Supporting Adoptee Awareness

Adoption brings with it many joys. But for adoptees, as well as others involved in the experience of adoption, the process of adoption results in facing some lifelong issues, also known as seven core issues, that may show up in a variety of ways. These issues affect adoptees and their families to different degrees over time. Their impact will be different for everyone.

Although it may sometimes feel hard to reckon with, as the graphic above shows, loss and grief are at the center of the experience of adoption. Loss and grief then spiral into feelings of abandonment and rejection, a sense of shame and guilt, struggles with intimacy and trust, conflicting loyalties, confusion about identity, and challenges with control and mastery. These issues are then wrapped, to greater or lesser degrees, and in particular contexts that may be different within each individual and in each family, in a cocoon of secrecy and denial.

Although it may sometimes feel hard to reckon with, as the graphic above shows, loss and grief are at the center of the experience of adoption. Loss and grief then spiral into feelings of abandonment and rejection, a sense of shame and guilt, struggles with intimacy and trust, conflicting loyalties, confusion about identity, and challenges with control and mastery. These issues are then wrapped, to greater or lesser degrees, and in particular contexts that may be different within each individual and in each family, in a cocoon of secrecy and denial.

This video from The Vermont Consortium for Adoption and Guardianship examines how these issues might manifest for a child or youth at different ages and stages, along with ways a parent or caregiver can help a child navigate them. You can also find out more about ways these issues might manifest, and what to do about them, in our previous blogpost on Managing Lifelong Issues in Adoption.

Knowing that other adoptees are grappling with these issues, too, is one thing that can help an adoptee cope. Adoptees share parts of their stories on the Adoptee Mentoring Society site. Both April Dinwoodie’s blog and her podcast, Born In April, Raised in June: What Adoption Can Teach the World, offer a powerful, wide range of interviews and discussions about the adoption experience.

Another tool that may help adoptees increase their awareness around these issues, and decide how they want to work with them over time, is this Adoptee Consciousness Model. Find out ways to use this model at adopteeconsciousness.com.