Episode 407 Podcast > Full Transcript
So many parents at some point wish they'd had a time machine to go back and know earlier what we didn't know then about parenting; which is the whole premise of this podcast to take the long view. And with adoptive parenting, that wish can be even stronger because so much we don't know about the adoption part of parenting doesn't actually turn out to be as well functioning as we think. Much of the conventional wisdom about adoption turns out not great for adoptees. And by the time we figure that out, often through crisis, the moments of opportunity to be on a healthier trajectory may have passed. Hearing adult adoptees tell us what works well for them – and not so well for them – is a gift to us.
With me today is Greg Gentry, an adoptee who has reflected on his own journey of adaptedness and who hears stories of other adoptees through his connection with Fireside Adoptees, an online group to help adoptees thrive. Greg interviewed me last year there as a means of helping adoptees get a glimpse into why their adoptive parents might be the way we are and I have the pleasure of interviewing Greg here to give adoptive parents the experience of entering a time machine, of consulting a sort of crystal ball, orienting on the future to lend insights to what helps and what can hurt adoptees.
Lori Holden:
Welcome, Greg.
Greg Gentry:
So, glad to be here, Lori. Thank you very much.
Lori:
It's so great to talk with you. Let me tell you a little bit about who you are.
Greg:
Absolutely. I'd be interested to hear.
Lori:
Greg Gentry is a domestic baby scoop era adoptee. If you want to know more about that term, check out Episode 302. Greg was born in California in 1969. He spent the first six weeks of his life in foster care before going to live with his adoptive family. Greg has gone through the ups and downs of Reunion with his maternal side since 2006. In 2021, a fellow adoptee helped him locate his paternal family. He's been in Reunion with members of his late father's side since early 2022 and continues to cultivate those relationships.
Since coming out of the Fog – a term that we're going to cover in this episode – Greg has been an active member of the online and in-person adoptee communities. Greg is facilitator and interviewer for Fireside Adoptees. Additionally, Greg hosts in-person meetings for Adoptees Connect out of Derry, New Hampshire.
So, again, Greg, I'm so excited to have this opportunity to talk with you today about the five things that your parents did well and six things you wish they could have done differently.
Greg:
I'm really happy to be here. And wanted to say before you start that the interview that you and I had on Fireside was transformative for me and put me on a track, I think, for more openness and receptivity to what's going on in the broader adoption constellation and a real desire to be as informative and helpful as I can be for adoptive parents, if in any way I can aid in helping the experience for adoptees to improve through helping adoptive parents. So, thank you for that.
Lori:
It's an honor to hear you say that. Greg. And I think you've highlighted for me what I think the secret sauce in all of this is, is openness and which is an ability to talk about and hear about things. And when we do get triggered about them, we explore our triggers instead of shut down that openness rather than closedness. Which is probably, I'm guessing, what we're going to explore. But you find that in your work, and I find it in my work. And I do think in the emotionally charged relationships within adoption, that's what helps us navigate them.
Greg:
I would have to agree with that for sure.
Lori:
So, would you briefly tell us what you'd like to share about becoming an adoptee and being an adoptee? Like, what's your story?
Greg:
So, it's interesting. I like the word about becoming and being like those held together because it is easy in the wider culture to view adoption kind of as, unfortunately, a transactional thing that happens. In a single moment in time, a person qas adopted. And adoptees, like me, many of us think of this as such an ongoing process. We speak about being adopted, meaning it continues for us. So, I will say to people, “I am adopted”, whereas somebody who's not as conversant might say, “Oh, you were adopted.” I'll say, “I am adopted because it is part of my identity for life and it does inform absolutely everything about me.” It touches every area of who I am, touches all my relationships, touches how I work. It touches how I raised my family.
And it also allows, I think, for once people start to take that in more and ask about my individual experience, it provides opportunities for things people haven't really considered that I think is really beneficial for social awareness, because there are things there are narratives that are very hard to topple or even just to get a footing on and say, “This isn't the full story of what's going on here” or “This isn't an accurate portrayal of what this experience is.”
I would say that, of course, every adoptee has highly individual and personal and sacred experience. So, I tend, even though there are some generalities, of course, in adoption, like we could speak about private infant adoption, for example, versus something else, but there are some generalities. But it's important to respect the uniqueness of everybody's story and the fact that all of us will come at it from that perspective. We do find, though, I think, that there are commonalities that unite us. Even though the circumstances around relinquishment are going to be different for each person, the way it impacts the nervous system may be different for different people. It's still the fact that we can, I think, come together in ways that recognize and see across all of that, that there are things that unite us, that allow us to speak together and hopefully unite in a way that's more beneficial for the reform of the broader adoption narrative.
Lori:
It was explained to me this way once, Greg, and this is what I think you're saying that – because I used to really try to orient on adoption was something I did. It wasn't something that were my children's identities. I didn't want to saddle them with that identity. So, I was very precise about my language. We adopted them instead of they are adopted or they were adopted. And somebody explained it to me like this. It's not like I was a female or I was an American. I was those things then and I am those things now, just like I was adopted and I am adopted today. And so that helped me understand that becoming and being that you were talking about.
So, what's your story, Greg? The parts that you want to share.
Greg:
So, you mentioned that was adopted in 1969; a closed adoption and the Baby Scoop era, which I know you've said that you've covered that in other episodes. But my birth mother was very young and so was my father. And I know there was some discussion of whether I might stay in the family. I think probably it was decided that collectively there wasn't going to be a possibility for that. I don't think it was entirely due to financial circumstances. I think it was more due to the maturity level of the people I might have remained with. I had an uncle who was interested in adopting me, if my mother had not been able to keep me. I think he was probably just too young to have taken that on at that point. And I believe my grandmother was at a point in her life where probably it wasn't for her something she could consider having another child that close to the family to raise. So, the circumstances, I've never completely hammered out, even in my reunion, the full understanding of all of it. But I've heard bits and pieces of it.
And in 1969, as part of the closed adoption, it meant that I don't have access, for example, to my original birth certificate. Being born in California, I still don't have that. Even though I'm in reunion and know these families, I still don't have a copy of that. I was raised near San Diego and lived 37 years in California, and the fog plays a big part of that. So, you can talk about that a little bit too, if you'd like. But we'll talk about the different ways growing up and thinking about adoption played into my life.
I feel like it was in a lot of ways, kind of an ordinary life. But also, was punctuated with these this disparity that I felt and didn't always know where that came from in the sense of not fully fitting in, I would say.
I entered adulthood, having not really looked into my adoption at all. I found out, when I was ten, I was adopted by having watched an episode of My Three Sons, and Ernie on there was adopted. And I asked my mom; I just kind of called out nervously, “I wasn't adopted, was I?” And she came into the room and said, “You were adopted. And we had told you that before and you must not remember that.” I guess I don't know when that happened, but it wasn't something I was able to process at the time, I guess.
So, I ended up having this conversation with my parents. They were very compassionate, at age ten, when I found that out. But I felt more of a disconnect after that conversation. And I felt it with my two older adoptive sisters who are biologically related to my parents. And so, I sort of settled into this parallel “I'm in the family, but don't feel the same as them.” I didn't before, but definitely didn't after.
Lori:
So, let me interrupt here, because some listeners may be thinking that maybe it was a mistake for your parents to tell you at that timey that it would have been better for you because of what you just said if you had not known. Can you address that if that's correct or not?
Greg:
Yeah, it's definitely not something to keep from a child or from an adult, because I have friends who are who find out at age 50 or above that they were adopted and it's absolutely devastating to someone's identity. And it can be for a child. You could argue that if found out at ten, I was pretty far along and then that was kind of late to find that out. They considered it, like I said, in this sort of transactional back in the past sort of thing – We told you that before. So, really that meant the conversation for them had ended and we weren't talking about it anymore. We never really did. That was problematic too. And when we got when we talk about the things that I think they should have done differently, that would be one of the things I'll mention.
I will say for anybody who thinks, “Maybe I just won't tell them,” it's actually a very cruel thing to do because very many adoptees know there's something up. They feel it. It doesn't feel the same. And if you tell them or you don't tell them what that might be that's happening, some of them are going to find out anyway and it's going to be very catastrophic when they do for them and for the adoptive parent. And if you thought the relationship might have been strained before, it probably will break irreparably at that point. But it's also, if you think about it, unthinkable to keep a human being from knowing that about themselves.
Lori:
They also internalize it.
Greg:
Yeah.
Lori:
If they're having that sense in them, that intuitive sense that something is different or “wrong” about them, (I'm doing that in air quotes).
Greg:
Yeah.
Lori:
they internalize it and be in a lack of information and ability to make sense of that story. They make it – you as an adoptee can make it about you. So, I think you make a really good point. This is not a one-and-done conversation. We tell them at age two or 4 or 6 and call it done. This is a continuing and a deepening. And I think that maybe you're going to get to this in the items we’ll talk about.
I mentioned the time machine, one of the things I didn't know was the developmental stages and that my adoptees are going to understand adoption at deeper and deeper levels along the way. And so, when I thought at age four that we were all in the clear, because nothing was coming up from it, it's just because they didn't have the depth of understanding at that point. And then it does come back around again. There's always a spiraling around of these things.
Greg:
And the ill fit that I've talked about, if that's being actively kept from somebody, why they feel that way, I know from my LDA (Late Discovery Adoptee) friends, the resentment that that can build. Because in order to keep someone in that state, you actively have to be engaged in a deception that will devastate somebody and absolutely damage relationships beyond repair, in a lot of cases.
Some people have said, “Well, it wasn't the plan for me to be told.” It's really unacceptable, to be honest. To be blunt, it's not acceptable to not tell your child they are adopted. I'll just go out and say that directly.
Lori:
Yeah, and we did interview two Late Discovery Adoptees and Episode 403 and they said exactly what you're saying. Even if you're not lying by commission, the lie by omission puts a barrier between parent and child that no parent would consciously want to have there. And this is probably one of the – I want to make sure we get to those 11 things. But to lay the groundwork for those 11 things you're going to cover with us, we need to talk about coming out of the fog. So, tell us briefly what that is and what that experience was like for you.
Greg:
Yeah. I just passed the two-year mark of coming out of the fog, just a couple of days ago. Wow, what an experience that is. It's not a universal experience, but it's a widespread experience for adoptees. And it varies for every person. But it's for me, an experience of having kind of existed in this this bubble, this cushion, where the full impact of being an adopted person isn't aware, isn't part of your awareness, isn't part of your understanding. You've kind of bargained it away in a sense or never allowed it to come to the surface to think about it actively. And when it finally does happen, it's completely – for me, it was very disorienting and destabilizing because it was an impact of loss. It was realizing all the things that had to happen for me to be where I was at age 51, it happened for me. And that's common for Baby Scoop era adoptees I found to be about 50 years old and suddenly come out of the fog when they realize, “But I bought into the societal narrative of adoption being beautiful, being a chosen and wanted person, and completing a family. And maybe my birth family wasn't desirable and so I buy into a lot of that.” And you stay in this fog, this cushion, this space that perpetuates that for you.
And so, coming out of it is being confronted by the reality of what it really means to have been impacted by your adoption and realizing there are parts of you that suddenly fall away. Ways that you coped with the world, with your reality, those are gone, suddenly. You may have family support that's gone when you suddenly are talking about this; people that needed you to go along with what the story was. And suddenly, when you're out of the fog and you're speaking on your own, in your own terms and your own language and addressing what this is like, it can be an alienating experience, too. It's liberating for sure, but it also comes with a with a high price. For me, it came with a very high price to come out of the fog.
Lori:
So, I have to ask then, if being in the fog is cushiony and safe and being out of the fog is liberating, but hard, why is it worth it; giving up the safety and the cushion?
Greg:
I think it's something that your mind will bring you into that state of coming out of the fog. I think you become aware that you're maybe approaching the boundary of it and that something might be about to change. I could kind of see that happening for me, but I hadn't fully hit into me. It's, I think, worked out at a subconscious level where all these elements are colliding in you and they're going to push you into a new consciousness, a new awareness, whether you want to be there or not. This is why you can't really yank somebody out of the fog. You can keep talking to them about it, but you can't precipitate that event for them because it's not an ethical thing to do because they may not be prepared for that at that point. Because inwardly, it's not that work is being done, but it kind of is. The processing to bring them into that awareness may not have completed. And so, it's not a safe thing to do to somebody to try to pull them out of that. We want for that kind of liberation and we want for people to have that kind of awareness and come into their own, but you can't really make it happen for someone.
In terms of whether it's a space that you say, “Hey, I was safer in there.” I think a lot of people, and myself included, felt, “Yes, I'm safer in there.” But you realize you've moved to – you're a different person when you come out. There's really no question of going back into it because you can't undo what happened. You won't be able to restore that. I've heard people talk like, “I just need to get back to this. I need to get back to this.” There's really no way to unring the bell and go back in the fog.
Lori:
So, coming out is kind of a path towards more wholeness and it needs to be self-directed. Is that kind of what I'm hearing you say?
Greg:
It's definitely those things. I won't pretend that the wholeness just happens.
Lori:
It's work. It's transformation.
Greg:
It's all these pieces. Yeah. It's not – I have a new picture of myself, and I move forward with that. That probably happens for some people. As I said, it's very individualized, but usually for the people I know, it's been like, “What do I do now? How am I going to get through this? What's going on? How do I even describe this?” It is an opportunity for that wholeness and liberation. But it doesn't just happen, unfortunately. It's a lot of work.
Lori:
It's messy before it gets whole, right?
Greg:
Yeah.
Lori:
Wholeness and liberation.
Greg:
I think it’s a lifetime to build what happens after that. That's what I'm finding so far.
Lori:
So, can you tell us the five things that you've come up with that your parents did well? Because I think we need to pay attention to those things first before we go to the other side. We need to get a solid footing here as parents.
Greg:
Sure. And I thought about the order of these. And I don't know if – You know, it's easy to think like in terms of a hierarchy of needs, like the Maslow's Hierarchy of needs. I didn't try to put them in a sequence like that, but I did want to start with material provision. And right away, that can be a problematic statement because am not saying they had more money than, let's say, my biological family so I ended up where I was supposed. That's not at all what I'm saying. That's part of the problem with the social narrative of adoption is, “But these people might have more money and resources for you, so you're in a better place.” I'm not trying to suggest that. That's not an acceptable reason for coercing someone to give up a child or thinking, “You're not entitled to have your own child because you can't provide for them the way someone else can.”
But I will say that there was stability in in the provision I had. It wasn't wealth or anything like this, but it was reliable, which is important for a person to be able to be raised that way with some sort of stability. So, as much as I, again, like I said, I'm not trying to paint it in terms of disparities of wealth and provision. I just would say they did a good job of making sure I had a roof over my head and enough to eat. So, I did put that there. But interestingly, even though that's a foundational thing, it's not probably the most important thing that I think that they gave me.
They did give me a lot of affection. I would think that that's probably the second thing here. Interestingly, though, the way my nervous system is primed, I kind of react against the physical part of that. Even now, with touches and things from them, it feels painful at times. It physically can feel painful.
Lori:
From them specifically or from people.
Greg:
From them.
Lori:
Okay.
Greg:
Them specifically. To the point where I kind of recoil from it. They would want for this to be a really open and loving thing and think they're expressing that. and am receiving it that way, but I'm also aware of this physical boundary I want to have from it to kind of insulate myself from it a little bit. But I feel like it was the right thing to do to try to show me that affection, because it did show that they were trying to be loving towards me. And that's something I definitely think they did right.
The household was very calm and peaceful, without a lot of emotional turmoil. That's actually part of the downside, too, that I'll get into. It was so bland that I didn't experience the full range of emotional development I should have. I wasn't exposed to that because they were also not emotionally mature that way. So, that will actually kind of go into both of these categories. But in terms of being acclimated to a more soothing environment, that definitely was something there. The house was calm. There wasn't a lot of a lot of things happening that would be distressing psychologically to me. Even though I didn't realize it was a deficit of emotion that was really being expressed, it was salutary. It was helpful to me, as somebody growing up, that it wasn't disruptive and combative and all of these different kinds of ways. So, I would say that that's definitely something also that I believe they got right.
And I know they did want me to fit in with the larger family. By the larger family, I don't mean just my two older sisters, but with my grandma with all my aunts and uncles, my cousins. There was always an effort for me to be integrated with them. And so, I always saw and I'm using the word “saw” versus “felt” because it's important the language there. I saw all the family and I sat with all the family and I went to the reunions with the family. We have a lot of family in San Diego. And I never could sit comfortably in it. I couldn't feel it. I couldn't feel what it felt like to be connected with them.
They were always very nice people to me. And think my parents did the right thing by wanting me to be to be part of that. They also didn't know I was not experiencing it the way I think they hoped I would. But they were trying, at least, for me to have a place to fit. They weren't keeping me off to the side. They were never saying, “This is our adopted son, as you know,” or nothing like that. It was never brought up anywhere in the family.
Lori:
{crosstalk 25:32}.
Greg:
Yeah.
Lori:
They attempted integration. Yeah.
Greg:
Yeah, I would say that. There were some other adoptees in the family and I guess I never found out who they were. That was kind of problematic, but I understand now why that happened.
So, I think those are four of the five things that I would say that that they did for me, that they did right and did well. They always – and this will be possibly a problematic for – they always made me feel wanted. Now, wanted is a problematic word for adoptees because it kind of leads to a lot of things. It’d take a while to unpack that. But I never had the sense that they wished I was someplace else. Let me put it that way. Maybe that's better than wanted, because wanted can sound like chosen and chosen is a whole problematic thing for adoptees as well, because we know that that's not really the way this works in adoption. It's usually a question of who's available and not who is chosen. But I always felt wanted.
Now, wanted can mean that they felt a gap in their family – And my dad has expressed it that way – and they wanted to fill the gap. That can be problematic, too. That can be language around family building that's not salutary to adoptees as well.
I always felt like, though, that they were happy I was there. Maybe I should use language like that to say it; to say what I'm trying to say. It was never a case of, “This was a mistake for us” or “You don't really fit here.” Nothing like that really happened. So, I feel like I was raised knowing there was a place that they had hoped I was comfortable in and that I was fitting in with.
Lori:
So, thank you for sharing those five things. When I hear them, what I'm relating it to is kind of the home study. Like what the home study is meant to do is set the bar to make sure that a baby or a child is being placed in a safe, affectionate, calm, connected home where the child has a place; that sense of being, of having a place wanted, like you say. It's a bar. It's a minimum level. It's not a maximum level. So, that's just to try to prevent further loss and trauma from a child, from being in need for a lack of predictability with food and housing and all that; things and affection and being integrated into families. Some level of emotional wellbeing of the family, at least in current day. I know that wasn't always happening in the Baby Scoop era.
Greg:
Right.
Lori:
But now, Greg, let's go to the shadow side, because to be whole, for us parents to also come out of our fog and be able to think critically about how we do adoption and not continually be on autopilot with it with somebody else's rules. We need to be able to take a critical look at things. So, this is where we're going to get into the harder side; the shadow side. One trait that comes from emotional intelligence is the ability to incorporate the shadow side with the sunny side. This is my very predictable both-and message that has to pop up in at least once every episode. So, start talking to us about the six categories of things that perhaps your parents missed the mark on.
Greg:
I would like to start with the emotional intelligence part. I could, I think, describe it as a lack of emotional modeling and engagement. And really, that's symptomatic of what they themselves didn't have. I realized that they couldn't show me what had never developed in them. So, I don't know. It's not meant to be an unfair blow to them. So, you didn't have this, so I don't have it. But the fact of the matter is, it did mean that I was feeling things, but I wasn't seeing anybody else, like act like they felt anything. Very little range of emotional contrast in my family.
They would bicker and little things like this, but my dad was a very warm and affectionate person. He still is. And my mom is too. But there wasn't much displayed beyond that. I didn't learn about anger. There was a few (very few) emotional outbursts like that, and they scared me. But I never – it was never something I understood or had come to see was an acceptable part of the range of human emotion.
In fact, my mom kind of speaks against that even now. She's kind of opposed to feelings. One time really recently she said, “You want to go with us on this little trip?” I said, “I really want to stay home and process some things that I'm thinking and feeling.” And her response was, “I wouldn't want to do that. I wouldn't want to sit and feel what I feel.”
And so, it's a very revealing thing, but it means that whatever development I had seems to have come from whatever my inward disposition was genetically. And then developing something on my own independently of what I was seeing from them, because they definitely weren't showing it to me. So, I'm fortunate that I was able to transcend that to the degree that I have and have a broader range of emotional expression. Because that intelligence piece – and I haven't been perfect at it by any means – but it's allowed me to see that this would have been something that I would have benefited from in my childhood if that had been there. And I think my whole family would have benefited from that as well; like my sisters as well, seeing that. So, that's one thing that I would say, right off the bat, is something I wish had been different. Whether or not, again, it's fair to say they should have been that way when they weren't able to be or didn't know how to be. That might be a different question but would have benefited from that if they had.
Lori:
So, maybe if they had done some work around feeling the shadow side and been able to model that for you and given you entries into your own shadow side; the full range of emotions.
Greg:
Yeah, I would I would say that's true. And I know that for the age bracket they were in for the era, that kind of work wasn't going on. It was stolid and working class. And this is how you are. It wasn't harsh, but it wasn't emotive either. And it left. It left without this, again, contrast that would have been beneficial for the kids growing up in that house to have enable to see and model themselves.
I think probably one of the things I would also put on this list of six is there was only a qualified recognition of my differences. When you have an adopted child, and I don't need to tell you this, Lori, they're different. And it doesn't benefit the child or the parents to pretend like the differences aren't there, they shouldn't be there or that they should be kind of – I use the word or the term expression “paved over.” I always felt like the differences were paved over because instead of freely admitting that the reason I had differences was because I came from somewhere else, there was never any attribution to any genetic inheritance or anything I had. It was, “You're just a little different.” I had a different temperament; very different temperament, different emotional gifts, different disposition, of course. And because of that, it probably was not well serving to me to act like that wasn't there. And they act like and tell me – and I'll speak about this also – to speak like it didn't matter to them that those differences might be there. It was more comforting to them to tell me they didn't see any difference than it was for them to ask me whether I noticed the difference myself.
And it wasn't that they tried to short circuit any of my talents coming out or anything. They just didn't know what to do with them entirely. They didn't know how to help me cultivate them. It didn't show a lot of interest in them. They kind of held them in sort of like awe and reverence, like, “Oh, you're – Well, I guess you're just really smart” or this or that. And that meant I was really acutely aware of the difference. And they weren't unintelligent. It wasn't anything like that. They put me in this category that made me feel like you're telling me I'm not different, but I know I am. Why can't we just talk about that? And why can't that be okay the way it is? So, that's something that I feel like it's really important for adoptive parents to be able to acknowledge and recognize and cultivate in their children.
Lori:
Yeah. As I listen to you, I'm recalling the last interview I did, episode 406 with Dr. Chaitra Wirtra-Leiker, and we were talking about talking about race with adoptees. And one of the things we got to was that we need to see the sameness, specifically about race. But I think what you're saying is this is about adoptees, too. We need to recognize our sameness and the connection that we have, the ways that we're the same, but also the differences, giving room for those. Because without that piece, you can't be seen for who you are. And if I had my own time machine and I could go back with my own kids, I would have put more energy into seeing my kids.
Now, race is something that's very apparent. It's right there on the surface, but as you're talking about the dispositions and the traits, I don't think I was attuned to seeing my kids for who they are, for the ways they were different from me. And that's one thing that I wish. So, thank you for that. For number two.
Greg:
Yeah, definitely. I really relate to that.
Lori:
Great. Do you have anything else to say on that before we go to number three?
Greg:
I think that, unfortunately, it's interpreted, and probably fairly as by the adoptees saying, “It's snubbing where I came from and the stock I came from; the people that I'm here from. And so, to show it to say that that doesn't apply is really a denigration of who I am as a person.” That's very similar to what you've said here, I think.
Lori:
Yeah, that's a good extension of that is having a respect and a curiosity about your original family; your very first family.
Greg:
Right. For sure. I think one of the things I'd like to put on this list is they were not forthcoming about what they knew around the circumstances of my relinquishment and adoption. And I still don't know very much of that. And whatever I do know, I've heard almost none of it from them. It's the little bit I've heard from my birth mother. So, it will sound unbelievable probably to a lot of people, but I can easily feel like I came out of nowhere. And like, I didn't have – like, I really was delivered by a stork or into somebody's arms, and that I didn't have this this past; this history, that there was no agency or no handing off of a child. I can't piece any of that together in my mind because nobody's ever told me what happened.
The only thing I know is this six weeks of foster care, which was a shock to find out, too. And unfortunately, that was a practice in the Baby Scoop era for, “Is this child going to be okay? Are they going to manifest psychological issues? Let's put them over here for a while, see how they're going to do when they get placed.” But they were not forthcoming about what they did know.
When did the few times ask about it, there were a lot of tears from my mom, “We've told you everything we know.” That wasn't the case. I found out that wasn't the case because they put me to the test in a really dramatic way, when I told them I'd found my birth mother. They said, “What was the name you were you were given up under?” And I had to tell them that name. So, my mom said, “Okay, that's the right name.” So, right away I knew. So, you do know these things. You haven't told me these things, but you've been telling me you've shared everything you know, and you've been crying about it. So, I won't ask you about it.
And so, I don't even, to this day, know very many things about that. I can tell you that that leads to trust issues towards an adoptive parent or parents to know that those things were withheld, particularly when I was asking about them, and still being – The most important thing was the defensive position for my mom to preserve whatever this meant for her and not to be able to face the pain of, “Oh, he doesn't think he's ours” because that was the language, “You’re ours. We chose you. You were the answer to prayer.” And so, there was this illusion for her and the thought of me getting closer and any approximation to that wasn't something she could take. So, they kept things from me. And I feel like that's a real disservice to do to an adoptee.
Lori:
Yeah. And just about every attachment therapist that I've listened to or talked with says that it's less about the story that you have to come to terms with than it is about the way you can process your story and the space and support you have in making sense of that story. It's the making sense of the story that helps. So, for adoptees, when you're missing the first chapter or two or the introduction to the story, that can make that sense making really hard when you're missing some pieces. And then what you're also saying, I think, Greg, is that when those pieces have been kept from you or you were told you had all the pieces, but then you didn't, that sense of betrayal on top of everything. Anything to wrap up number three before you go on to number four.
Greg:
No, I think that that about does it for that. Thank you.
I think the fourth one would be – It's kind of rolled up into something else, which is not asking me about how I felt. Just telling me it didn't matter how that it didn't matter to them. So, what I mean, they weren't saying, “It didn't matter to me,” but they were, in a sense saying, “It didn't matter to me.” So, it solved their problems of insecurity; “It doesn't matter to us. It doesn't matter to us. We don't think of you any differently.” To this day, I haven't been asked how I felt about that. Even now, even after we've had finally serious conversations about adoption, this hasn't been any of them. The only thing was a challenging question, “Well, you didn't have it bad, did you?” That's a confrontational question. How am I supposed to answer something like that? No, I didn't have it as bad as, unfortunately, many adoptees I know did, but it's still a confrontational question. What are you expecting me to answer when you say something like that? So, never having been asked what my experience was like.
Lori:
So, kind of making this a feedback loop where they were so concerned about delivering the right messages for you that they didn't really check into how it was being received by you. Is that is that saying that right? Yeah.
Greg:
Yes. And it ties into a couple of the other points that are on this list here. And one of them is that whenever they had that conversation with me in those early years and before asked at age ten and when asked at age ten. I don't think they ever made sure I understood what adoption meant. They might have not have known what it meant. And like I say that because we mentioned that kind of instantaneous adoption mindset; it's done. That's what it meant to them. We've gone over this. Maybe we don't have to talk about that anymore. That was in the past. You were little. It doesn't have an impact. So, never making sure that I understood.
The only thing I kept hearing in the few conversations after that was how much I was wanted, how much I was loved. There was never any question about, “Do you want to know anything about her?” or “Do you want us to tell you anything about her or what we know?” It was none of that. It was just, “We want you to know loud and clear that we want you here. We love you.” And that's what it became in my head. Okay. It didn't settle me. It didn't resolve the conflict I was feeling inside. It just that was the end of the conversation.
Lori:
So, is this one – This is number five. Is that right? Like {crosstalk 43:41} or is this a 4a.
Greg:
Kind of like a 4a.
Lori:
Okay.
Greg:
I don’t know if I may have mislabeled some of these.
Lori:
So, it sounds like this one is – When your parents got out of their comfort zone in talking about adoption issues – and let's acknowledge that their comfort zone about adoption issues was not a very big one. But when they did, when they were pushed to the edge of that comfort zone, they fell back on their comfort area topics of, “We want you. We love you.” And you're saying that's necessary, but it's not sufficient.
Greg:
It's exactly the right the right way to describe that. It's necessary, but it's not sufficient. And it also needs to be shared with an adoptee in a way that you're not trying to corner or influence their experience because you can have a great adoption. You could argue that I did and still say, “This sucks that this happened to me. I wish this hadn't happened to me,” and they could still have done – everyone say they did all the things right. I say, “Yeah. Yeah. And it still is not something I wanted to have happened in my life and that I wouldn't wish for people to go through.”
So, it can devolve into this formulaic, “What do the adoptive parents have to do to get this right.” And fortunately, they can do all the right things and you still will be faced with the fact that the person who has adopted knows whether or not that's where they want to be. They grow up with all the money and all the love and all of the opportunity and still go, “Why do I have to be here? These aren't my people. This isn't where my body thought I was going to end up.”
And so, I know that can be distressing, I'm sure, for because it's part of the narrative. But we're building a family. We're doing something loving for a child, and we want them so much. And you just – you can't corner the experience of the person who's going through this and try to shape that into what you want it to be on the other side.
Lori:
Angela Tucker in her new book, You Should be Grateful, she mentions this both an which an adoptee can feel love and connection with their adoptive parents and an appreciation for being in this family and at the same time wish they hadn't been adopted; they hadn't needed to be adopted. When those two things can coexist in an adoptive parents reality, that gives the adoptee the permission to have both of those things. And it actually creates more connection between adoptee and adoptive parent, rather than less connection when adoptive parents can allow for that, “I wish I wasn't adopted.”
Greg:
I'm glad you said that, because it's not a temperamental thing. It's not, “You're not my real mom. You're not.” Adoptees are entitled to feel that and say those things. But that's not what it is. It's not a temperamental outburst. It's like, “Why do I feel scratchy in these clothes all the time?” “It's because we make you wear a wool sweater.” But wool doesn't feel good on my skin.” “We have to wear the wool sweater because you're in the family and we all wear wool sweaters” and like, “Hey, I have to do this. But this isn't a fit for me this way.” So, yeah, the both-and part.
I have enormous fondness and love for my parents. And I wish something different had happened to me. That's hard to say. You know, they could listen to this.
Lori:
Yeah. Yeah. In the back of my mind, I am thinking, “Is it in your mind that your parents might listen to this?”
Greg:
Yeah.
Lori:
Yeah, yeah, I'm sure.
Greg:
And it's not easy to say these things.
Lori:
Yeah. Yeah. And the step before saying them out loud is to have the permission to say them to yourself and live your truth. And I think that's what I would like adoptive parents to hear, is to give your adoptees the space to hear, to understand their truth by working on your own stuff. Can you go on to number five, Greg?
Greg:
Yeah. Number five is they didn't provide subsequent occasions to talk about adoption. So, after age ten, up to when I found my birth mother at 36 or 37, there was a lot of times we could have talked about this and we never, ever did, except to have my mom say, “We told you what we know” and cry. So, they missed all these years that they could have – Even if they didn't; let's say they knew nothing else. Let's say they really didn't know how old she was or anything. They still could have been talking to me about it. And we could have discovered it together.
Lori:
My heart breaks for your mom and for your dad and for the guidance they got during those times, in those times, or the lack of guidance. And it breaks for the adoptive parents these days who have this fragility and this brittleness. It feels almost breakable when you talk about it like this. It might hurt. I mean, the not being able to talk about adoption issues doesn't hurt just adoptees. It hurts adoptive parents, too. Think of the life they could have had, the much richer life they could have had if their own wounds, their fragility, their brittleness had been factored in to the conversations adoption professionals had with them about adoption.
Greg:
Boy, that was a really wonderful thing to hear. And it is fragile and tenuous. I understand how it must be emotional for someone to adopt a child and want so much for this connection and to want to preserve that every way they think they have to. And the insecurity that could very well be there. I do understand that cognitively. I can feel it, some of it too. I just know that it can never be the – it can never be at the center of what happens in an adoption. It has to always be the child goes into the center and the insecurity of the parents. It's not that that's not important. It can't be resolved by going and getting a child.
Lori:
Exactly. Adoption cures childlessness, but it doesn't cure anything that caused the childlessness like infertility. If there's still grief, if there's still insecurity over minness, like “This baby is mine. This child is mine,” that will be there until it's addressed on the adult levels, not with the child. You need to meet my needs, but let me figure out how to meet my own needs with my own network of support, whether that's professional help and therapy or a support group or something at the adult level that doesn't make the child the solution.
Greg:
Yeah.
Lori:
Do you have a number six for us?
Greg:
I do. And it's actually really kind of a painful one because it's the sort of thing that puts an uncomfortable spotlight on something that happened in my family context, which is that my parents displayed problematic behavior towards other adoptees in my family that they didn't display towards me. And I watched an inequitable treatment of people that they should have been more loving and nurturing towards and didn't receive that kind of treatment myself. But it always, since I've observed that, it's made me wonder what they really think about adoption. Because a lot of it could be interpreted as saviorism of saying those kids were adopted and they're not appreciative of it. And isn't that a shame? Look what they threw away. And these are people very, very close to my family, to me. And I had to see this. And without anyone asking me what an adoptee experience is like, ever; never asking me about this. Not realizing how painful that would be for me to see other people treated that differently.
Lori:
That must be very painful to know that they're treating you one way about your adaptedness, but other people a different way about their adaptedness. And there's kind of a true colors thing in between those two, right?
Greg:
Yes, because the only reason I can think of in my mind for the disparity: one is that they really wanted a boy to complete their family and that was me. They had two daughters. So, I was kind of placed in this kind of on this pedestal. And then other was I was highly compliant. I didn't fight, I didn't disobey. I didn't do anything wrong growing up. So, I wasn't a problem. The other adoptees displayed different types of behavior than did. They were the ones that were talked about.
Lori:
But you are a good adoptee.
Greg:
I was a good adoptee. Even their biological families were talked about in negative terms as, “Oh, they're repeating the patterns of.” So, I had to hear this for years; for decades. And no. And I was still in the fog, but I was kind of like, “Something is weird about this.” And when I finally came out of the fog, I realized that was that was not acceptable to do that. Because the other people knew I was an adoptee, too. They weren't being treated that way. Why was I being elevated in this way? Just because I got along. I'm very well with everybody and I didn't say anything. I mean, if I'd done something disappointing, would I have been? Well, we gave you a chance and you blew it. So, that's painful. And that will always cast a shadow for me about or wonder about What do you really think about what adoption is?
Lori:
I really appreciate you. I'm sorry. Go ahead, Greg.
Greg:
I said, “Do you really think you're rescuing or saving people because you act like it?”
Lori:
I really appreciate you sharing that, Greg, because when I work with adoptive parents, at first, what they're after is, “What are the words I need to say? Tell me the words. Tell me the script to get this right.” And I feel like your parents had the script. And so, what I try to help adoptive parents know is that this isn't about the words. This is about where you're coming from. How comfortable are you with this actual world of adoption, not just the shiny, happy Sunnyside world of adoption? Because the work that we do as adoptive parents in expanding our comfort zone comes out in the right words. And the lack of work. You can have the right words, but not have that feeling behind the right words. And I think that's maybe what you're saying you experienced. The words were there, but the presence, the vibe was not there because the work hadn't been done.
Greg:
And there's no awareness that there is any work to do. Which is why I admire so much what you do. Because you know it's there.
Lori:
Yeah.
Thank you so much for these 11 glimpses into an adoptees heart and adoptees experiences. Like you said, these are yours and other people may – some of them may resonate with other people and some of them may not. Everybody's probably got their own list, if they had the freedom to think about their own list and the motivation to do that.
So, we're closing in on the end of our time together. And I'd like to ask you the question I'm asking all Season Four guests, Greg. How can we best help our children build healthy connections and identities right from the start or from today?
Lori:
I really think the transparency element is huge in this and the willingness to have done some inner work Before adopting a child. And understanding the importance of keeping your child at the center. I kind of like the constellation idea much better than the Triad, which kind of suggested three equal sides. And unfortunately, it's not. There really is a need to keep your child at the center. And I think that when you can do that and share transparently with them and enter into whatever questions they have and hear them, hear their words and value what they're saying and also value where they came from, I think you will have done the best you can. Again, there's no guarantee of a good experience. I don't even really like those ways of talking about, “Did you have a good adoption experience?” It sounds like a resort. How many stars would you give this? And it's not. It's a life that you live. So, it's really hard to break it down into those categories.
But I feel like that would be what I believe would be the best you can do as an adoptive parent to show that you're trying to center your child, not insisting that they have a certain reaction to it or feel a certain way in response. So, latitude for them to feel what they feel and transparency about everything you can share with them.
Lori:
I love that, Greg; latitude and transparency. Those really feed into the openness to that is the one-word distillation that I work on. So, thank you for that. And thank you for all the vulnerability you've shown us in the last hour.
Is there anything else you'd like to say in clothing? Not clothing. Would you like to say anything in clothing? Would you like to say anything in closing, Greg?
Greg:
I want to say that the allyship that you and other adoptive parents on the platforms who are really trying to do your best for this is recognized and appreciated, at least by me. I won't speak for everybody because I know that that's not the proper thing to do either. But thank you for entering into this with us to try to do the best we can for the future of adoptees; the people that will still enter into this later on.
Lori:
Thank you so much for that, Greg. And I want to also spread that shout out to all the adoptive parents who are striving and doing the work; doing the work, people, as we say around here at least once an episode, too. So, thank you for sharing. Thank you for being vulnerable. I hope that if your adoptive parents do listen, that they see your heart and that it expands their comfort zone in being able to love you and see you.
Greg:
Thank you. That means a lot. I appreciate it. Lori.
Lori:
Thanks for being here, Greg.
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