Adoption

Being adopted, I've been considering trying to locate my birth mother. I never really cared before and even now, I'm only vaguely curious about her. I'm interested in my health history. I joined adoption.com and saw a book recommendation. The title is The Primal Wound: Understanding the Adopted Child by Nancy Verrier. Her major premise is that being adopted is a traumatic experience and can cause a lot of issues for adoptees such as being afraid to get close to people, fear of loss, being overly compliant or acting out, just to name a few. While reading the book, I could see myself. I could better understand where my fear of emotional attachments and loss come from.

The author points out that adoption isn't bad, it's just that a newborn looks for its mother and instinctively knows her and has grown inside her for 9 months. To not see her is felt on a conscious and subconscious level. What is interesting is that even babies that are separated from their mothers because of being born prematurely, exhibit the same kinds of behaviors as adoptees. The bottom line is that the bond with the birth mother is important and we should understand that. It's a very good book and makes one think of adoption in a different way.