Man's Primal Wound

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I was in 2nd grade when my parents told me I was adopted.

That’s the earliest memory I have of being ‘different’.

I told my friends after my parents gave me the news and they started making fun of me, saying my parents bought me at the baby store. As if I was Magilla Gorilla swinging in a hammock inside Mr. Peebles pet store and many people passed me by because I wasn’t good enough.

My mom always says that I was claimed. My birth mother gave me up right at birth, I was placed in an orphanage nursery (The New York Foundling – please donate HERE) and 30 days later my parents were able to take me home. My adoptive parents will always be my parents; I am a grateful adoptee.

It wasn’t until I was 46 that I got any information about my birth parents. My wife had encouraged—not so gently, she nudged—me to try to get info because I had spoken frequently about it. I had filled out paperwork twice over the previous 20 years and never sent it. It was time to see if I could get some medical and background info.

They were just two kids – maybe they dated, maybe it was a one and done kind of thing, but my birth dad offered marriage so I think they must have had some kind of relationship.

My birth parents were both 18 years old. Both Irish Catholic kids. Holy Mother Church would be proud they didn’t use a condom but they would probably need to do about 100 Hail Mary’s each for the sin of pre-marital sex.

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They were just kids.

It shattered all the different personality scenarios I had in my head over the years about who and what my birth parents were. I had this idea that my birth mom was like the good-hearted prostitute in Pretty Woman—sweet! My mom was Julia Roberts!—who just couldn’t bear to abort her baby. Maybe she had fallen in love with her ‘client’. Or perhaps I was the bastard son of 1000 angry souls like Freddy Krueger. These are the things you think of as an adoptee who watches movies: Where did I come from? Who am I? What am I a product of?

They were just two kids. Maybe they dated, maybe it was a one and done kind of thing. My birth dad offered marriage so I think they must have had some kind of relationship. Birth mom’s mother was not happy, her dad was more compassionate. No idea about birth dad’s parents.

Two kids. High school kids. Innocent kids. Well, maybe not so innocent.

My birth mother, at 18 years of age, made the decision to have me and give me up for adoption. The info said that she told birth dad after he offered marriage that they both couldn’t take care of me and it would be too hard for them. Was that true? Maybe she dealt with the Catholic guilt and shame of being pregnant, and after she did the ‘right thing’ of having me, she just wanted to move on with her 18-year-old self and have a life. Maybe her mother was not ready to be the grandmother of a bastard. A mistake.

I cannot control these things and cannot control the thoughts of ‘what if’ and ‘why’ in my head.

All I know is that their decision affected the course of my life and why, despite how good my life has been, there is still an empty void of not belonging that stirs in my soul.

I was given up.

Abandoned.

Not good enough.

A mistake.

Did birth mom have other kids she kept? How did birth mother and birth dad move on? Do I have half brothers and sisters? Do I look like anyone, have the same mannerisms of anyone? Does anyone mirror me?

Until I read Nancy Verrier’s book “The Primal Wound” I didn’t realize how much my adoption had affected me, my emotional makeup and the way I interact with people and how I handled life events as an empty feeling child.

Again, I’ve had a wonderful life with the usual ups and downs. My parents gave me the best of everything and did the best they could for me, and still do to this day. I have been incredibly lucky to have the loving parents I do but they cannot stop the way I feel—it is an inside thing—something that has tugged at me my whole life. It is something that has simultaneously driven me, hindered me, and caused me to isolate and back away from people and situations. A life spent with a chip on my shoulder to prove myself and to prove to my birth parents they made a mistake in giving me up. And it is my abandonment-insecurity complex that’s caused me to keep people at arm’s length.

The road to ‘wholeness’ has been long and winding, and for many years I have sought to force many different square pegs into the hole in my heart. That’s a story for another time.

For now, this is the first part of my story as part of the adoption triad.

If you are an adoptee, have you felt this way?

If you are an adoptive parent, what has your experience been?