Label: relinquishment and loss

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Sensitively Responding to Fears of Abandonment

by Lyla M, Chinese adoptee raised in the USA

“What’s that key around your neck?” – I get that question as much as I get questioned about where I’m from.

I wear a golden key around my neck. I’ve been wearing it that way for ten years.

It says, “Togetherness is love, 10.02.62” on one side and “M. T.” on the other.

My mom, being a rebel, decided to skip school with a childhood best friend. They wandered the streets of New York City. They found the key. They tried to find the owner/place it went to. However, it had been thrown into the middle of street, so they were unsuccessful. My mom and best friend always thought it was a lover’s quarrel. Key thrown away in anger.

Fast forward to when my mom adopted me.

When I was little, I had a fear my parents would not come home to me after a date night.

My mom would say, “Take this golden key from this tower, keep it with you. We’ll be home when you’re sleeping and you can personally give it to me in the morning.” It gave me a sense of security. Like my mom and dad were with me and would return.

When I graduated high school, I had chosen to attend college out of state. As a gift, my mom had the golden key strung and gave it to me as a gift, as a promise to always be with me, that my mom and dad would always be there, at home, waiting for me to come home, key in hand (or around neck, to be precise).

A little story about a key shaped like a heart in honour of Valentine’s Day.

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I Lost My Mother Twice

by Linzi Ibrahim adopted from Sri Lanka to Australia, founder of Sri Lankan Adoptees.

I miss you every day but most of all today.
The pain never fades.
You were taken from me twice, I have grieved you twice.
You lived the hardest life and still managed to be the most incredible human.
You were kind, loving, fun, confident, and an incredible cook!
From the moment I came back, you were instantly a loving mother towards me, picking up where we left off.
I felt like I was home, I felt fully relaxed for the first time.
Amma, I could see the pain and trauma in your eyes.
I know it was hard to see me and remember all of the trauma you felt many years ago.
I had always felt it too.
I miss you!

Linzi and her Amma, born deaf/mute. Linzi was stolen from her and put up for adoption.

#amma #adopteevoices #adopteestories #adopteemovement #srilanka #intercountryadoption #interracialadoption

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Adopted Men Only Online

by Niels Ernest Lam, transracially adopted in the Netherlands with African and Dutch heritage; adoption / lgbti / life coach at Simply Niels and with AFC.

At the end of March, I attended the first edition of Men Only Online. This was created by Adoptee & Foster Coaching (AFC) because more and more adopted men are open to deepening in terms of relinquishment and adoption. Olv. Hilbrand Westra (정운석) and Sandor Penninga met with a number of domestic and foreign adoptees.

I must confess that I was quite tense beforehand because until recently I have not previously talked to only men about my relinquishment and adoption. Previously, I always participated in groups that mainly include women. And I also found it exciting because because of my homosexuality I didn’t know how the group would react to it. My assumption is that women accept this easier than “real” men. However, the tension, created by myself, soon disappeared like snow through the sun. The openness and vulnerability of all the men present made me feel no less or different from the rest. My sexual orientation didn’t matter at all.

The morning flew by, a lot was discussed. There was recognition in everyone’s story. That made for the connection.

Once again, I would like to thank the men who were there for who they are. And for what they contributed to this morning.

Original post in Dutch

Door, Niels Ernest Lam

Afgelopen zaterdag was de eerste editie van Men Only Online. Dit is in het leven geroepen omdat steeds meer geadopteerde mannen openstaan voor verdieping op het gebied van afstand en adoptie. olv. Hilbrand Westra (정운석) en Sandor Penninga ging een aantal binnen- en buitenlands geadopteerde met elkaar in gesprek.

Ik moet bekennen dat ik van tevoren best gespannen was omdat ik tot voor kort niet eerder met alleen maar mannen over mijn afstand en adoptie heb gepraat. Voorheen nam ik altijd deel aan groepen waar voornamelijk vrouwen bij zitten. En ook vond ik het spannend omdat ik vanwege mijn homoseksualiteit niet wist hoe de groep erop zou reageren. Mijn aanname is dat vrouwen dit makkelijke accepteren dan ‘echte’ mannen. De spanning, door mijzelf gecreëerd, verdween echter al gauw als sneeuw door de zon. De openheid en kwetsbaarheid van alle aanwezige mannen maakten dat ik mij niet minder of anders dan de rest voelde. Mijn seksuele geaardheid speelde helemaal geen rol.

De ochtend voorbijvloog, is er veel besproken. Er was herkenning in een ieders verhaal. Dat zorgde voor de verbinding.

Ik wil nogmaals de mannen, die erbij waren, bedanken voor wie ze zijn. En voor wat ze hebben bijgedragen aan deze ochtend.

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Balancing Love and Loss

by Bina Mirjam de Boer adopted from India to the Netherlands.
Originally shared at Bina Coaching.

Photo from the book : Children of Bombay

The love we feel for ourselves and for others is often determined by how we experienced our mother’s love as a child. Maternal love combined with the degree of “presence” of mother and child.

Have you received, lost, or is this an unfulfilled desire? Have you experienced safety or are you constantly alert and feel unsafe? Have you felt connected and live with the knowledge that you belong to something or is the feeling of being out of connection and not belonging always present?

If you balance with or without a safety net, do you have the courage to accept love and make the connection or move out of fear of loss and this creates isolation.

These processes are constantly taking place on a subconscious level. By creating awareness about this and allowing what wants to be seen, heard and or felt, you create a space in which you reduce the fear and allow love.

#AdoptieCoach
www.adoptiecoach.frl

Original in Dutch

Balanceren tussen liefde en verlies

De liefde die we voor onszelf en voor anderen voelen, wordt vaak bepaald door hoe jij als kind de liefde van je moeder hebt ervaren. Moederliefde in combinatie met de mate van “aanwezigheid” van moeder en kind.

Heb jij de moederliefde ontvangen, verloren of is dit een onvervuld verlangen. Heb jij veiligheid ervaren of ben je constant alert en voel jij je onveilig. Heb jij je verbonden gevoeld en leef je met de wetenschap dat je ergens toe behoort of is het gevoel van uitverbinding zijn en het niet toebehoren altijd aanwezig geweest.

Balanceer je met of zonder vangnet, durf jij de liefde te nemen en de verbinding aan te gaan of beweeg je vanuit de angst voor verlies en zorgt dit voor isolatie.

Deze processen spelen zich voortdurend op onbewust niveau af, door hierover bewustzijn te creëren en toe te laten wat gezien, gehoord enof gevoeld wil worden, creëren je een ruimte waarin je de angst verkleind en de liefde kan toelaten.

#AdoptieCoach
www.adoptiecoach.frl

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The Aloneness of Motherloss

by Mila Konomos, adopted from South Korea to the USA. Poet, artist, activist.

Mila with her child, embracing all that was lost to her as an infant, separated from her mother.

I have been processing the Aloneness of #MotherLoss a lot lately.

Intellectually, I know what self-talk to cultivate. I know I am not alone. I know that I have people in my life who care for me and value me.

But this aloneness is deeper than that.

This aloneness is the the aloneness of Mother Loss.

I feel so alone so often because I do not have a Mother.

I lost my First Mother at 5 days old.

I lost my Foster Mother at 6 months old.

I grew up with a Mother who could not see my trauma. Hence, she did not know how to love or comfort me through the loss, pain, and grief of my Adoptedness.

I feel alone because I was always alone in my pain and grief.

I feel alone because I have spent most of my life crying alone.

I feel alone because I have rarely known what it is to not be alone, not only physically but emotionally.

I feel so alone so often, because Mother Loss is a loss that remains for a lifetime.

There is no way to replace a Lost Mother.

No one else on earth can compensate for a Lost Mother.

Only One Mother bore me in her own body. Only One Mother’s heartbeat, breathing, and voice were what I heard for 9 months. Her scent, her face were as though my own.

I watched a documentary recently during which the narrator said, “Babies think they are a part of whomever they are within.”

This is profound in the context of Adoptees severed from our mothers as infants. We must have experienced separation from our mothers almost as though being ripped in two, torn away from ourselves. Split violently apart.

I have to allow myself to grieve this Mother Loss. It is eternal. Even 12 years post-reunion, Mother Loss remains. I can never get back the Mother I lost. I cannot retrieve the over three decades of my life that I was lost, compounded by the loss of language, culture, and geography.

There is a pain and loneliness that is hard to describe when you find what you had been looking for all of your life and yet it still slips through your fingers.

This pain of being so close yet still so far.

As though looking through a window but never actually getting to go in.

Mila with her son and a special Korean children’s book called, “Waiting for Mama”.

For more from Mila, follow her at her website, The Empress Han. Her newest poetry album Shrine is being released in May 2021.

#adoption #transracialadoptee #adoptionreunion #adoptee #adoptionistrauma #adoptionloss #adopteevoices

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Imagine Losing Your Parents Twice!

by Bina Mirjam de Boer adopted from India to the Netherlands.

It was October 10, 1990. “Imagine” by John Lennon played on the radio. I heard my adoptive mom on the phone tell my sister that our father passed away….

14 years and orphaned again.
My adoptive father suddenly died because of a medical mistake after a hernia surgery. As a result, our family would never be complete again.

As a child my surroundings often told me to be grateful for my new life with my new parents. No one told me adoption not only causes you to get new parents, but adoption also causes you to lose your parents twice.

The pain and sadness I felt as a 14 year old was immense and loneliness was unbearable. I didn’t understand then that I not only mourned the loss of my adoptive father, my safety and my new family, but that the loss triggered my old loss trauma.

Nowadays I know I’m not alone in this. A lot of adopted people have traumas that originated before they were adopted.

Traumas invisible and unpredictable and triggered by loss. Loss of a pet, home, friendship, health, job, divorce of adoptive parents or loss of a loved one or adoptive parent(s).

Sometimes the early child traumas are too large with all the consequences. But often knowledge of loss trauma can help with relinquishment and adoption, we need to declare this “abnormal” reaction to an apparent small event.

The circumstances surrounding my adoptive father’s death have helped me to make it my mission to create knowledgeable aftercare through and for adopted persons.

At AFC we notice that adoptees benefit from adoption coaches who specialise in relinquishment and adoption. This is because those adopted themselves have also suffered similar loss. Knowing the loneliness and the sadness, carrying their fate and surviving the pain.

And today I comfort myself with the thoughts that my adoptive father is proud of me, my passion and drive. And that this didn’t make his death entirely pointless….

#Adoptionisnofairytale

In loving memory, Nico Brinksma.

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Adoptee Remembrance Day

For Adoptee Remembrance Day I want to highlight and honour those who have attempted suicide and also those who have died of suicide. This is a topic within adoption that needs far more attention and resources. We lose adoptees to suicide because there is not enough supports to recognise and enable healing from the losses that many experience.

I wrote this because I understood this cry for help from someone I’m currently supporting and it rings of the truth we experience in being relinquished. Our relinquishment is not a once-off action without consequences – our loss is experienced internally on a very deep level, and for some, it’s felt every moment, every day and can become overwhelming!

“I want to go home!”

This is the cry of a young man as he struggles, dangling from the noose created for himself.

In these most vulnerable moments, the pain is so intense and raw, he can see no other way to have some peace.

How does he ever get to this moment?

It’s a lifetime of misunderstood pains which build up, no words to express.

It’s a bodily anger and rage from not understanding why she left him, was he not good enough? Was it his fault?

From an early age the body cuts off – his only survival mechanism.

Love does not conquer this pain, anguish, and confusion! Love cannot penetrate.

Who is he? How did he end up here, in a different country, surrounded by people that are not his by nature? This is not what he wanted! 

Generations lost – their trauma resides within his body.

Darkness seeps into his soul.

No way out? 

Only hope will relieve … find her. 

The one – who’s sounds and movements his body cells remember.

It will be his only chance to live.

Can someone help him come home … to her?

Then maybe it will make some sense. 

This loss and pain he doesn’t understand. 

Home is where he wants to be!

In honour of those we have lost who struggled through this, and for those who still struggle every day – You Are Not Alone!

ICAVs Memorial page

Resources

The Body Keeps Score by Bessel van der Kolk
The Primal Wound by Nancy Verrier

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