Creating Content Appealing to Adoptive Parents While Also Helping Adoptees.
Everyone knows or loves someone who's adopted, and everyone usually has at least one person in their immediate circle or family who is adopted.
It's a new year, which means new goals, visions, dreams, and GROWTH!
I have been in these trenches of Adopteeland for almost a decade and a half now, and I have grown in my journey along the way. I have seen my fellow adoptees grow, and I have witnessed Adopteeland grow.
What is Adopteeland?
The online adoptee community!
I have been writing about relinquishment and adoption trauma for well over a decade, and I feel, at this point, I am preaching to the choir sometimes. Thankfully, most adoptees are starting to catch on and get the layers of the primal wound, aka relinquishment trauma, aka separation trauma, aka adoption trauma! (they are all different events and experiences!)
Consider Reading: The Vital Contrast Between Relinquishment Trauma, Separation Trauma, Adoption Trauma and Why We Should Consider the Difference.
I can only write about this so much until I am blue in the face. Today, I am blue in the face. It's not that I will never write about these events again, but they will not be the highlight of my content like they have in the past. A lot of times, others in the adoption constellation, like adoptive parents and biological parents, can hear the message, but some grasp it to understand, and some don't.
Most Adoptees know because we live it!
In the last few years, my personal adoptee journey has shifted so significantly that I have uncovered one of the most powerful paths to healing I have yet to discover. Most of you know by now that it's diving into the complex grief topic when it comes to being an adoptee. I am so passionate about this topic!
Consider Reading: Acknowledging Immeasurable Adoptee Grief, The Real Mother.
I describe complex - grief in adoption as being THE REAL MOTHER. At the same time, many adoptees can agree that the "Mother Wound" reigns supreme not only once from the separation from our biological mothers but sometimes twice when it comes to our relationships with our adoptive moms. And then, many of us are rejected by our biological mothers or have emotional reunions, which creates an additional mother wound.
So many of us have been juggling this "Mother Thing" since we discovered we had another mother. Our experiences with our MOTHER'S are so loaded and complex, just like each of our individual journeys. There is no one-size-fits-all at the layers of the complexities!
Adoption: Grieve, Grow, Glo might appear to some as a "pro-adoption crusade" by the name alone, but I can assure you there are many reasons for this, and it is hardly a pro-adoption movement. The name was selected as such for many reasons, and I would love to take a moment and break it down for you!
Everyone knows or loves someone who's adopted, and everyone usually has at least one person in their immediate circle or family who is adopted.
Adoption was picked over Adoptee because adoption opens the crusade far and wide to reach everyone in the adoption constellation and beyond.
If I labeled this "Adoptee: Grieve, Grow, Glo," it likely would reach the masses much less than I hope this crusade will reach. I am not only talking to adoptees in this crusade, but I want to reach everyone in the adoption constellation! That is why adoption is a word used for the front and face of the movement instead of Adoptee.
Hopefully, you are following me!
Next, let's move to "Grieve, Grow, Glo" and why I picked this for the crusade. It outlines how things have worked for me personally, and this realization has saved my life! I hope that sharing my experience will help other adoptees. Once we make the connections as adoptees that likely a significant piece of our heartache and pain is because we are grieving, which is a very normal experience for all we have gone through, then we can acknowledge what we are going to do with this realization.
I recently described what my adoptee experience has been like not having any resources or tools to help me navigate my big adoptee feelings in an article called, "I'm Adopted, Help Me!"
Consider Reading: I'm Adopted, Help Me!
We can do nothing and stay in pain, or we can jump on the healing train and try to work through the steps toward processing our grief. This process will look different for everyone, but the simple acknowledgment that we are grieving is no small distinction. Once we know this, then we choose to tend to our grief by processing it!
Once we acknowledge that the grief in our adoption journeys is likely going to be a lifelong visitor, then we step into a space of healing. This is when we begin to grow. Time spent processing our big adoptee feelings promotes healing, growth, and freedom from all the layers we've kept inside for an entire lifetime.
So now you know why I used Adoption instead of Adoptee, and you know what Grieve and Grow means when it comes to the Adoption: Grieve, Grow, Glo crusade.
Let's get to the Glo.
Glo is short for glow, and my attempts to create a vision of what happens when we start to heal from this grief, loss, trauma, abandonment, and rejection that adoption causes. We begin to grieve, grow, and find ourselves, and when that happens, we start to carry a glow about ourselves that most people in our lives begin to recognize.
It's like the sun starts to shine brighter, and the sky is more vibrant than it's ever been. We begin to notice the beauty in everyday life that everyone else always talked about, but many of us, as adoptees, haven't had the opportunity to see it because our pain has been too great. It is a magical process; however, getting to this point is intense, painful inner work.
Here's the thing. No one will do it for us; we are all in charge of our healing. You might wonder where "Ready, Set, Go" comes from when you see "Adoption: Grieve, Grow, Glo, Ready, Set, Go." That means that I want to promote the concept of us all grieving together because no one should have to grieve alone in isolation, and the sooner we get to grieving and normalizing this process, the BETTER FOR US ALL.
This is where "Ready, Set, Go" comes in. Let’s get to grieving! Ready, Set, Go!
I want this message to reach everyone in the adoption constellation, especially adoptees and adoptive parents. I share as much as possible that if I had been able to begin my grieving process the moment I found out I was adopted, the trajectory of my entire life would have been different.
Instead, that raw internal pain I carried, the unprocessed complex grief, has been with me from the moment I was separated from my birth mother. But it showed up as anger, rage, self-sabotage, low self-esteem, self-destructive behaviors, deep longing and sadness, depression, suicidal ideality, substance abuse for 27 years, self-harm, and the list could go on.
No one helped me heal. No one helped me connect the dots on the reality that I was grieving. It has been a long, lonely, painful journey to figure this out, and no one helped me! NO ONE! Not even one of the many therapists I saw from five years old to my current age of 49. This should not be so, and it breaks my heart that it is so! Adoptees are dying because of their complex grief, loss, and deep sadness.
I hope the Adoption: Grieve, Grow, Glo, Ready, Set, Go crusade does a few things.
I hope it helps my brave and amazing fellow adoptees connect the dots on the reality that they might want to explore the grief process to help themselves heal. Another thing I hope it does is help adoptive parents realize that the grief process is essential and needs to be facilitated by them for their adopted children as early as possible.
I believe that everyone in the adoption constellation should become grief experts, and adoptive parents should become grief experts before they ever consider adopting as well. They should work through their grief before adopting a child to fill a void that adoptees can't possibly fill.
I was adopted to fill a void for a biological child, and I never was and never will be that biological child. The expectations that I would be caused me a lot of harm, and I am sure it was also a great disappointment to my adoptive mom, whom I was nothing like.
I believe with my whole heart if we continue to have conversations about all the complex grief areas that adoptees experience and that adoption is infiltrated with, we can start to help others understand the grief process more significantly. I genuinely believe this is life or death for adoptees. My grief almost killed me so many times over! I grieved all alone, in isolation, for my entire lifetime.
Hopefully, this shines a light on why the front and face of this movement might appear to be "pro-adoptive parent" or "pro-adoption." It is far from that, but we must reach adoptive parents, so the face of this movement and the content should be appealing to them. It's pro-lets get to grieving! Thankfully, many adoptive parents now want to understand. Remember, this is 100% adoptee-centric content behind the front and face.
Once we see the light, we can follow the light!
What if making the adoption, grief & loss connection in adoption changed everything? What if it’s a pathway to the light that actually makes sense? What if normalizing conversations about complex grief saved adoptees' lives? It has changed everything for me, and I hope it does for you, too.
Join the Adoption: Grieve, Grow, Glo Crusade.
Follow Us on Instagram: @grievegrowgloreadysetgo
Follow Us on Facebook: Adoption: Grieve, Grow, Glo
Use hashtags: #grievegrowglo #adopteesgrieving #adopteegrief #adoptiongrief #adoptiongrievingtogether #grievegrowgloreadysetgo
You don't have to grieve in isolation and alone.
Let's grieve together, ready, set, go.
Let's keep talking about grief, loss, and adoption. Let's normalize hard conversations. No one should have to grieve alone in isolation, so let's grieve together, ready, set, go.
I recently guested on the Thriving Adoptees podcast for the second time. Here's the link https://pod.fo/e/2063ec Simon Benn, the Brit adoptee who hosts the show, is looking for more guests. If you'd like to talk this through with him, email him at simon@thrivingadoptees.co
I see you; I feel your pain for all the adoptees who feel forgotten, lost, and alone. Please don’t give up, and know you aren’t alone in feeling like you do.
For anyone in the adoption constellation, are you interested in setting up a one-on-one AdopTEA RealiTEA Virtual Table Talk Session with me? Visit my booking page here. If you don’t find a time that works for you, contact me directly at pamelakaranova@gmail.com.
I have compiled a list of recommended resources for adoptees and advocates. You can find it here: Recommended Resources for Adult Adoptees and Adoption Advocates.
Thank you for reading and for supporting me and my work.
Understanding is Love,
Pamela A. Karanova
Here are a few articles I recommend reading:
100 Heartfelt Transracial Adoptee Quotes that Honor the Truth of Adoption by Pamela A. Karanova & 100 Transracial Adoptees Worldwide
What Are the Mental Health Effects of Being Adopted? By Therodora Blanchfield, AMFT
10 Things Adoptive Parents Should Know – An Adoptee’s Perspective by Cristina Romo
Understanding Why Adoptees Are At A Higher Risk for Suicide by Maureen McCauley | Light of Day Stories
Toward Preventing Adoption- Related Suicide by Mirah Riben
Relationship Between Adoption and Suicide Attempts: A Meta-Analysis
Reckoning with The Primal Wound Documentary with a 10% off coupon code (25 available) “adopteesconnect”
Still, Grieving Adoptee Losses, What My Adoptive Parents Could Have Done Differently.