First published by the Neufeld Institute—I feel fortunate that I discovered the Neufeld approach to parenting when my children were quite young, so I knew that they needed me to help bridge the night.

But knowledge wasn’t everything. I had to find my sense of play as a parent, too, lest I frustrate myself and begrudgingly wonder why my children wouldn’t just “Go the F**k to Sleep,” as the satirical book of the same title says.

Music seemed to offer a certain kind of magic for our family. Listening to, and playing music, has always been soothing to me, and I trusted Dr. Neufeld knew what he was speaking about when he mentioned the power of music to soothe small children, too.

Just before bedtime, I’d set the mood with dimmed lights and gentle serenading from a “Bridging” playlist that I’d created. Not only was it creatively rewarding for me to search for dream-inducing songs, but each song that I found reinforced messages I wanted my daughters to hear as they faced the long separation of nighttime:

• Child of Mine by Various Artists; Album: Down at the Sea Hotel – “so glad you are a child of mine.”
• Goodnight, My Angel by Various Artists; Album: Down at the Sea Hotel – “I would never leave you … wherever you may go, no matter where you are, I never will be far away.”
• May There Always be Sunshine by Kathy Reid-Naiman; Album: Sally Go Round the Moon – “may there always be mama, may there always be me.”
• Go to Sleep by Pat Hamilton; Album: Lullabies and Other Songs – “I’ll take care of you,” AND “I’ll keep you warm in the cold,” AND “if your dreams make you cry, I’ll be there by your side”
• Everybody Cries by Various Artists; Album: Down at the Sea Hotel – “wish that I could take away the tears from your eye, it’s just that sometimes, everybody cries.” AND “Just remember I’ll be there to greet you when you rise.”
• Oh Sweetheart by Pat Hamilton; Album: Lullabyes and Other Songs – “you’re the light of my life, oh sweetheart, I don’t have to think twice.”
• Keep You Safe by JJ Heller; Album: Painted Red – “quiet your heart, it’s just a dream, go back to sleep. I’ll be right here, I’ll stay awake, as long as you need me … to slay all the dragons, and keep out the monsters. I’m watching over you.”
• All Through the Night by Pat Hamilton; Album: Lullabyes and Other Songs – “while the moon her watch is keeping all through the night.”
• May We Both Rest by Various Artists; Album: Goodnight Baby Vocal Lullabies – “And when you flow into a distant tree, may we both rest. I’ll close my eyes and fly to thee … may we both rest.”
• Yo Te Amo by Kathy Reid Naiman; Album:Sally Go Round the Moon – “I love you, I love you, all day long I’m going to sing my little song.”

Rocking my daughters to sleep (or at least to a droopy-eyed, sleepy state) to these songs was enchanting—both ways. For my daughters, it was a wordless way to communicate that I wasn’t going away, that my love was steady, that I’d be holding on to them no matter what. For me, it was a means of letting go of the temptation to treat bedtime like a task list, a reminder to slow down and delight in the closeness this bedtime ritual offered us.

What’s more, rocking my children had a sad tinge to it. Through music and tones that spoke deeply to my soul, I could flash-forward a decade or two and see my daughters at different ages and stages when they’d no longer need, or want, me rocking them to sleep to music. Inadvertently, in this way it helped me find my tears—keeping my heart soft, more patient with middle-of-the-night interruptions, and better prepared for another day of physically exhausting parenting during those younger years.

© Sara Easterly. All rights reserved.
This essay was first published as an editorial by the Neufeld Institute.

The post The Two-Way Magic of a Bridging Playlist appeared first on SARA EASTERLY.

Understanding how the effects of adoption trauma can look so good they get missed.

First published by Severance Magazine—A common mistake adoptive parents make when hearing adult adoptees speak about adoption trauma is discounting their experiences because “times have changed” or their adoptee hasn’t voiced similar feelings. Some parents will straight-up ask their adopted children if they feel the same way and then rest easy when their children deny having similar feelings. Differing details of adoption stories can be used as evidence of irrelevance. Adoptee voices that land as “angry” are often quickly written off as “examples of a bad adoption.”

“Not my adoptee,” is a knee-jerk, defensive response that blinds parents to adoption-related dynamics that may be uncomfortable or painful to consider—especially when everything seems to be going swimmingly in early childhood. This posture, though, discounts the real and proven trauma inherent in adoption, missing an opportunity to fully support adopted children and ultimately benefit from closer, more authentic relationships.

That trauma looks good on you.

One reason it’s so easy to miss signs of adoption trauma is because it can present so well.

Adoptees are unintentionally groomed to be people-pleasers. Once we’ve lost our first mothers to adoption, we can work incredibly hard to win the love of our next mothers. We strive to measure up—doing and saying whatever is needed to keep our adoptive mothers close. This is all unconscious and certainly not meant to be fraudulent. To our brains, running the show, it’s simply a matter of survival. Children need parents, after all, and attachment is our greatest human need, taking priority even over such basics as shelter and food, as explained by child developmental psychologist Dr. Gordon Neufeld.

Of course, “good,” compliant behavior is welcomed and adored in our culture. What parent wouldn’t find a well-behaving child absolutely lovely? As a mother, I confess that my job feels so much easier when my kids behave. Unfortunately, though, the more adoptees are praised for our good behavior, the more our unhealthy patterns are reinforced and extend outside of our family relationships. We’ll ditch our true feelings in a heartbeat if it means feeling treasured and keeping loved ones close.

Other manifestations of adoption trauma are valued by mainstream culture: perfectionism churns out hard-working, dedicated students and employees who’ll always go the extra mile—nobody spotting the adoptee’s frantic need to prove his or her worth. Adoptees often make natural leaders—nobody knowing that we can harbor a desperate need to be in charge that started upon relinquishment when our brains decided nobody was looking out for us, so we’re best served when we’re at the helm. People-pleasers can also be charismatic, supportive, empathetic, and generous … others unaware of the self-sabotage that can be at play behind the scenes. We can seem unfazed in the face of stressful situations, many not understanding that’s because we’ve spent a lifetime diminishing our feelings and disregarding deep pain in order to become masters of compartmentalization.

These are traits we value in society. They serve. These traits aren’t all bad, of course. But they can be inwardly destructive—especially if adoptees aren’t aware of them, and most certainly if the cost is the adoptee’s true sense of self.

Adoption blinds.

Another reason it’s harder to spot adoption trauma is because it hides itself from adoptees themselves. The grief of losing a first family member through adoption is so significant it’s not easily looked at by the adoptee. Like looking at the sun too directly, it will burn. What’s more, our experiences of such great loss are often preverbal, before we learned words like loneliness, isolation, abandonment, and hopelessness to help us understand our overwhelming emotions—so overwhelming, sometimes, they aren’t felt. Our brains protect us in that way, because to feel them just might do us in.

Developmentally, most children won’t even have the capacity to reflect upon adoption loss until much later in life. This is what’s known as “living in the fog”—a state of denial or numbness in which adoptees are unable to closely examine the effects of adoption. When directly asked, in-the-fog adoptees often won’t have the consciousness, or the words, to talk about adoption trauma. We spend years, and possibly decades, feeling more comfortable parroting society’s or a family’s lighthearted interpretation of adoption than trying to articulate our underground, confusing, complex emotions.

When we sense a disconnect between our nuanced feelings and culture’s saccharine-sweet story of adoption, we blame ourselves. When we fail at being “perfect,” we are prone toward additional self-attack. When we’re more three-dimensional than simply “good” adoptees, we can resort to secrecy in order to keep the darker parts of ourselves hidden from those closest to us. In any of these ways, we can end up living a double life, censoring large swaths of ourselves—making it harder to feel fully known and rest in a sense of deep love by those closest to us.

This is why it’s critically important to listen to out-of-the-fog adult adoptees. Adoptees who share their stories aren’t usually doing so for fame, glory, or money, but out of a genuine desire to support other adoptees. We share on the other side of healing—or in the midst of our healing—in hopes of opening adoptive parents’ eyes to our innermost secrets that we wish our parents had had access to in our younger years.

Are some of us angry? Absolutely. Society hasn’t made room for our voices in the story of adoption, despite the fact that we’re its central players. Some of us have been let down by the people closest to us—again and again. Some of us haven’t felt seen or known. Some of us have been mistreated. Some of us have sought to take our own lives to stop the pain without having to shed light on adoption’s darkest manifestations.

“Not my adoptee” could easily be your adoptee—whether you or your child recognize so right now. Like all children, adoptees eventually grow older; hopefully, in the name of their mental health and wholeness as individuals, their feelings around adoption will evolve over time. As your child matures, you’ll want your child to look back and know that you did your best to understand them, to see them, to know them, and to guide them. While all adoptees are different, and each story is unique, listening to #adopteevoices—an array of them—is of utmost importance when raising adopted children toward their full developmental potential.

© Sara Easterly. All rights reserved.
First published by Severance Magazine.

The post “Not My Adoptee!” Yes, Your Adoptee. appeared first on SARA EASTERLY.

First published by Lavender Luz—Deciding when and how to share our kids’ stories publicly can be tricky for parents to navigate, especially when it seems everyone around us is posting photos and stories of their children online. Kid-focused posts are usually met with adoration from mainstream culture, who cherish a refreshing break from the rest of the feed that is so often ranting, despairing, or arguing.

Understandably, parents through adoption would like to be able to share their parenting joys online, too. Such sharing is rampant, as a tour through the thousands of posts tagged #adoptionrocks reveals.

But from an adoptee’s perspective, there are important dynamics to be mindful of before publicizing adoption-related stories. Here are eight of them:

1. Consent and Oversharenting

Young children are unable to provide consent around whether their pictures and stories are shown on the Internet or in other public spaces. But for adoptees, consent is even more complicated than age.

There’s a power imbalance inherent in all mother-child relationships—needed, of course, to parent our children—but we must treat that power with care, especially when it comes to seeking consent from adoptees.

Adoptees are not able to provide true consent to the sharing of their adoption stories until they are “out of the fog”—able to walk their way around all sides of adoption and put into their own words what it means to them. Until then, they will be too worried about pleasing their parents to make authentic decisions around consent.

As an adoptee, I write from experience. Sadly, I was unable to speak my truth around this to my adoptive family until I was in my forties and my adoptive mother had died. Until then, I spent years politely nodding along as she used my story to sing the praises of adoption.

I’d learned at a very early age how to read others and be “good” for my parents—particularly my adoptive mom. From my brain’s perspective, my first mother abandoned me, so I learned to comply in order to keep my next mother close. I desperately needed to win her love. To my survivalist brain, it was a matter of life or death. There was no way I could be honest with my mom about how much it hurt each time she shared “our” adoption story with others.

2. Silencing Adoptees

When adoptive parents lead the conversation on adoption, it silences adoptees and reinforces flawed beliefs.

Unfortunately, my mom’s adoption story was not really “our” story. My story was a different one. And each time my mom shared her story, she unknowingly pushed my story to the background—so much so, that there was no space for me to make sense of it.

Even though I landed in a wonderful adoptive family, because of the initial relinquishment and loss that’s inherent in adoption, I lived prone to feeling like I didn’t matter. The continual sharing of my mother’s side of the story only seemed to reinforce this flawed belief.

3. Control is very important to adoptees.

From the moment it’s determined that we’re better off in one family over another, our destinies, and often our lives, feel beyond our control.

We try to make up for this lacking sense of control in any number of ways. For me it was creating handwritten spreadsheets cataloguing all of my stuffies, and as an adult, going into event planning, where I could control thousands of logistical details. For other adoptees, it might be control over relationships, or eating, or varying forms of self-attack.

No matter how it manifests in adoptees’ lives, when we’re blatantly not in control, it can trigger unhealthy ways of seeking control. More than anything, we should have complete control of our personal stories—including how, and when, we wish to share them.

4. Adoptees are sensitive to feeling used.

Whenever family preservation is bypassed in favor of adoption, an adoptee is used to complete another family. This is the setup of adoption—no matter how great the need for the adoption, and regardless of the loving environments in our adoptive families. Even if it’s hard to agree with this logic, it’s important to be aware of this dynamic and tread gently around it.

Adoptees don’t want to be used by our parents in the name of platform-building or garnering likes. We don’t want to be used to prop up adoption, advocate against abortion, or, in the case of transracial adoption, demonstrate a parent’s racial wokeness.

5. Perpetuating Myths

#adoptionrocks and phrases like “forever family” perpetuate myths.

When it comes to adoption, everything is more complex than simple hashtags or catchy phrases convey. And more often than not, delighted adoptive parents tend to perpetuate the myth that adoption is an entirely beautiful and noble thing.

Adoption can certainly be beautiful—mine was. But it was hard, too, and filled with pain that I felt alone in and overwhelmed by because the myths squeezed out room for complexity.

Without the nuances and perspectives of adoptees—whose bodies carry the complete range of emotions and experiences tied to adoption—the #adoptionrocks myth is not only superficial but causes harm.

Myths don’t help other families when they encounter struggles. Presenting one-sided, sunny stories of adoption are harmful to adoptees, who suffer in isolation and are four times more likely to attempt suicide. Superficial depictions of adoption, too, can cast shadows on our closest relationships.

6. Trust and Honor Are Sidelined

There is a level of mistrust in the parent who publicly shares, because their child’s story has not been honored.

Attaching deeply is already risky for adoptees, due to the trauma of relinquishment. That fragile parent-child relationship becomes even riskier when parents center themselves in stories that ultimately belong to their children. The child’s defended heart asks: Can my mom really be trusted? Does my parent really see and know all parts of me?

Our goal in parenting is for our children to feel safe enough to depend on us. We need that dependence in order to lead children. An environment of trust and safety is also critically important for helping our children learn to love deeply—paramount to emotional wellness.

7. Setting Up Adoptees for Relational Problems

Sharing adoptees’ stories sets up adoptees for relational problems.

If a child learns to be compliant and adapt to their parents’ needs for sharing a child’s stories, how will that same child stand up for themselves in adolescence? Or in a romantic setting when feeling pressured? Or in a work setting when asking for a well-deserved raise?

Having our privacy constantly violated teaches adoptees that consent means consenting. We infer that our purpose as adoptees is to meet others’ needs.

Unintended outcomes: We may not understand healthy boundaries, how to advocate for ourselves, or where all of our immense frustration comes from that catches us all by surprise when it comes out as a storm.

8. Adoptees Need Room to Evolve

Adoptees will evolve and change their views on adoption as time goes on.

Even though my own children are not adopted, I obtain their consent before sharing stories about them online or in other public spaces. But I still have to ask myself if it that consent will hold as their levels of consciousness and critical thinking evolve.

For adoptees, our understanding of adoption is guaranteed to shift over time. As decades press on and maturity informs, our feelings change. I wasn’t able to look honestly at the impact of my adoption until mid-life. Only then could I articulate some of the discomfort or irritation I’d previously felt when consent was sought. While I’d politely given it then, I wouldn’t do so now.

Keeping the decades-long evolution in mind is a good reminder to err on the side of caution when it comes to publicly sharing.

In Summary, Proceed with Awareness

In this social media age, most of us have made mistakes in this area. I’m an excited and proud parent who’s guilty of oversharing about my kids, too.

But awareness of the dynamics around the sharing of adoptees’ stories, and holding an honoring and sensitive perspective before going public, will make an important difference for adoptees and their parent-child relationships.

© Sara Easterly. All rights reserved.
First published by Lavender Luz.

The post Eight Important Dynamics to Consider Before Oversharenting Your Adoption Story appeared first on SARA EASTERLY.

First published by Red Letter Christians—Six years ago, I survived an apocalypse.

My mom was dying—and while it felt like my entire world was crashing down on me, that wasn’t the apocalypse. But it was the catalyst for it.

Even though I survived just fine, and also found myself flourishing afterwards, I’ve only recently learned that an apocalypse isn’t something to be feared. Instead, it’s something to yearn for.

But apocalypse doesn’t necessarily equate to the end of the world, as it seems to be widely interpreted. That’s what I always believed it to be, at least, and it was where much of my sarcasm about getting ready for The Apocalypse has come from. Jokes were made—by me—about how I, as an adoptee, was always waiting for the other shoe to drop, for more trauma to seek me out, and how my hard-wired hyper-vigilance would more than prepare me for the coming of world’s end.

In 2020, though, the sarcasm doesn’t seem so funny. Or fun.

Until I remember my apocalypse. It was fun, which is bizarre, because it came just as my mom was dying. For the second time in my life, I was losing a mother, the mom who raised me and loved me with a fierceness I didn’t return for 41 years because to do so felt too dangerous. Mothers leave, I’d learned at birth. Can another be fully trusted? Just when I finally learned to fully give my heart to my mom, my greatest nightmare—losing her—was coming to fruition. What could be fun about that?

The apocalypse, that’s what—specifically, being able to hear the voice of God for the first time in my life.

Now that I’m an adult, I’m thankful for the BibleProject for explaining the Bible to laypeople people like me. In How to Read the Bible: Apocalyptic Literature, I learned that apocalypse comes from the Greek word that means “uncover.” According to BibleProject, an apocalypse is “When you suddenly see the true nature of something that you couldn’t see before.” It’s a “heavenly perspective on an earthly situation.”

An apocalypse is when the curtain between heaven and earth is opened, and we get a big reveal that usually explains much of our lives.

I wish this had been explained to me much earlier. This knowledge could have helped me get through countless zombie movies during middle-school sleepovers.

In my case, as my mom was dying and I faced the greatest separation I’d ever known, God spoke to me and offered me mother-love in exactly the way I’d always longed to receive it. And suddenly my entire life as an adoptee began to make sense.

At first it struck me as a mistake. I wondered if I hadn’t gone off the deep end. Surely God tuned into the wrong channel. My sister was the devout one. She was losing our mother, too, and just as much in need of comfort. Why me? Me, who always kept my parents’ faith at an arm’s distance? Me, with my dark past? Me, the “bastard child” of an “unwed” mother? Me, who could never relate to the God I learned about—a God who seemed mad at me, a God I would never measure up to, a God who didn’t want me any more than I presumed my birth mother had.

But God did want me.

As I flew away from my mother’s death bed, God was there rocking me, comforting me. “See there, can you feel me rocking you to sleep?” God said, reframing the airplane’s turbulence that had riddled me with anxiety before.

Talking with me in exactly the language and playful tone I could hear, God showed me I was known. “By the way, you’ve got to stop sitting in these seats in front of the exit row that don’t recline.”

I laughed—and lapped it up, but also continued marveling because I couldn’t believe it. I’d never felt more like an outsider anywhere than in the Church. I wasn’t supposed to be a part of God’s “in” club. The Church was God’s home, after all, wasn’t it?

At Church, I always heard props given to adoptive parents for their saviorism. There, everyone around me implied how grateful I must be for my selfless parents. There, I served as an example of a model adoptee, reassuring parents interested in adopting that their children, too, would grow up happy and adjusted. There, where vague, trite, and confusing explanations of adoption abound:

God’s will. (To dismantle one family to make another?)

Your birth mother loved you. (By leaving?) 

You’re our blessing. (Who is adoption about?)

There, where non-adoptees readily teared up at the beautiful story of adoption that mirrors the ways we’re all adopted by God. There, I experienced no room for questions or my grief—always unnoticed, let alone supported. I’ve never known anyone in the Church to deliver an adoptee a casserole to soothe their first mother’s loss and the incredible pain of relinquishment, even though I’ve watched countless adoptive parents receive special treatment for what are widely accepted as their multitudinous, sanctified sacrifices.

Just as I didn’t have a proper understanding for apocalypse, I didn’t have a word for what I now know is gaslighting. I wasn’t able to understand apocalypse because I believed the lies gaslighting told me—that I didn’t matter, that God plays favorites, that my sole purpose was to meet others’ needs, that mothers are breezily replaceable—never grasping that these weren’t necessarily reflections of God’s point of view.

Until my apocalypse, when God showed me that I mattered. Until I encountered the mothering of God.

Too many adoptees feel silenced and alone. Too many adoptees live in alarm, stuck in our brain’s ingrained modes of fight, flight, or fawn. Too many adoptees flee from the Church—and God—because of its misrepresentation throughout our lives.

Adoptees are four times more likely to attempt suicide. I am counted in that statistic. Many of us are raised to be compliant people-pleasers, so it makes sense that our overwhelming emotions and attacking energy, which have to go somewhere, turn inward.

But it doesn’t have to be this way.

Jesus, too, was misunderstood by many in the Church—religious people who ultimately persecuted him. But he kept his eyes on God. Everything looks better when we do that, too.

“Yes, the world can be very scary and you have not felt safe here,” God had said to me on the plane. “But I made all of this. It’s beautiful, too.”

It’s not easy seeing beauty when relinquishment trauma puts us on high alert to danger, darkness, and potential loss. But focusing on God, rather than on the thin understanding of adoption as it’s been presented throughout the American church for the last century, helps us become more adept at taking notice of the beauty. That beauty abounds, even in 2020—in the world, in others, and in each of us.

God has a deeper understanding of us. God gets the nuances of adoption and understands our pain—all of it, even the parts we think we’ve kept totally hidden. Jesus, too, was an adoptee, after all. And God is near to the brokenhearted—adoptees included, because adoption isn’t possible without a trail of broken hearts.

Since my apocalypse, my sense of worthiness has changed. Even on my lowest days, I know that I am adored. When I’m overcome with fear, I focus on God’s light inside of me. When I’m taking myself too seriously, I recall the gentle, loving chuckle of God and remember to laugh and play and create. When I struggle to belong or to be liked, I remember I’m a precious child of God. When I’m unsure, I stop my tendency toward busying around to listen and hope that I’m paying close enough attention to hear what God has to say.

Whether we seek refuge in the Church or not, my wish for all adoptees is to experience an apocalypse. I also yearn for adoption culture as we know it, and as it has been largely fanned by the Church, to receive a heavenly reveal that makes it clear one family isn’t “in” over another, that teaches us to embrace the complexity of adoption, and that makes room for each of us in the adoption constellation to know that we’re immensely loved and nurtured by God.

© Sara Easterly. All rights reserved.
First published by Red Letter Christians.

The post An Adoptee’s Apocalypse appeared first on SARA EASTERLY.

The slow creep started a couple of weeks ago.

I often blame it on the days getting shorter. As summer evenings begin to cool and the days grow shorter, at first I ponder whether it’s got something to do with the changing season or the atmospheric pressure.

Gradually it builds, this feeling of isolation and loneliness. Rejection seems to seek me, and no matter what else disproves it, I only have eyes to see the negative—each seeming to confirm that I don’t matter.

I feel tired. Deflated. Hopeless. Defensive. Friendless. Flat. Numb. Lacking energy.

Did I mention that my birthday is tomorrow?

Like many adoptees, I find my birthday to be a complicated day. I equate it to the mixed feelings many people—adopted or not—say they feel about Christmas. Like Christmas, birthdays get built up as joyous occasions, significant celebratory events. Yet lurking below the surface is often a well of emotions—many of which, if they were to be expressed, wouldn’t match cultural expectations AT ALL and so must stay tucked inside.

For adoptees, our birthdays often remind us of our losses. For those of us relinquished at birth, our birthdays may not be remembered but our bodies and brains hold on to the feelings. Disorienting sadness can overshadow everything, and we can develop a strong instinct to oppose festivities around our day.

Birthdays didn’t always make me feel this way, as you can tell by this gleeful picture taken during my eighth birthday party at The Organ Grinder:

This is partly because we process adoption differently at various stages in our lives. It’s also because my mom was the ultimate Magic Maker when it came to marking special occasions—Christmas always top of the list, but birthdays a close second!

In kindergarten, as in most years, my birthday fell on the first week of school. My mom built up my day by bringing in musical instruments—enough for every student. I still cherish the memory of marching in circles around the rug with my 16 classmates—tooting plastic horns, rattling tambourines, and shaking maracas as we paraded through the classroom to celebrate my big occasion.

This style of lavish treatment continued through college, with giant boxes of presents and handwritten love letters shipped to my dorm, and proceeded into my adulthood—well into it. My mom and dad flew to Seattle for my 41st birthday—unwilling to let the day go by without fanfare.

But then my mom died. Now birthdays are a reminder that I lost not one, but two moms.

Often times, I wish my mom had been able to spot my childhood grief. I wish she had raised me during an era where adoption-savvy information was readily available and she could have known about adoptee trauma and attachment wounds.

Other times, I realize that I had enough of a natural lens for sadness. And I love that my mom had blinders to it—at least on my birthday. The magic my mom created on my birthdays helped counter my sense of worthlessness in ways I only realized after she had gone.

I’m preemptively thanking you for any birthday wishes here, friends, and letting you know that I’m taking tomorrow off from social media to celebrate my birthday, Mom-style. I’m ready to come up out of my dark birthday funk.

I wish you were all here with me in person, and that Covid wasn’t restricting us from gathering together in person, so you could join me in a parade, blasting plastic instruments while shuffling in circles.

But I’m going to imagine my mom leading you in doing that, anyway. And you can imagine me smiling just as freely as I did when I turned eight.

The post Birthday, Mom-Style appeared first on SARA EASTERLY.

First published by Red Letter Christians—

“You’re God’s gift to us.”

“God brought us together.”

“It was God’s will for you to join our family.”

Have you ever said things like this to your adopted child? For adoptees like me—growing up in Christian circles where adoption is often presented as biblically sanctioned and as abortion’s golden opposite—these blessing statements are often enthusiastically shared—both directly with adoptees and with others when our adoption stories are told.

While you’re likely speaking your sincere truth, and while God certainly may have lent a divine hand in bringing you and your child together, this kind of spiritual-speak can be dangerous. As someone who grew up hearing these messages again and again, I’m warning you that it could erode your parent-child relationship—and possibly your child’s belief in a loving God.

As a child, my journey with this started when I was a seven-year-old, following a huge yellow and black veined butterfly all over my front yard. Sadly, my butterfly friend was hit by a car. I stayed by her side as she suffered and ultimately died. As an adoptee prone to sensing and feeling anguish, I felt the butterfly’s death so deeply I thought that I, too, might die.

My mom didn’t know how to console me, especially as I spent days mired in tears and grief. She figured the best way was through church—and the promise of heaven.

Only … it was my mom who was consoled …. and transformed—into a full-fledged “born-again Christian.” She dove in big—first with a Mothers of Preschoolers group. Then by starting a neighborhood Bible study.

“It’s because of Sara that I found God,” my mom would boast to her friends and religious cohorts. Sooner or later, she’d launch into a re-telling of my butterfly story, which became a public talk she gave over and over throughout my life. Thanks to adoption, my mom was given the blessing of a child—who led her to her loving Savior.

People delighted in my mom’s beautiful story of a double blessing. But there was a long-term cost when it came to our mother-daughter relationship. There was also a cost to my faith.

While children are undeniably blessings, being overly effusive about “God’s divine plans” when it comes to adoption discounts the very real loss for adoptees and first/birth families—as if only one family’s triumph is what matters to God, as if the lifelong consequences for adoptees and first/birth families don’t matter.

Anytime we look past loss and grief in order to center ourselves in a story, we’re presenting an overly simplistic, and oppressive, view of religion. Touting “God brought us together” is the equivalent of saying, “Your tragedy is God’s will for my own benefit.” I’d even argue that declaring God’s very mysterious will with strong authority could violate the third commandment: “God won’t put up with the irreverent use of his name.” (Exodus 20:7 MSG)

What’s more, for adoptees—already prone to feeling unworthy from the moment of relinquishment no matter how wonderful the circumstances are in our adoptive homes—this presentation of God’s preference reinforces our tendency toward flawed thinking. It becomes more proof that we are broken, unwanted, insignificant. We’re already inclined to silently hold on to this pain and feel ashamed. Feeling that God is all about our adoptive parents, and we’re merely a tool to bring them joy, fulfillment, and family, can reinforce a belief that we don’t matter, further silence us, and alienate us from the God our faithful parents are desiring to point us toward.

This alienation is not entirely the result of religious messaging, to be fair. Adoption, by its very nature, can lead adoptees to question God. Nancy Newton Verrier, an adoptive mother and psychotherapist focused on separation and loss in adoption, has referred to a common experience for adoptees in infancy, where “the overall feeling is a betrayal of the universe, of God, of the cosmos, of the infinite being. This was not supposed to happen,” Verrier writes. “It is outside the realm of the natural order of life.”[1]

Adoption is not natural—and we gloss over this with heavy leaning on spiritual speak. An infant is not supposed to be separated from the mother whose womb brought forth life. Isn’t that at the heart of the pro-life argument?

It shouldn’t be a surprise, then, that so many adopted children raised in the Christian faith run from it as adults. Similar dissonance that adoptees notice in widespread religious messaging around adoption is real:

• God takes sides, and it’s not mine.
• Premarital sex is a sin … but it may also be God’s will to bring a baby to a family in need.
• We can be sure of God’s will … when it suits—because it couldn’t be God’s will for anyone to struggle with infertility and not have a child.
• Adoption is the answer to abortion … but pro-life isn’t as important when it comes to the historical and still prevalent use of corruption, coercion, and racism that can factor into adoption.

My private adoption happened to be the result of coercion. My adoptive mom had a hint that something wasn’t right about the circumstances surrounding my adoption, but she wanted a baby so badly she didn’t ask questions.

Knowing that she was a good person, I have come to understand that she wouldn’t have been able to live with herself if she thought she’d taken another mother’s baby. She had to believe that my adoption was divinely arranged. Once I realized this, the spiritual-speak began to make a lot of sense.

Similarly, once I understood God in my own way, apart from religious justification, I could see that God always cared deeply about me as an adoptee. There was a holy hand looking out for me in my adoptive family. But I’ve come to understand that same divine presence would have been there had I stayed with my first/birth family, too.

I share all of this not to make you wrong for adopting—nor for fiercely loving your child and saying so. But out of a sincere hope that adoptive parents will steer away from the blessing language to be more honoring to adoptees and to God.

“Every desirable and beneficial gift comes out of heaven.” (James 1:17 MSG) Children are no exception, no matter how they come to your family. Thank God for the child who has blessed your life—but keep it private, remembering that adoption is always more nuanced than simplistic religious language can possibly convey.

[1] Nancy Newton Verrier, Coming Home to Self: The Adopted Child Grows Up (Baltimore: Gateway Press, Inc., 2003), 354.

© Sara Easterly. All rights reserved.
This essay was first published by Red Letter Christians.

The post The Dangers of Adoptees as Blessings appeared first on SARA EASTERLY.

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It’s cool that the first adoptee has been selected for this year’s Gerber Baby contest. Yes, young Magnolia is adorable. But her viral story is what many refer to as an adoption fairy tale—one of many seemingly feel-good news stories that are always centered on the “amazing” adoptive parents’ experience, designed to make society gush.

Compliments are usually applied in thick, giving props to the adoptive parents for how giving and selfless they are, and how lucky their children are (even though these are praises that would feel gross slathering onto parents of biological children—not to mention, often imply racial and/or class superiority). In one post shared on social media, someone lauded, “This child was adopted into a loving family who get the complexities of adoption.”

I was glad to learn Magnolia’s is an open adoption, which will go a long way for Magnolia and both her first and adoptive parents. But if her new family really understood the complexities of adoption, they would honor a few important rules:

1. Do not use your adopted child to win a contest, to gain publicity, or to spread your personal message.

Adoptees have already been used to create, or add to, a family. It may sound harsh without the typical sugarcoated adoption talk rooted in savior-ism, but it is a logistical truth: Adoptees (and first/birth parents) are used in order to make adoption a reality.

If this were a common understanding between all in the adoption constellation, we would understand how complex this is for an adopted child. But with sensitivity around this, parents could make a concerted effort to ensure that any using of their adopted child stops there.

No parent should further use any adopted child to enter a contest, for post-contest national publicity, or with an agenda to highlight how “beautiful” adoption is. (Adoption can certainly be beautiful, but it is ALWAYS much more complex than that since it starts with family separation and trauma.)

2. Make room for ALL of an adoptee’s feelings.

My heart aches by the pressure already piled onto Magnolia via her parents’ and our culture’s commitment to a happy story.

“She brings us so much joy,” said her father in a 3rd hour of TODAY interview. “She’s always happy,” he added, before describing her as “the happy little girl that she always is.”

In describing Magnolia’s personality, Gerber’s announcement shared that she “brings joy to everyone she meets.”

First of all, how do the joyful emotions felt by others say anything at all about Magnolia’s personality?

And where is the room in all of this for Magnolia’s complete mix of feelings? Who has ever met a child who is ALWAYS happy? Anyone who’s been around a young child for six minutes knows that’s a ridiculous description. No such child exists … except in a weary parent’s dreams, when entertaining the fantasy of parenting a robot occasionally sounds appealing!

What happens over her lifetime when Magnolia is forced to live up to this pressure to always be happy and bring others joy? Will she question her existence? Her purpose? Is her life really only about bringing other people joy? How will she bring joy to herself, if it’s ingrained in her to always be focused outward?

What about her other feelings? Magnolia holds more feelings inside than simply happiness, even if her adoptive dad doesn’t yet notice her full range. Will there be room for Magnolia to feel emotions often labeled as “negative,” such as frustration? Anger? Jealousy? Fear? Sadness?

Speaking of sadness, where is the room for her grief? Adoption begins with loss, lest we forget. Magnolia lost her first mother, open adoption or not. As anyone who’s lost a parent at any age can attest, parental loss can be painful, and can take years, or even up to a lifetime, to process. It’s even harder to process when it’s preverbal and unrecognized. Magnolia may not have the words and consciousness now, but she has experienced deep loss that hasn’t simply disappeared because she was placed into a happy, new environment.

If the “happy” narrative is doggedly pressed, and if her adoptive mother continues believing it’s good that “we celebrate adoption every single day,” will there be room for Magnolia to mourn the loss that is also a part of her story? Or will Magnolia, like so many adoptees, stuff her unsanctioned feelings deep, to the point of depression and self-attack?

3. Keep adoption a private matter.

Sharing that a child is adopted is completely up to the adoptee and those closest to the family. Magnolia’s adoptive mother did not need to call this out on the TODAY show, or with Gerber at any point in the contest process. It doesn’t matter how obvious it may be, looks-wise. It’s nobody’s business but the adoptee’s.

Magnolia is a not a prop. She is a human being, who might one day be upset that her adoption was shared so publicly before she was old enough to understand the long-term consequences and provide consent.

Now that she’s been brought onto the public stage, we all know Magnolia’s personal details—details best shared with those closest to her. It can be painful for adoptees to be cornered into talking about being adopted when others nosily prod. Adoptees already stand out in the family, without shared genealogy. Throughout childhood and adolescence it can be even more uncomfortable standing out. Talking or not talking about being adopted should be Magnolia’s choice. But being appointed “the spokesbaby” for adoption takes the choice away from her.

To that end, I feel torn even writing about young Magnolia. I have been sitting on sharing this post for almost a week now. But since she has already been thrown into the spotlight, and in the interest of education and advocacy for all adoptive families, I also feel it’s important to voice the many things that are inherently problematic with this situation—not only for Magnolia, but also for society at large.

Whenever we’re confronted with these kinds of stories that are dripping with the sweetness of fantasy, please keep in mind that anything related to adoption is more layered and complex than we may first be led to believe.

The post Gerber Baby and Adoption Fairy Tales appeared first on SARA EASTERLY.

Mother’s Day can be hard—for other reasons besides missing my mom. That’s because I have another mom—the woman who raised me for my first nine months in utero. She delivered me into this world before we were pulled apart by shady adoption practices in an era when patriarchy was left totally unchecked.

I felt the mother loss throughout my entire life. I wondered about my birth mother constantly. I imagined what she looked like, and if I looked like her. I wondered if she thought of me. I looked to see myself in any older woman I admired. Fantasies held so much promise and power, they ruled.

RELATED: “Real” Talk in Adoption

Sadly, my mom had unresolved issues of jealousy and felt threatened by my first mother. My closed adoption was not only literal, but also emotional. I opted not to talk about my birth mother because I didn’t want to hurt my mom’s feelings. But it added a layer of complexity to Mother’s Day—and to my relationship with both mothers every day.

Even now, as an adult, I struggle with fearing I’m hurting one or the other mothers in some way on this loaded occasion that is Mother’s Day. If I celebrate one mother, will the other mother feel left out? Is it dishonoring to one mom to honor the other? How can I honor both mothers?

RELATED: Moses and Me: A Biblical and Personal Case for Honoring Birth Mothers

Women being jealous of other women is commonplace. My mom was certainly not the first to feel envy of another woman—nor was she the only mom to feel pangs of worry and fear over the thought of losing her daughter to another mother.

In a way, it’s natural. When our hearts dare to love another deeply, the thought of losing that love cuts to the core—and there is almost nothing as fierce as mother-love.

I was reminded of this last night at bedtime, when my young daughter (biological to me) asked me in a whisper, “What’s your greatest fear, Mom?”

Losing you. My heart promptly whispered back. (But sharing this with my daughter in that moment felt inappropriate, so I responded in a murkier way that suggested the same thing.)

Even if fear of loss comes naturally to us as parents, though, that doesn’t make it okay to let fear take hold. Honoring both mothers is not an adopted child’s responsibility. Children are not meant to take care of their parents’ feelings. Children shouldn’t have to choose between mothers—both of whom hold a significant place in their child’s heart.

Today is Birth Mother’s Day. I only learned of this holiday recently, and I love it. It rounds out Mother’s Day weekend. Reaching out to, or talking about, your child’s birth mother today, in that same spirit of appreciation and love intended for Mother’s Day, will not only help lessen the mother-conflict for adoptees, but also remind everyone that that both mothers are part of a team.

As they say, there is strength in numbers, and it is a wonderful thing for a child to feel love for, and to be loved by, both mothers.

The post Celebrating Birth Mother’s Day appeared first on SARA EASTERLY.

First published by Lavender Luz—Being an adult adoptee while being a parent can be an asset. I’m not advocating for trauma as a prerequisite for parenting, but I do think experiencing intense separation as a child has shaped my parenting in significant ways. Because of lived experience I know, on a primal and intuitive level, the importance of attachment. I understand how damaging separation can be, particularly for children who have already been saturated in separation.

For this reason, when my children were still babies, I sought out the attachment-based, developmental wisdom of Dr. Gordon Neufeld, bestselling author of Hold On to Your Kids and founder of the Neufeld Institute, an organization dedicated to helping caregivers raise children to their full potential. Over the last decade, the relational and science-based insights I’ve learned have supported my parenting immensely. Many of Dr. Neufeld’s insights are particularly useful when caring for children—adopted and nonadopted alike—under any number of stressors in this often-alarming world and become even more essential during a pandemic.

The Dual Face of Separation

It’s important to understand that separation is both the biggest trauma and the biggest threat to your adoptee. Remembering this paradox is helpful in knowing how to parent during this difficult time.

Separation-related problems show up in a variety of ways, such as anxiety, agitation, fears and phobias, or trouble with bedtime. As I mentioned in Part 1, there is a way in which the pandemic-related shelter-in-place regulations help resolve a lot of separation, keeping families physically together and removing many of the potential dangers that unconsciously face adoptees into more separation.

But there is more to removing separation than through physical closeness.

Tip 1: Avoid Discipline That Separates

Time-outs, love withdrawal, silent treatment, and sending children to their rooms are some common discipline practices that use separation (emotional or physical) to elicit good behavior from children. These practices may work in the moment, but they come at a cost. Especially for the adoptee, whose brain has held on to early separation trauma and whose heart will quickly harden when facing too much separation, too much shame, or when the child feels unsafe.

This is true all of the time, but especially so during a pandemic, when adoptees may already be facing a lot of separation and feeling especially unsafe.

What’s more, the separation that ensues from these kinds of disciplinary practices can point the child down the path of feeling more alarmed, more frustrated. OR going into pursuit of love: working to be “good” in order to preserve the relationship—which might not look like a problem to the parent at first, but creates an underlying insecurity for the child that can have lifelong effects in future relationships.

Instead of using separation to address behavior problems, aim to keep your child’s heart soft and strengthen your child’s attachment to you. This requires more effort and takes longer than more immediate fixes focused on problem behavior, but the payoff will be more than worth it.

This doesn’t mean ignoring unruly behavior. But it does mean treading lightly when it comes to responding in any way that will message to an adoptee that receiving love is dependent on being “good.” The intention is to keep your relationship solid and your child’s heart soft. Children with soft hearts are more inclined to be good for those to whom they are attached … and to eventually mature to their full potential: the ultimate goal.

Tip 2: Bridge Separation

“Bridging” is a commonly used term by Dr. Neufeld and a tactic I often employ whenever separation is inevitable. During the pandemic, when we are now physically apart from many loved ones for the foreseeable future and face the added threat of being apart should COVID-19 take hold, bridging separation is a way of keeping other key adults in the adoptee’s world close—birth parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, teachers, and cousins.

In this regard and during a pandemic, technology and creativity come in handy. In our home right now, this looks like regular online lessons led by grandparents, regular virtual family reunions, and shared meals over Zoom. While it’s not the same as in-person connection, cultivating such bridges to other caring adults and loved ones is especially meaningful at this time.

There is the added benefit of extending the village of attachment for my children and easing some of the heavy lifting from my shoulders. It also reinforces that caring comes in the form of hierarchy—where my children are looking up to other elders for information and guidance.

Most significant, though, through my lens as an adoptee, is the way this bridging reduces separation for me. I am keeping loved ones close. I’m finding ways to hold on to the rest of our family members, so that in turn my children feel the security and rest in knowing that we are ALL holding on to them during this hard time.

Tip 3: Connection Makes Separation More Tolerable

The closure of schools has us all schooling-at-home, and if we’re working parents, we’ve been dealt the unrealistic task of accomplishing both at the same time—or compromising sleep in order to tackle multiple roles each day. This isn’t sustainable for the long-haul and unless we are super-human, we will not be able to excel at both homeschooling and working as if it’s business as usual. We can’t be perfect employees and perfect parents—it wasn’t possible before the pandemic disrupted life as we knew it, and it’s glaringly impossible now.

So how to prioritize? Add in more time for one-on-one connection with your child, with you in a leadership role.

Adoptees are masters at picking up on disconnection, which we can be quick to read as rejection. As I mentioned in Part 1, a lot of adoptees are also prone to feeling our survival is completely up to us. If we feel a need to defend against vulnerable feelings due to feeling rejected, or if we sense a leadership or caring lapse, our brains will tell us that we need to take charge.

Tip 4: Maintain Your Role as the Leader

But now is not the time to cede your leadership role to an adopted child, no matter how scattered the pandemic may make you feel pulled in too many directions. Even if an adoptee’s energy seems strong and dominating, it’s coming from a deeply insecure place—a sense of overwhelm at the separation and alarm being experienced.

This doesn’t mean you have to push aside everything else. But intentionality in your day-to-day connection will ensure it doesn’t slip by the wayside during this chaotic, unsettling season. “A child who experiences closeness in the form of emotional or psychological intimacy is much more able to tolerate separation,” according to Dr. Neufeld.1

Preparing your child’s favorite dish, picking out a great book to read together every day, teaching your child to garden or play an instrument, or going on walks together—just a few ideas of ways you can assume responsibility for helping your child hold on to you … and have some fun, in the process!

You CAN Turn Separation into Connection

Separation is unavoidable—even more so right now in the midst of the novel coronavirus pandemic. We are all feeling pangs of separation, but adoptees will need particular care and support in this regard because separation has already affected us so deeply. Adoption is the result of a profound separation, after all.

But with an eye on reducing additional separation, separation does not have to be an ongoing source of relational frustration and can instead offer opportunities for your child to more vulnerably attach to you … for a much deeper, satisfying, and long-lasting connection between you and your child.

The post Cultivating Connection with a Separation-Saturated Child During Covid-19 appeared first on SARA EASTERLY.

Both the Hulu series and book by Celeste Ng, Little Fires Everywhere, have sparked a blaze in me as I devoured both from the perspective of an adult adoptee, mother, daughter, and writer. In celebration of both the book and the on-screen adaptation, over the next several days I’ll be sharing some of my reflections on various themes that stood out for me. There will definitely be spoilers in this review series, so if you haven’t yet watched and/or read, you may want to flag these for a different time, once you have.

 

Little Fires Everywhere and Giving Away Precious

Today I’m ruminating on what it means to give away that which is precious to us—factors that propelled key characters to make such sacrifices, and the benefits/rewards and ultimate cost of doing so. This time, I’m primarily concentrating on the mini-series, where certain plot points are portrayed differently than in the novel.

What leads us to sacrifice that which is precious to us?

I loved how Little Fires Everywhere had me considering this question in so many situations, such as:

• Lexie giving away her virginity
• Mia giving away a cherished piece of art
• Mia giving away her body for another family’s baby
• Bebe giving away her infant

First of all, I have to commend the series from a writing perspective, headed by showrunner and executive producer Liz Tigelaar, inspired and influenced, of course, by author Celeste Ng. What an artful setup of the characters’ pain. Their suffering feels all the more intense to us when we come alongside the characters’ emotions and know exactly what is precious to each of them … before it is given away and short-term rewards are overshadowed by complications that fester and burn into one of many little fires.

In all cases, desperation is the overwhelming driver. But what puts each character into that state of desperation, and the consequences that ensue, are unique for each character.

Lexie’s Virginity

Early on, we see it’s important to Lexie to hold off on having sex with Brian. She insists they wait until prom for their consummation, to model after Brenda and Dylan from Beverly Hills, 90210.

But before long Brian pulls away from Lexie, after learning that she’s stolen Pearl’s story of personal struggle to use in her own Yale application essay. Lexie moves into desperate mode. Sex, she impulsively decides, is the only way to keep Brian close, and so she gives away that virginity she’d been holding on to as precious.

The reward? Lexie is able to hold on to Brian for a little while longer. She also gains a sense of superiority, being first among her friends to lose her virginity and brag about every detail.

But the cost is long-term intimacy. Lexie knows her fix is temporary and grows insecure and manipulative. Ethical and racial tension builds, and she has to work harder to protect her fragile relationship. Lexie recognizes the futility in the couple’s shallow level of relating soon after becoming pregnant. They’re not close enough for Lexie to honestly confide the pregnancy to him, especially after Brian makes it clear he’s not up for becoming a parent. Neither sex nor a potential baby would keep her relationship intact, so the sacrifice had been futile.

Mia’s Artwork

In episode four, “The Spider Web,” Mia finds herself in a situation where she decides to sell a piece of artwork that is especially meaningful. Over the course of several episodes, we learn of two cherished pieces of art—one a photographic expression of Mia’s “terrifying” side, created under the guideance of her mentor and eventual love interest, the renowned artist Pauline Hawthorne—and another, a photograph of Mia taken by Pauline Hawthorne. When Elena offers to buy the first piece, Mia tells her it’s not for sale. When Anita reminds Mia which piece would make the kind of money she needs, Mia at first insists she can’t sell that one.

But desperation pushes Mia to compromise her stand. She’s projecting all kinds of pain onto her co-worker and friend, Bebe, wanting to help fight a battle for a child in a case against privilege that echoes her nightmares. Out of desperation she first offers to sell one piece of art to Elena, and when that fails, sends the Pauline Hawthorne art to Anita.

The cost, though, is that Mia’s very efforts to keep her daughter close end up pushing Pearl away when the Pauline Hawthorne photo leaks to the media. The privacy Mia’s worked so hard to build, ever on the run to stay hidden from her past, is now compromised. Pearl is rightfully angry with her mother, questioning Mia’s lies and their life of unnecessary hardship and transitions. These are substantial costs.

Mia’s Body

In episode six, we finally come to understand Mia’s past. Always a passionate artist, she’d been elated to move to New York to attend a prestigious art school for a degree in fine arts. Soon university offers more than a honing of Mia’s artistic talents, when her mentor takes an interest in Mia.

But after Mia’s financial assistance is rescinded, she becomes desperate fast. As a struggling student without support from her parents, Mia doesn’t have the means to come by $12,000 to stay in school. She takes her brother’s advice to heart, “There’s always a way,” saying yes to an offer of surrogacy so that she can hold on to both art school and Pauline. The same body Mia had been honoring through her art, and through following her sexual longings, gets sacrificed.

Mia gets to stay in school. Her relationship with Pauline progresses to a deeper level. The cost, though, is that Mia finds she cannot go through with the surrogacy arrangement. After her brother dies and she loses her parents due to their shame and ostracizing, Mia can’t handle additional loss. Fleeing from New York and changing her name, Mia ends up creating for herself a lifetime of running—instability for her daughter, while Mia is plagued with nightmares of Pearl’s father catching up to her.

Bebe’s Baby

When we are fully introduced to Bebe’s story, we are dropped into the scene that shows what she holds most precious—right in her arms. But Bebe is in her moment of ultimate desperation—an immigrant experiencing difficulties breastfeeding while alone and living in poverty, unable to afford electricity to heat her barren apartment or formula for her ceaselessly crying infant, May Ling. It’s easy to see, though, how much May Ling means to her, through Bebe’s desperation to keep her baby alive.

As Bebe’s desperation escalates into hopelessness, she makes a life-changing decision and gives precious May Ling away—leaving her at the fire station.

The reward comes for May Ling. She is treated for the hypothermia she’d suffered and placed in a new home. There, she’s nurtured by two loving parents who’d been desperate to finally have a child to care for and bestow with a plush and cozy life thanks to their means.

The cost, though, is that May Ling can’t rest until she knows where her baby is. She’s haunted and overcome emotionally at the sight of other young girls who would be her daughter’s age. She’s full of regret and desperately wants to reunite with her baby.

And while May Ling is too young for words, the additional cost is to her sense of self. No matter how plush and loving her new life with the McCullough family may be, her formative experiences of taking in the world are based on the ultimate separation: between mother and child.

As an adoptee, I know too well how deeply the trauma of this loss will affect May Ling (renamed Mirabelle) for the rest of her life, throughout all of her relationships. It will be harder for her in a family that has shown an inability to acknowledge the importance of her heritage and first mother. She will likely feel a divide between the two mothers, giving rise to fantasies and secrecy as she pines for her first mother.

Like many adoptees, Mirabelle may feel pressure to live up to her adoptive parents’ great expectations—unspoken, but inferred: that she fill the hole left by their tragic season of infertility. If the significance of Mirabelle’s adoption is unacknowledged and her preverbal grief left untreated, she’ll likely either embrace the role of people-pleaser at the expense of her true self, or she might show any number of signs of what could later be labeled rebellion—both are common destructive paths for adoptees in similar situations.

This is not to say the cost to Mirabelle is completely hopeless, but her parents are going to need to wake up soon! (And based on the ending, this is likely a moot point.)

So … are such sacrifices of the heart worth it?

As I look at the collective of these examples in Little Fires Everywhere, it’s easy for me to judge. Giving away that which is precious to our hearts ALWAYS seems like an unwise path to choose—at least in hindsight. In fiction and engaging on-screen drama, it amps up the plot and engages us in the story. But as far as what is good for the characters, the cost seems too great in the end to have made sacrifices of the heart worth it.

This is how life is, though, isn’t it? And off-screen, there’s more to it than that. Outcomes of each complicated heart-choice build into a series of other complex heart-choices, each bringing about other rewards and costs. A reader recently shared these words about a conversation she had about my book:

“Life is drama. We DO have ups and downs. Those hard parts of the story are the parts that need resolution. And Sara showed us that resolution and redemption. In other words, don’t judge a book by the messy part of the plot.”

I believe her words apply to Little Fires Everywhere, too. Without the drama, without the ups and downs, without circumstances that sometimes result in hard choices sacrificing the precious, there is no opportunity for change and growth. To quote from my memoir, Searching for Mom—not to be shameless, but because there seem to be a lot of complementary themes:

“Mistakes of all kinds are messy. Mistakes are painful. Mistakes hurt—often others. My mistakes hurt you, and all those who haven’t had a chance to know you. But mistakes help us grow. Mistakes offer us the opportunity to transform.”

To that end, I’ve enjoyed how Little Fires Everywhere has transformed me, pushing me to consider so many examples of ways life brings us to the point of choices, and the impact of those choices when our core values are most compromised.

There are even more examples of other key characters giving away that which is precious: Pearl, Elena, Bill—to name a few and the list could go on. What things touched you in this regard? Join me on Facebook and Instagram for conversation. I’d love to discuss more!

RELATED: Little Fires Everywhere, Narcissism, and Mother-Blaming

The post Little Fires Everywhere—An Adult Adoptee’s Reflections: Giving Away Precious appeared first on SARA EASTERLY.