What is it like to be adopted and then raised in another country?

Question

Sometime children are adopted by people from another country. What is it like for adoptees to be raised "away from home."

Thanks.

Answer 1

My sister and I were adopted at age 9 from an orphanage in Wales and grew up in St. Louis, Missouri.

Some really terrible things happened in that orphanage and I never missed it or Wales at all. It was cold, the food was lousy, and nobody really cared about any of us though I remember that the matrons tried to be nice.

Over the decades since we were adopted, my sister and I occasionally discussed our life pre-adoption and I assure you from personal experience that your whole romantic concept of "away from home" is totally out of line with our reality.

My real parents are the people who took us away from that horrible life and gave us a good home filled with love and security.

We did look up my birth mother when we were in our 20s and I think she was glad to see us and we were somewhat glad to meet her, but once we actually did meet and talk with her, it was not very interesting.

I really liked the comment from the guy who took his adopted daughter back to Colombia. From my own experiences it seems that he reported what she told him accurately: I share her feelings.

Answer 2

Cochise,

as a member of the triad with direct experience relating to the question, you got cut off pretty badly but i appreciate your comment.  I knew a family that adopted two children from latin america and both kids (kids heh, they're actually 30 some years old) told me how grateful they are for the opportunities here.  they do go back for habitat for humanity so they still get a chance back there but they say that they just don't recognize it as a part of them.  They said they're american and don't care about their heritage.  It's just something htey put on a census form only because they're required to put of hispanic origin .. .

Answer 3

Okay so I was not adopted, and I am sure I will get some feedback on that but, my best friend Genna was adopted from Russia. When she turns 18 her parents are going to let her go and experience her culture and were she is from. If her parents had not of told her were she was from she would have never thought once about it. It depends on the person I say. She says she always wonders what it would be like to grow up there, and the benefits of were she is. Just sharing her story..

Answer 4

Im telling you, the person who is adopted is a very lucky person. Dont misunderstand that it's hard for the kids, it would be hard for them to Not be adopted. I hope this will get people think :) ;)

Answer 5

i wasnt adopted but i came to the usa from india when i was 11 and i use to live in a village over there and then ended up in new york city and it was a big difference and i was totaly lost for the 1st year and then got to know stuff slowly soo its a big change and im now 17 and still miss my little town baq in india

Answer 6

Our daughter lived in Colombia until she was 13 years old.

About 2 years after the adoption, we took her with us back to Bogota in December. She is now age 15.

She couldn't wait to get back home to Texas. The orphanage where she spent the last five years before we adopted her is a shabby dump - the kids have very little hope for a better life.

She is old enough to understand just how fortunate she is to have her much much better life since adoption.

We see many very angry people who are anti-adoption on this adoptions forum, but their particular situations are specific to them. For most of these abandoned and displaced kids from other countries, being adopted into a loving family is a godsend, no matter where they end up.

Answer 7

I am an adoptee - but I was raised in the country that I was born in. (Australia)

I can not say myself how it would feel to live as an adoptee in another country than that of my birth - but I can say that for many many years - if people asked me what I thought of my adoption - I would have sprouted all happiness and sunshine - as that is what I knew that others would WANT to hear.

It's only in the last two years that I've been truthful with my thoughts and feelings - and can now truthfully say that I have huge losses from being adopted.

I have a great adoptive family - but I still have many losses.

Adoptive parents that say that their children have NO issues - really have no idea.

Adoptees will tell their parents whatever they think they want to hear - they don't want to be rejected once again.

Yes - if the adoptee is an older age adoptee with a traumatic past - I'm sure they would be gushing with happiness at their change in situation - but NO adoptee should ever be made to feel grateful for their lives.

That should be up to the adoptee to work through themselves. ALL adoptees have losses. And those losses effect adoptees in many different ways.

Here are some blog links to some trans-racial adoptees - all raised in a different country from the one they were born into -

words straight from the people that have lived it - as they are the only ones that can truly say what it feels like -

http://ethnicallyincorrect.wordpress.com...

http://harlowmonkey.typepad.com/harlows_...

http://heartmindandseoul.typepad.com/

(the above blogger is also an adoptive parent)

http://juliasworld.wordpress.com/

http://notsocalm.wordpress.com/

Many many adoptees (when they are old enough to voice their inner most feelings) will often state that to be an adoptee - losses include -

parents

family

name

roots

knowledge

history

truth

For TRA - or 'Transracial Adoptees' - losses would also include (on top of those above) -

country

language

culture

For any adoptive parent to negate an adoptees inner most feelings - however trivial they may sound - is to hurt the adoptee.

Answer 8

I dont think for one minute that the adoptee would know any different! If the adoptee was say from america, and braught up in france, they wouldnt know any different at all. America wouldnt be classed as "home", the place the child grew up would be. Its like moving house to anouther district, your not from there, but it becomes your home.

Answer 9

my sister was adopted i asked her before.

she says since she was raised here (u.s.) she just feels like she is american to she never feels away from home. this is her home.

Answer 10

i wouldn't know i was not adopted

Answer 11

Nice to see non- adopted people feel they can speak for adoptees, like they really know how it feels lol!

I was born and adopted in the USA and raised most of my life in the UK.

It gives me a unique perspective to witness two very different ways in which adoption is viewed and practised and I can tell you, it is WAAAAY different!

In the UK families have the support they need to stay together, if there is there choice - the support is there every step of the way.   I actually volunteer for a family support charity and work with families on a daily basis who, had they been in the USA, would have surely had no option than be separated through adoption for financial an social reasons.  These families just need a little help, for a time and I have witnessed them flourishing and standing on their own two fee in no time.   It is very gratifying to see.

Adoption is operated as a social service for children.  Private adoption is illegal and soliciting for newborns is outlawed.

The infant adoption system in the USA disgusts me.  Free enterprise gives way to money being made off the backs of little babies and vulnerable women, often women who would make wonderful moms if they were given the chance and a little support when they most needed it.

It is a multi-billion dollar industry fuelled by consumer demand.  It is so wrong.   Anyone looking in from the outside can see that and media reports in countries outside of the USA reflect this.  I guess the USA lives in it's own little bubble where adoption is normalized and issues not recognized.

I am an American, Irish American.  I intend to reclaim and celebrate my heritage, as I should have been allowed to do long long ago.  

After years of feeling like an 'alien' floating through life with no roots, finally I am sure of who and what I am.  I will fight for the rest of my life to restore my rights as an adult, the right to the truth of my origins, of my childrens' ancestry.

I guess I 'blended' into society and the match with my adoptive family was excellent, as good as it could be.  Yet I always felt different, even though treated the same as my parents' natural children.  They are my family and yet, there is a strong pull to re-connect with my roots.

In my twenties I returned to live in the USA and I visit my birthplace annually since my adoptive family still has many friends there.  I have a deep connection with my Country of origin and someday, I hope to be able to trace that back even further, from New York back to the old Country, to Ireland.  They are my people and I WILL reconnect with them

I just pray that adoptive parents nowadays celebrate their childrens' natural heritage in every way possible.  It is SO important.  So important.

Apologies for the rambling.  This is a hugely emotional issue for me and I have been mute for 36 years of my life.   Now I have a voice, there's no shutting me up!  hee hee

ETA:  re some of the other answers telling (yet again!) how I 'should' feel! I reserve the right to define my own experience.  

England is my home,  yes, always will be.  America is my home too.  I am an citizen by birth.  My roots are there and I continue to have a strong connection with the States.   I have voted at the American Embassy ever since attaining voting age, it is my right as an American.

Every time I pass through the airport in the US, I receive a friendly "Welcome home m'aam", it feels right

I claim my heritage just the same as the next person.  People celebrate their roots every day.  That is their right.

pppffftttt!

Answer 12

love is the key.

if you are not being loved you become confused and start to doubt yourself. and it goes bad.

however, with love... everything can go well.

this guy i know he was told by his new mom, "Jesus and you share something in common, earthly parents raised Jesus even though He was God's son. And God has sent you to us to raise as our very own child, too."

And He remembers how special and loved that made him feel.

-david jang

Answer 13

the simple fact of being outside the country where one was born is a big deal, at least for me, and i never had a father, so i guess sometimes i feel lonely and sad, and i wish i was somebody else and i ask myself why, why do i have to go trough all this? but there is no answer for that