April 29, 2025 • 59 mins
In this powerful episode of Mind Your Own Karma, I welcome back returning guest and fellow adoptee Jean Widner, who is here to launch her groundbreaking new book: The Adoption Paradox. If you're an adoptee, part of the adoption triad, a therapist, or simply someone who wants to better understand the complex realities of adoption—this is a must-listen conversation.
Jean’s book is already being called the most important educational book about adoption since The Primal Wound, and it’s easy to see why. Through nearly 100 deeply honest interviews—with adoptees from all walks of life, birth and adoptive parents, therapists, and allies—The Adoption Paradox reveals the emotional truths, systemic issues, and lifelong impacts that the glossy adoption narrative often leaves out.
🔥 Pre-orders are open now, and if you act fast, you can get a personally signed paperback copy shipped directly from the author ahead of the official release around May 20, 2025. Don’t wait—this book will change lives and ignite conversations.
➡️ Order the book and learn more at: https://adoptionparadox.com/
📘 Follow Jean’s journey and updates on social:
Facebook personal author: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100080741770981
Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/AdoptionParadox/
Website: https://adoptionparadox.com/
*** Petition for Justice and Reform: Stand with Overseas Adopted Koreans:
https://secure.everyaction.com/05xuVX9o0USu68aFTT_ELw2#_ftn1
✨ If you're a healer, somatic therapist, intuitive guide or practitioner using unconventional, holistic or out-of-the-box modalities—and you feel called to share your story or be on the show—reach out! We’re always looking for guests who bring insight, heart, and deep healing to the table.
📧 Contact:mindyourownkarma@gmail.com
🌐 Podcast Info: mindyourownkarma.com
🌀 Feeling activated by this episode? Ready to go deeper in your own healing?
Trauma doesn’t just live in the mind—it also lives in thebody. That’s why I offer SMGI® (Somatic Mindful Guided Imagery), a powerful modality that helps you release stored pain and reconnects you with your body’s wisdom.
🌿 Start your healing journey with me at: somatichealingjourneys.com
More about Jean Widner:
Jean is a domestic adoptee born in 1965 and raised in Washington State. After having a mostly positive adoption experience growing up, she now shares her story, as it continues to evolve navigating adoption’s complexities. Jean is a marketing consultant and joint venture affiliate marketing expert and along with her husband has built and sold two e-commerce companies. She is the owner of a local news and information blog in her small town
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hey there, it's Melissa Brunetti, and welcome to the
Mind your Own Karma podcast. Hey there, Karma crew.
Thanks for joining me for another episode of Mind.
Your own karma. If you've been around for a bit,
(00:23):
you probably know the podcast has been shifting gears a little
bit lately. I've really felt the call to
expand the conversation, moving from just adoption stories to
exploring healing and transformation in all kinds of
ways. But what I want you to know is I
haven't stepped away from the adopted community.
(00:43):
Not at all. I'm still deeply committed to
bringing you the voices, resources, and stories that
support healing and help educatepeople about the real
experiences behind adoption, andtoday's episode is one of those
really, really important ones. I'm so excited to welcome back a
(01:05):
returning guest, a fellow adoptee, a truth teller, and now
a published author. She was on the show back in
September of 2023, and her storyreally struck A chord with so
many of you. And now she's back with what I
honestly, honestly, I think thisis the most important book about
(01:26):
adoption since The Primal wound.Yes, I said it.
It's called the adoption Paradoxand it really is game changer.
Jean Widner interviewed nearly one of her people, adoptees,
birth parents, adoptive parents,therapists and allies.
And she really pulls back the curtain on what adoption really
(01:46):
looks like and feels like for the people living it.
This book doesn't hold back. It's brutal, it's brutally
honest, it's emotional, and it is so needed.
Whether you're adopted, part of the triad, or just open to
hearing some hard but important truths, this episode is for you.
All right, let's RIP off the Band-Aid and get into it.
(02:09):
Here is my interview with Jean Widner, adoptee and author of
The Adoption Paradox. You're welcoming Jean Widner to
the show today again for the second time.
Hey, Jean. Hi.
Hey, I was looking back, I can'tbelieve that I had you on the
show in September of 2023. I was like, well, going back
through the list and I'm like, where is she?
(02:31):
I'm like, it wasn't that long ago.
So if you want to hear Jean's adoption story, you can go back
to what was it Season 2 episode 82 in September of 2023.
If you kind of want to get her story and kind of the
perspective that she's coming from, although we're talking
about her book today, what she'sgoing to talk about and it's got
(02:53):
a lot more perspectives in it than just adoptees.
So we'll dive into that. What I do want to say is, and
I'm not blowing smoke up your butt with this cause I've read
the book. I predict that this is going to
be as big, if not bigger than The Primal wound.
I, you know, I've been diving deeply into, well, adopt adoptee
(03:18):
advocacy, you know, in the last two years, three years really.
But, you know, my whole life I've been an adoptee and there
was so much I didn't know, so much I learned.
And I think I loved the way it was, you know, having the
personal stories intertwined in there just kind of drove home
(03:42):
everything that you were saying,you know, scientifically and,
you know, just in the history and all the things.
It just kind of was like, kind of like, Yep, that's correct.
That's correct. You know, all these people are
saying. And it's not like you went
around and hand picked people totalk to, to interview for this
book. You know, people I'm sure came
to you and said, I'll give my opinion.
(04:05):
So it's not slighted in one way or the other.
This is just what it is. This is this is what it is and
it's presented that way, which Ithink is very impactful.
And if you just took all the thequotes from all the people that
you've interviewed and put that in a book and just gave that to,
(04:28):
you know, parents that are thinking of adopting adoptees,
anybody that is touched by adoption, it would be huge just
doing that little piece. And there was like so much more.
I have no idea how you put all of this together, so I kind of
want to start with that. Like how did you do all of this?
(04:50):
There was so much like you had to have a village to help you.
So now I'm willing to talk, finally.
Yeah, no, I did have a village and, and, and first of all,
thank you. Thank you so much.
Thank you for having me back on the show and giving the
opportunity to talk about the book and the work and everything
that went into it. Thank you yourself also for
participating in it. And so and for the compliment.
(05:12):
I can only hope that what you predict comes true because I'm
doing this because I want to help people.
So how, why, how did we do this?So one of the smartest things
that I did do when I got serious, I had the idea for
writing the book in the fall of 2021, announced my intention to
(05:33):
the world on Facebook. A terrifying movie again as it
is. Now I got to do it.
Yeah, Now you said that and you said it big so, but I got really
serious in early 2022 and realized very quickly when I
started to look at the research that I knew that I wanted to
have be a big backbone of what it what the project was going to
(05:57):
be. I hired 2 UNLV students, two
lovely young women. They were both juniors at the
time, just late in their junior year, Right?
So it's spring ish. Yeah.
So they were in late in their junior years, Both of them were
psychology or psychology adjacent majors, and I only let
(06:17):
them have 10 hours a week a piece.
But we just literally between the two, you know, between the
three of us, you know, we would meet once once a week or every
other week. They had various assignments.
I broke down, you know, OK, we're going to do a deep dive on
statistics or here's the deep dive on adoptee viewpoints.
(06:37):
And then we moved to birth parent viewpoints, and then we
moved to adoptive parent viewpoints and just really did
all of that deep dive on assembling a massive amount of
study data and then summarize that for me.
I have the biggest Google Drive you've ever seen of all of this
stuff. So if I hadn't done that, I'd
(06:59):
still be writing and still be researching.
Yeah, I am amazed at how you putthat all together.
And I, I just, I don't know. I don't know how you did it.
I do not know how you did it. I'm amazed too.
So you've said, and you've said it on my podcast before, that
your adoption story wasn't, you know, a hard one per SE.
(07:22):
So what originally made you feelcompelled to write The Adoption
Paradox? I mean, I got the idea after
finally, only finally, finally feeling like I was worthy of
having my own search and worthy of being able to undertake such
a thing for birth family in late2020.
(07:43):
And having reached that decisionto go ahead and start that, of
course, I started reading other books, the first of which was
The Girls Who Went Away, which is a story of our generation.
And it was one thing to kind of know that our mothers were maybe
not treated very well in the 19,you know, 40s, fifties, 60s into
(08:06):
the 70s. It was one thing to know the
theory of that, but it was a whole other thing to read about
it and confronted through again,real first person telling.
And of course, all of the research that, you know, Anne
Fessler amassed in, in in writing that book.
And that struck me. And so it was from that that I
(08:26):
decided there was a real need for storytelling that
encompassed all points of view. And then, of course, as often
happens in life, one afternoon evening, my husband and I are
sitting around in our backyard. And he says, what's your white
whale, babe? Like?
What is one of the things that you still really feel like you
(08:46):
want to accomplish? You know, because, I mean, I
turned 60 this month, right? I'm not yet in the autumn of my
life, but I can see it from here.
And he says, what do you what, what's that one thing you think
you want to do? And I said, I think I want to
write a book. I think I want to take what I've
learned in terms of writing because I run a, a news blog
located here in my small town, which taught me discipline and
(09:09):
how to produce. And I also remember, you know,
even going back into high school, I was an essayist.
I love picking up a topic and immersing myself in it, and
especially if I see a 'cause there that I'm passionate about,
I'm passionate about sharing it or sharing an alternative point
of view. So all of those things coalesced
and gave me the harebrained ideaI could do this.
(09:32):
Go. And off you went.
And off we went. So near the end of the book you
wrote, This is not the book I intended to write.
What book did you intend to write and how did this one
evolve from that? I did not anticipate to feel as
critical. I think of adoptions processes.
(09:55):
I thought, oh, won't this be interesting?
I'll tell stories from differingpoints of view.
I still naively had in my head that the baby scoop era and the
girls who went away that that had like ended that things were
different. In modern adoption, we have open
adoptions. Well, surely there's interesting
(10:17):
and diverse points of view and Ithink that there's ways to help
people and talk about things because, you know, again, I
mean, I've had to, I, I had to seek the assistance of self
help. And you know, I've, I've, I've
spent time, you know, in a therapist's office working on
myself and my own inner growth. And so I'm one of those people
(10:37):
that believes that airing thingsout has benefit.
And so with, again, coalescing all of that around this idea, I
thought I was just going to be writing an intellectually
interesting storytelling exploration.
What I didn't expect was to findprocesses and adoption that I
felt so strongly about that I feel have problems.
(11:01):
That was a surprise. Well, yeah, there was a lot of
things I didn't know that I readabout in there too.
It was like, holy crap, it's just mind blowing.
It's still mind blowing. It's like I just, I don't
understand how we haven't gottenpast a lot of this stuff.
So what were what were some of the most shocking or eye opening
(11:21):
things that you uncovered? Like you were just talking about
researching the history of adoption.
Wow, do you want that alphabetical or?
Chronic. Yeah, the truth of the history
and some of the wrongs that havebeen committed over time in the
name of helping children and thefact that we still culturally
(11:42):
don't seem to listen to childrenand give them their due in the
way that they should. Our biases about money and
privilege and who has it and whodoesn't and why that is and how
that evolves and then what the consequences are for how we
build families. The fact that our birth
(12:03):
certificates are still treated the way that they are and that
we still encounter so much bias in trying to equalize our
access. The fact that not all
international adoptees were madecitizens.
That caught me flat footed. Like what the literal heck is
(12:23):
this? You know, so that's a.
That's a start on a list. Yeah.
Talk about that. International adoptees and the
citizenship a little bit. I know we're going to have a
link to a petition in the show notes, but talk about that a
little bit. Yeah, that that really did catch
me off guard. Prior to the year 2002, thousand
(12:46):
and one any adoptee that was brought into the United States
through an international adoption, whatever country,
whatever process. But basically from I mean,
international adoption was born in Korea after the end of the
Korean War into the United States primarily.
We were the we were the founderson that one, but not every child
(13:09):
was naturalized. You apparently still had to take
that child and put them to the naturalization process, which
was separate from the adoption process.
And so I think parents were given incorrect or bad advice.
I think that maybe agencies justdidn't know.
(13:30):
I think maybe in the rush sometimes for the volume of
adoptees that we're coming over,particularly when you start to
look at, you know, the 1990s andwhen we were really revving up
quite a lot of international adoption was occurring.
I just don't think there was adequate follow through
explanation or preparation. And so we failed and parents
(13:52):
either knowingly or unknowingly didn't finish that process.
And now you have a bunch of folks who then ended up tripping
into that information like, wait, what?
What do you? What do you mean?
Come again? How?
This not, you know, how was thisnot done properly?
And so, you know, that's something that Congress is well
(14:16):
aware of. You know, they passed, you know,
legislation in the year 2000 which took effect in 2001 that
any adoptee once they qualified to become adopted into the
United States, which there is a qualification there that is
supposed to be gone through. But you know, otherwise, as soon
(14:36):
as as long as those boxes are checked, as soon as they hit US
soil, they are citizens. They knew they had the gap in
that legislation, that it covered anyone who was under the
age of 18 when that legislation passed, but it didn't address
anyone who was 19 or older. They knew they had that gap and
they've never circled back and closed that loop.
(14:57):
They have left those folks in limbo, struggling, paying
attorneys, you know, having to try to fight to make sure that
they can stay in the United States and that and they should
be able to function as citizens so.
So as you were talking, I was just thinking, 'cause I know
international adoptees, on top of just being an adoptee, have
(15:18):
so many more things to think about.
They shouldn't have to think about that.
I mean, they already feel displaced and you know, all the
things adoptees feel on top of other things from being
international. But then to have that feel like,
OK, I don't even have a home. I really don't have a home.
You know, let's talk about a little bit about what are some
(15:39):
of the things that you discovered and talking to
international adoptees, what other struggles do they have on
top of the normal adoptee thingsthat we talk about?
Yeah. I mean, we talk in it in, in, in
adoption about layers. You know, you have what it is to
be a kid in this modern era anyway.
Then you have what it is to pairat that kid in this modern era
(16:01):
anyway. And then you tap in, you know,
to adoption. And the fact that there is some
inherent trauma, however that manifests whatever, whatever,
However we can argue about that to the end of days, but there is
inherent trauma in separating aninfant from its mother.
How that adaptation goes, then if you add a transracial piece,
(16:21):
that complicates it. And then, oh, we're going to add
an international element on there too.
So you've now taken a person whois out of their culture, out of
their religious heritage, out oftheir familial heritage, out of
their language, depending upon the age that they are.
You know, because if language hasn't formed up and they're
(16:42):
brought to the United States, well then they're learning
English as their dominant language.
If a child is 345 older, they'vealready started to immerse
themselves in that language at their home, and now you're going
to make them reassimilate on that too, which immigrants have
done since the dawn of time. It's a little different, though,
when an adult immigrates to the United States because they want
(17:06):
to or they're bringing their children with them.
It's something else to take a child completely away from their
family and all that they knew that was familiar, and then plop
them down and say, aren't you lucky?
Let's go. Aren't you a blank slate?
Let's let's go. Come on.
(17:27):
Chop chop, get with the program.No, let's.
Let's. We're giving you everything get
with the program. And again, you know I am not
that person. I cannot and will not speak for
for those folks other than the ones who spoke to me.
And their words speak for themselves.
Yeah, yeah, definitely. Yeah.
(17:51):
Let's go back to the Baby Scoop era a little bit.
How did the lack of contraception and abortion not
being legal until 7273, how did that shape the Baby Scoop era
and the wave of adoption that followed that?
Yeah, I mean, you know, I try topaint a, a, a picture of that in
the book, you know, with the research that I did.
(18:12):
And of course, you know, again, Anne Fessler's work, you know,
leading the way on that. We, I mean, we still had some
really, really old fashioned well, and somebody's going to
yell at me about the use of thatterm too, but we still have some
very stigmatizing points of viewabout, you know, sex outside of
(18:37):
marriage. Those points of view still exist
to this day. And I'm not going to say that we
don't own our responsibilities. We all own our responsibilities.
But, and I'm going to say that if you cut people off from
options or education and information to best allow them
(18:59):
to function in a responsible andan individually responsible
manner, what do you expect? You know, so I mean, you have
all of these cultural pushes andshoves that are coming to bear
during this era. You have a worldwide baby boom
as it is, and then you have unmarried teens who have new
(19:21):
levels of access to one another.And young people are hormone
factories. And that's what we do.
And we respond to those hormonesin, you know, sometimes maybe
not the most thoughtful way, right?
I mean, our prefrontal is not finished, right?
Risk reward systems are not fully online.
So we put a bunch of young people into situations where we
(19:45):
have this also emerging, more permissive culture.
And really, we're surprised. That we had, I think what struck
me was the part where you said that contraception was only
available to married couples. It just seems so targeted
towards women. I mean, the whole thing, not
only the lack of contraception and abortion, but also once they
(20:11):
got pregnant, they were also targeted again.
Like it. It was like.
You know you can't win. You can't win here.
Oh no, that double standard was wielded very cruelly, you know,
against those women and young girls, some of them, but, and,
and regardless of how they got pregnant, whether whether the
sex was fully consensual or not,you know, that was it.
(20:32):
You either got married, which isof course, the majority of, of,
of, of what I think, you know, that's why we have the term
shotgun wedding, right? Is a lot of people got married
or you know, you sent that girl away?
Yeah, Yep. So in the book you talk about
(20:53):
adoptee consciousness and I've never, I didn't have never heard
that term before. Is there a difference between
adoptee consciousness and comingout of the fog?
They're two different things. And the adoptee consciousness
model we owe to Doctor J Ron Kimand a lot of her colleagues
there who kind of created that fog.
And I do cite the references in the book, although I don't
(21:13):
recall them right now, but you know, do do take a look at that
in the, in the, in the notes in the book.
The FOG is both an acronym, excuse me, both an acronym and a
metaphor. You have it standing for fear,
obligation and guilt, which is sort of an evolution and a
metamorphosis that happens within an adoptee as they grow
(21:36):
and start to process the state of having been adopted and
therefore also first relinquished by someone.
And then the realization, well, wait, I'm now with this new
family, and I'm feeling a littlevulnerable about the fact that
somebody gave up on me once and now does it mean I could be
(21:56):
given up on again? And so there's a lot of fear
that is inherent in many adoptees.
And it was certainly apparent within myself, even though I
really didn't have the word for it, you know, And so then you
have fear and then you create this language that is built
around rescuing a child, saving a child, you know, So then that
(22:21):
creates A dynamic where there's a feeling of obligation back to
you towards your parents, like, oh, they rescued me from a
gutter or something like that. Well, gosh, you know, so now I
now I'm, I'm obliged to be a good kid, right?
And then to feel guilty if you just exist because how did I
come into how, how can you tell me that I'm valued?
(22:44):
And so it's really, really hard to process that I think as kids.
And I don't think again that adoptive parents, certainly in
our era were given any tools to have to process any of this.
You know, and I'm not really sure how well we're preparing
adoptive parents now. I think some are and some
aren't. And so you have the acronym,
then you have the metaphor, which is coming into awareness.
(23:09):
And that's where the fog or consciousness, they're both
telling the same story there, which is a shift in how you view
first your own process and then adoption in general at a larger,
at a, at a, at a larger view. And it's painful.
(23:30):
It's painful. I went through that process in
the course of writing this book.Painful.
Wow. Well, how could you not?
I mean, how could you not if youweren't in the if you weren't
coming out of the fog you were going to after hearing all these
stories. And I mean, you just, there's no
way around that after reading itor hearing it.
(23:53):
Yeah. And I mean that's The thing is
that, you know, as going back to, you know, the adoptee
consciousness model, that's called rupture and that's a
painful place to be. Rupture is painful and then you
and, and, and then you're in dissonance, which is wait,
everything I thought I was that was true is shifting like
(24:13):
literally in front of me. Like you can almost literally
feel a wobbliness within one's being when you're in that place.
And that's a very uncomfortable place and.
So. I didn't enjoy it.
My mission was to write through it anyway and try to figure it
(24:36):
out the best that I could so. Did it help?
Did it help you, you think in that process or did it
exacerbate it? What do you think?
A little of both, you know, because how can I not be
affected by the stories that I hear, right?
And so then I would be processing my own internal
(24:59):
journey and then hearing and reading, you know, reading
research that is again, backing up exactly what I'm hearing in
story. And then, you know, for, for for
every person that that gave me their story in the book.
I mean, I remember every single one of you.
I remember your stories. I remember the things that you
(25:20):
said to me. So now I'm with you on your
journeys too. And so how do I not also process
what's happening in our larger society alongside myself?
So both things were happening tome and that was not always easy.
Yeah, I know. I mean, you know, I've heard a
lot of stories myself and I justgot done taking four months off
(25:44):
after doing 2 years straight of adoptee stories.
And I was getting so way down from hearing over and over and
over. And my producer finally was
like, you're not putting out another episode.
You are taking a break. She's like you, you have to
stop. Like, and so I did.
(26:05):
I I'm back now after four monthsand kind of shifting a little
bit the podcast, but still also wanting adoptive to be adoptive
focus somewhat and, and helping adoptees.
So yeah, it's it's heavy. It's super heavy.
It is, yeah. So in all your interviews, how
important was it when you were listening to adoptees for
(26:28):
adoptees to find out they were adopted young as opposed to
later, even teenager or, you know, late discovery, really
late discovery. How important was that?
It's, it's, it's devastating to be told later after you started
to form up and know your place in the world or how you even
think you know your place in theworld.
(26:50):
You know, there was a, a gentleman who I interviewed who
was old school. He's an old school gentleman,
lovely man. You know who I, I, I know
somewhat socially here in town. And I mean, he was told when he
was 7 and it rocked his world asit would.
And so of all the things that happen out there, let's be
(27:10):
clear, not telling your kid about their parentage and not
telling them that they're adopted and not telling them the
truth is a really terrible thingto do to someone.
Yeah, it's. Not OK under any circumstances,
ever. It is never OK.
(27:30):
Yeah, never adoption or not. Like it's just, yeah.
And then and nowadays, how can you with DNA and you're only
waiting for a bomb to go off. So it's just kind of dumb, which
kind of goes back to why we can't get our birth certificates
and everything else. It's just like, it doesn't make
no sense. None of it makes sense.
So you talk about separation trauma and you asked in the book
(27:53):
if it was real. What did you discover both in
research and personal stories? And what what does science say
about separation trauma? You know, there's there's a
growing body of science over both what happens in utero, how
that affects us as we grow and, and, you know, come out
initially as little infants, youknow, ready to thrive, right
(28:16):
and, and how that can can impactour development.
We're continuing to see more andmore research on just the entire
concept of how much power our nervous system actually impacts
our overall well-being. You know, Besser Vandelkock's
book, You know, the Body Keeps the score.
(28:37):
It's been on the New York Times bestseller list for what, four
years, Five years? Whatever it is, there's a reason
for that. And not just because he, because
he wrote a book about this interesting nerdy science thing,
but clearly it's resonating withpeople.
Otherwise people wouldn't still keep turning to it as a source
for information and healing and understanding because we we hurt
(29:05):
ourselves, in my opinion, by buying into collective denial of
a potential problem. I think we do ourselves great
damage both as individuals and in a larger society if we live
in denial of a problem, any problem, right?
And pivoting now to me right down to center is, you know,
(29:28):
again, we're not, we're not really going too much into my
story, but I was certainly affected by the fact that my
adoptive mother was addicted to prescription drugs and alcohol.
I, I did all the work, man. I did, you know, adult children
of Alcoholics, which I will say saved me, absolutely saved me
because I was really struggling as a human being because I'd
(29:50):
learned some really bad behaviors and bad models of, of,
of being and worked hard on myself to come back out of the
other side of it. And I would still say to you, I
still know that there were otherthings that were kicking around
inside of me, but of course, notknowing where to put them, I
just attributed them to alcoholism and to end up being
(30:11):
raised with an addict. So I'm putting these problems
that I still know that I have internally, but I'm putting them
in the wrong box, which means I'm not going to get the right
solution to them. So then when I do this reading
and this research and I go, Oh my God, there it is.
(30:31):
There's the answer. How freeing is that, right?
Best thing ever, you know, to have the right box to put
something in to go, Oh my God, that is the source of this.
And so I know know that there are a lot of people out there
who are functioning through whatever they went through in
(30:52):
their life, whether it's adoption or whatever.
But if you don't find the right thing to unlock that problem and
really address it, what are you doing?
You're just, you know, then, then as human beings, we've set
ourselves up where we're, we're running on a hamster wheel, but
it's the wrong wheel. And then we don't get answered.
(31:13):
We're not getting anywhere. We're not getting anywhere.
And so, you know, that's what I would say.
Then again, now extrapolating out is we're we're tearing at a
narrative here and and the narrative is adoption is
amazing. Adoption is beautiful.
(31:34):
If you have good parents, there should be nothing wrong with
you. And life is amazing.
You're just looking at it the wrong way.
You just, you know, maybe you just need to have a different
attitude. And that's because our society,
we really, really want pretty bows on our boxes.
Gosh, we want we, we want that narrative.
(31:56):
We really do. And we're not going to actually
solve the issues that folks are facing without at least going
into this and saying, OK, this isn't everybody's story.
Of course it's not. But it's also not nothing
either. And I, I, I invite everyone to
(32:18):
really take an honest deep dive and a read and just think about
their lives. Yeah.
I think recently in the last year, and I kind of mentioned
this last week with another guest, was that I realized that
when I was in the womb, I was there.
(32:39):
When my mother found out she waspregnant with me, which was
stressful. When her mother died, when she
was six months pregnant with me,I was there.
I went to the, I went to my grandmother's funeral, you know,
and I was just like, you know, and through all the traumas that
she went through those nine months, I was there.
And I was experiencing it just as she was, as I was forming.
(33:03):
You know, what did that do to me?
Like scientifically, how does that it has to affect, you know,
And it was just like, whoa, I had never thought about that
before that I was there, you know, experiencing the cortisol
and all the stress hormones and the stress worry, whatever, you
(33:24):
know, whatever she was going through, I was there.
It's crazy to think about. Yeah, it is.
And not only that, but remember you and I are born with two
ovaries full of eggs. So we're born with the next
generation already in us. Our DNA, however that is formed
(33:47):
up is fully present and accounted for.
And that is unique to women versus men.
Men's sperm accumulates over there over over time.
And so that which is interesting, you know, on that
side of the Ledger, because it means that then their their
Wellness in their lifespan can impact right the health of their
sperm that they pass on to make another human with.
(34:10):
But us it's set. Yeah.
It's already set. And there's part of where
generational trauma comes from, the science of it.
I mean, my children, you know, also experienced part of that as
well. That's crazy.
It's so crazy to think about. Yeah, it is.
(34:31):
So in the book you said maybe the way to look at the primal
wound is less literal for those who keenly relate to it.
What if the power is in asking adoptees to lean into the
psychological pain they feel rather than hide from it?
So what conclusions did you cometo about leaning in instead of
hiding and and how important do you think that is in the healing
(34:52):
process of adoptees or birth mothers or whoever?
There's no way around it. There's only through it.
We have to, we have to go into the things that are troubling
us. If we we just again.
Since when does denial help anyone?
Now you might need denial for a period of time.
(35:13):
I think denial's alive, right? Sometimes it can literally keep
us alive. Eventually, if you want to be
more than a hurt person who willinevitably hurt other people and
continue to hurt themselves, if you want to eventually evolve,
this is where you have to go. You have to go inside, and you
(35:34):
have to be willing to risk finding things that are
uncomfortable and painful even more than you thought they might
be or they're different than youthought they might be.
Yeah, and it's ringing. I get it.
It's bloody terrifying. Yeah.
(35:56):
Do you think we can heal? Absolutely.
I think we have to try, you know, I mean, if nothing else,
we have to try and we have to keep trying.
And you know, again, I mean, you've gone into your own
modalities, right? You know, of, you know, the
somatic therapy and somatic healing and things like that.
I think that just seek and find something that works for you and
(36:20):
if it works, do it. Yep, Yep.
Whatever it is, do it. Absolutely.
So, you know, we hear a lot about kind of the common themes
of, you know, some of the thingsthat psychologically adoptees
struggle with the common ones. Did you notice anything that you
were surprised about and maybe some of the interviews or I know
(36:43):
there was a chart in the book that was showing we were you
were talking about, was it Doctor Libov?
I can't ever think of her name, the one that the one that's
coming out with that research about the suicide rates.
And there was some other things in there too that I hadn't
thought about that were shocking, that will be coming
(37:05):
out I guess, pretty soon, if they haven't already.
But what were some of the thingsthat kind of shocked you that
you hadn't heard? Yeah, I mean, Doctor Lynn
Zubov's work is who you're talking about will be coming out
soon. You know, even just hearing the
the 1st and most widely published statistic that
adoptees are four times more likely than the general
population to attempt or commit suicide, plus the outsized
(37:27):
representation that we have in addiction in particular.
You know, again, looking to, youknow, zooming out for a minute
and looking at our population asa whole before the pandemic in
2017, 2018-2019, we had three years in a row where life
expectancy overall in the UnitedStates robbed.
(37:50):
And it dropped due to diseases of despair, which is alcoholism,
drug, drug overdose or outright suicide, which you could argue
the other two are sometimes maybe just a different
manifestation of the other. But think about this in an era
where everybody's living longer.You know, the average life
expectancy for a woman is now about 80.
So with the baby boomers aging up, we still had a statistical
(38:15):
occurrence happening in the willful loss of life or the loss
of life due to diseases of despair.
It knocked that average down. It is not small, OK?
That is that is a big deal in and of itself.
And I remember that, that, you know, the NIH was kind of going,
hey, guys, we have an issue here.
Then we have the pandemic. So things go the way that they
(38:38):
go. Then we start to kind of
normalize in 2022-2023. Same pattern is reemerged.
And so we've already got a society that is struggling a bit
now. I've heard maybe in 2024, we've
maybe knocked that. We'll see.
That'd be great, right? I hear that, you know, deaths
(39:00):
due to fentanyl, for example, are finally down, right.
OK, so those would be good things.
But in a society that is clearlyalready struggling, if adoptees
are then at an outsized rate struggling more, is that that is
worthy of some attention. And, and it's, and I, I charge
(39:23):
our mental health professionals in our society to feel an
obligation to look at that, right.
I say to you, listen up guys andgals, there's an obligation that
you must, I think address, whichis to at least ask the question,
(39:44):
what's going on here? Yeah.
I mean, the rate is coming out to be what, 38 around 38?
When Zoo Bob's research is stillvery new, it's not finished, but
Oh my goodness, her statistics blow this blow 4% out of the
water. And she's also really the only
(40:05):
one who has studied, you know, birth mothers in particular,
first parent mental health and, and their long term health
outcomes. And I think it's worth noting,
you know, because she talks about this.
Too, in her presentations and even when she and I, you know,
because I, I, I talked to her in, in, in recording my sessions
(40:25):
for the book, she fell into thisside of the Ledger.
She was just doing research on reunions and how to reunions
more successful between adopteesand first families.
That's what she was really doing.
And so in the survey, when she started to put out her initial
(40:47):
results, she started to get so many people coming back saying
such and so had such and so was deceased, Such and so was
deceased. And then she went, that's weird.
Let's expand the survey out. And so then as you go through
the decision tree, the way that the survey is now built out, and
then she's extrapolating out that data.
Well, you know, as I cover it inthe book, I mean, we're talking
(41:10):
really, really abnormally high rates of suicide.
We're talking abnormally high rates of addiction.
We're talking lowered lifespans overall for birth mothers in
particular. Yeah.
That's scary and we need to be paying attention to this.
And again, it's the only study that I know of that's even been
(41:31):
done on this particular data point within First Parent
Health. Yeah, it was amazing.
I there was, when I looked at that chart, I mean, obviously
I'd known the suicide, I'd been hearing, you know, buzzes about
that coming out. But the other things, I mean,
it's not, it's, it's a huge difference.
(41:51):
So it's not just a coincidence. I mean, it's not like, oh,
couple percent, I mean, a couplepercent is a lot, but it's a lot
more than that. Can't deny it.
Yeah. And I mean that study that, that
that cites the 4%, I mean, I believe that's 2013, it's 2013
or 2014. So it's relatively recent, you
know, so again, we're not we're not talking about the 1940s or
(42:14):
the 1960s, we're talking about now.
And so again, I just we cannot continue to ignore this
information. Yeah, and it just won.
It just makes me wonder how theycollected their data and, you
know, because it is such a huge difference.
Like I just, you know, in here we were talking about that, that
like it was a big deal. You know, more times more
(42:36):
likely. It's like, wow, you know, now
it's just way more than we even ever thought.
Right. So after hearing from so many in
the adoption triad, what are a few things that you think
adoptive parents need to know that could lessen or even
prevent some adoption related trauma?
You know, and, and I mean, I will, I will quote, you know,
(42:58):
Lori Holden over at, you know, her podcast adoption, the
Longview, as well as other adoptive parents in the space,
which is first and foremost, do your own work, you know, and
again, that research really did surprise me.
I was glad to share it because Ithink it happens to reinforce
(43:18):
what a lot of adoptive parents will say, which is I didn't know
enough going into this and I hadn't maybe processed my own
emotional journey as much as I should have before beginning.
And so it again comes down to weare not giving people space in
(43:40):
our culture to process grief. And we talk a lot about adoptee
grief and adoptee spaces. And I think everyone can
understand birth parent grief and birth parents spaces.
But I don't think we're giving due justice to folks who have
experienced endless infertility pain.
(44:01):
And I think we need to, I think they deserve that space.
You know, they too have built uptheir own, you know, ghost
Kingdom, if you will, imaginations on children that
they wanted to have. And let's get real, everybody
wants to have their own natural child.
That is a deeply seated desire within so many human beings.
(44:25):
I believe it's put there by our dinosaur brain and our DNA,
which is first and foremost propagate the species because
that's how you survive. If you if if you don't have
young, you will not survive, right?
So we need to just, we need to not be resentful about that.
I think as adoptees, that is a very natural desire and we need
(44:47):
to help get the message out to these folks that you need to
process this before you begin this journey.
Because if you haven't, this will blow back on your family,
it will blow back on you, and itwill blow back on your children.
Yeah, again, let's just slip a Band-Aid on it and slip another
child into that slot there and everything will might be better,
(45:08):
right? It's going to take all that
away. It'll make everything all
better. And collective denial heals no
one. Yeah, yeah, it's a nice pipe
dream, but it doesn't work out that way.
No. And and and again, there's
there's ample data to support that.
Yeah, definitely. What did you learn from birth
parents from, you know, talking to all these birth parents for
(45:28):
the book that you think adopteesreally need to hear?
Did anything that they shared surprise you personally?
Oh, the things that surprised me, I think, well, again, we we
almost have to divide this conversation into two places.
(45:51):
There's our mother's generation,and then there's the mothers who
are relinquishing Now, I think our mother's generation, I think
it's really easy for us to wrap our heads around the fact that
our mothers didn't have any choices because culturally they
didn't have any choices. And so I think they were, in
general, bullied and shamed out of keeping children that they
(46:14):
very much wanted to keep. This isn't universal.
There are plenty of adoptees outthere who are gonna listen to
this. Well, you know, my birth mother
was not all that. Yep, we know that too.
You know, it's important that wenot romanticize and, again,
build false narratives around what are obviously individuals
in the modern era. I think, I think the thing that
(46:40):
really needs to permeate throughthis is people need to
understand how complicated thesedecisions get.
And I think people need to understand that these women do
really get fed this pipe dream of clearly, if you've walked
through the doors of this building, clearly, if you've
(47:00):
responded to this online e-mail or this online form, you can't
pair it right. I mean, I, I, I really think
that unfortunately, expectant couples who relinquish are
really having someone lean in onthem and telling them what they
can't do rather than telling them what they can or telling
(47:21):
that somebody else can do it better.
And everyone falls in love with this whole narrative of, you
know, the shiny, the shiny two cars and the nice big, you know,
MC Mansion House and oh, they'regoing to give my kids so many
opportunities that I couldn't give their kid.
And I just, you know, again, money doesn't make anybody a
(47:43):
better person. Money does provide
opportunities, OK? It provides options.
And I will never deny that. And I think we again need to
understand there is there is this many infants, none asking
to be reassigned to a new familywhen they're born.
That's true for the animal Kingdom and the human one.
(48:04):
So if we're going to do that andwe're going to understand that
there are long term consequencesfor everybody involved, we can't
be trivial about that decision. And it can't, in my opinion, or
at least it should not in my opinion, only be driven about
resources. Unresourced people need help.
(48:27):
They need options. If you have too many problems to
solve or if you have a woman whoreally, really, really, really,
really actually, for whatever reason does not want to be a
parent, OK, If this is, if this is really where she's headed as
the right decision for her, OK. And there were necessary
(48:47):
relinquishments among the birth parents that I interviewed where
you just had too many problems to solve.
And you had just it just I can see it.
And I can see it in that woman that she can see it.
This wasn't going to work. This was the best decision for
me. This was the best decision for
(49:07):
my child. And the difference between that
woman and the difference betweena woman who got manipulated is
gigantic. In.
Terms of the way that she's ableto view her life and in the
relationship that she then has with her kid.
Yeah. And I, I think even the ones
that really wanted, you know, made the decision thoughtfully
and really wanted to give their child up for adoption, I almost
(49:32):
see that as kind of the correlation between having a
good adoption, you know how we feel about having a good
adoption. I mean, there's still trauma
there. Even though she gave willingly,
gave her child away, there was, there's still some seated trauma
in there, even having to make that decision, whether she
really felt it was right, the right one, right?
Right. You also interviewed adoptive
(49:55):
parents. Did you find that they truly
understood the depth and complexity of adoption, or were
they unaware? Most were unaware when they
started. Most had worked really hard to
get aware very quickly. It's like I I found and
(50:15):
interviewed a lot of really, really good adoptive parents for
the book. And so, yeah, a lot, You know,
if there's one who said differently, I don't, I don't
recall it, but I think all of them said, yeah, as prepared as
I thought I was, there was many ways and angles and thought
processes that me and my husbandthought we'd gone through this
(50:38):
and this and this and this stillsurprised us, you know, kind of
thing. And so which, you know, again,
nobody comes with an instructionmanual, right?
Parenting is already hard if parents don't get some real
solid information and education,I think on the front hand before
they adopt that, no, you just added another layer and then
(51:01):
there's gonna be another if it'sinternational, one another if
it's generational, Right, Right.You know, if we don't give them
the opportunity to really be informed about that, it gets
hard. Yeah, yeah.
Really hard SO. I don't know, recently that's
another reason I kind of steppedaway for a little bit.
I was seeing so much division inthe community.
(51:22):
I really felt like we were starting to cannibalize
ourselves a bit, you know, and, and hearing a different
perspective and not agreeing with it and basically telling
each other that you're wrong because, you know, I don't,
that's, that wasn't my experience.
So how important is it that we validate each other's
experiences? You've heard so many stories now
(51:46):
you know, even when we look at things totally different in the
name of collective healing and change, how important is is us
seeing each other's stories and just validating each other.
It's extremely important. I mean, we do have to try to
understand that there, you know,our experiences are as fast as
(52:06):
the stars and with it are our opinions, right.
We, we sit on this sort of dimmer switch, if you can see
this. I mean, it's like on, on one
side is adoption is awesome, andthe other extreme is adoption
ought to be abolished, right? Most of us sit somewhere in the
dynamic in between. But then these two things exist
and I don't, I don't, I'm, I'm, I'm not calling them extreme.
(52:29):
I'm just saying that's kind of apolar opposite.
I don't think we do each other any favors if we fail to
acknowledge that I can be in alignment with your points of
view in this and this and this and this, but maybe not that,
right? Like I'm not comfortable with
that language or I'm not comfortable with that particular
point of view. But I'm with you over here.
(52:51):
If we lose the ability to try tocommunicate with and hear each
other and saying, it's OK if youdon't take this in all the
directions that I do, but I'm going to be over here, we risk
losing again that 75% solution in the middle, which is probably
(53:12):
where actual change lies. And again, I, you know, I know a
lot of those activists and I, I,I appreciate them.
I respect their right to be out there.
I'm not necessarily going to be in agreement with everything
that everyone says and they're not going to be in agreement
with everything I say. And that has to be OK.
(53:33):
And I'm going to have to learn how to walk that talk myself.
So it's and I'm not saying it's going to be easy.
Right, so kind of in closing, what do you hope readers get
from from reading your book Adoption Paradox?
Perspective, healing, validation, I think those are
(53:54):
three big words right there. And, and if you find it a waste
of time, OK, give it to, you know, give it to somebody else.
I don't think that's going to happen, but.
You know, that's the thing. No one, no one thing can be
everyone's story. I mean, one of the there was
this one wonderful writer writers group that I was
(54:15):
attending. And she says, you know, before
you put yourself out there, she says, take your three favorite
authors and the best books you've ever read in your whole
life, and then go to Goodreads and read their one star reviews.
Because no matter what, you know, somebody's not gonna like
you and someone's not gonna agree with you.
And so again, I, I, I know that my book isn't gonna be for
(54:37):
everybody, but I hope it's for Ihope that the community can
embrace it and understand it. And I hope that also people
outside of the community can embrace it and understand it, or
at least give it its fair due. Yeah, yeah.
Good. It's all I've been asked for.
Yeah. So tell us, when is the book
(54:58):
maybe coming out? It's not out quite yet, so.
We have a we have a tentative drop date of May 20th, give or
take, and so follow me on Facebook.
Yeah, where can we find? For my new book, Tell Us.
Where we can find you and all that good stuff too.
Yeah, we'll keep that also, of course, in the show notes, but
(55:20):
adoption paradox.com is my website.
From there you can sign up to mynewsletter.
And then also there's Adoption Paradox.
You can find that on Facebook and you can find my author, Gene
Kelly Widner on Facebook as well.
And I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm working on some other channels because I
(55:41):
know I do need to do a few more,but that's where I've built
myself out now, so. Awesome.
So I just want to tell you, I hope that you have like your
bags packed and I think you're going to be flying all over the
world being an expert now on a lot of this stuff and being
asked to speak all over the place.
(56:02):
And I have to, I have to say, I was not expecting what I read.
Like it. Like I said, I've, you know,
been immersed in the community for a while and it was still
shocking to me a lot of the things that I read in there,
things I didn't know, things I got educated on that I needed to
hear such an important book. I just really think it's going
(56:25):
to explode. And I hope that you feel super,
super proud of yourself for putting this out there.
Thank you. Thank you so much.
You have no idea. What that means.
Thank you. You're welcome.
Thanks for coming on today. Thank you for having me so much.
It's been great to. Be here.
I told you this episode was going to be.
Powerful and this is an even full throttle.
(56:45):
You have to read the. Book to get the full effect and.
Honestly, as deep as we went today, there's so much more in
Jean's book that we didn't even get to touch on.
There's just no way to cover it all in one conversation.
And if you care about adoption or want to truly understand it,
you need to read this book, The Adoption Paradox.
It's not just a book, it's an education, it's a mirror, and
(57:09):
it's a movement. And pre-orders are open right
now. And here's the best part.
If you order now, you'll get a personally signed paperback copy
from Jean herself shipped right out to you as soon as they're
available. The official release date is
around May 20th. But don't wait.
Get your copy locked in today and you'll find all the links to
(57:29):
Jean and the book in the show notes.
And if you're a healer, A practitioner using an
unconventional or alternative modality, or someone who's
walked through deep personal transformation and now helps
others do the same, I'd love to hear from you.
I'm always looking for guests who bring something unique,
heart centered, and healing to the table.
(57:52):
Whether it's somatic work, energy healing, trauma informed
practices, spiritual growth, nervous system regulation, or
something a little outside of the box that's changing lives, I
want to hear from you. If that's you or someone you
know, reach out to me at mindyourownkarma@gmail.com.
(58:13):
And Speaking of healing, if today's episode stirred
something in you, it might be time to go a little deeper.
That's where somatic mindful, guided imagery comes in.
Our bodies, they hold on to trauma in ways our minds can't
always access a process, and sometimes talking about it just
isn't enough. Somatic healing reconnects you
(58:35):
with your body, helps you release what's been stuck, and
supports real transformation anda sense of balance.
You can learn more about workingwith me at Somatic Healing
journeys.com. Somatics might just be one of
the numbers in your healing combination, and I would be
honored to support you on your healing path.
(58:57):
Thank you for being here today, Karma crew, and TuneIn.
Next time, because you might be just one listen away from a
totally different life. So as always, take what you need
and leave what you don't. And always remember to mind your
own karma. I'll see you all next time.
(59:24):
This podcast is created for educational.
Purposes by the telling of adoption experiences the views
expressed in this. Podcast may not be.
Those of the host or mind your own karma.
Hey there, it's Melissa Brunetti, and welcome to the
Mind your Own Karma podcast. Hey there, Karma crew.
Thanks for joining me for another episode of Mind.
Your own karma. If you've been around for a bit,
(00:23):
you probably know the podcast has been shifting gears a little
bit lately. I've really felt the call to
expand the conversation, moving from just adoption stories to
exploring healing and transformation in all kinds of
ways. But what I want you to know is I
haven't stepped away from the adopted community.
(00:43):
Not at all. I'm still deeply committed to
bringing you the voices, resources, and stories that
support healing and help educatepeople about the real
experiences behind adoption, andtoday's episode is one of those
really, really important ones. I'm so excited to welcome back a
(01:05):
returning guest, a fellow adoptee, a truth teller, and now
a published author. She was on the show back in
September of 2023, and her storyreally struck A chord with so
many of you. And now she's back with what I
honestly, honestly, I think thisis the most important book about
(01:26):
adoption since The Primal wound.Yes, I said it.
It's called the adoption Paradoxand it really is game changer.
Jean Widner interviewed nearly one of her people, adoptees,
birth parents, adoptive parents,therapists and allies.
And she really pulls back the curtain on what adoption really
(01:46):
looks like and feels like for the people living it.
This book doesn't hold back. It's brutal, it's brutally
honest, it's emotional, and it is so needed.
Whether you're adopted, part of the triad, or just open to
hearing some hard but important truths, this episode is for you.
All right, let's RIP off the Band-Aid and get into it.
(02:09):
Here is my interview with Jean Widner, adoptee and author of
The Adoption Paradox. You're welcoming Jean Widner to
the show today again for the second time.
Hey, Jean. Hi.
Hey, I was looking back, I can'tbelieve that I had you on the
show in September of 2023. I was like, well, going back
through the list and I'm like, where is she?
(02:31):
I'm like, it wasn't that long ago.
So if you want to hear Jean's adoption story, you can go back
to what was it Season 2 episode 82 in September of 2023.
If you kind of want to get her story and kind of the
perspective that she's coming from, although we're talking
about her book today, what she'sgoing to talk about and it's got
(02:53):
a lot more perspectives in it than just adoptees.
So we'll dive into that. What I do want to say is, and
I'm not blowing smoke up your butt with this cause I've read
the book. I predict that this is going to
be as big, if not bigger than The Primal wound.
I, you know, I've been diving deeply into, well, adopt adoptee
(03:18):
advocacy, you know, in the last two years, three years really.
But, you know, my whole life I've been an adoptee and there
was so much I didn't know, so much I learned.
And I think I loved the way it was, you know, having the
personal stories intertwined in there just kind of drove home
(03:42):
everything that you were saying,you know, scientifically and,
you know, just in the history and all the things.
It just kind of was like, kind of like, Yep, that's correct.
That's correct. You know, all these people are
saying. And it's not like you went
around and hand picked people totalk to, to interview for this
book. You know, people I'm sure came
to you and said, I'll give my opinion.
(04:05):
So it's not slighted in one way or the other.
This is just what it is. This is this is what it is and
it's presented that way, which Ithink is very impactful.
And if you just took all the thequotes from all the people that
you've interviewed and put that in a book and just gave that to,
(04:28):
you know, parents that are thinking of adopting adoptees,
anybody that is touched by adoption, it would be huge just
doing that little piece. And there was like so much more.
I have no idea how you put all of this together, so I kind of
want to start with that. Like how did you do all of this?
(04:50):
There was so much like you had to have a village to help you.
So now I'm willing to talk, finally.
Yeah, no, I did have a village and, and, and first of all,
thank you. Thank you so much.
Thank you for having me back on the show and giving the
opportunity to talk about the book and the work and everything
that went into it. Thank you yourself also for
participating in it. And so and for the compliment.
(05:12):
I can only hope that what you predict comes true because I'm
doing this because I want to help people.
So how, why, how did we do this?So one of the smartest things
that I did do when I got serious, I had the idea for
writing the book in the fall of 2021, announced my intention to
(05:33):
the world on Facebook. A terrifying movie again as it
is. Now I got to do it.
Yeah, Now you said that and you said it big so, but I got really
serious in early 2022 and realized very quickly when I
started to look at the research that I knew that I wanted to
have be a big backbone of what it what the project was going to
(05:57):
be. I hired 2 UNLV students, two
lovely young women. They were both juniors at the
time, just late in their junior year, Right?
So it's spring ish. Yeah.
So they were in late in their junior years, Both of them were
psychology or psychology adjacent majors, and I only let
(06:17):
them have 10 hours a week a piece.
But we just literally between the two, you know, between the
three of us, you know, we would meet once once a week or every
other week. They had various assignments.
I broke down, you know, OK, we're going to do a deep dive on
statistics or here's the deep dive on adoptee viewpoints.
(06:37):
And then we moved to birth parent viewpoints, and then we
moved to adoptive parent viewpoints and just really did
all of that deep dive on assembling a massive amount of
study data and then summarize that for me.
I have the biggest Google Drive you've ever seen of all of this
stuff. So if I hadn't done that, I'd
(06:59):
still be writing and still be researching.
Yeah, I am amazed at how you putthat all together.
And I, I just, I don't know. I don't know how you did it.
I do not know how you did it. I'm amazed too.
So you've said, and you've said it on my podcast before, that
your adoption story wasn't, you know, a hard one per SE.
(07:22):
So what originally made you feelcompelled to write The Adoption
Paradox? I mean, I got the idea after
finally, only finally, finally feeling like I was worthy of
having my own search and worthy of being able to undertake such
a thing for birth family in late2020.
(07:43):
And having reached that decisionto go ahead and start that, of
course, I started reading other books, the first of which was
The Girls Who Went Away, which is a story of our generation.
And it was one thing to kind of know that our mothers were maybe
not treated very well in the 19,you know, 40s, fifties, 60s into
(08:06):
the 70s. It was one thing to know the
theory of that, but it was a whole other thing to read about
it and confronted through again,real first person telling.
And of course, all of the research that, you know, Anne
Fessler amassed in, in in writing that book.
And that struck me. And so it was from that that I
(08:26):
decided there was a real need for storytelling that
encompassed all points of view. And then, of course, as often
happens in life, one afternoon evening, my husband and I are
sitting around in our backyard. And he says, what's your white
whale, babe? Like?
What is one of the things that you still really feel like you
(08:46):
want to accomplish? You know, because, I mean, I
turned 60 this month, right? I'm not yet in the autumn of my
life, but I can see it from here.
And he says, what do you what, what's that one thing you think
you want to do? And I said, I think I want to
write a book. I think I want to take what I've
learned in terms of writing because I run a, a news blog
located here in my small town, which taught me discipline and
(09:09):
how to produce. And I also remember, you know,
even going back into high school, I was an essayist.
I love picking up a topic and immersing myself in it, and
especially if I see a 'cause there that I'm passionate about,
I'm passionate about sharing it or sharing an alternative point
of view. So all of those things coalesced
and gave me the harebrained ideaI could do this.
(09:32):
Go. And off you went.
And off we went. So near the end of the book you
wrote, This is not the book I intended to write.
What book did you intend to write and how did this one
evolve from that? I did not anticipate to feel as
critical. I think of adoptions processes.
(09:55):
I thought, oh, won't this be interesting?
I'll tell stories from differingpoints of view.
I still naively had in my head that the baby scoop era and the
girls who went away that that had like ended that things were
different. In modern adoption, we have open
adoptions. Well, surely there's interesting
(10:17):
and diverse points of view and Ithink that there's ways to help
people and talk about things because, you know, again, I
mean, I've had to, I, I had to seek the assistance of self
help. And you know, I've, I've, I've
spent time, you know, in a therapist's office working on
myself and my own inner growth. And so I'm one of those people
(10:37):
that believes that airing thingsout has benefit.
And so with, again, coalescing all of that around this idea, I
thought I was just going to be writing an intellectually
interesting storytelling exploration.
What I didn't expect was to findprocesses and adoption that I
felt so strongly about that I feel have problems.
(11:01):
That was a surprise. Well, yeah, there was a lot of
things I didn't know that I readabout in there too.
It was like, holy crap, it's just mind blowing.
It's still mind blowing. It's like I just, I don't
understand how we haven't gottenpast a lot of this stuff.
So what were what were some of the most shocking or eye opening
(11:21):
things that you uncovered? Like you were just talking about
researching the history of adoption.
Wow, do you want that alphabetical or?
Chronic. Yeah, the truth of the history
and some of the wrongs that havebeen committed over time in the
name of helping children and thefact that we still culturally
(11:42):
don't seem to listen to childrenand give them their due in the
way that they should. Our biases about money and
privilege and who has it and whodoesn't and why that is and how
that evolves and then what the consequences are for how we
build families. The fact that our birth
(12:03):
certificates are still treated the way that they are and that
we still encounter so much bias in trying to equalize our
access. The fact that not all
international adoptees were madecitizens.
That caught me flat footed. Like what the literal heck is
(12:23):
this? You know, so that's a.
That's a start on a list. Yeah.
Talk about that. International adoptees and the
citizenship a little bit. I know we're going to have a
link to a petition in the show notes, but talk about that a
little bit. Yeah, that that really did catch
me off guard. Prior to the year 2002, thousand
(12:46):
and one any adoptee that was brought into the United States
through an international adoption, whatever country,
whatever process. But basically from I mean,
international adoption was born in Korea after the end of the
Korean War into the United States primarily.
We were the we were the founderson that one, but not every child
(13:09):
was naturalized. You apparently still had to take
that child and put them to the naturalization process, which
was separate from the adoption process.
And so I think parents were given incorrect or bad advice.
I think that maybe agencies justdidn't know.
(13:30):
I think maybe in the rush sometimes for the volume of
adoptees that we're coming over,particularly when you start to
look at, you know, the 1990s andwhen we were really revving up
quite a lot of international adoption was occurring.
I just don't think there was adequate follow through
explanation or preparation. And so we failed and parents
(13:52):
either knowingly or unknowingly didn't finish that process.
And now you have a bunch of folks who then ended up tripping
into that information like, wait, what?
What do you? What do you mean?
Come again? How?
This not, you know, how was thisnot done properly?
And so, you know, that's something that Congress is well
(14:16):
aware of. You know, they passed, you know,
legislation in the year 2000 which took effect in 2001 that
any adoptee once they qualified to become adopted into the
United States, which there is a qualification there that is
supposed to be gone through. But you know, otherwise, as soon
(14:36):
as as long as those boxes are checked, as soon as they hit US
soil, they are citizens. They knew they had the gap in
that legislation, that it covered anyone who was under the
age of 18 when that legislation passed, but it didn't address
anyone who was 19 or older. They knew they had that gap and
they've never circled back and closed that loop.
(14:57):
They have left those folks in limbo, struggling, paying
attorneys, you know, having to try to fight to make sure that
they can stay in the United States and that and they should
be able to function as citizens so.
So as you were talking, I was just thinking, 'cause I know
international adoptees, on top of just being an adoptee, have
(15:18):
so many more things to think about.
They shouldn't have to think about that.
I mean, they already feel displaced and you know, all the
things adoptees feel on top of other things from being
international. But then to have that feel like,
OK, I don't even have a home. I really don't have a home.
You know, let's talk about a little bit about what are some
(15:39):
of the things that you discovered and talking to
international adoptees, what other struggles do they have on
top of the normal adoptee thingsthat we talk about?
Yeah. I mean, we talk in it in, in, in
adoption about layers. You know, you have what it is to
be a kid in this modern era anyway.
Then you have what it is to pairat that kid in this modern era
(16:01):
anyway. And then you tap in, you know,
to adoption. And the fact that there is some
inherent trauma, however that manifests whatever, whatever,
However we can argue about that to the end of days, but there is
inherent trauma in separating aninfant from its mother.
How that adaptation goes, then if you add a transracial piece,
(16:21):
that complicates it. And then, oh, we're going to add
an international element on there too.
So you've now taken a person whois out of their culture, out of
their religious heritage, out oftheir familial heritage, out of
their language, depending upon the age that they are.
You know, because if language hasn't formed up and they're
(16:42):
brought to the United States, well then they're learning
English as their dominant language.
If a child is 345 older, they'vealready started to immerse
themselves in that language at their home, and now you're going
to make them reassimilate on that too, which immigrants have
done since the dawn of time. It's a little different, though,
when an adult immigrates to the United States because they want
(17:06):
to or they're bringing their children with them.
It's something else to take a child completely away from their
family and all that they knew that was familiar, and then plop
them down and say, aren't you lucky?
Let's go. Aren't you a blank slate?
Let's let's go. Come on.
(17:27):
Chop chop, get with the program.No, let's.
Let's. We're giving you everything get
with the program. And again, you know I am not
that person. I cannot and will not speak for
for those folks other than the ones who spoke to me.
And their words speak for themselves.
Yeah, yeah, definitely. Yeah.
(17:51):
Let's go back to the Baby Scoop era a little bit.
How did the lack of contraception and abortion not
being legal until 7273, how did that shape the Baby Scoop era
and the wave of adoption that followed that?
Yeah, I mean, you know, I try topaint a, a, a picture of that in
the book, you know, with the research that I did.
(18:12):
And of course, you know, again, Anne Fessler's work, you know,
leading the way on that. We, I mean, we still had some
really, really old fashioned well, and somebody's going to
yell at me about the use of thatterm too, but we still have some
very stigmatizing points of viewabout, you know, sex outside of
(18:37):
marriage. Those points of view still exist
to this day. And I'm not going to say that we
don't own our responsibilities. We all own our responsibilities.
But, and I'm going to say that if you cut people off from
options or education and information to best allow them
(18:59):
to function in a responsible andan individually responsible
manner, what do you expect? You know, so I mean, you have
all of these cultural pushes andshoves that are coming to bear
during this era. You have a worldwide baby boom
as it is, and then you have unmarried teens who have new
(19:21):
levels of access to one another.And young people are hormone
factories. And that's what we do.
And we respond to those hormonesin, you know, sometimes maybe
not the most thoughtful way, right?
I mean, our prefrontal is not finished, right?
Risk reward systems are not fully online.
So we put a bunch of young people into situations where we
(19:45):
have this also emerging, more permissive culture.
And really, we're surprised. That we had, I think what struck
me was the part where you said that contraception was only
available to married couples. It just seems so targeted
towards women. I mean, the whole thing, not
only the lack of contraception and abortion, but also once they
(20:11):
got pregnant, they were also targeted again.
Like it. It was like.
You know you can't win. You can't win here.
Oh no, that double standard was wielded very cruelly, you know,
against those women and young girls, some of them, but, and,
and regardless of how they got pregnant, whether whether the
sex was fully consensual or not,you know, that was it.
(20:32):
You either got married, which isof course, the majority of, of,
of, of what I think, you know, that's why we have the term
shotgun wedding, right? Is a lot of people got married
or you know, you sent that girl away?
Yeah, Yep. So in the book you talk about
(20:53):
adoptee consciousness and I've never, I didn't have never heard
that term before. Is there a difference between
adoptee consciousness and comingout of the fog?
They're two different things. And the adoptee consciousness
model we owe to Doctor J Ron Kimand a lot of her colleagues
there who kind of created that fog.
And I do cite the references in the book, although I don't
(21:13):
recall them right now, but you know, do do take a look at that
in the, in the, in the notes in the book.
The FOG is both an acronym, excuse me, both an acronym and a
metaphor. You have it standing for fear,
obligation and guilt, which is sort of an evolution and a
metamorphosis that happens within an adoptee as they grow
(21:36):
and start to process the state of having been adopted and
therefore also first relinquished by someone.
And then the realization, well, wait, I'm now with this new
family, and I'm feeling a littlevulnerable about the fact that
somebody gave up on me once and now does it mean I could be
(21:56):
given up on again? And so there's a lot of fear
that is inherent in many adoptees.
And it was certainly apparent within myself, even though I
really didn't have the word for it, you know, And so then you
have fear and then you create this language that is built
around rescuing a child, saving a child, you know, So then that
(22:21):
creates A dynamic where there's a feeling of obligation back to
you towards your parents, like, oh, they rescued me from a
gutter or something like that. Well, gosh, you know, so now I
now I'm, I'm obliged to be a good kid, right?
And then to feel guilty if you just exist because how did I
come into how, how can you tell me that I'm valued?
(22:44):
And so it's really, really hard to process that I think as kids.
And I don't think again that adoptive parents, certainly in
our era were given any tools to have to process any of this.
You know, and I'm not really sure how well we're preparing
adoptive parents now. I think some are and some
aren't. And so you have the acronym,
then you have the metaphor, which is coming into awareness.
(23:09):
And that's where the fog or consciousness, they're both
telling the same story there, which is a shift in how you view
first your own process and then adoption in general at a larger,
at a, at a, at a larger view. And it's painful.
(23:30):
It's painful. I went through that process in
the course of writing this book.Painful.
Wow. Well, how could you not?
I mean, how could you not if youweren't in the if you weren't
coming out of the fog you were going to after hearing all these
stories. And I mean, you just, there's no
way around that after reading itor hearing it.
(23:53):
Yeah. And I mean that's The thing is
that, you know, as going back to, you know, the adoptee
consciousness model, that's called rupture and that's a
painful place to be. Rupture is painful and then you
and, and, and then you're in dissonance, which is wait,
everything I thought I was that was true is shifting like
(24:13):
literally in front of me. Like you can almost literally
feel a wobbliness within one's being when you're in that place.
And that's a very uncomfortable place and.
So. I didn't enjoy it.
My mission was to write through it anyway and try to figure it
(24:36):
out the best that I could so. Did it help?
Did it help you, you think in that process or did it
exacerbate it? What do you think?
A little of both, you know, because how can I not be
affected by the stories that I hear, right?
And so then I would be processing my own internal
(24:59):
journey and then hearing and reading, you know, reading
research that is again, backing up exactly what I'm hearing in
story. And then, you know, for, for for
every person that that gave me their story in the book.
I mean, I remember every single one of you.
I remember your stories. I remember the things that you
(25:20):
said to me. So now I'm with you on your
journeys too. And so how do I not also process
what's happening in our larger society alongside myself?
So both things were happening tome and that was not always easy.
Yeah, I know. I mean, you know, I've heard a
lot of stories myself and I justgot done taking four months off
(25:44):
after doing 2 years straight of adoptee stories.
And I was getting so way down from hearing over and over and
over. And my producer finally was
like, you're not putting out another episode.
You are taking a break. She's like you, you have to
stop. Like, and so I did.
(26:05):
I I'm back now after four monthsand kind of shifting a little
bit the podcast, but still also wanting adoptive to be adoptive
focus somewhat and, and helping adoptees.
So yeah, it's it's heavy. It's super heavy.
It is, yeah. So in all your interviews, how
important was it when you were listening to adoptees for
(26:28):
adoptees to find out they were adopted young as opposed to
later, even teenager or, you know, late discovery, really
late discovery. How important was that?
It's, it's, it's devastating to be told later after you started
to form up and know your place in the world or how you even
think you know your place in theworld.
(26:50):
You know, there was a, a gentleman who I interviewed who
was old school. He's an old school gentleman,
lovely man. You know who I, I, I know
somewhat socially here in town. And I mean, he was told when he
was 7 and it rocked his world asit would.
And so of all the things that happen out there, let's be
(27:10):
clear, not telling your kid about their parentage and not
telling them that they're adopted and not telling them the
truth is a really terrible thingto do to someone.
Yeah, it's. Not OK under any circumstances,
ever. It is never OK.
(27:30):
Yeah, never adoption or not. Like it's just, yeah.
And then and nowadays, how can you with DNA and you're only
waiting for a bomb to go off. So it's just kind of dumb, which
kind of goes back to why we can't get our birth certificates
and everything else. It's just like, it doesn't make
no sense. None of it makes sense.
So you talk about separation trauma and you asked in the book
(27:53):
if it was real. What did you discover both in
research and personal stories? And what what does science say
about separation trauma? You know, there's there's a
growing body of science over both what happens in utero, how
that affects us as we grow and, and, you know, come out
initially as little infants, youknow, ready to thrive, right
(28:16):
and, and how that can can impactour development.
We're continuing to see more andmore research on just the entire
concept of how much power our nervous system actually impacts
our overall well-being. You know, Besser Vandelkock's
book, You know, the Body Keeps the score.
(28:37):
It's been on the New York Times bestseller list for what, four
years, Five years? Whatever it is, there's a reason
for that. And not just because he, because
he wrote a book about this interesting nerdy science thing,
but clearly it's resonating withpeople.
Otherwise people wouldn't still keep turning to it as a source
for information and healing and understanding because we we hurt
(29:05):
ourselves, in my opinion, by buying into collective denial of
a potential problem. I think we do ourselves great
damage both as individuals and in a larger society if we live
in denial of a problem, any problem, right?
And pivoting now to me right down to center is, you know,
(29:28):
again, we're not, we're not really going too much into my
story, but I was certainly affected by the fact that my
adoptive mother was addicted to prescription drugs and alcohol.
I, I did all the work, man. I did, you know, adult children
of Alcoholics, which I will say saved me, absolutely saved me
because I was really struggling as a human being because I'd
(29:50):
learned some really bad behaviors and bad models of, of,
of being and worked hard on myself to come back out of the
other side of it. And I would still say to you, I
still know that there were otherthings that were kicking around
inside of me, but of course, notknowing where to put them, I
just attributed them to alcoholism and to end up being
(30:11):
raised with an addict. So I'm putting these problems
that I still know that I have internally, but I'm putting them
in the wrong box, which means I'm not going to get the right
solution to them. So then when I do this reading
and this research and I go, Oh my God, there it is.
(30:31):
There's the answer. How freeing is that, right?
Best thing ever, you know, to have the right box to put
something in to go, Oh my God, that is the source of this.
And so I know know that there are a lot of people out there
who are functioning through whatever they went through in
(30:52):
their life, whether it's adoption or whatever.
But if you don't find the right thing to unlock that problem and
really address it, what are you doing?
You're just, you know, then, then as human beings, we've set
ourselves up where we're, we're running on a hamster wheel, but
it's the wrong wheel. And then we don't get answered.
(31:13):
We're not getting anywhere. We're not getting anywhere.
And so, you know, that's what I would say.
Then again, now extrapolating out is we're we're tearing at a
narrative here and and the narrative is adoption is
amazing. Adoption is beautiful.
(31:34):
If you have good parents, there should be nothing wrong with
you. And life is amazing.
You're just looking at it the wrong way.
You just, you know, maybe you just need to have a different
attitude. And that's because our society,
we really, really want pretty bows on our boxes.
Gosh, we want we, we want that narrative.
(31:56):
We really do. And we're not going to actually
solve the issues that folks are facing without at least going
into this and saying, OK, this isn't everybody's story.
Of course it's not. But it's also not nothing
either. And I, I, I invite everyone to
(32:18):
really take an honest deep dive and a read and just think about
their lives. Yeah.
I think recently in the last year, and I kind of mentioned
this last week with another guest, was that I realized that
when I was in the womb, I was there.
(32:39):
When my mother found out she waspregnant with me, which was
stressful. When her mother died, when she
was six months pregnant with me,I was there.
I went to the, I went to my grandmother's funeral, you know,
and I was just like, you know, and through all the traumas that
she went through those nine months, I was there.
And I was experiencing it just as she was, as I was forming.
(33:03):
You know, what did that do to me?
Like scientifically, how does that it has to affect, you know,
And it was just like, whoa, I had never thought about that
before that I was there, you know, experiencing the cortisol
and all the stress hormones and the stress worry, whatever, you
(33:24):
know, whatever she was going through, I was there.
It's crazy to think about. Yeah, it is.
And not only that, but remember you and I are born with two
ovaries full of eggs. So we're born with the next
generation already in us. Our DNA, however that is formed
(33:47):
up is fully present and accounted for.
And that is unique to women versus men.
Men's sperm accumulates over there over over time.
And so that which is interesting, you know, on that
side of the Ledger, because it means that then their their
Wellness in their lifespan can impact right the health of their
sperm that they pass on to make another human with.
(34:10):
But us it's set. Yeah.
It's already set. And there's part of where
generational trauma comes from, the science of it.
I mean, my children, you know, also experienced part of that as
well. That's crazy.
It's so crazy to think about. Yeah, it is.
(34:31):
So in the book you said maybe the way to look at the primal
wound is less literal for those who keenly relate to it.
What if the power is in asking adoptees to lean into the
psychological pain they feel rather than hide from it?
So what conclusions did you cometo about leaning in instead of
hiding and and how important do you think that is in the healing
(34:52):
process of adoptees or birth mothers or whoever?
There's no way around it. There's only through it.
We have to, we have to go into the things that are troubling
us. If we we just again.
Since when does denial help anyone?
Now you might need denial for a period of time.
(35:13):
I think denial's alive, right? Sometimes it can literally keep
us alive. Eventually, if you want to be
more than a hurt person who willinevitably hurt other people and
continue to hurt themselves, if you want to eventually evolve,
this is where you have to go. You have to go inside, and you
(35:34):
have to be willing to risk finding things that are
uncomfortable and painful even more than you thought they might
be or they're different than youthought they might be.
Yeah, and it's ringing. I get it.
It's bloody terrifying. Yeah.
(35:56):
Do you think we can heal? Absolutely.
I think we have to try, you know, I mean, if nothing else,
we have to try and we have to keep trying.
And you know, again, I mean, you've gone into your own
modalities, right? You know, of, you know, the
somatic therapy and somatic healing and things like that.
I think that just seek and find something that works for you and
(36:20):
if it works, do it. Yep, Yep.
Whatever it is, do it. Absolutely.
So, you know, we hear a lot about kind of the common themes
of, you know, some of the thingsthat psychologically adoptees
struggle with the common ones. Did you notice anything that you
were surprised about and maybe some of the interviews or I know
(36:43):
there was a chart in the book that was showing we were you
were talking about, was it Doctor Libov?
I can't ever think of her name, the one that the one that's
coming out with that research about the suicide rates.
And there was some other things in there too that I hadn't
thought about that were shocking, that will be coming
(37:05):
out I guess, pretty soon, if they haven't already.
But what were some of the thingsthat kind of shocked you that
you hadn't heard? Yeah, I mean, Doctor Lynn
Zubov's work is who you're talking about will be coming out
soon. You know, even just hearing the
the 1st and most widely published statistic that
adoptees are four times more likely than the general
population to attempt or commit suicide, plus the outsized
(37:27):
representation that we have in addiction in particular.
You know, again, looking to, youknow, zooming out for a minute
and looking at our population asa whole before the pandemic in
2017, 2018-2019, we had three years in a row where life
expectancy overall in the UnitedStates robbed.
(37:50):
And it dropped due to diseases of despair, which is alcoholism,
drug, drug overdose or outright suicide, which you could argue
the other two are sometimes maybe just a different
manifestation of the other. But think about this in an era
where everybody's living longer.You know, the average life
expectancy for a woman is now about 80.
So with the baby boomers aging up, we still had a statistical
(38:15):
occurrence happening in the willful loss of life or the loss
of life due to diseases of despair.
It knocked that average down. It is not small, OK?
That is that is a big deal in and of itself.
And I remember that, that, you know, the NIH was kind of going,
hey, guys, we have an issue here.
Then we have the pandemic. So things go the way that they
(38:38):
go. Then we start to kind of
normalize in 2022-2023. Same pattern is reemerged.
And so we've already got a society that is struggling a bit
now. I've heard maybe in 2024, we've
maybe knocked that. We'll see.
That'd be great, right? I hear that, you know, deaths
(39:00):
due to fentanyl, for example, are finally down, right.
OK, so those would be good things.
But in a society that is clearlyalready struggling, if adoptees
are then at an outsized rate struggling more, is that that is
worthy of some attention. And, and it's, and I, I charge
(39:23):
our mental health professionals in our society to feel an
obligation to look at that, right.
I say to you, listen up guys andgals, there's an obligation that
you must, I think address, whichis to at least ask the question,
(39:44):
what's going on here? Yeah.
I mean, the rate is coming out to be what, 38 around 38?
When Zoo Bob's research is stillvery new, it's not finished, but
Oh my goodness, her statistics blow this blow 4% out of the
water. And she's also really the only
(40:05):
one who has studied, you know, birth mothers in particular,
first parent mental health and, and their long term health
outcomes. And I think it's worth noting,
you know, because she talks about this.
Too, in her presentations and even when she and I, you know,
because I, I, I talked to her in, in, in recording my sessions
(40:25):
for the book, she fell into thisside of the Ledger.
She was just doing research on reunions and how to reunions
more successful between adopteesand first families.
That's what she was really doing.
And so in the survey, when she started to put out her initial
(40:47):
results, she started to get so many people coming back saying
such and so had such and so was deceased, Such and so was
deceased. And then she went, that's weird.
Let's expand the survey out. And so then as you go through
the decision tree, the way that the survey is now built out, and
then she's extrapolating out that data.
Well, you know, as I cover it inthe book, I mean, we're talking
(41:10):
really, really abnormally high rates of suicide.
We're talking abnormally high rates of addiction.
We're talking lowered lifespans overall for birth mothers in
particular. Yeah.
That's scary and we need to be paying attention to this.
And again, it's the only study that I know of that's even been
(41:31):
done on this particular data point within First Parent
Health. Yeah, it was amazing.
I there was, when I looked at that chart, I mean, obviously
I'd known the suicide, I'd been hearing, you know, buzzes about
that coming out. But the other things, I mean,
it's not, it's, it's a huge difference.
(41:51):
So it's not just a coincidence. I mean, it's not like, oh,
couple percent, I mean, a couplepercent is a lot, but it's a lot
more than that. Can't deny it.
Yeah. And I mean that study that, that
that cites the 4%, I mean, I believe that's 2013, it's 2013
or 2014. So it's relatively recent, you
know, so again, we're not we're not talking about the 1940s or
(42:14):
the 1960s, we're talking about now.
And so again, I just we cannot continue to ignore this
information. Yeah, and it just won.
It just makes me wonder how theycollected their data and, you
know, because it is such a huge difference.
Like I just, you know, in here we were talking about that, that
like it was a big deal. You know, more times more
(42:36):
likely. It's like, wow, you know, now
it's just way more than we even ever thought.
Right. So after hearing from so many in
the adoption triad, what are a few things that you think
adoptive parents need to know that could lessen or even
prevent some adoption related trauma?
You know, and, and I mean, I will, I will quote, you know,
(42:58):
Lori Holden over at, you know, her podcast adoption, the
Longview, as well as other adoptive parents in the space,
which is first and foremost, do your own work, you know, and
again, that research really did surprise me.
I was glad to share it because Ithink it happens to reinforce
(43:18):
what a lot of adoptive parents will say, which is I didn't know
enough going into this and I hadn't maybe processed my own
emotional journey as much as I should have before beginning.
And so it again comes down to weare not giving people space in
(43:40):
our culture to process grief. And we talk a lot about adoptee
grief and adoptee spaces. And I think everyone can
understand birth parent grief and birth parents spaces.
But I don't think we're giving due justice to folks who have
experienced endless infertility pain.
(44:01):
And I think we need to, I think they deserve that space.
You know, they too have built uptheir own, you know, ghost
Kingdom, if you will, imaginations on children that
they wanted to have. And let's get real, everybody
wants to have their own natural child.
That is a deeply seated desire within so many human beings.
(44:25):
I believe it's put there by our dinosaur brain and our DNA,
which is first and foremost propagate the species because
that's how you survive. If you if if you don't have
young, you will not survive, right?
So we need to just, we need to not be resentful about that.
I think as adoptees, that is a very natural desire and we need
(44:47):
to help get the message out to these folks that you need to
process this before you begin this journey.
Because if you haven't, this will blow back on your family,
it will blow back on you, and itwill blow back on your children.
Yeah, again, let's just slip a Band-Aid on it and slip another
child into that slot there and everything will might be better,
(45:08):
right? It's going to take all that
away. It'll make everything all
better. And collective denial heals no
one. Yeah, yeah, it's a nice pipe
dream, but it doesn't work out that way.
No. And and and again, there's
there's ample data to support that.
Yeah, definitely. What did you learn from birth
parents from, you know, talking to all these birth parents for
(45:28):
the book that you think adopteesreally need to hear?
Did anything that they shared surprise you personally?
Oh, the things that surprised me, I think, well, again, we we
almost have to divide this conversation into two places.
(45:51):
There's our mother's generation,and then there's the mothers who
are relinquishing Now, I think our mother's generation, I think
it's really easy for us to wrap our heads around the fact that
our mothers didn't have any choices because culturally they
didn't have any choices. And so I think they were, in
general, bullied and shamed out of keeping children that they
(46:14):
very much wanted to keep. This isn't universal.
There are plenty of adoptees outthere who are gonna listen to
this. Well, you know, my birth mother
was not all that. Yep, we know that too.
You know, it's important that wenot romanticize and, again,
build false narratives around what are obviously individuals
in the modern era. I think, I think the thing that
(46:40):
really needs to permeate throughthis is people need to
understand how complicated thesedecisions get.
And I think people need to understand that these women do
really get fed this pipe dream of clearly, if you've walked
through the doors of this building, clearly, if you've
(47:00):
responded to this online e-mail or this online form, you can't
pair it right. I mean, I, I, I really think
that unfortunately, expectant couples who relinquish are
really having someone lean in onthem and telling them what they
can't do rather than telling them what they can or telling
(47:21):
that somebody else can do it better.
And everyone falls in love with this whole narrative of, you
know, the shiny, the shiny two cars and the nice big, you know,
MC Mansion House and oh, they'regoing to give my kids so many
opportunities that I couldn't give their kid.
And I just, you know, again, money doesn't make anybody a
(47:43):
better person. Money does provide
opportunities, OK? It provides options.
And I will never deny that. And I think we again need to
understand there is there is this many infants, none asking
to be reassigned to a new familywhen they're born.
That's true for the animal Kingdom and the human one.
(48:04):
So if we're going to do that andwe're going to understand that
there are long term consequencesfor everybody involved, we can't
be trivial about that decision. And it can't, in my opinion, or
at least it should not in my opinion, only be driven about
resources. Unresourced people need help.
(48:27):
They need options. If you have too many problems to
solve or if you have a woman whoreally, really, really, really,
really actually, for whatever reason does not want to be a
parent, OK, If this is, if this is really where she's headed as
the right decision for her, OK. And there were necessary
(48:47):
relinquishments among the birth parents that I interviewed where
you just had too many problems to solve.
And you had just it just I can see it.
And I can see it in that woman that she can see it.
This wasn't going to work. This was the best decision for
me. This was the best decision for
(49:07):
my child. And the difference between that
woman and the difference betweena woman who got manipulated is
gigantic. In.
Terms of the way that she's ableto view her life and in the
relationship that she then has with her kid.
Yeah. And I, I think even the ones
that really wanted, you know, made the decision thoughtfully
and really wanted to give their child up for adoption, I almost
(49:32):
see that as kind of the correlation between having a
good adoption, you know how we feel about having a good
adoption. I mean, there's still trauma
there. Even though she gave willingly,
gave her child away, there was, there's still some seated trauma
in there, even having to make that decision, whether she
really felt it was right, the right one, right?
Right. You also interviewed adoptive
(49:55):
parents. Did you find that they truly
understood the depth and complexity of adoption, or were
they unaware? Most were unaware when they
started. Most had worked really hard to
get aware very quickly. It's like I I found and
(50:15):
interviewed a lot of really, really good adoptive parents for
the book. And so, yeah, a lot, You know,
if there's one who said differently, I don't, I don't
recall it, but I think all of them said, yeah, as prepared as
I thought I was, there was many ways and angles and thought
processes that me and my husbandthought we'd gone through this
(50:38):
and this and this and this stillsurprised us, you know, kind of
thing. And so which, you know, again,
nobody comes with an instructionmanual, right?
Parenting is already hard if parents don't get some real
solid information and education,I think on the front hand before
they adopt that, no, you just added another layer and then
(51:01):
there's gonna be another if it'sinternational, one another if
it's generational, Right, Right.You know, if we don't give them
the opportunity to really be informed about that, it gets
hard. Yeah, yeah.
Really hard SO. I don't know, recently that's
another reason I kind of steppedaway for a little bit.
I was seeing so much division inthe community.
(51:22):
I really felt like we were starting to cannibalize
ourselves a bit, you know, and, and hearing a different
perspective and not agreeing with it and basically telling
each other that you're wrong because, you know, I don't,
that's, that wasn't my experience.
So how important is it that we validate each other's
experiences? You've heard so many stories now
(51:46):
you know, even when we look at things totally different in the
name of collective healing and change, how important is is us
seeing each other's stories and just validating each other.
It's extremely important. I mean, we do have to try to
understand that there, you know,our experiences are as fast as
(52:06):
the stars and with it are our opinions, right.
We, we sit on this sort of dimmer switch, if you can see
this. I mean, it's like on, on one
side is adoption is awesome, andthe other extreme is adoption
ought to be abolished, right? Most of us sit somewhere in the
dynamic in between. But then these two things exist
and I don't, I don't, I'm, I'm, I'm not calling them extreme.
(52:29):
I'm just saying that's kind of apolar opposite.
I don't think we do each other any favors if we fail to
acknowledge that I can be in alignment with your points of
view in this and this and this and this, but maybe not that,
right? Like I'm not comfortable with
that language or I'm not comfortable with that particular
point of view. But I'm with you over here.
(52:51):
If we lose the ability to try tocommunicate with and hear each
other and saying, it's OK if youdon't take this in all the
directions that I do, but I'm going to be over here, we risk
losing again that 75% solution in the middle, which is probably
(53:12):
where actual change lies. And again, I, you know, I know a
lot of those activists and I, I,I appreciate them.
I respect their right to be out there.
I'm not necessarily going to be in agreement with everything
that everyone says and they're not going to be in agreement
with everything I say. And that has to be OK.
(53:33):
And I'm going to have to learn how to walk that talk myself.
So it's and I'm not saying it's going to be easy.
Right, so kind of in closing, what do you hope readers get
from from reading your book Adoption Paradox?
Perspective, healing, validation, I think those are
(53:54):
three big words right there. And, and if you find it a waste
of time, OK, give it to, you know, give it to somebody else.
I don't think that's going to happen, but.
You know, that's the thing. No one, no one thing can be
everyone's story. I mean, one of the there was
this one wonderful writer writers group that I was
(54:15):
attending. And she says, you know, before
you put yourself out there, she says, take your three favorite
authors and the best books you've ever read in your whole
life, and then go to Goodreads and read their one star reviews.
Because no matter what, you know, somebody's not gonna like
you and someone's not gonna agree with you.
And so again, I, I, I know that my book isn't gonna be for
(54:37):
everybody, but I hope it's for Ihope that the community can
embrace it and understand it. And I hope that also people
outside of the community can embrace it and understand it, or
at least give it its fair due. Yeah, yeah.
Good. It's all I've been asked for.
Yeah. So tell us, when is the book
(54:58):
maybe coming out? It's not out quite yet, so.
We have a we have a tentative drop date of May 20th, give or
take, and so follow me on Facebook.
Yeah, where can we find? For my new book, Tell Us.
Where we can find you and all that good stuff too.
Yeah, we'll keep that also, of course, in the show notes, but
(55:20):
adoption paradox.com is my website.
From there you can sign up to mynewsletter.
And then also there's Adoption Paradox.
You can find that on Facebook and you can find my author, Gene
Kelly Widner on Facebook as well.
And I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm working on some other channels because I
(55:41):
know I do need to do a few more,but that's where I've built
myself out now, so. Awesome.
So I just want to tell you, I hope that you have like your
bags packed and I think you're going to be flying all over the
world being an expert now on a lot of this stuff and being
asked to speak all over the place.
(56:02):
And I have to, I have to say, I was not expecting what I read.
Like it. Like I said, I've, you know,
been immersed in the community for a while and it was still
shocking to me a lot of the things that I read in there,
things I didn't know, things I got educated on that I needed to
hear such an important book. I just really think it's going
(56:25):
to explode. And I hope that you feel super,
super proud of yourself for putting this out there.
Thank you. Thank you so much.
You have no idea. What that means.
Thank you. You're welcome.
Thanks for coming on today. Thank you for having me so much.
It's been great to. Be here.
I told you this episode was going to be.
Powerful and this is an even full throttle.
(56:45):
You have to read the. Book to get the full effect and.
Honestly, as deep as we went today, there's so much more in
Jean's book that we didn't even get to touch on.
There's just no way to cover it all in one conversation.
And if you care about adoption or want to truly understand it,
you need to read this book, The Adoption Paradox.
It's not just a book, it's an education, it's a mirror, and
(57:09):
it's a movement. And pre-orders are open right
now. And here's the best part.
If you order now, you'll get a personally signed paperback copy
from Jean herself shipped right out to you as soon as they're
available. The official release date is
around May 20th. But don't wait.
Get your copy locked in today and you'll find all the links to
(57:29):
Jean and the book in the show notes.
And if you're a healer, A practitioner using an
unconventional or alternative modality, or someone who's
walked through deep personal transformation and now helps
others do the same, I'd love to hear from you.
I'm always looking for guests who bring something unique,
heart centered, and healing to the table.
(57:52):
Whether it's somatic work, energy healing, trauma informed
practices, spiritual growth, nervous system regulation, or
something a little outside of the box that's changing lives, I
want to hear from you. If that's you or someone you
know, reach out to me at mindyourownkarma@gmail.com.
(58:13):
And Speaking of healing, if today's episode stirred
something in you, it might be time to go a little deeper.
That's where somatic mindful, guided imagery comes in.
Our bodies, they hold on to trauma in ways our minds can't
always access a process, and sometimes talking about it just
isn't enough. Somatic healing reconnects you
(58:35):
with your body, helps you release what's been stuck, and
supports real transformation anda sense of balance.
You can learn more about workingwith me at Somatic Healing
journeys.com. Somatics might just be one of
the numbers in your healing combination, and I would be
honored to support you on your healing path.
(58:57):
Thank you for being here today, Karma crew, and TuneIn.
Next time, because you might be just one listen away from a
totally different life. So as always, take what you need
and leave what you don't. And always remember to mind your
own karma. I'll see you all next time.
(59:24):
This podcast is created for educational.
Purposes by the telling of adoption experiences the views
expressed in this. Podcast may not be.
Those of the host or mind your own karma.
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