What saying or term as an adoptee, do you hate hearing?

Question

Okay, I'm a pretty okay adoptee, i have no issues that i hold on to. I still have to say that hearing these terms or sayings that i listed below still make my skin crawl.

"be thankful your mother didn't abort you"- I mean DUH, I am very thankful to be alive. Just because i asked a question about her in no way means i hate my adoptive parents or are ungrateful to them.

"You should be greatful that you were adopted"- Huh? Yes, i'm thankful that i have two people that love me. But it is almost condensing when someone says that.

"You could of grown up in an orphanage"- When this was first said to me by someone, i thought it was a threat. (i was kinda of young)

What other sayings have adoptees heard that really gets under your skin?

I have to say that for the most part all of us adoptees are thankful for the lives we lead. These terms or sayings just seem to be said to cut us down to size or just to be rude.

Answer 1

What is it like to be adopted?  To which I always responded:  What is it like not to be adopted?  All that genetic repetition; it's positively incestuous.  (I don't really think that...a shock value only comment.)

Your parents loved you so much that....  even as a child I knew this was just something pretty you say to kids.

Don't you care where you come from?  Answer:  It doesn't matter where you come from, it is where you end up that matters.

Worst of the worst:

me:  what was the process/procedure for relinquishing a child?

bdad:  A lady came to our house and took down our information.  And that was it.

me:  you didn't have to sign papers or go to court?

bdad:  no

Answer 2

Did you want to find your Real Mother

Have you looked for your Real Mother

What about your Parents

Have you always know you were adopted

I wish I was adopted

Wow thats Amazing

I know why you were adopted because your REAL Parents didnt want you - oh yeah that one was a kicker ! at school - primary school by a little miss snotty

Im sure there are loads more !

Answer 3

I guess your adoption was meant to be.

I wish I was adopted.

You know, there are worse things than being adopted.

Your adoptive family is your REAL family.

Your adoptive mother is the one who wiped your butt, yada, yada (job she WANTED, right?)

And after a 20 year reunion, I have had people in my life, when I'm telling a story about my natural mother, and call her MOTHER, will interrupt to say, Don't you mean your birthmother?  No, I don't!!  Grrrrrrrrr.

Answer 4

"Don't you ever wish you could meet your 'REAL' mom?

" Oh, I'm Sorry.  I didn't know."  

But the most stupid thing EVER was when a person asked:

"So, have you ever thought about dating your brother....he's cute"  (in reference to my sib who is also adopted)

Answer 5

hahah oh god, i do love the 'oh i'm sorry. i didn't know'. or when people akwardly respond with, 'whoah. thats awesome.' but i'd say my favorite is the, 'so what do you call you new mom?' um, i've been living with her for seventeen years now. she's not so new anymore.

and this one isn't really a common question or remark but i was in a really bad fight with my sister like a month ago, she's adopted too, and she said something like 'thank god i'm not blood related to you' and that hurt a lot. have you guys ever gotten something like that?

Answer 6

I really dislike hearing the term "b*****d" because although it is outdated to consider it to mean "born of a non-married couple," the historical reader in me can't help but think that people who use it are just ignorantly using a comment that could refer to a lot of adopted children.

Answer 7

Okay, I'm not an adoptee, but an adoptive mother.  My daughter just turned 3 in December.  A few weeks ago someone said this to me right in front of her and I was seriously so angry I almost hit them:

"Do you know why her real parents didn't want her?"

Excuse me - she is standing right here; do you want me to tell your child that "her real or otherwise parents didn't want her"???

Answer 8

Thank goodness no one ever used the following one on me, because it's one of the cute little cliche "niceties" most people can see right through:

"You didn't grow in my tummy, but you grew in my heart."  Ewwwww.

Or how about:

"Your parents loved you so much they gave you up.

Oxymoron, anyone?

I was fortunate.  My adoptive parents didn't say a whole lot of the little sayings like this.  Mostly, they just told me the truth.

The only one they said was, "We picked you."  It wasn't too long before I figured out that wasn't true.  We were matched.  Fortunately, they didn't say it for too long.  Apparently the agency told them to say that to make me feel "special."

eta:

Oh, the one someone stated to Cruzgirl, that's just nasty.

Answer 9

I hate all of the ones mentioned.  I get both "Don't you want to know your real parents?" and "Your adoptive parents are your real parents."  (Duh:  They're ALL real.)  If I'm told to be grateful I wasn't aborted one more time, I'll blow a gasket, and I am not lucky or "special because I was chosen."  I also hate being asked if I will adopt one day, as if adoption could somehow be inherited.  And when I was searching I hated being asked, "Why do you want to find someone you never knew?" or "Why look for her, she didn't want you" "or "Do your parents know you're doing this?"  As a kid I was very confused by "Your mother loved you so much she gave you up."

Currently my most hated are "You must be one of those angry/bitter adoptees" or "You must have had a bad adoption experience."  But my all-time unfavorite has got to be, "I wish I were adopted."

Answer 10

That my adoptive parents are ashamed of me.  That I should be grateful that I was aborted or dumped in a dumpster.

Sorry folks I am a 65 model adoptee.  It didn't happen that way in that time.

Answer 11

As an adoptive parent I get sick of the "adopt a programs" out there that trivialize what adoption is.

I also get sick of hearing terms like "real parents" or questions of "how much did they cost" as if my child were a pair of shoes or a car to be bartered for and chosen by price tag.

It annoys me when people bash adoptive families as if there is something horrible about them. Especially when they don't understand how hard the struggle is for some people to have children of their own when they want them so badly and adoption is the only way.  Worse is when media always makes an issue out of adoption when something negative happens as if the adoptees or adoptive families of the world are somehow responsible as their own little group in society.

Answer 12

I really hate hearing, "Why can't you adoptees just accept that your birth mother didn't want you?"  

Even if it were true, which in my case it wasn't, it's just such a mean thing to say to someone.  Why would anyone want to be so cruel?

Answer 13

"Oh..so you could marry your cousin, dad (ew!) or any other 'relative'". So dumb it doesn't need an explanation.

"Don't you want to meet your 'real' parents?" Yes. But is it any of your business?

"I wish I was adopted." Still hear that all the time. Okay..well..I wish I was a "real girl".

"Your sooo lucky..." Why? Because I don't get to live with those biologically related to me; don't get to know anyone who looks like me; am taken away from my mother??

"You must be so thankful." Oh yes. Everyday for 20 minutes I thank every relative in my adopted family that they let me join them and be a part of all the fun.

People are so so unintelligent at times.

Answer 14

This must be the new classic:

"God put you in the wrong tummy."

and the corollary:

"God wanted you to be in this (adoptive) family."

Couldn't God get it right the first time?

Answer 15

ugh, i hate hearing "don't you want to know your 'real' parents"?  (i do and always have -- they raised me).

ETA::: Laurel, lol about the "i wish i was adopted" . . . think about all those poor kids sitting at the family reunion just hoping that they don't have any of their drunk and crazy uncle larry's genes running through them; or their wierd animal hoarding aunt's genes   lol  j/k