The Ghosts of Adoption aka Living Haunted

Silhouettes

A silhouette without a face these ghosts I chase from place to place.
Shadows playing hide and seek elude my call evade my reach.
They come and go within my dreams, looming near but never seen.
Just when I think they've gone away I realize they are back to stay.
Haunted by similarities, in the mirror this face I see.
It is mine but comes from where?
I find no peace, only blank stares.
Few clues to riddles lost in time.
Can't capture what I can not find.
Pursuing what I can't deny.
The truths from days that have long gone by.

I hear so much well intentioned, and some not so much so, "advice" doled out to adoptees about their adoptive situations.  Mostly in search and reunion, or more importantly the lack thereof.  I think as adoptees we are always searching even if we have found our biological family and roots.  We search for our place in a family we are not connected to by genes and heredity.  We search for our place in the world as we watch other families operate out of this commonly shared heredity.  And we search for your place within our biological family if we are lucky enough to find them, and be accepted by them.

Most know both of my biological parents have refused to release their identities to the courts.  And, although my biological mother sent a non-identifying letter and a 40th birthday card both of my biological parents want to carry on and keep the secret that is my existence.  Just how does one ever forget about the roots and genes they come from?  Rhetorical there.

You don't, you can't, and you never will.  You can live in denial, you can push it as far to the back of your mind as you can, but at some point in time it will come up and confront you and most of the time without notice.  I believe it's better to address it when it comes up or burying the emotions and denying them, at least for me, have worse consequences at a later time. 

I turned off the computer and the TV the other day and decided to take my mind off of adoption and do something else.  Not an hour it seemed that went by as I changed channels that there was not some adoption themed show on or topic that came up in conversation on news and talk shows.  I switched to a Science channel show to watch Penguins (they are so very cute).  Ten minutes into the show what do you think?  YEP the narrator began talking about orphaned penguins whose parents never returned from fishing and the penguins whose babies died and how they tried to adopt the orphaned ones!

I just laughed and shook my head.  I know I will never be able to look into a mirror for any length of time and not wonder where I got my eyes, my nose, and my hair.  I will always jump whenever someone says to me "You remind of someone I used to know" and begin with innocent questions about who and where they are.  I will always wonder who my mother and father are who are responsible for my being in this world.  I will always wonder if I will ever be able to know my siblings, or for them to have the chance to know me.

I now know from my non-id information and the letter from my biological mother where so much of "me" comes from.  I have assimilated it into who I am and it has given me a foundation of confidence I never had before.  I am such a more integrated person how could anyone not be?  But, I will always want the rest of "my" story.

Although I don't have names, or cities, or even a state to search in and all tracks of my existence and birth have been covered up, I will always continue to search in some capacity and wonder almost every day who I really am.  I will always be a part of another family whether I am a secret or not.  And, if anyone comes across a 60 something woman, 4' 10" tall, just under 100 lbs., with green eyes and brown hair, feel free to let me know. ;)