What do I want from my adoptive parents?

The adoptee community globally is reeling from the shock of major announcements and publications recently. Firstly, we had China announce they were ending intercountry adoptions. Secondly, we had the release of the incredibly well put together AP series of 4 in-depth articles and PBS documentary covering South Korea’s intercountry adoption since its beginnings, including the interview of up to 80 adoptees across multiple adoptive countries. Then this week, a report from Switzerland shows the intercountry adoptions from India are mired in illegal practices. These major announcements together with the previous reports and actions from numerous adoptive countries in Europe (Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland, Denmark, France, Norway, Sweden) leads me to question why the biggest global demanders of children – USA, Canada, Italy, and Spain – remain stoic in their positions to wilfully remain ignorant and pretend these problems no longer exist under the guise of “we’ve improved things from the past, therefore no need to look”.

These latest announcements are not news to me but provide external validation for what we’ve been sharing for years as a global adoptee community. It is liberating to have the public visibility to what we struggle with in our lives as adoptees and for the world to understand we are a large global community of impacted people, over 1.2 million displaced from our birth countries. Let’s also be truthful in understanding the 1993 Hague Convention for Intercountry Adoption came about because these very practices were exposed decades ago and it was hopeful that an international convention would stop and prevent these from recurring. But instead, we now know that despite the best effort, knowledge and desire to prevent the illicit and illegal practices in intercountry adoption, the 1993 Hague Convention has remained a toothless tiger to stop the trafficking of children. Fundamentally, the 1993 Hague Convention has failed to put enough safeguards in place. What needs to happen as a minimum is that every signatory country must implement adoption legislation that will ensure the illegal and illicit practices are criminalised and punishable. Without this, and as it currently stands, perpetrators face almost insignificant punishment for small pieces of their crime, such as the falsification of paperwork. The punishment they get does not take into account the actual lifelong impacts on the people involved, i.e., adoptees, birth families, adoptive families, our extended families.

Currently many Korean, Chinese and Indian adoptees are grappling with coming to understand some layers of truth in intercountry adoption. Many are questioning for the first time if what they’ve been told all their life until now is truthful. Were our loved ones outright lying or were they also manipulated by the huge machine of the adoption industry? How does this happen? Were our adoptive parents the cause of so much trauma (via their naive demand for us), or were they taken advantage of? Or both? How often and much did our adoptive parents turn a blind eye to any critical thought about what went on in obtaining a child? Why didn’t they ask more questions? Who is to be held accountable? How? Was our adoptee displacement part of a bigger political agenda? Have we been abandoned not only by birth family but also by birth country and government? Where do we turn for sound advice? How can we seek help and support?

It is a very difficult time for some adoptees, as I’m sure it is for their adoptive parents. We have grown up now and en-masse there are over 1.2 million of us seeking answers to our questions and wondering what the truth is about our origins and how we came to be adopted. I ask myself what would I have wanted right now from my adoptive parents. So I have written a few thoughts to give voice to what is on my mind. Hopefully these thoughts provide a starting point to discuss with loved ones. Hopefully these discussions bring you closer together as adoptees and adoptive families. But I am also realistic and acknowledge that not all families are capable of weathering this storm. Sometimes we adoptees have to row our own raft separately to our families because the support, acknowledgement, empathy and trust is just not there. Some adoptive families remain in denial and minimise, which adds more harm to adoptees seeking closeness, trust and answers. Sometimes we have to journey our paths at different paces and places and we can’t always wait for adoptive parents to catchup.

Below are my thoughts of what I would want from my adoptive parents, given where I’m at in my journey of awareness about the realities of intercountry adoption. I recognise this may not be other adoptee’s views and thoughts and I encourage you as adoptees and adoptive parents to start the discussions and see what you feel and want.

How I’d like my adoptive parents to respond

An acknowledgement that they have inadvertently caused harm.

An apology for what they did starting with robbing me of identity, country, kin, culture, language, religion, people.

A commitment to do a deep dive into the adoption industry to truly look at what they’ve created and participate in.

An acknowledgement of their own inherent biases especially the racial and colonial underpinnings of the entire adoption industry.

An acknowledgement they understand their own privilege and the role that plays in the adoption industry of who is supported (adoptive families) and who isn’t (birth families).

A willingness to deeply look at and share about their own true motivations of why they adopted and how this led them to be blind to the reality of what they participated in.

An acknowledgment of the powerlessness I sit in as adoptee, especially during childhood when this life changing process was done to me by adults but yet for which I had no choice or power to have a say. Then also in later years, as a mature adult, there’s still so much powerlessness in my situation and it can take decades for me to have the will power, knowledge and resources to want to take action.

A commitment to help me unreservedly – financially, legally, and practically;
to help me find my family if that’s what I want;
to make available all documents and artefacts that could help me learn the truth of what went on in the practical matters of facilitating the adoption;
to help me obtain dual citizenship to my birth country;
to be provided emotional counselling from professionals who understand trauma and adoption for as long as it takes to find my peace;
to help and provide funding for me travel back and forth between my countries, to understand more about my country, culture and the people I was born with and discover who they, and who I am when I have the opportunity to embrace my origins (if this hasn’t been done already).

To be financially helped and enabled to hold entities and parties accountable for the wrongs done to me, even if that means acknowledging the wrong done as parents too.

A commitment to stand with me and demand an end to this crazy industry and practice of plenary adoption which severed my rights to my origins and makes it almost impossible to find out who I am and who I was born to (not just birth parents, but all the extended birth family).

A commitment to help my birth family and country so that intercountry adoption no longer needs to be seen as a solution, but that countries can be helped to look after their own children, whether able-bodied or disabled, and the impacts of cultural and racial displacement in transracial adoption are eliminated.

A commitment to ensure that no child is ever commodified again, purchased and sold via adoption, surrogacy, donor conception; and an end to any other family formation method that allows a child to have their true identity hidden and their birth country rights removed.

A commitment to help put laws in place to allow society to see that this form of buying and selling of children is wrong and to hold perpetrators accountable.

A commitment to push for an apology, acknowledgement and reparation from the governments and authorities, institutions (orphanages, hospitals, agencies) and individuals (lawyers, judges, doctors, nurses, middle people) who were involved in my intercountry adoption in both birth and adoptive countries.

In my opinion, where there is an acknowledgement and commitment, meaningful action needs to follow if the apology is authentic.

I realise this list must seem daunting for most. I also recognise that we journey the path of awareness in stages and it doesn’t happen all at once. So if you are an adoptive parent reading this, know that I recognise you are human and that it can take time to truly come to terms with what you’ve participated in.

From my own experience, I know I didn’t just arrive at once in understanding what I would want from my adoptive parents. The journey itself has been seasoned through stages. I will say that at first I thought I only wanted an apology. An apology validates the pain and trauma I’ve experienced. But I eventually realised later on that an apology is hollow if it is not followed up on by action that I see as meaningful to me. Your adoptee might have completely different views and thoughts on what they see as meaningful to them and what they want.

Over time, I came to understand that I also wanted accountability and a commitment to ensure no other child had to go through what I lived.

I want to end the practices of harm and the trauma that have resulted in my life and the lives of too many others whom I support in my ICAV network.

I hope that adoptees reading this will be empowered to think for themselves about what they want from their adoptive parents.

I hope that adoptive parents reading this will have a starting point for reflection and deep introspection, and hopefully later some discussion points to be had with your adoptee.

Please don’t forget to surround yourself with supports during this time. It is vitally important you do not travel this path alone. There is a ton of good supportive and safe spaces, both professional and peer available here, listed by major regions around the world.

Resources

The 4 AP articles covering South Korea’s intercountry adoption: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4 ; PBS Documentary (1.5hrs long, avail only in Canada, USA, Korea). It’s also avail on Amazon Prime. Contact ICAV if you wish to view and you are outside these locations.

Is my adoption illegal or illicit?

Lived experience suggestions for responses to illicit adoptions

Lived experience of illegal and illicit adoption (webinar) covering perspectives of an adoptee, adoptive parent, and birth father

Children’s rights to access justice and effective remedies

Victims of illegal adoption speak out at the UN

Let’s talk about illegal and illicit intercountry adoptions

One adoptee’s thoughts on the UN Joint Statement on Illegal Intercountry Adoptions

Being illegally adopted and a forced reunion

Money never makes up for what I lost as a First Nations Canadian

Why are Dutch adoptive parents silent en-masse?

Greek intercountry adoptee advocacy

Voices against illegal adoptions speak at the United Nations