hands over baby to strangers, trusting they know what they are doing;

2. Baby is placed in foster care for approximately one month; the identity of this temporary caregiver (or multiple caregivers) the adoptee will never know; this period of time - the first 30 days of life - is simply...lost.

3. Baby is handed over to a second (or third or fourth?) set of complete strangers who celebrate the arrival of the child, who is traumatized, shocked and grieving;

4. Child is told of its adoption at four or five or six years of age and sometimes, the unpleasant task of "telling" done, this is the only time the issue is discussed.

In my case:
5. Everyone pretends the child is not adopted, is part of the biological family, and that it is not a subject worthy of further discussion

6. Adoptive parents LIE, in front of the child, that the child is theirs and makes up stories about who she looks like; the stories change, sometimes she looks like her dead grandmother, sometimes like her dead grandfather;

7. When child gets up enough nerve to ask about her background, adoptive mother has hysterical temper tantrum and the child is told that she is bad and ungrateful for asking about "that woman" and is reminded who her "real" mother is.

8. Adoptive father, when secretly pressed, tells teenager that she is a German Jew; she believes this for two decades until she discovers he understood wrong because "it wasn't that important to begin with";

9. When the adoptee grows up and has a daughter of her own, her adoptive parents stake their claim: the grandchild is said to look exactly like her adoptive grandmother

10. Having been denied any real information about her biological family, having been made to feel guilty for even thinking about her first mother, the reality of her mother is hard to grasp, even months after finding her.

11. Adoptee's first mother either can't or won't tell her who her father is.

You can see by this simple and incomplete list that such a person - forced to live with such restrictions - is condemned to live a half-life. A pretend life. You have to numb yourself to survive. It is CRAZY-MAKING. It is like being stuck in an alternate universe where everything is off and you are slowly going mad while everyone around you goes about their business, untroubled.

And then you wake up.

Like it's a bad dream.

And then you discover, after decades of isolation, that there are other victims of this social experiment and you begin taking stock, reflecting on the past, trying to figure out just what the hell happened?

Adoptee Traits: Putting It All Together

2007-03-11T20:47:00.000-07:00

If you read enough adoptee blogs long enough, themes begin to emerge.

Younger adoptees, older ones from the ill-fated social experiment that is the Closed Era and then, of course, the transracial adoptee facing the additional challenge of Strangers in a Strange Land and most recently, the Donor Generation. Different, but somehow linked together.

Themes of alienation. Disconnectedness. Insecurity.

The feeling of abandonment doing battle with knowing you were wanted and needed.

The sadness.

The obligation.

The STRANGENESS.

The superiority. The degradation.

Given away. Surrendered under pressure. Relinquished of free will.

Picked as the last and only option. Second choice.

The people pleasing. The tendency to become a "fixer." Never quite fitting in.

Back and forth. Forth and back.

Adoptees discovering - online - that we are NOT alone and finding that we have so much in common, no matter that we grew up thousands of miles apart, separated by decades, divided by class and race.

In rereading Betty Jean Lifton's Lost & Found this weekend, ten months after discovering the online community of adoptees, I stumbled across this quote:

"Call them what you will-a pseudo-species, survivors, exceptions-adopted adults insist they feel outside the mainstream of human existence. Instead of asking, "Who am I?" they ask, "Who are we?" Speaking an emotional shorthand, they compare common traits in their adoptive parents as if they had emerged from a communal womb. They sound like brothers and sisters reminscing about the family. The gravitational pull of their shared experience holds them together in their own private galaxy. Just as society has kept secrets from them, they kept secrets from society. It is this private world of tribal secrets that binds them together in a new kind of kinship. Together they have a chance of discovering who they are."

Given all of this, how do I really feel about adoption?

Elizabeth is brave enough to say she hates it. I hate it, too. Or at least my experience of it. Not that I had a choice.

It's not something I'd wish on someone else.

I haven't devoted nearly enough thought - yet - to where I stand on adoption as an institution.

In some cases, it simply can't be avoided. But should it be promoted as a wonderful solution?

I don't think so.

Being Adopted & Achieving Long Term Goals

2007-03-09T08:21:00.000-08:00

Normally, I don't talk about non-adoption personal stuff in this blog. This probably makes me come off as humorless, negative and no doubt, really intense.

There's one challenge I continue to face and I'm wondering, can it too be linked to adoption?

Once upon a time, I was a good news producer. Then I was a fairly decent radio producer. Okay, high strung but that's a prerequisite for those sorts of jobs.

Once, I threw an old typewriter at a reporter because he begged for extra time and the lead in my newscast, then bagged me by coming up with a one-minute lame ass excuse for a story just before airtime. After the show, I chased him around the newsroom and we had a screaming match. I thought I was going to get fired. Instead, the news director slapped me on the back and said, "Thank God. I thought you'd never grow some balls."

Throw a deadline and a bunch of curve balls and I'll make it. You can count on me. Nina does deadlines.

Okay, so why can't I finish writing a novel? My lifelong dream? My ultimate goal?

My computer is litered with evidence of my failure to complete:

a) Ten decent chapters of a young adult novel set in the near future after an environmental disaster;

b) Twelve chapters of a novel about a successful Latina professional forced to move back to L.A. where she must deal with her difficult family while trying to save her company by finding Hispanic business clients when she can't speak Spanish;

c) An entire draft of 250 pages of a young adult horror novel featuring a murderous mother ghost and, yes, spontaneous combustion; (okay, go ahead, laugh-but I've always been obsessed by spontaneous combustion since I was a kid);

d) Other false starts too numerous to mention.

SO WHAT THE HELL???

Why do I lose steam? Why did I abandon the 250 page draft? Why didn't I rewrite the damn thing? All these efforts were made before I admitted adoption was a big deal, before therapy and long before reunion.

Recently, I heard a radio interview in which a novelist was asked why she waited until her forties to begin writing and she said that whatever crisis she had faced freed her to write.
Mmm.

Then, while rereading Betty Jean Lifton's, Lost & Found: The Adoption Experience, I came across this quote by adoptive father and psychologist William Reynolds:

"The adoptee is inclined to be a rather shy and personally wary individual who is ill at ease in dealing with others. Impulsive in decision making, whose self-image tends to be remote and untrusting, who has real difficulty persisting at tasks without immediate rewards, and whose tolerance for frustration and delay is minimal."

Umph. Seen in that light, it's no wonder I gravitated toward news production. The rewards are immediate. You roll in to work, spend the next eight hours assemblying a newscast, then you put on a show and you sit in the control room and have the satisfaction of watching your product flash on the screens before you.

Writing a novel requires self-motivation and persistence. The reward is unsure. Publication is a hope and dream. There are many frustrations and delays. Umph again. Writing also requires self-esteem. Belief that you have something interesting to say in a fresh way.

Okay, I don't want to make this post too long and I'll continue it, but any thoughts on the link between creativity, the difficulty of achieving long term goals and being adopted? I've started yet another draft of a novel, but this time, it's about adoption and I'm trying a more structured approach: character analysis, plot outline, theme list, etc. and this I really want to finish.

Holding on to the Mythical Father

2007-03-07T12:01:00.000-08:00

Coming to accept there isn't a realistic chance I'll find out the last name of my father.

My mother says she can't remember.

It's in my file held in Los Angeles County. My mother said she'd write a letter asking for a copy but my Post Adoption Services social worker said, "No." It's sealed. Even with my mother's permission to release the information she provided, it's the county's obligation to protect his privacy.

It's the law, I was told.

Some days, I really want to know.

Others, like today, I'm not so sure.

He's my last mythical figure. Can my psyche afford to have him become real? If I don't find him, he can remain what I have made him and want him to be: real, bonified, parent material. Not that I want him to parent me. But just act like a grown-up. Someone who is NOT child-like and needs attention.

My adoptive father is child-like. He talks nonstop nonsense, jumps from subject to subject without transition, is nearly incapable of abstract thought, delights in other people's misfortunes . He is well, not like a man. He was never like the other dads. Even though the other dads were undereducated and had factory jobs, too, they acted different: like men. Occasionally, I've wondered if he has extremely low IQ or is a bit mentally disabled (are the two the same?)

What if I meet my biological father and he's a goofball, too?

I lost the myth of my mother when I got to know her. She had a rough childhood, too, and is a lot like my adoptive father, although not that bad. (Nobody is ever that bad).

Coming off a life of dealing with two self-centered adoptive parents, discovering one more self-centered parent is a rude awakening. What if I found FOUR? Would that send me right over the edge?

Is hanging onto a myth of my own creation better than the risk of discovering another narcissist? And so what if he is? I've learned to (try to) emotionally detach as a coping strategy, I could just apply it to him, too. But at least I'd know. And what if he a) knew about me and wondered about me all these years; b) sobered up c) acted like a real man and not a child...aren't I depriving myself of claiming ONE grown-up for a parent...even if we don't have a father-daughter relationship?

Giving myself a headache! And for what? I still don't have his last name. But I'd LIKE it so I could make the decision MYSELF instead of having the County of Los Angeles make it for me.

The Fixer, The Pleaser, The Desperate Seeker

2007-03-05T08:05:00.000-08:00

Fellow adoptee Mia recently blogged about some of the things we have in common. Things like a narcissistic adoptive parent, an equally unhealthy first mother and a big fat question mark for a father. Mia has the additional burden of dealing with a bio family who mostly refuses contact and an adoptive brother who is the golden child of a her a-parents.

Still, the similarities!

I'd like to add my two cents to some of her points:

Mia:
"I am convinced they adopted me so I could take the full burden of responsibilityfor their behavior. In other words if it were just the two of them they would have nobody to blame for their dysfunction. So I was forced into the roll of the source of all that was wrong, the scapegoat. Yet I worked my butt off trying to FIX everything for years. Honestly Istill feel like I have to fix everything. It’s a hard habit to break."

It's interesting to size up your parents - their strengths and weaknesses and skills or lack thereof - from the point of view of an adult. When we're kids, we have no clue. They are big and powerful and even when it feels wrong, we believe they are right. How can they not be? They are the people in charge. Except when they are not. These kinds of couples may have thought they wanted a child, but what they really wanted was a fixer. A child to fix their marriage, their infertility, their loneliness, their fear of growing old without a daughter to help care for them.

Adoptees of such parents can sense this. Our needs as unique individuals are rarely addressed and never taken seriously. It is the way we are treated and not treated. There is the unwavering expectation that we will listen and comfort and not rock the boat and solve problems.

Adoptees like us become FIXERS. And when we finally realize we don't like the role, we have to fight against it. Not just our Pavlovian panting at the sight of a problem, but the insistence of others that we continue in our Role as Fixer. Not only did we fix our a-parents problems, we help others, too. Case in point, my troubled sister-in-law. Over the years, I spent time, energy and money as she careened from one problem to the other. I bought her clothes, took her in several times. When I finally woke up and realized she didn't even like me - in fact, wished I'd never married her brother, I stopped. Cold turkey. But my new role as neutral spectator must be threatening to the family system. My mother-in-law keeps trying to rope me back into my old role as Fixer. Couldn't I call my SIL and talk some sense into her? After all, I have a family responsibility. No. No way.

And then there's the People Pleasing! We adoptees must grow little antennaes on our heads because we're hyper-sensitive to others moods. We meet someone new and have to win them over. We compliment others. Try to make them feel good. We stay at parties longer than we want to with people we don't even like that much. We volunteer to do all sorts of crazy things in our children's school, even when we don't have time, because we need approval from the teacher. In fact, we allow ourselves to get roped into all sorts of things because we have a hard time setting boundaries. Others first. Us last.

And one more point raised by Mia:

"I suppose if I were to be totally honest there was a huge part of me that desperately wanted to find a healthy version of a mother in my natural mother E. I told myself I wanted the usual; “to know where I came from”, “to say thank you” and all of the otherload of crap sayings we feed ourselves as an excuse for wanting the most natural thingin the world which is to simply know our mother. I didn’t find a healthy anything, instead I found an equally weak and self absorbed mother."

This is tragic. I mean, you're placed in a home where the parent(s) needed a parent and not a child and you were forced to become their emotional (and/or physical) caretaker, is it any wonder that we desperately hoped for at least one parent who can act like a real parent? How pathetic! Recently, I talked to my adoptive mother's oldest friend about some of this. She had no clue. I always really liked her. She listened without interruption and asked some questions. Of course, I was apologetic for taking up so much of her time and thanked her profusely for the gift of letting me talk for what, maybe five minutes?

Of course, I would have loved for my mother to do that. But she's not capable either. She had a horrible childhood and is self-centered and is child-like and needs attention. What disappointment! What crushing disappointment! It is this fact that keeps me from calling her after reunion.

What makes it especially hard to even raise such issues is the extent to which we have internalized our roles. The good, grateful daughter should not discuss her adoptive parents faults, even giant ugly ones like narcissism. What right have we to criticize? And when we find our first mothers or fathers disappointing, we struggle to voice that too because we feel guilty. After all, we found them and now stand in judgment. How dare we? What right have we to our disappointment that our mother is not the mother we had hoped for, often desperately. After all, we have no claim on her. We sought her out and now stand, a little surprised and maybe even bereft. But at least it's finally real. She's no longer someone who haunts us. She may trouble us, as a real person can only do. When she is no longer a ghost, neither are we. And when we admit that our adoptive parents weren't so nice and maybe even narcissistic, then can become real people, too instead of Problem Fixing, People Pleasing Pretend Children.

Good Grief!

2007-03-02T17:06:00.000-08:00

Who knew grief could be so good?

Certainly not plesant, but liberating.

So here's what happened:

Two weeks after meeting my birthmother I woke up sad. I mean, REALLY sad. It seemed to come out of nowhere. One day fine. Next day, so down in the dumps I didn't want to talk to anyone and in the middle of the day burst into tears and had a good, hard long cry. Very dramatic. For me. The sadness lingered for days.

The gloom finally lifted. And then I realized I'd never felt that way before. Ever.

And then came the anger. Okay, rage. Pissed off at my mother for using her sick 15-year old daughter as an excuse not to keep me (learned my mother hadn't taken care of her in years as she'd moved in with an aunt), pissed off at the social worker who didn't do a better job screening my adoptive parents, furious with my self-absorbed a-parents for stealing my childhood and making me their emotional caretakers.

Sadness and anger.

Two emotions I was NEVER allowed to express in my adoptive home.

Once I allowed myself to experience the grief that my mother did not keep me, to feel the utter sadness and bleakness of this fact, I realized this was a totally new emotion. I don't think I ever felt sad before. Not in a real, honest, visceral way.

When the worst had passed, I was able - in stages - to feel better until I was finally happy. Really happy. The sun came out and the air smelled fresh, met a friend for lunch and we enjoyed a great gossip. Later, I'm going out with my 14-year old daughter and friends, then I have a hot tub date with my husband. I mean, what a great day!

So why why why was I so cut off from these two emotions?

Two reasons:

1) adoption related issues; no need to explain, right?

2) Narcissistic parents.

Since I've picked on my Dad so relentlessly in this blog, I'll use my mother as an example. Besides, I can remember it so clearly, probably because my oldest daughter is the same age as I was when this happened: 16.

My steady boyfriend broke up with me, triggering major abandonment issues. Of course, I didn't realize that's what it was at the time. But I was distraught and panicked.

Where does a boy break up with a girl back in the late seventies? His mustang, of course, parked at the curb. I run inside my house, choking back the sobs. And then, just as I was winding up to let loose, my mother sees my face. Her eyes widen in alarm. She asks what happened.

At this point, I can't keep it together and can hardly get the words out because I'm sniveling and hiccuping and gasping and flailing about.

So she slaps me. Not really hard but enough to get me stop. "How dare you scare me like that!" she yells. "I thought something bad had happened to you, like you were raped or something. Don't you know what you did to me? Scaring me like that? How dare you. For Gods sake, he's just a boy. Who cares. Get over it. He was just using you anyway."

So much for a shoulder to cry on.

To keep the peace, I had to swallow my tears and go to my room and be quiet. If she saw red eyes or kleenex, she'd launch into a lecture about what I was putting her through with my dramatics.

As I've mentioned before, she had a similar reaction to questions about my adoption. "Why do you want to know about her? She's not your real mother. I am. Don't you know what you're doing to me?"

This was my mother's favorite refrain: "Don't you know what you're doing to me?" It was said every time I showed the faintest signs of pain or anger or, God Forbid, disagreement.

To survive, I had to be if not happy, at least compliant and devoid of any scary emotions that might upset my mother. Did I mention I was lonely? An only child stuck with parents who were incapable of empathy.

One has to realize one's parent(s) are narcissists before one can even begin to get in touch with the person trapped inside. Where else did she have to go except underground?

And here's one of the most disturbing things. That narcissism isn't some rare, pathological affliction. I think we could form armies and take over the world if we children of narcissists ever decided to get together. And what would our war cry be? "Empathy for one and all?" "Death to narcissists?"

Adoptee Non-Identifying Papers

2007-02-27T10:24:00.000-08:00

This is fellow-adoptee Mia's heartfelt and eloquent blog response to my post below. It made me cry. In a good way. If you're an adoptee toughing it out with the complexities of reunion, if you struggle with self-absorbed parents, if you - like Mia - carry the additional burden of being adopted AND being placed in a family alongside a bio child, if your mother can't or won't tell you who your father is...then please don't miss it:

"I wanted to write you regarding your recent reunion with your mother. Amongother things. I knew you were going to meet with her. Every time I thought aboutvisiting to see how it went I had this totally hard core anxietyattack. I know that must seem weird but let me explain..." www.miassavinggrace.wordpress.com

Having only seen my non-identifying adoption papers, I have nothing to compare them to.

Are they fairly representative?

Do they usually include the mother's state of mind?

Mine does. In a section entitled, "Circumstances of Placement/Other Significant" information on page 5, it states:

"Birth mother was interested in adoption for you from the first appointment."

My mother confirmed this. At 37, she knew what she was doing and found the public agency on her own.

"Birth mother describes herself as being called 'heartless' by her mother and her stepsisters for her plan of adoption."

She has repeatedly told me this, too. Definitely not the kind of thing this relinquished person wants to hear. Ever.

"She suffered great guilt after your birth."

She must have because it took her ten days to make her final decision. Which explains why I went into foster care. My mother has no recollection of any of this. Guess she blocked it out.

And finally, "There has been no contact from either of your birth parents since the relinquishment."

I'm really all over the place on these bits from the non-identifying papers. I guess, if my mother had been young and vulnerable, they wouldn't have stated, "Birth mother cried non-stop but pressure applied by social worker and maternal family prevailed," right?

I mean, it's the truth. Or some version of it as noted by a social worker back in 1960. And what about the social worker? Was she properly trained and experienced? Were her assessments correct?

It's all there in back and white. Yet it's gray with time. All murky now. Like trying to see some distant floating creature through a foggy glass.

In trying to decide what I want out of reunion: continued contact, limited and occasional contact, no more because I'm done but I'm so glad I finally met you, I find myself going back to my non-identifying papers looking for clues, evidence, something I can't quite put my finger on.

Am I looking for some sort of connection to the woman who was my mother? Am I trying to "get back" to her before she closed up and shut down and pushed me back to the farthest reaches of her mind?

If you have non-identifying information, what do you make of yours? If you're in reunion, how does what's in those papers stack up against the reality of your biological family?

Who's My Daddy?

2007-02-25T21:20:00.000-08:00

Will the missing piece to the puzzle that is me please stand up?

Hey you, the tall blond Mexican national working in construction with the pissed-off American ex-wife step forward. Yeah, into the lineup, thank you very much and shut the f___k up because I have some questions to ask, dammit.

Did you really have light blue eyes?

Were you really of German and Mexican ancestry?

Did you really wear size 13 shoes?

Did you really have fair skin and a nice body build with an oval face shape?

How old were you? Just over 30?

Were you really an "irrepresible" playboy with "good expression and sentence construction"?

Did you really tell her you were "sterile?"

How much liquor did you actually consume the night my mother told you she was pregnant?

And you did what? Pretend she'd said nothing at all?

Did you know she was pregnant or not?

Do you know I even exist?

You see, I'm having a little problem. My mother - after 47 years - can't remember your last name and I can't find you. I tracked her down. Mission accomplished. Now I'm setting my sights on you. I feel it's my right to at least know your name. Maybe even find out what you're like. You are my missing fifty percent.

Meeting my mother wasn't easy. It still isn't. You see, I just reread my non-identifying information and came across the paragraph that, until now, I've only skimmed over because it's just too painful. But I dragged it out just now and made myself read it. That and the description of you.

Here's what it says, so we're on the same page:

"Your mother suffered great guilt after your birth. She wondered if she was doing the right thing. She had considerable pressure from her mother to keep you as her condition became more noticeable. She took ten days to make her decision and stated that she needed to give you up for adoption. She stated that it appeared her older daughter had tuberculosis and would need a lot of care. She thought it would not be fair to either of you for her to take you into that situation."

Oh, and here's the sentence that I haven't been able to read since I first received my non-identifying information:

"She (my mother) described herself as being called "heartless" by her mother and her stepsisters for her plan of adoption."

At least, my mother had a plan.

Did you have a clue?

The Dysfunction Stops Here

2007-02-25T00:07:00.000-08:00

If there's one good thing to come out of my adoption trauma, it's this.

In order to understand it, I read and read and read.

At some point, I learned about the importance of "mirroring." Basically, acknowledging your child's experience by being in-tune and empathetic. Instead of saying, oh no, falling off the ledge didn't hurt you at all, you say, oh, falling off the ledge must have been very scary and I understand why you're crying.

My adoptive Dad is 80 years old and still talks about his nasty, alcoholic father who beat and verbally abused him and denied him warmth and attention as if it all happened yesterday.

And while my adoptive Dad developed narcissistic personality disorder and was incapable of acting like a father, the dysfunction stops here. With me.

This is the beauty of education. The wonder of books. The opening up of better new worlds and a whole new approach to parenting. We are not doomed to repeat. We can love, unconditionally, even if we were not.

The good thing in the dark stuff? My husband and beautiful teenage daughters. And if you've been around teenagers, you know I'd be lying if I said I never nagged or scolded or raised my voice. But I do try to "mirror" them. It's probably just as important to "mirror" teenagers as it is a toddler. They're trying to figure stuff out: relationships, school, teachers, who and what they want to be, their values. So when they come home and start talking, I remember all that I've read in psych articles and I try hard not to interject and repeat their key points and say something like, "That must have been really frustrating for you. What did you do then?"

Believe me, it's NOT perfect. Sometimes I'm so alarmed or angry that I blow a fuse and skip straight to the lecture...and watch them shut down. And try again.

But if I had to say what I am grateful for, it's knowing that I can try to overcome the past and not parent in the way that led me to blog in the first place! I am grateful for my daughters and my husband, who is not adopted and does everything he can to NOT to parent like his parents.

Adoptees: Speak Truth to Power

2007-02-23T18:48:00.000-08:00

Was just listening to Tavis Smiley's radio broadcast on the State of the Black Union.

A excellent speaker talked about the importance of speaking truth to power and someone else paraphrased Malcom X that black people didn't land on Plymouth Rock. Plymouth Rock landed on them. There was also a call to challenge authority.

At some point, a speaker said no apology for slavery was forthcoming and an Important Person in Power said black people "should just get over it" or some such nonsense.

And it all resonated.

It got me to thinking of where we adoptees are in OUR struggle to be heard.

If the evil system that was the Closed Era - which ended relatively recently - represents OUR enslavement then we are not very far along at all.

We are just finding our voices. Gathering strength. Trying to articulate all those things that an entire industry is dedicated to silencing. The internet has allowed us to find each other. There are more of us disgruntled adoptees (I think Possum coined this term and I love it!) than the industry would have the world believe.

Adoptees are a class of people without power. Decisions are made for us. We are condescended to throughout our lives. We are told to "get over it." There are rights just for us and the rights everybody else gets. We are the subject of documents issued by the Catholic Church (as mocked by Mia).

It is early days yet in our struggle.

After Reunion: Figuring It Out

2007-02-22T17:27:00.000-08:00

Suz, in a comment to my previous post, asked some important questions from the perspective of a mother in reunion. She also said something that I've thought a lot about. From her perspective, lack of feedback (silence!) after reunion feels like punishment (being doled out by her daughter). Suz, I'm sorry.

It got me to examining my own silence: eleven days.

Am I trying to punish my mother?

What am I doing? What do I want? Do I want continued contact? Did I accomplish what I needed with one meeting?

Not sure. Just not sure.

It's sooooo BIG.

Today was a sad day. A really sad day. A "how could you have left me? day. And an angry one, too.

My adoptive Dad has been especially whiny/complainy/needy the last couple days. Nothing new. Just his old narcissistic self multiplied by age/dementia.

My mother intended for me to have a better life. That's what she wanted. Instead, I was placed with a low income family without a value for education and with a long, rich history of neurosis.

She says she marched into the public adoption agency intent on adoption from the first. She received financial aid in exchange for her commitment to surrender. She says she refused to hold me because she didn't want to get attached. She had no idea I was placed in foster care for a month. She asked few questions, trusted the system. She did not call the social worker to inquire after my welfare. I DO feel abandoned and not surrendered or relinquished.

My mother is a sweet little old lady. She also showed no emotion during our meeting, not to say that she felt none. I do believe she "split off" that dark period of her life. I can feel it. She talks about that time - and me as an infant - as if it happened to somebody else and that baby is not me.

Intellectually, I understand why she does this. It is how she has coped.

But from my perspective, post reunion, it feels like I have been split off. That I am not real. A nonperson. And while she has been entirely agreeable in meeting with me and reaching out and answering all my questions (except the last name of my father), because she is so detached, it feels like another abandonment.

My silence is probably more about self-protection than punishment. All mothers are different. This is one adoptee's reaction to a particular mother who is much older and in a much different emotional place and stage than many first mothers. Maybe this reunion suffers from bad timing. Really bad timing. Maybe I should have done this sooner when we were both younger. Maybe there's such a thing as leaving something too long.

Post Reunion Etiquette

2007-02-21T09:24:00.000-08:00

Is there such a thing?

Or maybe this should be titled, "Post Reunion Expectations."

Woke up realizing I'm in a post reunion void.

Have been more busy than usual lately - in a good way - feeling happier and certainly more grounded than before I met my mother. I was terrified to meet her, this 83 year old woman. I am so glad I did.

It's been 10 days since our meeting. Now what?

I've needed the time and space to process her real face and personality and all that is her - or as much can be gleaned in 1.5 hours. I guess she's doing the same.

While I can't bring myself to call - yet - I'm a tad surprised and, admittedly, a wee bit hurt that she hasn't called or dropped a note. After all, I initiated the search, the first meeting, etc. Umph. Maybe she's thinking the same thing.

On the positive side, have realized just how much progress I've made on dealing with abandonment issues usually triggered by unexplained fades like not getting return phone calls or emails, etc. Dropped a note to my niece - we had a good first meeting - to ask after a problem she was having and to thank her for hosting the meeting with my mother. No reply. Normally, this would freak me out but while I'm curious, I'm not upset. She works long hours and is dealing with some ucky stuff right now. My reaction represents a big leap forward in fighting the Abandonment Demon.

Another positive, my mother is a neat freak. I am so NOT. However, I am trying to find my inner clean gene. It's GOT to be in there, somewhere, so I've been trying to be more efficient. I spend focused time on straightening up and it's amazing how much better the house looks. It's also easier to THINK and RELAX when you're not stepping over stacks of newspapers, piles of laundry and drifting mounds of dog hair!

When All Is Right, What is Wrong?

2007-02-19T12:11:00.000-08:00

I lost a great quote from a self-help book. I read them on a selective basis and this one had to do with dysfunctional families. (No surprise there)

It had to do with chaotic parenting. Basically, a child is raised by a parent or parents who bounce from crisis to crisis.

At first, I didn't think this had anything to do with MY adoptive family. Narcissism and self-absorbtion, sure. But not chaos.

And then I had a hot tub epiphany.

There I was, last night, sitting with my husband in our brand new hot tub. It was a nightmare getting it installed and we were finally enjoying the steaming water, the clear night sky and the scent of jasmine wafting from the newly blooming vines.

Everything was right with the world.

Had just talked to my youngest daughter on her first away trip with another family. Safe and sound. Check.

Oldest daughter upstairs with two girlfriends. We could hear screechy girly noises and the sound of instant messages being received. All good. Check.

Husband. Bad back being relieved by hot tub, which is why we got it in the first place. Check.

Me? Great. Sitting in the hot tub, I did not feel adopted or like the daughter of a whacky narcissist nor did I feel abandoned by my birthmother. Wasn't thinking of any of those issues.

BUT, somehow, I couldn't totally relax. Or maybe the problem was that I WAS relaxed but was feeling guilty. Like things were just too good to be true. So I began casting about. Did I forget something? What if my youngest tried to call and I'd left the phone inside? Okay, oldest daughter would pick it up. Had I forgotten to call my Dad? No. I had to FORCE myself to stay in the moment and enjoy. And I did.

This morning I realized I've always done this. That I ruin perfectly beautiful moments batting away a looming feeling of dread. Is it that I think I am unworthy of happiness? Could this be related to being relinquished as an infant? That I am always on my guard because my entire world might change - for the worse - in a flash?

Or is it due to the chaos of childhood?

Besides being a narcissist, my adoptive father also suffers from acute anxiety. When he traveled to Hawaii he spent weeks fretting about what could go wrong. The second his feet touched Hawaiian soil, he began worrying about the trip to the volcano and, once at the volcano, began worrying about the drive back. Then he worried nonstop over the plane ride home. You get the picture. Trips to the dentist, a simple cold, an unreturned item borrowed from a neighbor, all were causes of DRAMA. All were treated as if the stakes were high and the consequences catastrophic. And on the day with nothing much going on, even the arrival of the phone bill could cause of a fuss. We must drop everything because he had to dash to the phone company and pay the bill in person. Mundane life was lived at high intensity. Simple conversations were equally intense. Small talk did not exist for him. He must recount his many troubles to casual acquaintenaces in the supermarket isle. He demanded attention and intensity.

My husband has long noticed this about my a-Dad. That he moves from crisis to crisis and if there isn't one, he'll create one.

I never connected this to my struggles to relax, to stay firmly rooted in the moment. If you are raised by such a person, then you have this modeled for you. You have to learn - from other people and later in life - how to regulate one's emotions. To learn to power down. To learn that such intensity is draining and harmful and UNNATURAL. That you can slam the door on a life of chaos and say, "Good riddance!"

I See Dead Patterns

2007-02-16T09:32:00.000-08:00

Recently, an especially ODIOUS person took time out from his very important day to chastise a young blogger - trying to come to terms with some serious nature-of-birth-identity-issues - and advised her to unstick herself from the past and just get on with her life.

I'm paraphrasing, but you get the point because, if you're adopted or a first mother or have a sperm donor Dad, you've heard it.

It occurred to me - last weekend - that reflecting on the past is CRITICAL, not because we want to wallow in it, but because we need to figure out how we COPED with it and discover if all those coping strategies are working for us today.

There are certain things I do that bug me. Really bug me. I had no idea where they came from, only that they made me uncomfortable. These behaviors could ruin an otherwise nice, family weekend. Keep me up at night. Send me into a non-productive frenzy in which I scurried around and got absolutely nothing important done. Or, took a nap.

One example:

When I meet someone new, I'm not me. I knock myself out trying to be nice and saying the right thing. Afterward, I'm drained. Like I made a major effort against my inner will. It's very Pavlovian. Meet a stranger. Act super friendly!

Why? Why why why???

Epiphany while visiting my adoptive Dad. He introduces me to one of the nurses in his dementia unit and he says, "Doesn't she look like a clown with that lipstick? Tell her it looks awful. She won't believe me."

So what did I do? Stepped in front of my Dad's wheelchair, in effect blocking him, and said in my brightest voice: "I LOVE your lipstick!!! What brand is it? Oh, MAC. I LOVE Mac..."

We then have a 5-minute chat about the virtues of MAC lipstick for us ethnic women.

Yes my Dad has dementia. But he's ALWAYS done this sort of thing, as far back as I can remember. When I was around 10, we were at a wedding and some old friends of my a-mom stopped to show off their baby. He was a big, bald, chubby thing. I'm already cringing, but it's no use. My Dad says, "Kinda looks like Kruschev doesn't he?"

I'll never forget the look on their faces. Wounded eyes and their shoulders sagged.

So what did I do?

I jumped up, declared the baby to be the CUTEST BABY EVER!!! and then, to prove it, spent the rest of the wedding carting Baby Kruschev around making the biggest fuss you've ever seen. Did I really want to do that? No. I wanted to run around with the rest of the kids my age, but I couldn't. Not lugging around a 25 pound infant.

Reflecting on the past helped me understand the patterns. Oh, that is what my A-Dad does. This is my coping strategy. I'm a fixer. Now that I know I'm a fixer I can retrain myself to STOP because I don't like fixing things and it leaves me emotionally drained and resentful.

Another case in point. I called my Dad at the appointed hour. He complains non-stop and, at one point, tells me he's so mad at "Bernie" that he's going to punch him. I tell my Dad he is not allowed to hit Bernie and threaten consequences like you would a pre-schooler itching for a fight.
Sure enough, the phone rings an hour later. My Dad is complaining of chest pains and is demanding the paramedics. Normally, I'd spend all evening calling him every half hour, call the nurses, have a lousy night's sleep with the phone next to my pillow and yammer at my tired husband about my manipulative Dad.

Last night I DIDN'T. I KNEW my Dad was pulling my strings. Besides, I wanted to focus on my 16-year old and HER mock trial competition which ended last night and she was in the mood to talk. So we did and I didn't think about my Dad beyond determing that he was having an anxiety attack and that he had settled down.

Now that's progress!!! That's identifying old patterns and coping strategies and being mindful of them and trying to move past them.

(The coping strategies mentioned aren't really adoptee related, but those linked to being raised by a narcissist without empathy or filters. I DO have adoptee-related-anecdotes but these are easier to explain and a little more entertaining. )

Every person - the adopted and non-adopted - have coping strategies. But it's arguable that adoptees have more...rooted in our reaction to loss and grief and trying to fit into a family of genetic strangers. We're dancing the Adoptee Dance, a fast and furious and sometimes exhausting jig.

Adoptees: Writing Our Way Into Existence

2007-02-15T08:27:00.000-08:00

Most people can never understand the depths of loss an adoptee experiences.

Joy wrote about this with her usual eloquence and creative flair. Please check it out. It made me a wee weepy. www.joy21.wordpress.com. Also, don't miss the comments.

Which leads me to the importance of blogging for some of us adoptees.

We try to explain.

We try to get people to understand.

We're trying to make sense of something we had no control over.

We try not to care about other's quivering indignation that we feel loss and grief instead of gratitude and joy that we were "chosen."

We try to shrug off all that unwanted advice. The "don't get stuck in the past" and the "just get on with your life" crap.

We MUST explore the past before we can embrace the future.

We MUST unlock the grief, the sadness, the confusion, the bewilderment and yes, the anger.

This is NOT getting stuck in the past. We MUST put a framework on it. We MUST define it and CONTAIN it because it's a Medusa of a monster. It's the scary fluttery demons inside Pandora's Box. Otherwise, the snakes or the demons continue to haunt us, attacking us when we least expect. They WILL get us if we don't get them first.

We DO exhaust ourselves trying to explain something some people really don't WANT to understand. It's just too uncomfortable.

In some cases, those who wanted us wanted someone, anyone, but not necessarily us.

On some days, we don't feel real. We feel unreal. Being adopted is a surreal state. We're trapped in a netherworld of being rejected and being wanted.

We exhaust ourselves trying to explain the inexplicable.

We struggle for words where they often fail us. How to capture this nuance? That fleeting feeling?

This is my belated Valentine's Day Love Note to the Blogosphere: Thank you for providing a way for me to write my way into existence. Thank you for providing a community of adoptees and others touched by and interested in adoption. Did I mention I LOVE comments and the genius that went into the creation of that feature? Thank you Blogosphere for making it possible for all of us adoptees to find each other...across state lines and time zones. For allowing us to explore our feelings while still in our jammies.

Post Reunion Euphoria: The Crash!

2007-02-13T12:32:00.000-08:00

I can see this is going to be a PROCESS.

After 1.5 days of euphoric reaction to meeting my mother for the first time, I woke up feeling a bit blue.

Spent the morning trying to analyze it.

My therapist had advised me to roll up the "windows" when meeting with her, knowing that my mother isn't the most sensitive person in the world. She's not in the least malicious, but she is brutally honest and, as I've learned the hard way, this sweet little old lady is capable of delivering one hell of a knockout blow.

So I "rolled up" my windows. Which was a good idea because I remember trying not to flinch a couple times and my niece darting nervous glances in my direction.

And while I was able to deflect some of her unintentional verbal muck, one or two pieces of crap managed to squeek in through the one inch window gap.

I think it's important for me to pin down the source of my discomfort. I'll move past it quicker that way.

My niece asked my mother who I looked like when I was born.

My mother shrugged. "I guess like her father," she replied vaguely.

"What do you mean 'you guess'? my niece shot back. " You saw her didn't you?"

"Well, not really," said my mother. "The nurse kept trying to bring her to me and I only peeked at her once because I couldn't let myself get attached. Uh uh. No way. So I just saw her for a minute and that was it. I had already made up my mind, you see."

Okay. This isn't one of those tragic scenes out of "The Girls Who Went Away" in which a teenager is sobbing over her baby while her disapproving mother and social worker hover nearby, adoption papers and pen at the ready.

And then there are the reasons for the relinquishment. "It was mostly economic," my mother explained. "I already had three children to take care of, I had no husband and I had to work. I couldn't do that to you. I wanted you to have a father and a mother and an education."

Okay. Two of those "children" were already grown and had left the house. Which left one teenager, but that daughter had been living for several years with her aunt so, technically, my mother wasn't taking care of anybody. And then she mentioned that several months after giving birth, she ran into my father at a nightclub.

I've heard some of this before. It's just harder to hear in person, I guess.

This is NOT a romantic story of a young girl who desperately struggled to keep her baby. This is the story of a 38-year old divorced woman who marched into a public adoption agency, accepted financial aid in exchange for agreeing to give up her baby, then hit the bars and club scene less than two months later. By all accounts, my mother is NOT the nuturing type and time and again chose the men in her life over her children.

This is not to say that she did not grieve her loss. Just maybe not as much or as deeply as other first mothers. As a relinquished person, I would LIKE to have had one of those first moms. But I don't. I'm going to allow myself to feel disappointed and let myself have whatever feelings surface. I'm STILL glad I met her and I STILL feel more me than I did before reunion.

Who knows. Maybe I'll wake up euphoric tomorrow. Or not. It's certainly an interesting and important process though. I can't imagine NOT meeting her.