by S. Kripa Cooper-Lewter

2013

 The stories we are told and the stories we tell have great meaning for our lives.

 As a social worker, researcher, author, life coach, wife, parent, and adult adoptee, I am fascinated by the way families go about constructing a coherent narrative of their family lives. The narratives children are told by their families shape how they view themselves in relation to family and the broader world. This is one of the most important functions of families: giving children a sense of identity.

Personal identity develops in part through the family’s historical and cultural legacies, passed on through stories and related experiences. As part of everyday life, stories are developed and shared from one family member to the next, a rich process of interweaving and co-construction of narratives—layered with meaning—that bind families together. As children begin to narrate their own lives, incorporating their family’s stories into their sense of self, they often revisit the narratives they have been told across their lifespan and revise their narratives based on new information and experiences.

For children of color who are adopted, adoption narratives carry huge weight. As adoptive parents and others create or transmit their origin stories, children listen closely and internalize the accompanying messages about adoption. Narrated stories of birth and adoption play a significant role in fostering self-esteem, resilience, and strength. When explaining how a child joined their family, the way in which the story is constructed and told is critical for self-acceptance and the ability to trust. Even for adopted children with areas of uncertainty and gaps in their historical legacies, this act of narration is crucial, because they still carry with them biological reminders or marks of their heredity, serving as a reminder of the past ties they once had.

In 2012, I completed a qualitative dissertation based on the life stories of twenty women of color adopted transnationally and transracially to the United States before turning three. The women in my study were between the ages of 25-38 and represented eight different countries of origin. I utilized the autobiographical narrative to explore and compare how these women regarded their identity formation, the meaning they attributed to their experiences, and how they constructed or reconstructed their personal narratives and identities over time. Across these twenty life stories, four re-occurring themes emerged:

• Difference: how being different shaped them
• Connections: how family and relationships influenced their hopes and dreams
• Identities: finding and revising who they were and could become
• The Journey: gaining perspective and making meaning out of their life experiences

Despite experiences of vulnerability, loss, and challenge, each woman interviewed and every story shared demonstrated the human spirit could emerge strong, beautiful, and resilient.

The stories these women were told as children about their beginning history shaped their initial perspective of how they came into the world and who they were. As young girls, they often experienced both subtle and not-so-subtle messages about the possible circumstances into which they were born. Being loved by their birth mothers enough to be given away or rescued from a life of poverty emerged as common narratives about the beginning of their life. For example, Lena shared, “So that was basically the narrative, that I was the daughter of a poor single woman who just wanted to give me a better chance at life [laughter], as is often the story, I think.” However, the narratives of being rescued or given the opportunity for a better life did not always provide a satisfactory explanation or rationale for the underlying difference transnationally-adopted women felt and faced. As Hope explained, “One of the interesting things now that I see is she’d always emphasize the poverty that she brought me from … More than, ‘It’s okay to be adopted, it’s okay to be different.’”

In contrast, the stories told by other parents omitted any reference to birth family. For these women, their beginning narratives began with a recounting how their parents came to the decision to adopt or other aspects of the adoption process (not being able to have children, completing the adoption home-study, going to pick up their daughter from the airport). Some women felt that their parents’ omission of their birth family’s presence or contribution created a void or gap in their self-understanding, although as young girls, they did not articulate or verbalize these feelings. As these women reflected back upon their beginning adoption narrative, they expressed a desire that their parents would have shared more openly, as Sylvia shared, “I wish they would have been more open about my life before I joined their family.”

In other instances, narratives were incomplete because of abandonment, relinquishment, or complex adoption processes (including sealed records). Not having a “birth” or “beginning” story may create anxiety across different stages of development. The women in the study highlighted the importance of the source of information underlying their beginning adoption narratives. Common sources of information or misinformation included what was contained in their adoption paperwork, or what their parents had been verbally told by an adoption agency representative at the time of their adoption. Given the scarcity or lack of information in many situations, abandonment was a common theme among participants’ beginning stories. After learning that their daughters had been abandoned, some parents created a beginning narrative to attempt to explain this situation. In other instances, parents provided intricately detailed stories, with layer after layer of detail. However, later in life, some women found they were unable to verify these details, leading to further questioning and doubt.

Participants identified the beginning narratives their parents told as incredibly powerful. The narratives helped to shape their developing identities and understanding of how they came to be. Some parents had difficulty addressing their daughter’s birth family history. Most parents based their narrative on initial records or conversations with adoption agency representatives, while others developed explanations of their own. Regardless of how the stories were formed, based on fact or fiction, the stories contributed to the initial lens with which women began to view themselves and make sense of what it meant to be adopted.

Each one of us has a personal narrative: the story we tell ourself about who we are and how we are connected to others. The experience of adoption makes the construction of an autobiographical narrative and related identity processes more complex, especially when there are gaps in information. Based on what I have learned from the women I listened to in my research, from the many other adoptees I have met and spoken with over the years, and from my own experience as an adopted person, I have come to believe that it is extremely important for adoptive parents and others who are imparting adoption narratives to:

• Choose words carefully.
• Speak honestly.
• Honor all aspects of a child’s narrative, including both the known and unknown.

Equip and empower your children to decide when and with whom they want to share or not share their story. Let them know there may be pieces of their story yet to unfold.

Our stories are sacred. One day the stories you have passed on to your children as their adoption narrative will become an essential part of their own life story. The stories you tell matter.

Stephanie Kripa Cooper-Lewter, Ph.D., L.M.S.W., is a Certified Personal and Executive Coach who has been a keynote speaker at Pact Family Camp. Portions of this article excerpted and revised from Dr. Cooper-Lewter’s dissertation, “Identity Journeys: Life Stories of Women Adopted Transnationally as Children.”