Adult Adoptee Book Recommendations
I’m working on a few posts pointing to other writings on the ‘net, written by adult adoptees. In the meantime, I thought I should put some book recommendations out.
Many of the books I’ve read by adult adoptees were borrowed from my social worker after a conversation we had at our one year follow up visit after GG’s adoption. As a result, I can’t pull them off of my bookshelf and remind myself which books I liked more than others. Also, many of the books I read don’t seem to be available anymore, and I don’t remember enough about title and author to be able to find them with a search – I remember enough details to know they aren’t showing up on an Amazon search, but not enough to be able to find them. And to be honest, even of the ones I can find, I read them all within a short time of each other, and they kind of blend together in my brain. I’m giving a list of them here, but I can’t really give an individual review of each book. There are several newer books in this list, published since I did all of my reading on the subject. In those cases I’ve either had people I know recommend them, or I’ve read what other reviewers had to say about the books and felt them worthy of this list. So here they are, in no particular order:
- In Their Own Voices: Transracial Adoptees Tell Their Stories
(and the follow up In Their Parents’ Voices: Reflections on Raising Transracial Adoptees
- After the Morning Calm: Reflections of Korean Adoptees
- Outsiders Within: Writing on Transracial Adoption
- Twice Born: Memoirs of an Adopted Daughter
- Once They Hear My Name: Korean Adoptees and Their Journeys Toward Identity
- The Language of Blood
- A Single Square Picture: A Korean Adoptee’s Search for Her Roots
- Whose Child? : An Adoptee’s Healing Journey from Relinquishment through Reunion … and Beyond
- Trail of Crumbs: Hunger, Love, and the Search for Home
- Lost & Found: The Adoption Experience
- Beneath a Tall Tree
- Daughter of the Ganges: The Story of One Girl’s Adoption and Her Return Journey to India
One thing I want to point out is that there are several big issues here. The first is something all adoptees have to deal with, the loss of their original family and what that means and does not mean in their life, and how important that is in how they define themselves, and, well, a whole lot more, but you get the idea. And then a step beyond that, international adoptees also have to deal with the loss of their birth country and what that means (and does not mean) to them. And finally, transracial adoptees have to deal with the whole race thing, growing up where they are a minority instead of being part of the majority (as they would have if they’d remained in their country of birth)…. and growing up being raised by people of another race, who they don’t think can possibly understand the race issues that pop up in their life.
I actually recommend reading some of the writings of domestic adoptees who are raised by parents of the same race and comparing those with the writings of international adoptees. I think it puts more perspective on the layers of what our children will one day have to work their way through. If you only read the writings of international adoptees then everything kind of gets lumped together, but if you read the writings of adults who were white kids adopted domestically and raised by white parents then suddenly you realize our kids are dealing with layers upon layers of things they may feel they have to work through. (Or, maybe not, some never feel it’s a big deal… but for others it’s a bunch of huge deals.)
So look through the books in the list and then read the ones that speak to you. If I had it to do over again, I would have purchased the books that I got the most from, so that I could one day share them with my girls should they wish to explore this with my help. I’m guessing those books are out of print now, and I don’t remember enough about them to even launch a search for them.
When GlitterGirl reaches the age that she will want to read the writings of other adoptees then there will be a whole new crop of books out, and I’ll need to read through them again so that she and I can talk about them together at that time.
But I’m glad I’ve already read what I’ve read, and participated online as much as I once did with adult adoptees. It was important for me to gain that perspective, to see things from the child’s side. The way I handle questions about her adoption is much different than it would be without that very important perspective.
I will say again that once I felt I had a thorough understanding of the subject that I moved on. I think that burying yourself in it and not coming back out of it could be a very unhealthy thing to do. We need to understand these things, but we shouldn’t get bogged down. Read, research, think… learn what you can, and move on.
January 20th, 2009 at 12:09 pm
RQ, Thanks for posting this list. There are several new titles here that I look forward to reading.
I have read and taught _A Single Square Picture_ by Katy Robinson. I would highly recommend it. It is narrated without excess emotion but portrays the destabilizing shifts in information given an adult adoptee who returns to Korea to search for her birth mother. What she does begin to understand are the reasons why her birth mother and grandmother gave her up for adoption at the age of 7 even though her (controlling) birth father favored her.
_Outsiders Within_ is a harder read for an adoptive parent but I would also recommend it with some warnings. The views towards IA expressed here are harsher and wider ranging. It is an anthology of writings, so it captures how some adoptees view IA at one point in time.
Adoption is such a complex topic that I know views towards it shift over time. I prefer narratives such as _A Single Square Picture_ where you can track how the views of adoption actually change over time. I think that such works are more truthful and thus more useful.
January 20th, 2009 at 12:45 pm
“(Or, maybe not, some never feel it’s a big deal… but for others it’s a bunch of huge deals.)”
I just have to reiterate this. As an adult adoptee (white) I just don’t have the strong feelings that some have – yet it often seems as if only the people who have strong feelings write books/stories/tell their tale – so that many believe this is the only way adoptees are – and have even tried to convince me that I too must feel “this” way (depending on what they’ve read). In a catch 22 I’ve even been told that if I claim I don’t have “stuff” around my adoption then I’m blocking it and just haven’t let those feelings surface. At one time I let the strong belief of others affect me but dig deep as I could I could not uncover these feelings that were “supposed” to be there. I have now come to the (obvious) conclusion that different people react differently :D So as you’re reading the stories of adult adoptees, remember us quiet ones, the ones who aren’t speaking up about our “stuff” because it just isn’t that big of a deal to us.
My choice has been similar to RQ’s – I have read, I try to be open to possiblilites, I make resources available, I’m open to discussion but my plan is to let her figure things out for herself at her own pace (just as she always does lol).
January 20th, 2009 at 7:38 pm
lloll…you make a really good point. I took my 3 yo adopted daughter for occupational therapy. They knew her delays were due to long-term living in the SWI and that she was developing out of many of the behaviors she first displayed. The young therapist said, “I LOVE hearing IA stories because I was adopted from Korea! I think adoption is such a neat thing to do.” I have to admit that my first reaction (in my head) was, “Wow, I’m so glad to hear a positive opinion from an internationally adopted adult.”
I had researched the topic and hung out with adopted minority adults and their opinions were militant. I sought to understand for my daughters’ sake. Now I see that the issues that surface for some adoptees will motivate them to form groups and to write books or blogs. I am prepared for my daughters reactions and I am glad I studied about the topic. But I too could not dwell there as it gets way too sad and I end up second guessing myself as I try to do the best I can at raising my girls here in the moment…not the future “possible” daughters.
January 21st, 2009 at 5:24 am
Thank you for the booklist!!!
One book, that I would recommend as an introductory book, is Twenty Things Adopted Kids Wish Their Adoptive Parents Knew by Sherrie Eldridge. Although it is not a book written by an adult adoptee, but an adoptive parent who has interviewed adoptees, at least for me it was really good to read before reading writings by adult adoptees so that I had a better understanding of the issues they were talking about (it is otherwise so easy, especially if the text is passionate, to just get defensive and dismissive and ignore what the writer is actually saying).
January 21st, 2009 at 6:17 am
ONLY TWO DAYS (1st and 2nd March LIDS).
January 22nd, 2009 at 9:37 am
As an adult adoptee who does have some issues regarding being adopted, I’d also like to recommend these books (though they aren’t specifically about transracial adoption)
Journey Of The Adopted Self: A Quest For Wholeness by Betty Jean Lifton
The Primal Wound: Understanding the Adopted Child by Nancy Verrier
The last one is controversial and a hard read, be warned.