Dipping lightly and deeply into how each of the 7 core issues can show up in our day to day lives and how to heal some of our adoption related pain - Grief and Loss 

As I opened my eyes on 15 September I remembered that it was my birthday. Feelings of excitement and anticipation bubbled up as I reached for my cellphone. My husband was making coffee as I read loving texts from my two children and close friends wishing me happy birthday. It was the prefect start to my special day. My heart was filled with joy and excitement about these along with the day’s plans which were all of my choice. I jumped out of bed to the smell of fresh coffee and started to get ready for a celebration pancake breakfast on skype with my son and grandchildren living in Sydney. As I moved around I noticed how emotional I felt. One minute I felt elation, the next sad, then tears flowed, agitation, waves of emotions washed over me that I simply couldn’t control or fathom. I felt frustrated that I was feeling this way for no apparent reason. I had been looking forward to today and this was disarming…what if I was going to be like this all day! I reached out to my husband and said sadly ‘I feel so emotionally all over the place today”. He responded “it’s okay love you are like this every birthday remember”?

How could I forget that after all these years but we adopted people do forget. Call it denial or unknowingly slipping into ‘brain fog’. But our do bodies remember. They remind us consciously or unconsciously of the remnants of our separation trauma especially on our ‘birth days’. I used to feel a victim to these buried unexplained at times overwhelming feelings of loss grief and even rage. I hated them for robbing me of the ability to celebrate and enjoy birthdays and loathed myself for having them at all! 

Many years ago, I came to a place in my life where I was ‘over adoption related fog and patterns’ and embarked upon what became a 30 +yr personal growth path to find my way out of the suffering, find some inner ease and one day even flourish.

Nancy Verrier was the first person let alone clinician I came across that actually offered any understanding and validation of the impact of adoption. She articulated, named and explained a great deal of my perplexing and painful experiences. The relief at that time was liberating and life changing. 

In her book “The Primal Wound”(1993), Nancy illuminated 7 core issues that she believed stemmed from the original trauma of early separation of an infant from it’s mother that reverberates through an adopted person’s life being; abandonment, rejection, grief and loss, shame, guilt, fear. 

Nancy believes that grief and loss weave themselves through the fabric of an adopted person’s life; the loss of the deeply satisfying mother child connection, the loss of the biological, genetic and cultural history, the loss of belonging and the authentic Self. 

According to Nancy, profound sadness, grief and loss can be triggered at crucial points along the lifespan, such as anniversary reactions, relationship endings and birthdays. 

Carrying unresolved grief and loss around can feel like ‘walking through treacle’. Imagine feeling like this for your whole life without even knowing what it’s about. To reduce the ‘heaviness’ we often distract ourselves (food, alcohol, shopping) or strive harder to escape it. This can be exhausting! Those in relationship with us don’t know what to do, how to handle it. They often think that they are responsible for these emotions which affects their relationship with us. We need them to know that we are okay and so are they…that there is an elephant in the room….

We have a right to know that these are normal responses despite the fact that we have no conscious memory of it…weird to get your head around and that’s why it is so tough to understand and reach out for support.

When grief or loss flood to the surface we often berate ourselves for feeling these emotions or worse, Self abandon. We don’t know that these are in fact normal responses to early trauma and loss that we can’t remember. That coupled with no societal acknowledgement (which is the permission we need) we can’t begin to healthily grieve these many losses. Not expressing these feelings can lead us to be highly emotional, crying easily or over identify with other peoples’ sadness and loss. We can experience mood swings ranging from angry to sad and back again ( like me on my birthday). Without knowing why we feel this way, we suppress these feelings. This coping strategy leads to losing touch with our other feelings. When we suppress the ‘negative’ ones we lose access to our positive emotions. This feels like only half of us is fully alive.