One of my new favorite adoptee activities is occasionally taking a silly selfie and sending it to one or both of my known siblings. We don't live near each other so it's the closest I can get to sneaking up on them, scaring them and running away giggling... I'm the eldest & raised as an only child.
Here's tonight's treasure[?] or whatever...
Many adult adoptees were brought to the US as children, and adopted by parents who were themselves US citizens, but the adoptees were not granted US citizenship. Most of them were never informed that they weren't granted citizenship and now face possible deportation for something that is obviously not their fault. Often the countries they originally came from no longer recognize them as citizens either, so they have been made stateless.
@stevendbrewer Hold that thought for a while. We're about to begin National Adoption Awareness Month here in the US. To the extent that there is any attention given to it in the press and any awareness of it by the general public, it portrays adoption as so obviously good that there's no reason to ever question that assumption. I'll be sharing quite a bit here that challenges that societal narrative. I'm not a lone dissenting voice either. The entire structure of adoption makes it incredibly difficult for many adoptees, perhaps even the majority of adoptees, to have a grounded confidence in our own worth.
@ishe I haven't been particularly vocal about adoption on Mastodon. For several years, I was one of the louder #adopteevoices on Twitter, but it has become overwhelmed by bots and noise. There are a few islands of interesting content there that keep me around, but I probably won't be particularly vocal for National Adoption Awareness Month (#NAAM) over there next month because one of my biggest reasons for doing that was reaching other adoptees.
I've decided to bring that here. In keeping with the much more civil discourse here, I intend to lean heavily towards the facts of adoption from an adoptee perspective. Even keeping it civil, I imagine it will be very hard for birth parents and adoptive parents to hear. I'm not here to hurt them, but I'm also not going to be protective of their illusions. I have absolutely no qualms about pushing back hard on adoption agencies.
#AdopteesofMastodon #adoptee #adopteevoices :
Do you speak up about adoption online? If so what is it that you're attempting to share or teach other humans about adoption?
So often on mainstream social media, I see my fellow adoptees speaking out. I applaud them. I believe their experiences are 💯 valid no matter how they choose to present it, or whether I agree with them; however, in checking in with myself after reading their posts, I often feel a sense of negativity -- as though I'm walking away from a toxic exchange. I'm uncertain if this is merely social media somehow tainting their message, or if the individuals are simply so hurt by their experiences that the telling of them is a bit much, even for a fellow adoptee.
I wonder if any others are like me in that they believe it entirely possible to share negativity without requiring others to drink the same poison, in a sense??
Would love to see a discussion on this if anyone's open to it.
The family reunion [for my adoptive family] is this weekend. The last time I attended a reunion was probably in 2007. I got married in 2008. I never had a spouse or boyfriend or friend to attend with me. Cousins within my age bracket rarely ever attended & if they did, they either hid away reading a book or were very much better than I at small talk, connecting with distant relatives they probably won't see again till next year. My grandmother was alive & I attended most of the reunions with her. I wanted to. Reunions were typically held at a state park where I could go on brief walks, hikes, play with a camera without making others [or me] feel weird. Late last year, I learned I have biological half-siblings... I'm not going to the a-family reunion this year, though it's been years... it somehow seems so wrong that I would be attending yet another family reunion without my siblings.
#adopteevoices #adoptees #adopteefam #justthoughts #braindump
I finally got 'round to updating my Substack and going to work on posting there more often now.
I've been marveling at how much easier it is to get things done without Meta-based brain clutter.
I've not left Meta -- I may eventually hop on & deactivate accounts. But for now, I've backed away quietly. A big part of this is the fact that I'm in recent reunion with my biological family. I'm an #adoptee -- so not only am I recently in reunion, but several have added me on Facebook & it makes me sad to think of leaving the platform totally behind... feels a little like severing those relationships without giving them half a chance, even though that's not what I'd be doing at all. I will be inviting some of my newly-acquainted first family to other apps where we can do the same things as on Facebook, but I'm taking my time to figure the best way to phrase those invitations.
Tony Corsentino
tinker｡✧𓃦˚☽wolf
Domestic Supply 