I submitted my DNA mostly to find out where I came from since I knew nothing about my birth parents. Ended up matching with my birth mother and half sister on my mom's side and 3 half siblings on my Dad's side. My half sister started messaging me right away wanting to talk and my mom messaged me and sent her contact info. I waited a day and finally called my sister. She was amazing, and the story she told me has changed my life. Turns out when my mom got pregnant she was very young and didnt have the best support from her family. She ended up going to the Edna Gladney home for mother's during her pregnancy. After giving birth she was told that she had to pay all medical and housing expenses or give up her baby (me) for adoption. She tried to get family and bio father to help but they weren't interested. She has spend the last 30+ years looking for me. My sister has been contacting Edna Gladney adoption agency every few years since she was 13 (now 51) to see if I made contact. My bio mother wrote me a letter that I was supposed to get when I turned 10 with all her info and how to find her but I was never given the letter (Im now 50). I've been talking to my new sister everyday but haven't talked to bio mom yet. This has changed my life, finding out that she didn't want to just get rid of me and that she's been looking all these years really helps fill the abandonment issue void ive carried around my whole life. I have amazing adapted parents and they will forever be my Mom and Dad but I needed this. I needed to know I wasn't just abandoned. I plan on keeping this relationship going and we'll see how it plays out. Will probably contact bio mom one day this week. Thanks just needed to share this.

Hello all, me and my gf are trying to find an effective method to approach her bio dad. He doesn’t know of her existence and has a family of his own. Hes been married for almost as long as my gf has been alive which makes this kinda tricky. It also doesn’t help that he owns multiple bagel shops in across the area and is pretty successful, so the thought of having him think she’s after money is gonna cross his mind. But she’s honestly just looking for answers on her heritage and what happened the day she was conceived. I can tell it’s eating away at her to just understand who is she and where she comes from. Her mother and remaining family are a bit rocky in terms of their relationship. She wants to plan to reach and I told her I’d help but honestly I just don’t know what to do and how I would even go about setting something like that up. I know she’s not expecting me to do much, but I can’t stand to see her like that. Especially since she also doesn’t know how to go about it. She’s frozen in fear of the possibility of rejection. That’s why I ask for any advice on what the best approach would be on something like this. How do we establish that she doesn’t want to disrupt his life or get anything from him. She just wants to get answers and potentially make a connection if possible. Honestly the big hurdle is actually organizing a meeting or initial point of contact without coming off as invasive. It’s kinda hard to address all of those things I mentioned through a dm or a letter. If guys can help me come up with anything or have any advice it would greatly be appreciated.

Throwaway. Looking for advice from adoptees, adoptive parents, or anyone who's been through something similar. TW: childhood trauma, abuse, self-harm.

We adopted our oldest daughter at 14 after fostering her. She'd spent 7+ years in the system and experienced severe abuse, neglect, and trauma. She also experienced abuse in kinship care that wasn't believed or disclosed to us until after adoption.

She's an amazing person. I originally wanted to give an older teen a safe place to land, but she chose to call us her parents. We love her fiercely, and despite the challenges, we've built a wonderful life together.

But we're struggling, and I need advice on how to help her.

Almost a year ago, I checked her phone because I was worried about what I was seeing. I regret violating her privacy, but discovered she'd been engaging in risky online interactions with adult men for years, including sharing identifying information and reenacting past trauma online. We worked with her therapist, involved a detective, and transitioned her care to a trauma specialist. We removed device access, let her express her anger and grief, never shaming her.

Since then, we've tried to support her through each new struggle. We worked with her care team when she began self-harming, helped her access activities and friendships, and partnered with her school when her grades started slipping. We've also recently learned she's been smoking with friends and trying to access other people's devices to continue risky online interactions.

She's also struggling with eating, sleep, medication, school, and intense anger. Sometimes she lashes out at us, too. We keep working with her therapist and psychiatrist, but it feels like every time we address one issue, five more appear.

She's currently in weekly therapy, but I worry that an hour a week isn't enough to address a lifetime of trauma. Her medication list keeps growing, and my spouse has suggested a higher level of care. I'm hesitant about inpatient programs because I've heard some terrible stories about them, but I'm also scared we're not equipped to give her the support she needs.

For those who've been in a similar situation, what helped?

I love her so much. She's been through things no child should experience, and for years she wasn't heard or believed. I want her to know she's safe, loved, and not broken, even when things are difficult.

I'm looking for honest advice from people who've lived through something similar. What worked for you or your kids and what do you wish you'd known?

Here's my story as a birth father....

It was 1973… hot Italian girl at 15 and I was 17. I was a dishwasher and she was a server working at the same BBQ place in north Texas. We did it… short and sweet and she got pregnant because the “rubber” as we called it broke. Her parents sent her to the Edna Gladney Center in Fort Worth to have the baby and give her up for adoption. A day after the baby girl was born Peggy called me and gave me the details…. Time, weight, length, sex etc. I wrote it all down listening on that black rotary dial landline phone in the hallway in north Texas.

I made a notation of the birth details and carried it in my wallet for at least 30 years. I never forgot.

In late 1991, I found my birth daughter…. Her name is Lxxh. She was 17 at the time and I grew up 100 miles away from her. I didn't call her or contact her in any way. She was a high school beauty queen in northwest Texas.

After I found her I told Jxxy, who was the youth minister at First Baptist Church, my story. He knew her family name “Axxxxxxe”. He violated my confidence and her big daddy the dentist found out I knew who she was and where she lived, I had never contacted her in any way.

I told Jxxy the story at Thanksgiving in 1991 in my hometown of Sxxxxxn, Texas. Oddly enough I attended Midwestern State University in Wichita Falls from 1976 to 1977 driving back and forth on Taft Blvd passing her house 200 feet away on a side street. I had no idea she lived there.

After Thanksgiving I left Sxxxxxn and drove back to south Texas where I was teaching high school science. In December 1991, a warm night, the sun had set, minding my own business at my place in Victoria, TX I got a knock on my door. Some tall guy in a black suit and tie wearing a long trench coat I kid you not. He was a private investigator and said someone wants to meet you out in the car. I think it was a 4 door black Lincoln. I said who and the said Mr. Axxxxxxe. I am in shock… a deer caught in the headlights. How is this possible?

I step out and shake the hand of Lxxh’s adoptive father who didn’t have the decency to knock on the door himself. He came over 400 miles for his circus act. His brother Jxxy was with him… all dressed alike.

Black suits and ties with black trench coats looking like the Mafia in 75 degree weather. Let’s go get coffee, they said and I agreed, but even in the confusion I knew enough to drive my own car.

They follow me to a big café and we have coffee. They interrogate me, lie to me, question me police style like I am a criminal and ask me what my intentions are. I said I have no intentions. The PI made it clear he had investigated me because he had contacted the school district where I worked… and reported the school district said I was a great teacher.

Before we parted ways, Lxxh’s adoptive father said to me, we are connected for life… contact me any time. That was very short lived. I wrote him a letter and he made a general response in his own letter. I wrote another letter and his response was devastating… DO NOT CONTACT ME AGAIN. He never thanked me for contributing to his fatherhood. Lxxh will not give me the time of day even though she had a relationship with her birth mother Pxxxy (now deceased) and her half brother still living.

Axxxxxxe the dentist is now deceased as of 2024. I feel robbed to this very day. I never got to make my own first impression.

This entire experience has affected my life for 52 long years to the extent I had no other biological children.

I have never put this story in writing until now, but it kind of feels good. A release of some kind. I hid this from my wife for a long time, but I confessed several years ago. I left out many details, but I was never just a sperm donor. I was a birth father who never forgot and I think about it daily.

I'm almost 71 now.... college educated x 3, highly successful, hold multiple professional licenses and I have never been to prison or addicted to drugs. Nevertheless, I'm treated as the scum of the earth.

End of story..... C'est la vie

I know my bio dad, but I do not see him as a dad and never really have. All of my memories of when he was still around are from about 3 years old, and they're all traumatic. Yes, I have memories from the age of 3, they're pretty blurry but they did happen (confirmed by mom)

(Physically abusive towards me and mom) I think I saw him last at around 8 years old. That was our only and last meeting after my mother ran for the hills and called the police on him one night.

The meeting was fairly okay. We held hands and went for a walk. Then I believe we got pizza afterwards and he drove us. It felt as if he was a stranger, though.

My mother met my adoptive dad when I was about 9 too. We moved countries to live with him. Got adopted a few years down the line. Changed my surname and all.

While I do see him as my only father figure, I'm uncomfortable around the fact that my mother is so pushy about me not acknowledging he is not my bio parent. She'd throw screaming fits if I ever talked about it with other people and she knew.

She makes off hand comments like "You got your eyes from your father" (meaning my adoptive dad) which I know is blatantly bullshit. We're not genetically related, we're even a whole different race. (Adoptive dad is asian. I'm fully slavic). I also tell people he is not my biological parent anyways. I think that this is just a part of me. I see him as my dad, but he was not always my dad. He became dad later in life.

She acts as if this is shameful. I don't think so. But I'll never be able to have a normal conversation about my adoption with her. She doesn't want to hear anything related to my bio dad or that my adoptive dad is not my "real" father.

My siblings don't know about this. All of them are half siblings to me, I'm technically the odd one out of my siblings. We're basically keeping a secret from the whole world and some family

My mother is abusive emotionally, she has borderline personality disorder and refuses to treat it. My adoptive dad has always been a safe haven for us kids. If we were alone with her we would be doomed.

Recently a fight broke out between her and my father. She packed her things and asked us to come with her, we all collectively declined. Me included. She is my mother by blood, but incredibly unstable. The whole household walks on eggshells because of her, we'd be damned to be alone with her.

If I had the choice between staying with her or my adoptive dad, I'd choose my adoptive dad. I love her, but only as a child naturally loves their mother. I do not respect or like her as a person

Like I love her so much I'd die for her, but I can't hold a civil normal conversation with her like a parent and child would do at a damn table. As soon as an opportunity to get out of the household comes along, I'm out.

There's a lot more to my mother that I can't fit into a simple post, overall she has ruined and made the lives harder of many people she's close to and refuses to get help because she doesn't see any need to self-reflect. She got her diagnosis only because my Adad encouraged and begged her to when things were really bad. The therapy was very short lived because "ITS EVERYONE ELSES FAULT AND YOU DEAL WITH IT IM NORMAL"

I have mixed feelings about my adoption. As in, I love my dad, he's been there for us since the beginning, he never made me feel like I'm the odd one out or treated me any differently, at all. He was ready from day 1 to take me in as his own. He also did not pressure me to be comfortable around him. He waited. (Pressure came more from my mother, "Call him dad now"... "Tell him you want to be adopted") but never him.

But I also know I don't fully belong. I'm the only one out of my siblings that even knows that we're not fully related. I think that this is just part of what "just happened", I don't really have big negative feelings around it, it's more neutral. But my mother made it always seem like this even almost shameful thing and forced me to just shake my head in agreement on any statement she dropped around any opinions and decisions.

I'm adopted, and it's fine. He's my dad, and he acts like my dad. I feel like his daughter. But I also don't feel the need to erase my life before this, I know and remember it all.

It's part of me, and it happened. I can't deny it did not.

There was a life before this. And I remember. Only my mother wants me to forget.

Hey everyone, I was adopted as a baby from China and I’ve been in America since I was about 2yrs old. I just got a passport earlier this year. I got married earlier this month and I just went to the social security office to request a new card for my last name change. The woman assisting me told me that the system was showing I was not a citizen. I showed her my passport, license and certificate of citizenship and she said she just “clicked through the alerts” and approved for my new card. I am worried though because I’ve heard before that sometimes adoptee parents do not complete the final step of adoption by going back to the SS office to update the citizenship. Should I contact the SS office to discuss this or do you think the woman completed the update on her end? From what I read online, usually the citizenship is updated to show you as a citizen before the last name change is approved.

A little extra tidbit, on my certificate of citizenship, it does have a wrong middle name for me as my parents changed it later on. But my license, passport and current ssn has my correct middle name.

An Adoptee Remembrance Day Exclusive:

They promised a forever home. They didn't mention the pipeline to institutional care when it breaks.

Adoptees make up roughly 2% to 3% of the U.S. child population. Yet, look inside residential treatment centers, psychiatric facilities, and congregate care, and you will find them filling 25% to 40% of the beds.

Everybody says they want the data. Here is the brutal truth. Data is lacking and it always will be when our identities are legally erased the exact second an adoption is finalized.

Look at the landmark Pear study revealing an exponentially higher suicide rate among adopted individuals.

People demand answers and ask for the numbers, but how can we track a crisis or hold anyone accountable when the state seals the original records, wipes our history clean, and blocks the truth at every turn?

How does a child go from a finalized adoption to locked down behavioral programs, group homes, and state custody re-entry?

And why does the system suddenly act like they never existed?

It is called administrative data erasure.

Once an adoption is finalized, original birth records are sealed, and the legal machinery wipes the slate clean. When adoptions collapse, these youth are not tracked as adoptees anymore, they are cataloged generically as wards of the state, completely shielding the adoption industry from breakdown statistics and lifetime tracking.

There will never be accurate numbers, true oversight, or real answers until the laws change. Until original birth certificates are unsealed and systemic identity erasure is stopped, this entire system operates in the dark.

The myth is happily ever after. The reality is a silent, systemic pipeline and nobody is talking about where these children end up.

Read the full piece and unmask the system:

🔗 https://adopteeremembranceday.substack.com/p/unmasking-the-systemic-pipeline-why

#AdopteeRemembranceDay #Adoptee #adopted #Adoption #fostercare #troubledteen

I’m an older sister with two foster sisters. We’ve been fostering them since 2022. We still haven’t adopted. Parents lost rights a year ago and still, no adoption.

They had court today, and yet again, continued it out 2 more months. It’s a never ending cycle and I’m so sick of it. Has anyone else dealt with this?? This case is especially difficult because there are 9 siblings and the parents are doing EVERYTHING they can to delay adoption - Claiming they are native american, having another child (?!!??), suing foster parents, EVERYTHING.

I just need hope.

Hello, I am hoping someone could help me on what direction to go, because I this point I am frustrated. I am trying to apply for a passport, I was adopted from South Korea in 2002 and was granted automatic/derived citizenship upon adoption to my US born parents under the Childs Citizenship Act. This was before parents were automatically given a certificate of citizenship for their child though and my parents never applied for one as far as they know. They have not done the best job at keeping track of my paperwork either. What information do I need to apply for a passport now as an adult. Google tells me one thing, the website tells me another, the US department of Passports told me something else when I called them.

Hi. I joined because I have a friend that's an adoptee and has said that she has people pleasing issues and trauma from birth. I want to know if there is any specific literature for those who want to support and understand adoptees with those tendencies.

I recently said something to her that I thought was helpful to her but I think actually triggered her trauma and people pleasing issues. I apologized, which she accepted but said she needed time to talk with me about it which we did briefly but when i tried to reach out a week later, i misread some things and scared her off and she said she wasn't ready yet. It's been 2 or 3 weeks now and although it causes me anxiety and guilt ever day over hurting her so much she can't even bare hearing my voice, I'm doing my best to respect her boundaries now and not contact her and hope she reaches out eventually, even if it's just to end our friendship. It would destroy me, but if that's what is best for her I will accept it since I'm the one that screwed up, and if she feels safer without me then I just want her to be happy.

I just want to learn more about and try to understand what she's going through because it occured to me I might be hurting her in other ways I didn't realize for longer than I thought. I'm used to talking things out but I understand I probably triggered something that she needs time to process. I just want to get better understanding so if she forgives me I'll be better informed and able to support her and maybe one day be accepted back as her best friend.

I also know I have to work on things myself as I'm sure my self esteem and jealousy issues lead to all this, but I want to be better educated so I know how to better support her and navigate our conversations while keeping her triggers and sensitivities in mind. I'll also look into therapy if I can get it through my insurance to try and better myself but that's gonna take awhile.

Sorry for the long story. Anyway, again is there something I can read to do with adoptee trauma and people pleasing personalities? I've never read some old posts on here that have been helpful but feel i should also look up books I can read.

So I’m 17f of course I’m not adopting any time soon. I also happen to have level 1 autism and some other mental illnesses. I am getting into counseling and getting medication for it. I made a post in some autistic threads venting on how I had a friend say he couldn’t see me as a mom. I also mentioned how I wanted to adopt an older child. Like 10-15 years old.

Everyone was no very kind in the comments saying why don’t I just have my own kids and not to adopt an older child. 1. I would never wanna pass any of my mental illnesses down on a child. 2. I am a dance teacher for little kids. I have worked a little kids for the past three years and it has made me just not like little kids. (I also understand it’s the parenting too) but for some reason I still want to be a mother if that makes sense?

I said that to someone and they started attacking me saying that I only want an older kid because it’s “easier” I know for a fact that an adopted older kid probably isn’t easier because they have a lot of trauma. Which is what I was worried about for myself. I am in therapy and medicated also I’ll be maybe 30+ when I adopt I do really badly want this for myself and I’d make sure that kid was loved and put into therapy too. Makes me sad that people can’t see me doing a good job as a mother

i’m 21 and recently gave birth a little more than a month ago. I had no idea i was pregnant, i went to the er cause i thought i was having kidney stones and came out w a baby. i did want to originally give him up due to it being so sudden and me being so unprepared but i couldn’t imagine myself w out him. his dad is involved and is so much help w him, he knew what to do before me, he’s always taken care of his younger siblings and this is the first time for me ever caring for a baby. in the hospital everyone told us they would help out and everyone has been a huge help, we haven’t even bought anything baby related because everyone has given us stuff and they’ve even had their friends and family donate stuff to us. i just feel so exhausted and i don’t even feel like i’m financially able to take care of him, im on maternity leave and not working and i make more money than his dad so i just feel so selfish putting my baby in this situation. I genuinely do not feel or even the need to take care of him and i don’t really know my options about giving him away. I have no other outlet to express how i feel because everyone just makes me think everything is going to be okay but when it’s just me and him alone, i let him cry and scream because i’m in the other room sobbing about my life and how i wish i didn’t have him. i would just like some perspective if anyone else has been in my situation or what it’s like giving away a baby even though they are already brought home and family has bonded with them.

My dad and his siblings were adopted. There was recently a death in the family, which of course is when the drama gets stirred up. My aunt (dad’s sister) went to the deceased family member’s house to get some memento she wanted (direct family okay-ed it) and was accosted by her cousin who told her that her and my uncle and dad are “not real (insert last name)s”

This cousin is notably just a nasty person (my dad has complained about her for years) but what she said really hurt me, and it especially hurt my aunt. This person who died meant a lot to me and she was my family. It feels like a real punch in the gut. Like we’re invaders to the “real” family. My grandparents are amazing people and to imply that they aren’t my dad/aunt/uncle’s “real” parents is really nasty. None of them ever knew their bio parents.

I guess I just wanted to vent about it. If anyone else has had a similar experience, I’d love to know. I’d especially like to know how you cope with it.

Hello everyone. I hope I'm posting correctly as l've never done this before.
Long story short, I'm turning 30 in a month. I think this has me reflecting a lot on life and my adoption.
I'm a caretaker for my terminally ill adoptive father, and my adoptive mother passed away unexpectedly 4 years ago.
loved them as my own parents, as they were all I've never known. However, they changed my name when they adopted me and I accidentally discovered my strange birth name around the age of ten. My name was "Jovial" and they always kind of made fun of it.
My name is something else now obviously, and it's never felt right. When I talk about changing my name, people either talk about how it's disrespectful to my adoptive parents, or also proceed to make fun of the name.
To me, now that they are both almost gone, changing it back sort of aligns with me getting to live my own life for the first time at 30. I loved them, and didn't want them gone, but in a way I did a lot of raising/ caring for them my entire life and the roles were strangely reversed.....
Am I crazy for wanting to change it back? Am I crazy for thinking there is power in a name assigned at birth? Is it disrespectful? Is it a strange name? lol maybe no one will see this but maybe I also just needed to get this out

This is long but I need help for real, I was born in Haiti and given up for adoption, and in 2007 I was Adopted and brought to the USA. My adopted parents are both dead now, I'm 21, and since I was 16 years old I've been trying to get my records, anything, I don't know if I have a birth certificate, a certificate of citizenship, I know I have a social security number, but my adopted parents lost all of it and haven't helped me to get it before I turned 18, I can't go to college, I can't get a job, I can't get a home, I can't do anything because of what happened, I've contacted the DHC and they sent me my alien files, but guess what I tried to use the documents in there to get me a ID and they stone walled me and now I'm lost and giving up on this whole mess, I don't have a car cause I can't drive without a license and I can't get one with my papers. So can anyone, somebody please help me.

Any birth parents on this sub who were relieved or had neutral - positive feelings after their relinquishment? Who truly did not want to parent? Or who did not feel a strong bond or loss with their baby?
Would love to hear your perspective and why you chose the route you did/how things were for you after. Trying to do lots of research and hear from varying perspectives. This is no passing of judgement, as I feel I have not heard the perspective of many birth parents who feel this way and I am curious how common it is or if it even is common at all.

Edit for specificity

I'm 15 im looking forward to adopt a child when im older also reading books will help me improve my english I'd really appreciate ur help

If they come to mind, what do you think about?

Tried searching the sub but couldn't find what I was looking for.

I'm wondering how exactly does a birth mother in an open adoption form a relationship with the adoptive parents & child? Especially when they're in different states.

We agree the baby should know they are adopted but outside of that a little confused on how exactly to move forward.

We are both in states where Post adoption agreements are legally binding/enforceable & we agree a connection is a must for the baby's sake. Just confused on what that looks like.

Es una decisión que veníamos pensando hace tiempo. Hace poco finalmente nos decidimos. Vamos a adoptar a un bebé. Yo y mi esposa ya fuimos al DIF (la institución que se encarga de las adopciones aquí en México) y nos dijeron que económicamente somos aptas para adoptar. También tenemos estabilidad social y emocional. Es un proceso más lento de lo que pensé. Pero ser madres es una emoción que no puedo describir.

I’m a birth mom and a mom. Prior to becoming a mom, the grief of losing her was all consuming and the worst experience of my life. It’s still the worst experience of my life, but now having my son, it’s so much more complicated. I know two things can be true I can grieve the fact I didn’t get to raise her, and be so grateful my son exists. It’s just this really weird sliding glass doors thing. Like would I have moved twice after losing her, would I have gotten the same job, then met my son’s dad, if I was raising her? Would he exist if I was raising her? I think I’m just thinking about it a lot more because his first birthday was yesterday

Just wondering how many people disagree with the extremist approach the majority of the adoptees post on here?