November 5, 2025 • 49 mins
In this episode of Wards of the State, host Karlos Dillard introduces Brittany, a guest with a profound story of being a foster youth and an adoptee. Brittany shares her early life in foster care, the challenges she faced in her adoptive family, and her eventual reunion with her biological family. The conversation delves into the complexities of identity, the impact of trauma, and the resilience required to navigate life as an adoptee. Brittany emphasizes the importance of asking questions about one's origins and encourages others to seek their truth. The episode concludes with reflections on the importance of love, support, and the journey of healing.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Content warning.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
The Wards of the State podcast may contain material that
may be harmful or traumatizing to some audiences.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Listener discretion is advised.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Heylight Shiners, Welcome back to another amazing episode of Awards
of the State. We are pushing straight on through. I
want to just start by saying this, y'all. I don't
really get personal a whole lot on this show, because
I do want this show to highlight the lived experience
of other adoptees.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
But I don't think that I give myself enough.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Kudos and gratitude for this space to be able to
have over one hundred episodes of lived experience and foster
care and adoption, to be able to listen to some
of these stories that we hear that are gut wrenching,
that are just just honestly horrific, and then to also
get that followed up by stories of love and children
(01:21):
actually finding safe external childcare. It is something that is
so special to me, and I do it because I
feel like I owe the community to give them a
platform and give them a space, because I have gotten
a platform and I got the space to share my story.
But in reality, I have to realize that I ain't
got to do it. I don't, right, this is a
gift that I give to the community, and I'm so
(01:43):
hard on myself and I just wanted to just like
give myself flowers. Because here's the thing, y'all, if ain't
nobody gonna give you flowers to you, give them to yourself.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
Give to yourself. But no, I really want to.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
Appreciate all the listeners and all the light shiners coming
back every single week. Also, make sure you are watching
our episode on YouTube. They are now available on YouTube
to watch. I like watching the YouTube episodes. They're really great.
I like seeing the people's faces. And also you can
also make sure you are subscribing to us on Spotify
and leaving us a one two, three, four five star
rating review on Apple Podcast.
Speaker 1 (02:14):
But yeah, guys, if.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
Nobody is giving your flowers, make sure you give yourself
your flowers and make sure that you know that what
you're doing is important, whatever that might be.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
So that's just my little message for y'all for this week.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
So without further ado, I want to introduce the next
guest with What Experience.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
It's Brittany. Hi, Brittany, how are you doing today?
Speaker 3 (02:28):
Good?
Speaker 1 (02:28):
How are you? I am fantastic. I am blessed and
highly favored.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
So before the show, I was kind of asking you
a little bit about your experience, and you said that
you were a foster youth and an adoptee, so ye
kind of share with us how you got into the
external child welfare system.
Speaker 3 (02:43):
So I was born premature Alexandria, Virginia, and because I
was premature, I had a lot of health issues, and
so I was in the hospital about four months before
I was put in foster care. The foster home was
a Caucasian foster home and they specialized in foster kids
(03:08):
that had medical issues, most of which were respiratory issues
and things like that. From what I remember, there were
only three of us foster kids. The foster family had
adopted one of them, and so there was me and
a baby that were still foster youth. I was there
(03:32):
for about four years. My biological family did come and
see me, and from what I read in my records,
I was actually supposed to be reunified with them, but
it seemed through the notes, it seemed like every time
that I was ready to go with them, there was
some type of like grow block issue or something, and
(03:55):
it was always like Britney's too sick or they won't
be able to take care of her, which is very
you know, especially when I had family members that were
able and willing to take care of me. So I
was there for four years and then I was adopted
at four years old, and I moved from Virginia to Florida.
(04:15):
I'm not sure how, you know, my adoptive family, you know,
found me, Like, I don't know how all that works,
but I was adopted and moved to Florida. And at
first it was three of us adopted children, and then
it became eight, so I was a middle child of
(04:38):
eight adopted.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
Wow, that's a lot. So you were in this house
there was all these kids. What happened, Well.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
It started off being my older brother, my older sister,
and then me and then maybe I want to say
maybe like a month later, they adopted a baby. She
was six weeks old. And then after that we moved
around a lot, from state to state, and then we
(05:08):
and they.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
Were adopting these kids from foster care like you were
in or are they just private or were they you know?
Speaker 3 (05:13):
I think it was private. So because we were all
adopted from various places, even out of the country, so
at various ages, the oldest being was a sixteen year
old from Russia. So wow, right by the time we
(05:34):
settled in Chicago, there were eight of us living in
one house. And that's a lot of kids to have
to take care of and keep up with. So it
came with a lot of challenges and a lot of
the responsibility for the younger children was placed on the
older children. So me and my sister, tell me.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
At about your adopted parents, Like, I mean, that's a
lot of kids.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
Home. Yes, my adoptive mother was a she was a
CEO of like family resource organizations. And my adoptive father
he stayed at home, so he was a stay at
home father, which I think he got overwhelmed a lot,
and she wanted to adopt more children. He kind of
(06:26):
was apprehensive about it, but she just you know, did
it anyway, which then again put more responsibility on everyone
else because she was never home. So like, there was
a lot of conflict, a lot of abuse, a lot
of things that happened in the home that she was
not really aware of, nor did she really pay attention
(06:50):
to a lot of the things going on in the house.
And so a lot of it really was put on
my older sister and me to take care of the
younger ones who were also some physically disabled and things
like that. So as a high schooler, you know, taking
care of younger siblings and stuff while trying to maintain
(07:13):
a social life grades, you know, that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
It was really difficult for me when you say, you
said that you're physically disabled.
Speaker 3 (07:21):
No, I have adoptive siblings that are some of which
are physically disabled, and yes, so.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
They had are literally parentified.
Speaker 2 (07:31):
They parentified you and then turned you into a a living.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
Aid pretty much essentially, pretty much.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
I mean we were, you know, about how to take
care of them and which because of my nature, I'm
a caregiver, I am a nurturer. So for me, it
wasn't I wasn't really apprehensive about it because again, these
are my siblings. I'm going to take care of them.
I'm going to make sure they're okay, you know. And
I think that she knew that, which is why the
(07:59):
responsibility he was, you know, like here you go, you know,
because they were what see, my younger brother, he was adopted.
He was I think he was three when he was adopted.
But he's a triple amputite. So yes, yes, so tis
lived you know.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
Wait wait wait, yeah, these bitches are like Pokemon.
Speaker 4 (08:24):
Yes, they got a nigga from Russia at sixteen, the
Black girls from the Hood, a triple amputee.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Yeah, what were they thinking?
Speaker 3 (08:36):
I think?
Speaker 1 (08:37):
And all were they thinking.
Speaker 3 (08:39):
Was the performative aspect of it, because every time she
would adopt a child, she would get congratulated for it.
You know, they would have a celebration. She's not just
adopting like kids.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
She's adopting each kid that has, like a sixteen year
old Russian kid that probably is not fluent an American
or English, right, or that like taken away from his culture.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
Then a triple amputee.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
That just by itself, just that one child by itself,
is a lot to do for any.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
Parent, let alone some teenagers or some young child children.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
So it's like, at what point do you just be realistic,
Like that's a I do believe that infertility and adoption
trial like adopted, like it could be that it's like
a fetish, like it's a mental Sometimes some of these
people don't.
Speaker 3 (09:23):
And I think it's attention too, because she had she
has biological already, so both her and him had biological
children already separately, because they both came into their marriage
with their own children, but then deciding to adopt eight more.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
And I think also because of her career path. I mean,
if you're running a family organization, you should have like
put your money where your mouth this type of thing,
just so you can It's like promotion, you know, guy's
like a promos.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
You're like a promotion.
Speaker 3 (09:53):
And then some people what I could do extremely performative,
where we knew how to act, how to like talk,
how to be in a lot of different settings. So
when we go to the office or conferences and things
like that, we knew how we were supposed to kind
of behave quote unquote I don't know. But what I
(10:17):
guess what I didn't really understand was, Okay, if you're
a part of these big organizations, right, why is your
home in such disarray? Why you know you adopted all
these children and all these children that you say have
all these issues which come to find out as I've
because I've been an adult in read records and things
(10:37):
that a lot of the stuff that I was told
about my being in foster care, and then how like
my adoption came about like it's none of It's very
like Missless, it's it doesn't match like a lot of
the you know, they said that your biological parents weren't
around and things like that, and that's not the case.
(11:01):
They were teenagers, but that wasn't the reality of the situation.
I feel like they, I don't know whatever they did
to make it so that I could be adopted. Even
in my medical records, I was fine. There was nothing
like the doctors had basically, so I was healthy. The
(11:23):
only thing was they were just monitoring my lungs because
I was premature. But all these other things that they
claimed that I had, I didn't have it. So it's
weird that you would put a child up for adoption
when she has a whole family that is willing to.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Again, it sounded like it sounded like she knew somebody
because of her position and just wanted to add another collection,
add another child to the collection. That's what it. Unfortunately,
you hear that a lot people usurped their authorities. A
lot of will do this where they will deliver a
child and then see that it's a young girl and
(12:05):
be like, well, you know, I have a friend that's
been trying to be a mom, right and try to
facilitate like a little adoption like that. So unfortunately a
lot of people in those type of powerful positions will
use their power to, you know, do some unethical, questionable things.
Speaker 3 (12:17):
And that's what it seems like, because even with the
foster foster home, they said that it had to be
shut down because they were mistreating us. They claimed that, oh,
they were smoking around y'all and things like that, and
if it's a foster home for children with medical problems,
of course you shouldn't be smoking around them. But what
(12:38):
I also didn't understand was when I was adopted, I
was still allowed to be in contact with them. Like
from the time I was four until I was eighteen,
I was allowed to be in contact with them. They
called me, they sent me gifts and things. So if
they were mistreating me right in foster care, why was
I there still allowed to be kind.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
Of exactly exactly doesn't make sense.
Speaker 3 (13:01):
Not at all. And so those are things that kind
of made me question my own, you know, being adopted
and stuff like that, because none of it makes sense.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
So did you ever get a chance to speak to
your biological parents about what happened?
Speaker 3 (13:18):
I was reunited with them when I was twelve, or
I love that my whole family. I have a large family,
and mostly I've asked questions. I've been able to ask
questions and things and even from what they've told me
again looking at my records don't match. Yeah, and it's
(13:38):
like I really feel like they was really just jipped
out of you know, a child basically.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
And did they they end up having other children your
birth parents and raising them themselves or wow, you hate
to see that, right, well, I hate to see that
because it's like what happened before, what happen with me.
And then sometimes even as an adoptee, you feel like
you weren't good enough or they chose your other siblings,
when in reality they probably got got they probably got jip.
Speaker 1 (14:10):
Yeah, they don't know the system.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
I've had so many adoptees Like I was just I'm
working with an author. I'm working with an author and
she was from Russia and I know, no, maybe this
author was for the Yes, I get my authors, Diana, Yes,
I get them, I get them.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
My clients mixed up.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
And she says that as she's finding out her story,
she's learning that they literally lie like her mam was
just looking for help, like, hey, can you just help me?
Speaker 1 (14:35):
And they're like, yeah, we'll take your daughter, will help me.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
And she's thinking for like a couple hours, like her mom,
she doesn't understand and like, no, they're finna, they're gonna
take your baby and sell her.
Speaker 1 (14:44):
And they didn't explain it to her, and.
Speaker 2 (14:45):
Like that, I was like, so they really just to
be lying to parents. They were especially young kids. And
we see this currently, you know, with the whole Caitlyn
and Tyler thing, with the whole Tea moml thing.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
You know, that's a modern day example of that.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
And feel how you may about them as parents, them
as creators, they were kids who were cohorced and to
signing over their their chill, their rights and relied to
period point blank.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
Yes, that's ourn ethic.
Speaker 3 (15:12):
It's it's very much unethical, and it's it's really kind
of disturbing that people will go to great lengths just
to get what they want, like because it doesn't it
just doesn't make sense. And then like even because even
when I was growing up, I was told, you know,
every time I got in trouble, I was told, oh,
(15:33):
I'm gonna send you back to where you came from.
But I can't because they didn't want you anyway. That's
literally what I was told when I would get in
trouble up until I was reunited with them. So it's
like I'm sitting here like dang, like they didn't want me,
you know. And this is somebody that's, you know, my
adopted mother, who's supposed to be, you know, creating a safe.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
Based like I'm loving because I just I got off
the phone with my biological ant this morning, and she's
like in her seventies and she's the matriarch of her family.
She's the oldest one. No, my uncle's older than her.
But he just got a prison, don't He was in
prison for like forty years. They may no bother nobody.
He just stays in his apartment. I'm like, you know,
you out of prison, right, you go outside? But I
was talking to her, and sometimes usually our conversations will
(16:18):
she always asks me, she goes, why are your brothers
so mad at me?
Speaker 1 (16:21):
Like why don't they like me?
Speaker 2 (16:22):
And I was like, well, Auntie, I think a lot
of it goes back to when we were kids, Like
I remember being on the phone and having a social
worker because we were be like, our auntie will take us,
and my social worker was like, no, she won't.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
So then, like I guess, my social worker got tired
of her, she called my aunt.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
So she like we could hear it with our own ears,
which maybe not the best thing to do to children
in foster care, but it did make a point of like, hey,
don't get your hopes up on something that it's just
not there. And this morning I was talking to her
and she was like, well, I wasn't taking y'all. They
ain't my motherfucking kids. Those are my sister's kids. I
already took one of my brother's other kids. I ain't
taking five people.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
I got my own.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
And then she goes and grandma told me not to
take any of y'all's asses because me and didn't raise y'all.
Well anyway, I said, well, god, now, so if you
want to think that, like, yes, your family would be
there for you, but unfortunately some families are like mine,
where they're like, that's not my responsibility. So it really
does warm my heart when you find out we actually
would have taken care of you, right, Like it does
(17:18):
warm your ard like oh, yeah, you would have taken
care of me. I'm like that, I am loved, right,
I am loved.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
Yes, And it's just so for me, it's disheartening because like,
you adopted me, so why would you say those things
you know to me, especially a child who doesn't know
where she comes from and things like that, Like why
say that stuff? Like that's crazy? And that's probably a
(17:45):
control thing. It was.
Speaker 1 (17:46):
Probably it's all about control.
Speaker 2 (17:48):
It's all about control because once, I think a lot
of adoptive parents' first worst fear is you children reunifying,
finding out that everything they were told was a lie,
and then loving the biologic parents more. I think that's
every adoptive parents internal, even if they don't claim it.
I think that's all of their internal worry of what
if this child doesn't love me? But that's so human
(18:10):
and that's so okay because guess what, children who get
birth by their parents don't always love their parents right
or accept or or attached to their parents. But I
think that that's why a lot of them do these things,
like these controlling, manipulative tactics, like like be grateful without me,
you'd be dead, like oh, I'll send you back, like
things like that, where it's just a constant go to
(18:31):
a reminder of you have nobody and in reality, a
lot of us actually do.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
We just eve been lied to.
Speaker 3 (18:37):
And that's and it's like if and even just continuously
adopting more and more children when you know, like she
was never home, So how are you gonna take care
of all these kids if you're always don't?
Speaker 2 (18:51):
So when that happened, what type of things like so
you had to take care of like you're disabled to siblings,
how was that and how was that growing up? And
then like also was your relationship with your adopted parents now.
Speaker 3 (19:03):
Both of them are deceased. But like for me, because
I'm a nurturer, like I didn't it didn't bother me
to take care of my siblings. Like I felt like, okay,
well they weren't getting what they were getting from her
and him because even though he was at home, he
was physically there, but in terms of like emotional or
(19:25):
any of that, that was not there. So like okay,
you needed to go to a dance class, or you
needed you know, field trip money or like stuff like that.
Yeah he did that, but in terms of like really
having connection with us, that didn't happen either. And he
he was not a very nice man. He got he
(19:48):
had anger issues.
Speaker 2 (19:50):
I mean, and it also not to give him an excuse,
but Mitch, I do you're my second wife already raised
some other fucking kids and I got your biological children,
and then you want to bring eight more these motherfuckers
for me to raise.
Speaker 3 (20:02):
And he you know, and he did try to say, hey,
you know, if this is enough, but she guilt tripped
everybody into you know, oh, we would be bad, you
know people if we didn't accept the fact, oh we're
gonna she's gonna adopt one more kid. So and it
(20:24):
was always you know, y'all are adopted, and you know,
she'd show us pictures. I don't know where she would
get like these pictures, so I don't know if it
was a catalog, I don't know what where she would
find yours, like the kids like, so she would show
us pictures of children that she was thinking about adopting.
Speaker 4 (20:45):
And it's like, yeah, they have look books. Private agencies
have looked books like weird. Yeah, they have whole websites now,
like heart galleries. If you go to Hot Galleries of
America dot com or dot org, you.
Speaker 3 (20:56):
Can scroll through and you can like pick and shoes.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
They have foster kids and they adopted kids.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
And then they have also apps where you can like
swipe left for the ones you like and swipe right.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
For the words you're don't like. Temper here, isn't this?
That's then they have reality. Have you ever seen this show?
The Day I Found My Family?
Speaker 2 (21:15):
It's on A and E and it's adoption speed dating.
So they set a kid up. They set these kids
up at like tables, and then they bring like ten
families in and you get like twenty minutes each and
then the kid has to pick one and then that's
the whole show. So then the kid picks someone and
then for the next date, like they go on an outing.
They do like three outings, and then after the three outings,
then the kid has to decide if they want to
go with this family or if they want to go
(21:37):
try again, and you see if they can pick another family.
I was like, have you guys turned adoption into a
daily reality?
Speaker 3 (21:42):
They have? Yeah? Yo, that is crazy. That is very crazy.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
It's wold what they do with this industry, and everyone
just kind of like turns a blind eye because when
you hear the word adoption, you automatically feel in Oh
that's good, right, Oh, that that's good thing for them,
But in.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
Reality, it's not. The legal system has really corrupt.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
A lot of adoptees don't know any of their information,
their names, their real stories, the real history.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
And it's quite it's it's really just it's a form.
Speaker 2 (22:14):
Of genocide, if you ask me, it's a form of
genocide of just taking people and raising their culture and
identity and doing it legally governed and said, and to
do it to eight different shops, that's wild.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
That's wild. So your sibling that was a triple amputee,
like did who? Wait?
Speaker 2 (22:30):
Like did they who raised them? Because after y'all all
left home, like they still need help?
Speaker 3 (22:34):
Well, let's see I left. Let's see, I was twenty
one when I why I got kicked out. I ain't
gonna say I left. I got kicked out. And so
they were still in elementary school. So next oldest was,
(22:56):
you know, supposed to be the caregiver. She didn't do
a very good job. She created more trauma, which was
sad because I because when I got kicked out, Let's see,
I wasn't in communication with any of them for about
fourteen years.
Speaker 5 (23:17):
Oh wow, Like you you well I didn't. That wasn't
my choice, so they can stop communicating with you. Adoptive
mother's choice because I had I got pregnant when I
was seventeen, and then again when I was twenty one,
and with my when I got pregnant at seventeen, I
(23:41):
was coerced into giving her guardianship of my daughter.
Speaker 3 (23:46):
And so when you.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
Got your daughter back, please send met your daughter back. Yes,
she's done, Okay, thank you.
Speaker 3 (23:52):
It took fourteen years, but oh my god, you're kidding.
She once she got guardianship, she literally took control of
the whole thing. And the guardianship was supposed to only
be for health insurance because she was a PREMI. So
I was told, well, you know, because she's a PREI,
she's gonna need better health insurance. So I was like,
(24:16):
you know, it sounded good, right because I'm like, okay,
she's a premi. She was two pounds, so you know,
I'm thinking, okay, she's gonna need help. She didn't need
any of it. She was she came out of fight us.
So but because my adopted mother had guardianship, she was
able to control everything, every aspect of everything.
Speaker 2 (24:38):
Well, well you still have parental rights even at seventeen,
so any moment, just taken your baby and walk the
fuck on.
Speaker 3 (24:46):
But that's but because I didn't understand, I was not
knowledgeable about any of that, and she used that to
her advantage. Me and my daughter's father were not really
allowed to be involved in the parenting or any of that.
Since I do know that she was supposed to notify
us in terms of like if they moved, that never happened.
(25:10):
She would tell my other siblings, don't tell Britain that
we're moving, don't give her the ads, just don't give
a no contact information. Thank god for my older sister
who was like, no, I'm not going to do that,
that's not right. So anytime that anything happened, my sister
would tell me, and I'm very like, I am very
(25:30):
much grateful to her because I wouldn't know anything if
it wasn't for her being like, no, this is wrong.
Speaker 1 (25:37):
And it sounds like something happened because you said you
you left for fourteen years, your daughter's fourteen. You got
to raack, So what happened is something had to happen
for you to go back and get your daughter and
see them again.
Speaker 3 (25:48):
So I left when I was twenty one, and then
when I it was in got my bachelor's I think
it was twenty eighteen. So they were all living in
connect and my adopted mother she had got started well,
she had dementia, so they decided to move them from
(26:10):
her and my daughter to California. Now, my older sister
was told not to tell me, right, she was like, no,
I'm telling Brittany, that's her daughter. So I was graduating
with my bachelor's and I reached out to my adopted
mother's biological daughter, which was where they were at in California,
(26:32):
and I was like, hey, I'm going to be graduating
in Phoenix. You know, I would like to, you know,
this might be a good time, you know, for me
to reunite with my daughter. So she brought her to
Phoenix and we reunited and it was definitely just like
(26:55):
I was just over the moon, right because I'm seeing
this child who looks just like me, and you know,
but it's like, dang, I done missed out on all
these years. And she was, you know, also told things
that weren't true about you know, where I was, and
things like that. Maybe not even I think it was
(27:18):
like three years then my adopted mother's oldest started called me,
was like, oh, you know, can she come and live
with you? I said, surely, I won't say no, like,
come on, that's my child. So she is now living
with me and she has met her well my you know,
(27:43):
biological and what her biological side on my side, and
reunited with her dad so she talks to him and stuff.
But it's just while that's a blessing, it just part
of me feels like it didn't have to be this way, right,
It didn't have to y'all didn't have to do this
(28:04):
because not only did y'all keep her from me, she's
done had trauma right from not knowing who she is.
Speaker 1 (28:12):
Where's your separation trauma?
Speaker 3 (28:14):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (28:15):
And were these people white or black? White? Yeah? I did.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
I don't know why I asked that. I already knew. Yeah,
I was just confirming for the audience. This is cultural jediicide.
It's cultural jedicide what they're doing. Like, honestly, I got
to commend the adopted mother because she goes technically didn't adopt.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
Anymore, but I still got myself one.
Speaker 2 (28:36):
Like god dang, Like even after her eight she was
still trying to collect y'all's children.
Speaker 3 (28:40):
And that's what I felt too. I'm like, I felt
like I was telling my sister. I think I feel
like she's trying to start over because she done complained
about all of us.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
This actually happens so more than you think to adoptees
and their children, where their adoptive parents will adopt their Yeah,
it happens.
Speaker 1 (28:56):
Actually, it's it's pretty common. It's pretty common.
Speaker 2 (28:59):
We're adopted parents will have someone fourteen fifteen, their adopted
fourteen fifteen years old, kick out that child at sixteen,
and then raise their child as their own to try
to get like a redo. And it's quite sad. One
of the cases that I have, I was helping an adoptee.
It was so sick, it was so sick. So she
didn't know that she was adopted, found out that she
(29:20):
was adopted, got a genealogist, talked to her adopted like her.
Speaker 1 (29:23):
Mom, who she thought was her mom.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
Her mom was like, I don't know who your mom is, Like,
you know, you were left at a firehouse, Like it
was like a weird thing. She got a genealogist. The
genealogist ends up finding her biological mother. Guess who's her
biological mother, her legal sister. Her mom knew her daughter
had a baby at fifteen, she took her baby, her
daughter's baby, kicked her daughter out, moved across the country,
(29:48):
and acted like she never had that first daughter. So
she essentially raised her adopted granddaughter as her own, pretending
that she never knew that her own daughter, her own
adopted daughter was her granddaughter's mom. And I was like,
that's sick and heat.
Speaker 3 (30:01):
It is because even he started instead of her calling
me mom, they was like Brittany. They literally was like
they called me Brittany around her and had like as
if I was just some random person.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
Mm hmm, or sibling like yeah, that you're my big sister.
Speaker 3 (30:20):
Yeah. It's like even when I would call and she
doesn't want to talk to you, or it's like, okay,
this doesn't make sense. I would send stuff, it would
come back to me and then they would. She would
My adopted mother would tell the other siblings, Oh, I
haven't heard from Brittany. I don't know where Brittany is.
Mind you, she has all my contact information. Anywhere that
(30:41):
I went to, I would give her all my information.
She would tell everybody, Oh I don't know where Brittany.
Speaker 2 (30:47):
Is because that because that that made her narrative of
you being a mother that abandoned her child. That made
it because if she's, oh, yeah, she's sending letters and
gifts that I hear from her, that doesn't equal don't
don't equal the story that she was telling. Yeah, well
that's horrible. Well I'm glad that you did get through
reunite with her. And you say, yeah too, so that
you're reunited with both of them.
Speaker 3 (31:08):
Well, I know my son, he's always been with me.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
He's always been with you. Okay, so he was from
the get go he was.
Speaker 2 (31:14):
Yeah, how is their relationship because you know, that's a
long time to be without your sibling too.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
They are, they get along, there's regular siblings stuff. You know,
they get on each other's nerves. Yeah, but they I
love that, Yeah, but they do. So.
Speaker 2 (31:34):
So you you've done all of this, So you had
you had eight adopted siblers, seven adopted siblings.
Speaker 1 (31:40):
I know you talked.
Speaker 2 (31:40):
About your dad and you've been you've danced around your
life in that home as a black woman. How was
it being raised by an elderly white couple difficult?
Speaker 3 (31:52):
Because just not really being around a lot of black people.
Speaker 1 (31:57):
In Connecticut too.
Speaker 5 (31:59):
You said Connectic, I live in Connecticut.
Speaker 3 (32:04):
I was in when we lived in Chicago, so that's
a little bit. I was like more, it was a
culture shock because I was so used to being around
a lot of white people, and so I get to
Chicago and it's like, oh, there's all these black people,
(32:24):
and I didn't fit in because I'm like, I was
a tomboy. So like I'm sitting there with khakis on
and like just regular and it was it was really
a culture shock, but I really but they embraced me,
like I had a lot of friends. Elementary school, middle school,
high school was I loved my high school. And everyone
would be like, oh, you're so blessed. You know, you're
(32:46):
so blessed to have these white people, you know, to
have adopted you. And I'm sitting here like, but y'all
don't know what goes on in that house. Like for example,
when my adoptive father would get angry, like he would
he had a very short fuse. Oh, like he had
(33:06):
this thing where he liked to flip mattresses every other month.
Mind you, they had a California king. So me being
I was like like one hundred pounds, and he was like, Brinny, come,
you know, help me flip this mattress. So I'm over
there struggling. He gets mad, I get putting time out
on the stairs. He was so mad he took scissors
(33:29):
and he threw the scissors. Mind you, I was I
was not even face. I was facing down the stairs.
He threw scissors at me. They came past my head
and hit my knee. And I'm sitting here like I'm
in time out because I can't lift a mattress and
you're so angry about that that you decide you want to,
(33:51):
you know, physically do something about it.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
Like that's crazy, crazy, that's crazy.
Speaker 3 (33:57):
And a lot of times when we would get in
trouble with him, we would have to apologize for upsetting him.
So it wasn't the other way around where he would
have to apologize, I'm sorry for getting upset with you.
Speaker 1 (34:12):
No, it was, well, that's gaslighting as fuck.
Speaker 3 (34:15):
Apologized to him because we quote unquote were misbehaving. But
as we got older, we actually had the confidence and
to defend ourselves. It wasn't really physically, it was more
verbal like no, you can't, you know, do that which
is also why I was protective of my younger sibling
(34:35):
because I didn't want them to go through or deal
with what me and my older siblings had to in
the home. So I was I was a homebody anyway,
but I was always home just so that I could
make sure that nothing happened to them. Now I couldn't
watch them twenty four so things did happen, but I
(34:56):
was determined to not allow them you get mistreated or
hurt in that way. And a lot of people didn't
really know what was going on in our house. We
didn't talk about a lot of the things that were
going on in the house. For one, that was that
would ruin her image. But she had, you know, going
(35:18):
on with her job in the community and things like that.
But it's like I used to call it house of
horse because it's like, yo, we're dealing with this inside,
but on the outside you would never know.
Speaker 1 (35:29):
And that's what I tell people.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
Somebody just left a message or coming on my page
on Instagram and they said, you look so happy in
the photos, but you look so upset now as an adult,
when I was like, that's actually backwards.
Speaker 3 (35:40):
I'm happy as an adult.
Speaker 1 (35:41):
Know what in those photos. I had to smile, and
I did it perform, I would get in trouble, and
there were days where I just tried not to smile,
and I just learned just to smile because like, it's
not really worth it, because it's just gonna be crazy, and.
Speaker 2 (35:52):
Then it's gonna it's gonna snowball into something that's like,
now I'm grounded. It would be something as small as
me not smile, and then now that's upsets upsetting her,
and then somebody's.
Speaker 1 (36:03):
Coming up to meet being like, hey, Carlos, are you okay.
Speaker 2 (36:04):
And then that makes her feel like she's a bad parent.
So then now she's upset.
Speaker 6 (36:08):
Now she got to tell everybody, and now she's screaming
at me, and now we gotta leave the part. So
now I'm proud simply because I did not smile, and
it just always snowball into something that started off so
small that I had to choice not to say I.
Speaker 3 (36:22):
Didn't find it. It's not weird. It's so weird then
that you would think it was so just like cleaning
the house. You know, we always had to clean and
so and it wasn't a regular cleaner. It was like
it was to the point where you know you vacuum
the carpet, you had to vacuum it ten times in
(36:44):
each spot to have that pattern or whatever. Yep, dusting
like things like that.
Speaker 1 (36:50):
They have me on they floor.
Speaker 2 (36:51):
They have me on they floor with a with a
with a bucket of water and a toothbrush hitting floorboards.
That's great and not and no other children in the housework,
just me. I was out there chopping wood. I'll never
forget they have me. We lived in Michigan and we
had a wood burning fireplace and we used wood like
that for most of our house to warmer house one
(37:14):
of my and it was so convenient because I would
always conveniently get in trouble when they needed something done.
And I always knew, like as soon as like the
wood power was all, I was like, I'm about to
get in trouble again. And she would just make shit
up like I breathe wrong. You know what you're grounded,
God said, and chop wood. I was like, at this point,
you could have just asked me to chop the wood,
just stick out yours. You don't have to do this whole,
(37:35):
this whole game, because I already know I'm chopping wood, right.
Speaker 1 (37:39):
But I think it was.
Speaker 2 (37:39):
Her way to like justify to make your son do
manual labor, because now it's a consequence, it's not me
actually being unfair to him and making him do this
manual labor.
Speaker 1 (37:48):
And I remember this one day, I have refused to
chop the wood. I refused. I was like, I'm not
chopping it, and I just said.
Speaker 2 (37:55):
I sat out there and I figured, and it was
snowing too, and I figured, oh, they'll let me in
doing dinner because it was like two three clock at me.
Dinner came around five sticks it's dark, and she came
out and she was like, dinner's ready, but you're not
coming in to eat until you stacked wood and chopping
stacked the wood. And the way our dining room was
positioned is that it was right outside of the sliding
glass window of where I was stacking the wood.
Speaker 1 (38:16):
So like I was hungry, so I was, you know,
let me just get this done.
Speaker 2 (38:19):
I remember looking inside the window the slighting, and then
they were all just like happy. Like I remember thinking
to myself, I looked at my empty seat and I said,
this family actually looks better without me. And this is
why they don't They don't want me here, and I looked,
and I was it was kind of like, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (38:36):
If you've ever seen one of those Lifetime.
Speaker 2 (38:37):
Movies and like the person's outside in the snow and
they looking into a house and.
Speaker 1 (38:41):
Everyone's like you're past the print and it's just looking
so happy, and I'm.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
Just outside and I felt I think that was the
first moment that I deeply knew that my adopted parents
did not want me. It was very transactional, and that
was a lot to eat. It was a lot to
as what I was nine years old, ten years old understand. Oh,
I'm this was a transaction, right, and I'm I'm here
to help them work. I'm here to help them make
their lives easier. And honestly, once I got that through
(39:09):
my skull, my gonna say things, but perfect, I was
able to navigate her because I wasn't no longer looking
for a mother.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
I was just looking for a roommate. Girl. What do
you need me to do? Claim some stuff? Okay? Cool?
Can you just let me?
Speaker 2 (39:25):
And no child deserves that, children, especially adoptees, they deserve love.
They deserve safe, loving homes, They deserve to feel comfortable.
So I'm so glad that your adopted siblings, like the
older one or your oldest sibling. I'm so glad that
she was there for you, because that's kind of how
my brother is to their own son, Like we don't
speak to them at all, but he and I still communicate.
(39:45):
I go see my nieces. He just he's like them,
and he just has kids after kids.
Speaker 1 (39:49):
But he loves it.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
He loves him and his wife loves them some kids.
So if they like it, I love it right well,
I'll be a great uncle. But it's just so funny
that even some of their own children don't even talk
to them, and they want why, and you wonder why.
Speaker 3 (40:02):
And that's the two as you know, me and my
adoptive siblings have tried to explain to you know, my
adopted mother's biological children, like you know, this is what
we went through. We're not blaming them. We're sitting here.
This is our experience of how we were treated. We
(40:23):
just want y'all to understand this is what happened, this
is the trauma that we endured. This is you know,
just just hear us out like that's literally it. When
they don't need to fix nothing, they can't fix nothing.
But we just want them to at least hear us
and be like, Yo, I'm sorry that y'all went through that.
Speaker 1 (40:44):
Yep. And I think that's the biggest gift. That's the
biggest gift my brother gave me.
Speaker 2 (40:47):
He even wrote on the back of this I gave
I always give him my books before they come out,
because who better to say if it's accurate than a
person who was there, So he wrote, he goes, my
brother was always a shining light. The devil couldn't take
that away from him, no matter how hard she tried.
You will always be my family. I'm beyond proud of you,
and I love you so I every time I get
into my feelings, because there's sometimes I'm just like, my
(41:08):
birth mama is dead, my birth father's in a bottle
somewhere all the time. My other family, like when I
have my aunt, she's pretty good. My brother's you know, trauma,
this trauma, there's a trauma everywhere. And then sometimes I
just like, I really sometimes I'm just like I wish
that my adoptive family would just just being fucking normal,
like I will, like, how did I get like? And
(41:29):
I work with adoptive families who are fan fu fantastic
mm hm. Not perfect parents, but great parents, right, How
the fuck.
Speaker 1 (41:37):
Did I end up with like I was just like
I had to.
Speaker 3 (41:43):
I had to.
Speaker 1 (41:44):
It had to be me, right exactly.
Speaker 2 (41:47):
But I was talking to my aunt today about it,
and I was just like, why couldn't I got like
a great adoptive family who was gonna support me through
high school and college and I could have become an
attorney and like my life. And she goes, Carlos, because
that's not what God had. That wasn't your mission. She goes, Unfortunately,
your mission was to help other kids in the system.
So had you had a good experience, you would have
packed your shit and been like, I had a good
(42:07):
experience with y'all, I'm going off to college.
Speaker 1 (42:10):
I'm going on.
Speaker 2 (42:11):
But because I was abandoned, because I my parents did
leave me, because I did all these foster Now I
have a testimony. And for the longest time I hated
that people say, you have a testimony. A testimony is
just trauma that I learned how to navigate. Yeah, but
that testimony is actually not for you. It's literally for
other people. And once I understood that, I was like,
(42:31):
my testimony is not for me because I already lived it.
I already survived. It's not for me, it's for other folks.
And had I not been there, I would have never
met you. I would have never met all the thousands
of adoptees that I've been able to help. I've never
would have met Diana and help her finish her book. Like,
there are certain things that would never happen right exactly,
(42:52):
you can't question it. And and I think that's the
biggest thing in life for an adoptee that I can
say is I understand that we all have trauma and
things have happened, But I truly believe that after the
age of eighteen, you were in that driver's seat. For
the longest time, we've been on the back seat with
no fucking seat or car seat, just.
Speaker 1 (43:09):
Falling, just falling around the car.
Speaker 2 (43:12):
You know, just wanted to just give me a seat belt,
give me something to keeping it safe.
Speaker 1 (43:16):
Nothing.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
But then after eighteen you can kick them off the
fucking driver's seat. You put Joe seat punk on and
you say hold on, and you're in the driver's seat.
And once you know that, your life can change and
your life can go in any direction that you are
driving it, yes.
Speaker 1 (43:32):
But you gotta drive right. So I am thankful in
life that you know.
Speaker 2 (43:36):
I hate to say, but I'm thankful that those people
did those things too, because I wouldn't be who I am,
and I wouldn't have a testimony, and I wouldn't be
able to help the mount the people that I can now.
Speaker 1 (43:48):
Should I had to go on through that? Fuck? No, right, no,
here I should have had to.
Speaker 2 (43:54):
But there is some thankfulness in it because unlike a
lot of people, I didn't turn to a bottle. I
didn't turn to a needle. I directed my light to
my future. And that's why always stayed focused on And
when you look at the statistics of adoptees going through
you know, drug addiction and prison and incarceration and all
of these things, it just it's just like I I
(44:16):
and then you have survivors killed because then after you
plump bump yourself up, Oh yeah I did that, I.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
Did, then you started to really do this working Like wait.
Speaker 2 (44:23):
How did I do all of that at like seventeen
eighteen with no help? Like I really should be in
prison right now because you bitches were trying me.
Speaker 1 (44:34):
But I don't know how you stay calm little one.
Speaker 2 (44:37):
I don't know how you kept yourself together by yourself
with no safety debts. So then you're just like you
look at your siblings that didn't make it, and you
look at the other people that don't make it, and
you say, well, what let met you?
Speaker 1 (44:48):
Yeah, you know.
Speaker 2 (44:50):
So speaking of that, Brittany, I just want to say
thank you so much for coming on this show. And
I always ask all of my guests also guys viewers,
if you're listening to this, you have to go to
the YouTube.
Speaker 1 (44:59):
Brittany has such the most amazing smile.
Speaker 2 (45:01):
Every time she smiles, I smile because her smile is
just contagious and it's such a beautiful smile.
Speaker 1 (45:07):
And she got all her teeth.
Speaker 2 (45:08):
Listen, that's a lot to say for some of us
foster youth and adoptees.
Speaker 1 (45:12):
Okay, we was on that medal, we was on that
government insurance. Some of us are missing them side teeth. Okay,
we understand. But she she has such an amazing light,
so you guys have to check her out.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
But I always ask all of my guests one last
question at the end of the show, and that question
is what is one piece of piece of advice that
you would give a former foster youth or an adoptee
that has a similar experiences you to ask questions.
Speaker 3 (45:35):
Don't just you know, don't just take what they're telling you.
Ask questions because you never know who, where you come from,
who's out there, and you'd be surprised, you know, at
all the like even with you know, reuniting with your
(45:56):
biological family, Like there's so many amazing people in mind
logic fa like I love them to death, great grandmother,
like you get when I'm so insight, Just ask questions.
Find out where you come from and who you are.
I love that.
Speaker 2 (46:11):
Never stop shining, never stop centering, never stopped looking, never
stop asking. Well, thank you Brittany for coming on the
War to the State podcast and sharing your lived experience
with us and being vulnerable sharing your story and listeners.
Like I say every week, always shine your light because
you never know who you might be guiding to their
next destination in life.
Speaker 1 (46:28):
So it's the next time. Always shine your light, guys,
Content warning.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
The Wards of the State podcast may contain material that
may be harmful or traumatizing to some audiences.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Listener discretion is advised.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Heylight Shiners, Welcome back to another amazing episode of Awards
of the State. We are pushing straight on through. I
want to just start by saying this, y'all. I don't
really get personal a whole lot on this show, because
I do want this show to highlight the lived experience
of other adoptees.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
But I don't think that I give myself enough.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Kudos and gratitude for this space to be able to
have over one hundred episodes of lived experience and foster
care and adoption, to be able to listen to some
of these stories that we hear that are gut wrenching,
that are just just honestly horrific, and then to also
get that followed up by stories of love and children
(01:21):
actually finding safe external childcare. It is something that is
so special to me, and I do it because I
feel like I owe the community to give them a
platform and give them a space, because I have gotten
a platform and I got the space to share my story.
But in reality, I have to realize that I ain't
got to do it. I don't, right, this is a
gift that I give to the community, and I'm so
(01:43):
hard on myself and I just wanted to just like
give myself flowers. Because here's the thing, y'all, if ain't
nobody gonna give you flowers to you, give them to yourself.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
Give to yourself. But no, I really want to.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
Appreciate all the listeners and all the light shiners coming
back every single week. Also, make sure you are watching
our episode on YouTube. They are now available on YouTube
to watch. I like watching the YouTube episodes. They're really great.
I like seeing the people's faces. And also you can
also make sure you are subscribing to us on Spotify
and leaving us a one two, three, four five star
rating review on Apple Podcast.
Speaker 1 (02:14):
But yeah, guys, if.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
Nobody is giving your flowers, make sure you give yourself
your flowers and make sure that you know that what
you're doing is important, whatever that might be.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
So that's just my little message for y'all for this week.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
So without further ado, I want to introduce the next
guest with What Experience.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
It's Brittany. Hi, Brittany, how are you doing today?
Speaker 3 (02:28):
Good?
Speaker 1 (02:28):
How are you? I am fantastic. I am blessed and
highly favored.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
So before the show, I was kind of asking you
a little bit about your experience, and you said that
you were a foster youth and an adoptee, so ye
kind of share with us how you got into the
external child welfare system.
Speaker 3 (02:43):
So I was born premature Alexandria, Virginia, and because I
was premature, I had a lot of health issues, and
so I was in the hospital about four months before
I was put in foster care. The foster home was
a Caucasian foster home and they specialized in foster kids
(03:08):
that had medical issues, most of which were respiratory issues
and things like that. From what I remember, there were
only three of us foster kids. The foster family had
adopted one of them, and so there was me and
a baby that were still foster youth. I was there
(03:32):
for about four years. My biological family did come and
see me, and from what I read in my records,
I was actually supposed to be reunified with them, but
it seemed through the notes, it seemed like every time
that I was ready to go with them, there was
some type of like grow block issue or something, and
(03:55):
it was always like Britney's too sick or they won't
be able to take care of her, which is very
you know, especially when I had family members that were
able and willing to take care of me. So I
was there for four years and then I was adopted
at four years old, and I moved from Virginia to Florida.
(04:15):
I'm not sure how, you know, my adoptive family, you know,
found me, Like, I don't know how all that works,
but I was adopted and moved to Florida. And at
first it was three of us adopted children, and then
it became eight, so I was a middle child of
(04:38):
eight adopted.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
Wow, that's a lot. So you were in this house
there was all these kids. What happened, Well.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
It started off being my older brother, my older sister,
and then me and then maybe I want to say
maybe like a month later, they adopted a baby. She
was six weeks old. And then after that we moved
around a lot, from state to state, and then we
(05:08):
and they.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
Were adopting these kids from foster care like you were
in or are they just private or were they you know?
Speaker 3 (05:13):
I think it was private. So because we were all
adopted from various places, even out of the country, so
at various ages, the oldest being was a sixteen year
old from Russia. So wow, right by the time we
(05:34):
settled in Chicago, there were eight of us living in
one house. And that's a lot of kids to have
to take care of and keep up with. So it
came with a lot of challenges and a lot of
the responsibility for the younger children was placed on the
older children. So me and my sister, tell me.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
At about your adopted parents, Like, I mean, that's a
lot of kids.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
Home. Yes, my adoptive mother was a she was a
CEO of like family resource organizations. And my adoptive father
he stayed at home, so he was a stay at
home father, which I think he got overwhelmed a lot,
and she wanted to adopt more children. He kind of
(06:26):
was apprehensive about it, but she just you know, did
it anyway, which then again put more responsibility on everyone
else because she was never home. So like, there was
a lot of conflict, a lot of abuse, a lot
of things that happened in the home that she was
not really aware of, nor did she really pay attention
(06:50):
to a lot of the things going on in the house.
And so a lot of it really was put on
my older sister and me to take care of the
younger ones who were also some physically disabled and things
like that. So as a high schooler, you know, taking
care of younger siblings and stuff while trying to maintain
(07:13):
a social life grades, you know, that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
It was really difficult for me when you say, you
said that you're physically disabled.
Speaker 3 (07:21):
No, I have adoptive siblings that are some of which
are physically disabled, and yes, so.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
They had are literally parentified.
Speaker 2 (07:31):
They parentified you and then turned you into a a living.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
Aid pretty much essentially, pretty much.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
I mean we were, you know, about how to take
care of them and which because of my nature, I'm
a caregiver, I am a nurturer. So for me, it
wasn't I wasn't really apprehensive about it because again, these
are my siblings. I'm going to take care of them.
I'm going to make sure they're okay, you know. And
I think that she knew that, which is why the
(07:59):
responsibility he was, you know, like here you go, you know,
because they were what see, my younger brother, he was adopted.
He was I think he was three when he was adopted.
But he's a triple amputite. So yes, yes, so tis
lived you know.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
Wait wait wait, yeah, these bitches are like Pokemon.
Speaker 4 (08:24):
Yes, they got a nigga from Russia at sixteen, the
Black girls from the Hood, a triple amputee.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Yeah, what were they thinking?
Speaker 3 (08:36):
I think?
Speaker 1 (08:37):
And all were they thinking.
Speaker 3 (08:39):
Was the performative aspect of it, because every time she
would adopt a child, she would get congratulated for it.
You know, they would have a celebration. She's not just
adopting like kids.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
She's adopting each kid that has, like a sixteen year
old Russian kid that probably is not fluent an American
or English, right, or that like taken away from his culture.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
Then a triple amputee.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
That just by itself, just that one child by itself,
is a lot to do for any.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
Parent, let alone some teenagers or some young child children.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
So it's like, at what point do you just be realistic,
Like that's a I do believe that infertility and adoption
trial like adopted, like it could be that it's like
a fetish, like it's a mental Sometimes some of these
people don't.
Speaker 3 (09:23):
And I think it's attention too, because she had she
has biological already, so both her and him had biological
children already separately, because they both came into their marriage
with their own children, but then deciding to adopt eight more.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
And I think also because of her career path. I mean,
if you're running a family organization, you should have like
put your money where your mouth this type of thing,
just so you can It's like promotion, you know, guy's
like a promos.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
You're like a promotion.
Speaker 3 (09:53):
And then some people what I could do extremely performative,
where we knew how to act, how to like talk,
how to be in a lot of different settings. So
when we go to the office or conferences and things
like that, we knew how we were supposed to kind
of behave quote unquote I don't know. But what I
(10:17):
guess what I didn't really understand was, Okay, if you're
a part of these big organizations, right, why is your
home in such disarray? Why you know you adopted all
these children and all these children that you say have
all these issues which come to find out as I've
because I've been an adult in read records and things
(10:37):
that a lot of the stuff that I was told
about my being in foster care, and then how like
my adoption came about like it's none of It's very
like Missless, it's it doesn't match like a lot of
the you know, they said that your biological parents weren't
around and things like that, and that's not the case.
(11:01):
They were teenagers, but that wasn't the reality of the situation.
I feel like they, I don't know whatever they did
to make it so that I could be adopted. Even
in my medical records, I was fine. There was nothing
like the doctors had basically, so I was healthy. The
(11:23):
only thing was they were just monitoring my lungs because
I was premature. But all these other things that they
claimed that I had, I didn't have it. So it's
weird that you would put a child up for adoption
when she has a whole family that is willing to.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Again, it sounded like it sounded like she knew somebody
because of her position and just wanted to add another collection,
add another child to the collection. That's what it. Unfortunately,
you hear that a lot people usurped their authorities. A
lot of will do this where they will deliver a
child and then see that it's a young girl and
(12:05):
be like, well, you know, I have a friend that's
been trying to be a mom, right and try to
facilitate like a little adoption like that. So unfortunately a
lot of people in those type of powerful positions will
use their power to, you know, do some unethical, questionable things.
Speaker 3 (12:17):
And that's what it seems like, because even with the
foster foster home, they said that it had to be
shut down because they were mistreating us. They claimed that, oh,
they were smoking around y'all and things like that, and
if it's a foster home for children with medical problems,
of course you shouldn't be smoking around them. But what
(12:38):
I also didn't understand was when I was adopted, I
was still allowed to be in contact with them. Like
from the time I was four until I was eighteen,
I was allowed to be in contact with them. They
called me, they sent me gifts and things. So if
they were mistreating me right in foster care, why was
I there still allowed to be kind.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
Of exactly exactly doesn't make sense.
Speaker 3 (13:01):
Not at all. And so those are things that kind
of made me question my own, you know, being adopted
and stuff like that, because none of it makes sense.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
So did you ever get a chance to speak to
your biological parents about what happened?
Speaker 3 (13:18):
I was reunited with them when I was twelve, or
I love that my whole family. I have a large family,
and mostly I've asked questions. I've been able to ask
questions and things and even from what they've told me
again looking at my records don't match. Yeah, and it's
(13:38):
like I really feel like they was really just jipped
out of you know, a child basically.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
And did they they end up having other children your
birth parents and raising them themselves or wow, you hate
to see that, right, well, I hate to see that
because it's like what happened before, what happen with me.
And then sometimes even as an adoptee, you feel like
you weren't good enough or they chose your other siblings,
when in reality they probably got got they probably got jip.
Speaker 1 (14:10):
Yeah, they don't know the system.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
I've had so many adoptees Like I was just I'm
working with an author. I'm working with an author and
she was from Russia and I know, no, maybe this
author was for the Yes, I get my authors, Diana, Yes,
I get them, I get them.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
My clients mixed up.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
And she says that as she's finding out her story,
she's learning that they literally lie like her mam was
just looking for help, like, hey, can you just help me?
Speaker 1 (14:35):
And they're like, yeah, we'll take your daughter, will help me.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
And she's thinking for like a couple hours, like her mom,
she doesn't understand and like, no, they're finna, they're gonna
take your baby and sell her.
Speaker 1 (14:44):
And they didn't explain it to her, and.
Speaker 2 (14:45):
Like that, I was like, so they really just to
be lying to parents. They were especially young kids. And
we see this currently, you know, with the whole Caitlyn
and Tyler thing, with the whole Tea moml thing.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
You know, that's a modern day example of that.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
And feel how you may about them as parents, them
as creators, they were kids who were cohorced and to
signing over their their chill, their rights and relied to
period point blank.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
Yes, that's ourn ethic.
Speaker 3 (15:12):
It's it's very much unethical, and it's it's really kind
of disturbing that people will go to great lengths just
to get what they want, like because it doesn't it
just doesn't make sense. And then like even because even
when I was growing up, I was told, you know,
every time I got in trouble, I was told, oh,
(15:33):
I'm gonna send you back to where you came from.
But I can't because they didn't want you anyway. That's
literally what I was told when I would get in
trouble up until I was reunited with them. So it's
like I'm sitting here like dang, like they didn't want me,
you know. And this is somebody that's, you know, my
adopted mother, who's supposed to be, you know, creating a safe.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
Based like I'm loving because I just I got off
the phone with my biological ant this morning, and she's
like in her seventies and she's the matriarch of her family.
She's the oldest one. No, my uncle's older than her.
But he just got a prison, don't He was in
prison for like forty years. They may no bother nobody.
He just stays in his apartment. I'm like, you know,
you out of prison, right, you go outside? But I
was talking to her, and sometimes usually our conversations will
(16:18):
she always asks me, she goes, why are your brothers
so mad at me?
Speaker 1 (16:21):
Like why don't they like me?
Speaker 2 (16:22):
And I was like, well, Auntie, I think a lot
of it goes back to when we were kids, Like
I remember being on the phone and having a social
worker because we were be like, our auntie will take us,
and my social worker was like, no, she won't.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
So then, like I guess, my social worker got tired
of her, she called my aunt.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
So she like we could hear it with our own ears,
which maybe not the best thing to do to children
in foster care, but it did make a point of like, hey,
don't get your hopes up on something that it's just
not there. And this morning I was talking to her
and she was like, well, I wasn't taking y'all. They
ain't my motherfucking kids. Those are my sister's kids. I
already took one of my brother's other kids. I ain't
taking five people.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
I got my own.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
And then she goes and grandma told me not to
take any of y'all's asses because me and didn't raise y'all.
Well anyway, I said, well, god, now, so if you
want to think that, like, yes, your family would be
there for you, but unfortunately some families are like mine,
where they're like, that's not my responsibility. So it really
does warm my heart when you find out we actually
would have taken care of you, right, Like it does
(17:18):
warm your ard like oh, yeah, you would have taken
care of me. I'm like that, I am loved, right,
I am loved.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
Yes, And it's just so for me, it's disheartening because like,
you adopted me, so why would you say those things
you know to me, especially a child who doesn't know
where she comes from and things like that, Like why
say that stuff? Like that's crazy? And that's probably a
(17:45):
control thing. It was.
Speaker 1 (17:46):
Probably it's all about control.
Speaker 2 (17:48):
It's all about control because once, I think a lot
of adoptive parents' first worst fear is you children reunifying,
finding out that everything they were told was a lie,
and then loving the biologic parents more. I think that's
every adoptive parents internal, even if they don't claim it.
I think that's all of their internal worry of what
if this child doesn't love me? But that's so human
(18:10):
and that's so okay because guess what, children who get
birth by their parents don't always love their parents right
or accept or or attached to their parents. But I
think that that's why a lot of them do these things,
like these controlling, manipulative tactics, like like be grateful without me,
you'd be dead, like oh, I'll send you back, like
things like that, where it's just a constant go to
(18:31):
a reminder of you have nobody and in reality, a
lot of us actually do.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
We just eve been lied to.
Speaker 3 (18:37):
And that's and it's like if and even just continuously
adopting more and more children when you know, like she
was never home, So how are you gonna take care
of all these kids if you're always don't?
Speaker 2 (18:51):
So when that happened, what type of things like so
you had to take care of like you're disabled to siblings,
how was that and how was that growing up? And
then like also was your relationship with your adopted parents now.
Speaker 3 (19:03):
Both of them are deceased. But like for me, because
I'm a nurturer, like I didn't it didn't bother me
to take care of my siblings. Like I felt like, okay,
well they weren't getting what they were getting from her
and him because even though he was at home, he
was physically there, but in terms of like emotional or
(19:25):
any of that, that was not there. So like okay,
you needed to go to a dance class, or you
needed you know, field trip money or like stuff like that.
Yeah he did that, but in terms of like really
having connection with us, that didn't happen either. And he
he was not a very nice man. He got he
(19:48):
had anger issues.
Speaker 2 (19:50):
I mean, and it also not to give him an excuse,
but Mitch, I do you're my second wife already raised
some other fucking kids and I got your biological children,
and then you want to bring eight more these motherfuckers
for me to raise.
Speaker 3 (20:02):
And he you know, and he did try to say, hey,
you know, if this is enough, but she guilt tripped
everybody into you know, oh, we would be bad, you
know people if we didn't accept the fact, oh we're
gonna she's gonna adopt one more kid. So and it
(20:24):
was always you know, y'all are adopted, and you know,
she'd show us pictures. I don't know where she would
get like these pictures, so I don't know if it
was a catalog, I don't know what where she would
find yours, like the kids like, so she would show
us pictures of children that she was thinking about adopting.
Speaker 4 (20:45):
And it's like, yeah, they have look books. Private agencies
have looked books like weird. Yeah, they have whole websites now,
like heart galleries. If you go to Hot Galleries of
America dot com or dot org, you.
Speaker 3 (20:56):
Can scroll through and you can like pick and shoes.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
They have foster kids and they adopted kids.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
And then they have also apps where you can like
swipe left for the ones you like and swipe right.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
For the words you're don't like. Temper here, isn't this?
That's then they have reality. Have you ever seen this show?
The Day I Found My Family?
Speaker 2 (21:15):
It's on A and E and it's adoption speed dating.
So they set a kid up. They set these kids
up at like tables, and then they bring like ten
families in and you get like twenty minutes each and
then the kid has to pick one and then that's
the whole show. So then the kid picks someone and
then for the next date, like they go on an outing.
They do like three outings, and then after the three outings,
then the kid has to decide if they want to
go with this family or if they want to go
(21:37):
try again, and you see if they can pick another family.
I was like, have you guys turned adoption into a
daily reality?
Speaker 3 (21:42):
They have? Yeah? Yo, that is crazy. That is very crazy.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
It's wold what they do with this industry, and everyone
just kind of like turns a blind eye because when
you hear the word adoption, you automatically feel in Oh
that's good, right, Oh, that that's good thing for them,
But in.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
Reality, it's not. The legal system has really corrupt.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
A lot of adoptees don't know any of their information,
their names, their real stories, the real history.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
And it's quite it's it's really just it's a form.
Speaker 2 (22:14):
Of genocide, if you ask me, it's a form of
genocide of just taking people and raising their culture and
identity and doing it legally governed and said, and to
do it to eight different shops, that's wild.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
That's wild. So your sibling that was a triple amputee,
like did who? Wait?
Speaker 2 (22:30):
Like did they who raised them? Because after y'all all
left home, like they still need help?
Speaker 3 (22:34):
Well, let's see I left. Let's see, I was twenty
one when I why I got kicked out. I ain't
gonna say I left. I got kicked out. And so
they were still in elementary school. So next oldest was,
(22:56):
you know, supposed to be the caregiver. She didn't do
a very good job. She created more trauma, which was
sad because I because when I got kicked out, Let's see,
I wasn't in communication with any of them for about
fourteen years.
Speaker 5 (23:17):
Oh wow, Like you you well I didn't. That wasn't
my choice, so they can stop communicating with you. Adoptive
mother's choice because I had I got pregnant when I
was seventeen, and then again when I was twenty one,
and with my when I got pregnant at seventeen, I
(23:41):
was coerced into giving her guardianship of my daughter.
Speaker 3 (23:46):
And so when you.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
Got your daughter back, please send met your daughter back. Yes,
she's done, Okay, thank you.
Speaker 3 (23:52):
It took fourteen years, but oh my god, you're kidding.
She once she got guardianship, she literally took control of
the whole thing. And the guardianship was supposed to only
be for health insurance because she was a PREMI. So
I was told, well, you know, because she's a PREI,
she's gonna need better health insurance. So I was like,
(24:16):
you know, it sounded good, right because I'm like, okay,
she's a premi. She was two pounds, so you know,
I'm thinking, okay, she's gonna need help. She didn't need
any of it. She was she came out of fight us.
So but because my adopted mother had guardianship, she was
able to control everything, every aspect of everything.
Speaker 2 (24:38):
Well, well you still have parental rights even at seventeen,
so any moment, just taken your baby and walk the
fuck on.
Speaker 3 (24:46):
But that's but because I didn't understand, I was not
knowledgeable about any of that, and she used that to
her advantage. Me and my daughter's father were not really
allowed to be involved in the parenting or any of that.
Since I do know that she was supposed to notify
us in terms of like if they moved, that never happened.
(25:10):
She would tell my other siblings, don't tell Britain that
we're moving, don't give her the ads, just don't give
a no contact information. Thank god for my older sister
who was like, no, I'm not going to do that,
that's not right. So anytime that anything happened, my sister
would tell me, and I'm very like, I am very
(25:30):
much grateful to her because I wouldn't know anything if
it wasn't for her being like, no, this is wrong.
Speaker 1 (25:37):
And it sounds like something happened because you said you
you left for fourteen years, your daughter's fourteen. You got
to raack, So what happened is something had to happen
for you to go back and get your daughter and
see them again.
Speaker 3 (25:48):
So I left when I was twenty one, and then
when I it was in got my bachelor's I think
it was twenty eighteen. So they were all living in
connect and my adopted mother she had got started well,
she had dementia, so they decided to move them from
(26:10):
her and my daughter to California. Now, my older sister
was told not to tell me, right, she was like, no,
I'm telling Brittany, that's her daughter. So I was graduating
with my bachelor's and I reached out to my adopted
mother's biological daughter, which was where they were at in California,
(26:32):
and I was like, hey, I'm going to be graduating
in Phoenix. You know, I would like to, you know,
this might be a good time, you know, for me
to reunite with my daughter. So she brought her to
Phoenix and we reunited and it was definitely just like
(26:55):
I was just over the moon, right because I'm seeing
this child who looks just like me, and you know,
but it's like, dang, I done missed out on all
these years. And she was, you know, also told things
that weren't true about you know, where I was, and
things like that. Maybe not even I think it was
(27:18):
like three years then my adopted mother's oldest started called me,
was like, oh, you know, can she come and live
with you? I said, surely, I won't say no, like,
come on, that's my child. So she is now living
with me and she has met her well my you know,
(27:43):
biological and what her biological side on my side, and
reunited with her dad so she talks to him and stuff.
But it's just while that's a blessing, it just part
of me feels like it didn't have to be this way, right,
It didn't have to y'all didn't have to do this
(28:04):
because not only did y'all keep her from me, she's
done had trauma right from not knowing who she is.
Speaker 1 (28:12):
Where's your separation trauma?
Speaker 3 (28:14):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (28:15):
And were these people white or black? White? Yeah? I did.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
I don't know why I asked that. I already knew. Yeah,
I was just confirming for the audience. This is cultural jediicide.
It's cultural jedicide what they're doing. Like, honestly, I got
to commend the adopted mother because she goes technically didn't adopt.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
Anymore, but I still got myself one.
Speaker 2 (28:36):
Like god dang, Like even after her eight she was
still trying to collect y'all's children.
Speaker 3 (28:40):
And that's what I felt too. I'm like, I felt
like I was telling my sister. I think I feel
like she's trying to start over because she done complained
about all of us.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
This actually happens so more than you think to adoptees
and their children, where their adoptive parents will adopt their Yeah,
it happens.
Speaker 1 (28:56):
Actually, it's it's pretty common. It's pretty common.
Speaker 2 (28:59):
We're adopted parents will have someone fourteen fifteen, their adopted
fourteen fifteen years old, kick out that child at sixteen,
and then raise their child as their own to try
to get like a redo. And it's quite sad. One
of the cases that I have, I was helping an adoptee.
It was so sick, it was so sick. So she
didn't know that she was adopted, found out that she
(29:20):
was adopted, got a genealogist, talked to her adopted like her.
Speaker 1 (29:23):
Mom, who she thought was her mom.
Speaker 2 (29:24):
Her mom was like, I don't know who your mom is, Like,
you know, you were left at a firehouse, Like it
was like a weird thing. She got a genealogist. The
genealogist ends up finding her biological mother. Guess who's her
biological mother, her legal sister. Her mom knew her daughter
had a baby at fifteen, she took her baby, her
daughter's baby, kicked her daughter out, moved across the country,
(29:48):
and acted like she never had that first daughter. So
she essentially raised her adopted granddaughter as her own, pretending
that she never knew that her own daughter, her own
adopted daughter was her granddaughter's mom. And I was like,
that's sick and heat.
Speaker 3 (30:01):
It is because even he started instead of her calling
me mom, they was like Brittany. They literally was like
they called me Brittany around her and had like as
if I was just some random person.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
Mm hmm, or sibling like yeah, that you're my big sister.
Speaker 3 (30:20):
Yeah. It's like even when I would call and she
doesn't want to talk to you, or it's like, okay,
this doesn't make sense. I would send stuff, it would
come back to me and then they would. She would
My adopted mother would tell the other siblings, Oh, I
haven't heard from Brittany. I don't know where Brittany is.
Mind you, she has all my contact information. Anywhere that
(30:41):
I went to, I would give her all my information.
She would tell everybody, Oh I don't know where Brittany.
Speaker 2 (30:47):
Is because that because that that made her narrative of
you being a mother that abandoned her child. That made
it because if she's, oh, yeah, she's sending letters and
gifts that I hear from her, that doesn't equal don't
don't equal the story that she was telling. Yeah, well
that's horrible. Well I'm glad that you did get through
reunite with her. And you say, yeah too, so that
you're reunited with both of them.
Speaker 3 (31:08):
Well, I know my son, he's always been with me.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
He's always been with you. Okay, so he was from
the get go he was.
Speaker 2 (31:14):
Yeah, how is their relationship because you know, that's a
long time to be without your sibling too.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
They are, they get along, there's regular siblings stuff. You know,
they get on each other's nerves. Yeah, but they I
love that, Yeah, but they do. So.
Speaker 2 (31:34):
So you you've done all of this, So you had
you had eight adopted siblers, seven adopted siblings.
Speaker 1 (31:40):
I know you talked.
Speaker 2 (31:40):
About your dad and you've been you've danced around your
life in that home as a black woman. How was
it being raised by an elderly white couple difficult?
Speaker 3 (31:52):
Because just not really being around a lot of black people.
Speaker 1 (31:57):
In Connecticut too.
Speaker 5 (31:59):
You said Connectic, I live in Connecticut.
Speaker 3 (32:04):
I was in when we lived in Chicago, so that's
a little bit. I was like more, it was a
culture shock because I was so used to being around
a lot of white people, and so I get to
Chicago and it's like, oh, there's all these black people,
(32:24):
and I didn't fit in because I'm like, I was
a tomboy. So like I'm sitting there with khakis on
and like just regular and it was it was really
a culture shock, but I really but they embraced me,
like I had a lot of friends. Elementary school, middle school,
high school was I loved my high school. And everyone
would be like, oh, you're so blessed. You know, you're
(32:46):
so blessed to have these white people, you know, to
have adopted you. And I'm sitting here like, but y'all
don't know what goes on in that house. Like for example,
when my adoptive father would get angry, like he would
he had a very short fuse. Oh, like he had
(33:06):
this thing where he liked to flip mattresses every other month.
Mind you, they had a California king. So me being
I was like like one hundred pounds, and he was like, Brinny, come,
you know, help me flip this mattress. So I'm over
there struggling. He gets mad, I get putting time out
on the stairs. He was so mad he took scissors
(33:29):
and he threw the scissors. Mind you, I was I
was not even face. I was facing down the stairs.
He threw scissors at me. They came past my head
and hit my knee. And I'm sitting here like I'm
in time out because I can't lift a mattress and
you're so angry about that that you decide you want to,
(33:51):
you know, physically do something about it.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
Like that's crazy, crazy, that's crazy.
Speaker 3 (33:57):
And a lot of times when we would get in
trouble with him, we would have to apologize for upsetting him.
So it wasn't the other way around where he would
have to apologize, I'm sorry for getting upset with you.
Speaker 1 (34:12):
No, it was, well, that's gaslighting as fuck.
Speaker 3 (34:15):
Apologized to him because we quote unquote were misbehaving. But
as we got older, we actually had the confidence and
to defend ourselves. It wasn't really physically, it was more
verbal like no, you can't, you know, do that which
is also why I was protective of my younger sibling
(34:35):
because I didn't want them to go through or deal
with what me and my older siblings had to in
the home. So I was I was a homebody anyway,
but I was always home just so that I could
make sure that nothing happened to them. Now I couldn't
watch them twenty four so things did happen, but I
(34:56):
was determined to not allow them you get mistreated or
hurt in that way. And a lot of people didn't
really know what was going on in our house. We
didn't talk about a lot of the things that were
going on in the house. For one, that was that
would ruin her image. But she had, you know, going
(35:18):
on with her job in the community and things like that.
But it's like I used to call it house of
horse because it's like, yo, we're dealing with this inside,
but on the outside you would never know.
Speaker 1 (35:29):
And that's what I tell people.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
Somebody just left a message or coming on my page
on Instagram and they said, you look so happy in
the photos, but you look so upset now as an adult,
when I was like, that's actually backwards.
Speaker 3 (35:40):
I'm happy as an adult.
Speaker 1 (35:41):
Know what in those photos. I had to smile, and
I did it perform, I would get in trouble, and
there were days where I just tried not to smile,
and I just learned just to smile because like, it's
not really worth it, because it's just gonna be crazy, and.
Speaker 2 (35:52):
Then it's gonna it's gonna snowball into something that's like,
now I'm grounded. It would be something as small as
me not smile, and then now that's upsets upsetting her,
and then somebody's.
Speaker 1 (36:03):
Coming up to meet being like, hey, Carlos, are you okay.
Speaker 2 (36:04):
And then that makes her feel like she's a bad parent.
So then now she's upset.
Speaker 6 (36:08):
Now she got to tell everybody, and now she's screaming
at me, and now we gotta leave the part. So
now I'm proud simply because I did not smile, and
it just always snowball into something that started off so
small that I had to choice not to say I.
Speaker 3 (36:22):
Didn't find it. It's not weird. It's so weird then
that you would think it was so just like cleaning
the house. You know, we always had to clean and
so and it wasn't a regular cleaner. It was like
it was to the point where you know you vacuum
the carpet, you had to vacuum it ten times in
(36:44):
each spot to have that pattern or whatever. Yep, dusting
like things like that.
Speaker 1 (36:50):
They have me on they floor.
Speaker 2 (36:51):
They have me on they floor with a with a
with a bucket of water and a toothbrush hitting floorboards.
That's great and not and no other children in the housework,
just me. I was out there chopping wood. I'll never
forget they have me. We lived in Michigan and we
had a wood burning fireplace and we used wood like
that for most of our house to warmer house one
(37:14):
of my and it was so convenient because I would
always conveniently get in trouble when they needed something done.
And I always knew, like as soon as like the
wood power was all, I was like, I'm about to
get in trouble again. And she would just make shit
up like I breathe wrong. You know what you're grounded,
God said, and chop wood. I was like, at this point,
you could have just asked me to chop the wood,
just stick out yours. You don't have to do this whole,
(37:35):
this whole game, because I already know I'm chopping wood, right.
Speaker 1 (37:39):
But I think it was.
Speaker 2 (37:39):
Her way to like justify to make your son do
manual labor, because now it's a consequence, it's not me
actually being unfair to him and making him do this
manual labor.
Speaker 1 (37:48):
And I remember this one day, I have refused to
chop the wood. I refused. I was like, I'm not
chopping it, and I just said.
Speaker 2 (37:55):
I sat out there and I figured, and it was
snowing too, and I figured, oh, they'll let me in
doing dinner because it was like two three clock at me.
Dinner came around five sticks it's dark, and she came
out and she was like, dinner's ready, but you're not
coming in to eat until you stacked wood and chopping
stacked the wood. And the way our dining room was
positioned is that it was right outside of the sliding
glass window of where I was stacking the wood.
Speaker 1 (38:16):
So like I was hungry, so I was, you know,
let me just get this done.
Speaker 2 (38:19):
I remember looking inside the window the slighting, and then
they were all just like happy. Like I remember thinking
to myself, I looked at my empty seat and I said,
this family actually looks better without me. And this is
why they don't They don't want me here, and I looked,
and I was it was kind of like, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (38:36):
If you've ever seen one of those Lifetime.
Speaker 2 (38:37):
Movies and like the person's outside in the snow and
they looking into a house and.
Speaker 1 (38:41):
Everyone's like you're past the print and it's just looking
so happy, and I'm.
Speaker 2 (38:47):
Just outside and I felt I think that was the
first moment that I deeply knew that my adopted parents
did not want me. It was very transactional, and that
was a lot to eat. It was a lot to
as what I was nine years old, ten years old understand. Oh,
I'm this was a transaction, right, and I'm I'm here
to help them work. I'm here to help them make
their lives easier. And honestly, once I got that through
(39:09):
my skull, my gonna say things, but perfect, I was
able to navigate her because I wasn't no longer looking
for a mother.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
I was just looking for a roommate. Girl. What do
you need me to do? Claim some stuff? Okay? Cool?
Can you just let me?
Speaker 2 (39:25):
And no child deserves that, children, especially adoptees, they deserve love.
They deserve safe, loving homes, They deserve to feel comfortable.
So I'm so glad that your adopted siblings, like the
older one or your oldest sibling. I'm so glad that
she was there for you, because that's kind of how
my brother is to their own son, Like we don't
speak to them at all, but he and I still communicate.
(39:45):
I go see my nieces. He just he's like them,
and he just has kids after kids.
Speaker 1 (39:49):
But he loves it.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
He loves him and his wife loves them some kids.
So if they like it, I love it right well,
I'll be a great uncle. But it's just so funny
that even some of their own children don't even talk
to them, and they want why, and you wonder why.
Speaker 3 (40:02):
And that's the two as you know, me and my
adoptive siblings have tried to explain to you know, my
adopted mother's biological children, like you know, this is what
we went through. We're not blaming them. We're sitting here.
This is our experience of how we were treated. We
(40:23):
just want y'all to understand this is what happened, this
is the trauma that we endured. This is you know,
just just hear us out like that's literally it. When
they don't need to fix nothing, they can't fix nothing.
But we just want them to at least hear us
and be like, Yo, I'm sorry that y'all went through that.
Speaker 1 (40:44):
Yep. And I think that's the biggest gift. That's the
biggest gift my brother gave me.
Speaker 2 (40:47):
He even wrote on the back of this I gave
I always give him my books before they come out,
because who better to say if it's accurate than a
person who was there, So he wrote, he goes, my
brother was always a shining light. The devil couldn't take
that away from him, no matter how hard she tried.
You will always be my family. I'm beyond proud of you,
and I love you so I every time I get
into my feelings, because there's sometimes I'm just like, my
(41:08):
birth mama is dead, my birth father's in a bottle
somewhere all the time. My other family, like when I
have my aunt, she's pretty good. My brother's you know, trauma,
this trauma, there's a trauma everywhere. And then sometimes I
just like, I really sometimes I'm just like I wish
that my adoptive family would just just being fucking normal,
like I will, like, how did I get like? And
(41:29):
I work with adoptive families who are fan fu fantastic
mm hm. Not perfect parents, but great parents, right, How
the fuck.
Speaker 1 (41:37):
Did I end up with like I was just like
I had to.
Speaker 3 (41:43):
I had to.
Speaker 1 (41:44):
It had to be me, right exactly.
Speaker 2 (41:47):
But I was talking to my aunt today about it,
and I was just like, why couldn't I got like
a great adoptive family who was gonna support me through
high school and college and I could have become an
attorney and like my life. And she goes, Carlos, because
that's not what God had. That wasn't your mission. She goes, Unfortunately,
your mission was to help other kids in the system.
So had you had a good experience, you would have
packed your shit and been like, I had a good
(42:07):
experience with y'all, I'm going off to college.
Speaker 1 (42:10):
I'm going on.
Speaker 2 (42:11):
But because I was abandoned, because I my parents did
leave me, because I did all these foster Now I
have a testimony. And for the longest time I hated
that people say, you have a testimony. A testimony is
just trauma that I learned how to navigate. Yeah, but
that testimony is actually not for you. It's literally for
other people. And once I understood that, I was like,
(42:31):
my testimony is not for me because I already lived it.
I already survived. It's not for me, it's for other folks.
And had I not been there, I would have never
met you. I would have never met all the thousands
of adoptees that I've been able to help. I've never
would have met Diana and help her finish her book. Like,
there are certain things that would never happen right exactly,
(42:52):
you can't question it. And and I think that's the
biggest thing in life for an adoptee that I can
say is I understand that we all have trauma and
things have happened, But I truly believe that after the
age of eighteen, you were in that driver's seat. For
the longest time, we've been on the back seat with
no fucking seat or car seat, just.
Speaker 1 (43:09):
Falling, just falling around the car.
Speaker 2 (43:12):
You know, just wanted to just give me a seat belt,
give me something to keeping it safe.
Speaker 1 (43:16):
Nothing.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
But then after eighteen you can kick them off the
fucking driver's seat. You put Joe seat punk on and
you say hold on, and you're in the driver's seat.
And once you know that, your life can change and
your life can go in any direction that you are
driving it, yes.
Speaker 1 (43:32):
But you gotta drive right. So I am thankful in
life that you know.
Speaker 2 (43:36):
I hate to say, but I'm thankful that those people
did those things too, because I wouldn't be who I am,
and I wouldn't have a testimony, and I wouldn't be
able to help the mount the people that I can now.
Speaker 1 (43:48):
Should I had to go on through that? Fuck? No, right, no,
here I should have had to.
Speaker 2 (43:54):
But there is some thankfulness in it because unlike a
lot of people, I didn't turn to a bottle. I
didn't turn to a needle. I directed my light to
my future. And that's why always stayed focused on And
when you look at the statistics of adoptees going through
you know, drug addiction and prison and incarceration and all
of these things, it just it's just like I I
(44:16):
and then you have survivors killed because then after you
plump bump yourself up, Oh yeah I did that, I.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
Did, then you started to really do this working Like wait.
Speaker 2 (44:23):
How did I do all of that at like seventeen
eighteen with no help? Like I really should be in
prison right now because you bitches were trying me.
Speaker 1 (44:34):
But I don't know how you stay calm little one.
Speaker 2 (44:37):
I don't know how you kept yourself together by yourself
with no safety debts. So then you're just like you
look at your siblings that didn't make it, and you
look at the other people that don't make it, and
you say, well, what let met you?
Speaker 1 (44:48):
Yeah, you know.
Speaker 2 (44:50):
So speaking of that, Brittany, I just want to say
thank you so much for coming on this show. And
I always ask all of my guests also guys viewers,
if you're listening to this, you have to go to
the YouTube.
Speaker 1 (44:59):
Brittany has such the most amazing smile.
Speaker 2 (45:01):
Every time she smiles, I smile because her smile is
just contagious and it's such a beautiful smile.
Speaker 1 (45:07):
And she got all her teeth.
Speaker 2 (45:08):
Listen, that's a lot to say for some of us
foster youth and adoptees.
Speaker 1 (45:12):
Okay, we was on that medal, we was on that
government insurance. Some of us are missing them side teeth. Okay,
we understand. But she she has such an amazing light,
so you guys have to check her out.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
But I always ask all of my guests one last
question at the end of the show, and that question
is what is one piece of piece of advice that
you would give a former foster youth or an adoptee
that has a similar experiences you to ask questions.
Speaker 3 (45:35):
Don't just you know, don't just take what they're telling you.
Ask questions because you never know who, where you come from,
who's out there, and you'd be surprised, you know, at
all the like even with you know, reuniting with your
(45:56):
biological family, Like there's so many amazing people in mind
logic fa like I love them to death, great grandmother,
like you get when I'm so insight, Just ask questions.
Find out where you come from and who you are.
I love that.
Speaker 2 (46:11):
Never stop shining, never stop centering, never stopped looking, never
stop asking. Well, thank you Brittany for coming on the
War to the State podcast and sharing your lived experience
with us and being vulnerable sharing your story and listeners.
Like I say every week, always shine your light because
you never know who you might be guiding to their
next destination in life.
Speaker 1 (46:28):
So it's the next time. Always shine your light, guys,
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