123 [Healing Series] Examining Reunion
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Full shownotes: https://www.adopteeson.com/listen/123
Haley Radke: [00:00:00] This show is listener supported. You can join us and help our show grow to support more adoptees by going to adoptees on.com/partner.
You are listening to Adoptees On, the podcast where adoptees discuss the adoption experience. I'm your host, Haley Radke. This is a special episode in our healing series where I interview therapists who are also adoptees themselves so they know from personal experience what it feels like to be an adoptee.
Today we are talking about reunion. Let's listen in.
I am so pleased to welcome back to Adoptees On Lesli Johnson. Hi, Lesli.
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: Hi. Thank you.
Haley Radke: So excited to talk to you. I know you've got tons of stuff going on, and in your practice you are seeing so many different things come into your [00:01:00] office every day. Mostly connected to adoption. I'm assuming at this point
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: a lot of adoption, lots of trauma, trauma stuff, but yes a good portion of my work now is with the adoption and foster care community.
Haley Radke: Okay. Okay. So you sent me a note a little while ago saying that you were seeing something pretty regularly and wanted to kinda talk us through a little bit. Why don't you go ahead and tell us the thing that you keep seeing pop up and why you think it's important for us to talk about it.
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: Okay, sure. So it's something that I've thought about quite regularly and in the last several months, maybe even a year or two, but it's become more frequent and it came up in the last teen group that I facilitate. So it's a teen group of adoptees, and they were talking about who knew their biological parents or knew some of their biological relatives and who didn't, and age kept coming up, and one, one participant [00:02:00] said, what's this? What's with this 18? My parents keep saying at 18 we'll help you search. And I think that's that a lot of us have even heard that, even my parents didn't say that, but I know a lot of other adoptees whose parents said, “Oh, when you're 18 we'll help you search”.
And it got me to thinking more and more, who did? Who did decide on that number? And you and I were talking before we started recording, it, it feels like another one of those bits of information that someone at some point wrote down and that everyone has adhered to and really as adoptees, what we're trying to do now, I think, is break down some of these this arbitrary information and look at it on an individual basis and see, see where we can fill in some information so that kids don't have to be sitting in math class wondering, “huh, I wonder if my birth mom would recognize me if she saw me. I wonder if I have siblings. I wonder if my birth parents are even alive”. [00:03:00] So it just got me to thinking about why 18 and and. I certainly have families in my practice that I'm working with who are helping their kids find information much at a much earlier age.
Haley Radke: So this is interesting to me because, if you look at what the cultural view of adoption right now, it's like, well adoption. It's it's either international or it's open. What is there, what's search, what's reunion? What are you talking about for young people? Are you talking about cases that's like still closed adoptions or…
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: I am! because I believe that we, that as a society we are moving towards more openness in adoption and we've definitely You and I've talked before the varying degrees of openness, but there are still a lot of parents who, I wouldn't call them completely closed adoptions. They're sharing information on paper with their kids. But there are a lot of young kids who want to meet their siblings, meet their biological relatives and [00:04:00] adoptive parents are often filled with a lot of different questions, a lot of their own anxieties about that and wanting to know how to navigate that process.
Haley Radke: Okay. This is interesting. Before we talk about actually should we do this, should we not, You see adoptive parents as clients? Yeah?
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: I do. I see.
Haley Radke: Okay.
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: Yeah,
Haley Radke: so you can tell us, like pull back the curtain.
An adoptive parent comes to see you and says, “my child is asking questions and this is making me feel…” Like what ?
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: so what's the concern?
Haley Radke: Yeah. The adoptive parent, 'cause as adult adoptees, a lot of us are looking at the situation and thinking, of course we want connection with our family of origin and we want, genetic mirroring sooner and all of those kinds of things.
So what's in an adoptive parent's head when we're bringing that question to [00:05:00] them?
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: I think it's a lot of anxiety. I think it's a lot of what I'm not good enough or what aren't I doing or saying that they need more. I think a lot of their, it depends too on how much work adoptive parents have done how much of their own personal work that they've done related as it relates to adoption.
And I think the threat threatened that that they're gonna lose their child somehow, or that their child's gonna like their biological relatives more. I think a lot of, yeah, a lot of insecurity and wondering how it's gonna relate, how it's gonna affect their relationship with their child.
Haley Radke: Okay. Thank you. So, a kid is asking these questions and the adoptive parent comes to you either in their own session or, you're having this conversation with the family. What goes through your mind? Are you? Like we've already said, 18 is this arbitrary number. What should, this is a big question. What should [00:06:00] Reunion like, when should it happen?
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: I just don't even think I really don't think there's, I think it's an individual case by case. Situation. And again, reunion can look like a lot of different things too. I think that if we're always looking at it from the adopted person's or child's perspective and what's in the best interest for the child.
I encourage parents, once I normalize, that their child's curiosity and questions and desires. That's a real normal thing and. I really try to help parent adoptive parents be their child's best advocate. With all the information kids can get, even young kids, can get on social media, and I've seen this all too often in my office, where kids will find out a lot of things about their biology.
They'll find out that they have brothers, sisters, cousins, and they're getting that information from, Instagram or Facebook, rather than getting it from their parents who could actually help them. [00:07:00] Process some of the information. So once I normalize that their child's curiosities, we, I suggest, what can you share and what do you know?
And I'm working with a family right now that they have a 7-year-old and. She wants to meet her biological siblings and her biological mom, and it's gonna be a slow process and it's, we're gonna make sure that it's safe. And I don't even mean physically safe, but of course that's something to take into consideration.
But psychologically safe, because is this person going to, is this person able to maintain a relationship? Is this a pers is the biological parent or the biological family, are they gonna be reliable to, to stay in their. Their child's life. So it's different for everyone, but it's, again, it frees up a lot of, can free up a lot of head space for a child or a teenager who's thinking about this all of the time.
Haley Radke: And this is like peak identity formation [00:08:00] time, right? So you're already thinking about that. Exactly. So say I am the teenage adoptee. What is something that I could say to my adoptive parents that to open the door say, to let them know, I kinda wanna know more information, I might wanna search, I need your help with this versus, looking through file folders when they're away and doing your own Instagram stalking,
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: which has happened. I spoke, I was recently invited to speak at a school here in Los Angeles, and they. It's an exceptional school and that they have a large population of adoptees and they started a group two, two teen adoptees, started a group where they meet every week at lunchtime and they screen movies and all this really cool stuff around supporting each other.[00:09:00]
With regard to adoption, and they told their advisor, “we would like our parents to have some kind of group like this”. And so the advisor, who was also coincidentally adopt, was adopted, invited me to come to speak to this group of parents. And I talked about this. I talked about openness and sharing information.
And one of the parents. She was really, she had told her child that the a the, again, the age 18. And I think it, what happened was that it made the child go behind, just like what you said, go behind the parents' back. And so I guess to answer your question of what can a, what can an adopted person say to their parents, I still wish it would be
Why is the onus on the adoptee? Why? but that's the way it is. So I guess it would be just approaching their parent and say, “I think about this all the time. It would really be helpful if you could help me search, search before [00:10:00] I go to college. Search. I can get your support when I'm still in, when I'm your emotional support and have you help me navigate this while I'm still living at home”.
Haley Radke: When you say that the onus feels, still feels like it's on the adoptee because it often is even in asking that question, I'm thinking like, okay, and we still have to like, protect their feelings and, you gave us that insight what does it look like when the adoptive parent comes to see you?
Yeah. And what are their fears? And this is all just really tricky conversations.
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: It's tricky and I guess when you were just saying that I thought to myself, okay, how can I word this, it exactly what you're saying? Like, how can I word this in the right way so that they know I'm not, that I love them.
I love them, but I really want, I'm really curious about this, and that's. That's where there's still has to be so much work done.
Haley Radke: I appreciate having this conversation with you. 'cause I think back to, I was born in the eighties, right? And we weren't really [00:11:00] having these conversations with our adoptive parents.
Like our, I think a lot of our adoptive parents were trained to just be like. Just pretend like they're totally yours and this is not really a thing. And then, like they won't need to look and it was all swept under the rug. So just the fact that there's already, people coming to see you, not necessarily 'cause their child is in crisis of some sort, but just to get tools and like I think that's such a big deal that already these conversations are opening up more.
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: Yes.I agree with you. I agree with you and I mean that I feel like that's the way we're progressing in terms of just more openness in general and whether that be openness in the family, talking about it, openness in helping kids find out their information. Yeah. That and that adoptive parents can be so useful when they act as their child's [00:12:00] advocates.
Haley Radke: So one thing that I really appreciate about being in reunion with my dad right now is that it happened before I had children of my own. So my kids just have always had my bio dad in their life. They just don't even know any different. And so looking at it from, my kid's frame of mind and then looking at, a young adopted person. Okay, of course, safety is number one. I'm putting that on the list, but what are your ideas about is sooner better? I know that's all individual to tailored to each situation, but if you had some kind of sweeping themes you could give us about like pros of reunion. As a younger adopted person.
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: I do think it's a case by case and exploring what, what's happening presently. [00:13:00] That's, that the adopted person or the adopted child is wanting to know and is it related to, something that's not just I just that I just wanna know this information or I'm just curious about it.
And again, just exploring that, and sharing, what would it be like? I don't know if you could answer this, but I think to myself, what would it have been like for me if I didn't, think that my lunch lady could be my birth mother or think that my mom's best friend might have been, because she had a lot of kids and maybe she knew that my mom couldn't have biological children, so she maybe just gave one of her kids to my mom. What would it have been like to not have to think about that or not, wonder if my birth parents were going to return and take, take me home with them. So again it's openness and in some cases that means reunion.
Haley Radke: And it also though can just be having a name, to take them out of the, Betty [00:14:00] Jean Lifton and start like out of the ghost kingdom into reality.
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: Exactly. And that was something I emphasize when I worked with adoptive parents is, and I've been saying birth mother or the birth mother, first mother, first parents, but use their name.
Make, when you're talking about your child's biological parent or relative or sibling, use their name, make them a real person. I think that also helps parents contextualize and, I don't know, be more accepting that it's not “that person” or “her” or “the birth mother”, to me, that feels so, I don't know what the, I don't know what the word is. It feels so, inhumane maybe.
Haley Radke: I'm trying to think. I can't help you. It's depersonalizing, it's like they're the historic, the fairy. Like it's fairy, right?
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: Right. Yeah. It's depersonalizing. A couple years ago was working with a [00:15:00] teenager and his family, and he. He found that he had many, several siblings, he found 'em on social media and his parents were very open.
They knew that he was looking and they were helping him look. And, because they had done their own work, they weren't threatened. When he said, “I wanna meet them”. They contacted some of the, in particular, he wanted to meet two of his brothers or his half brothers. And, the parents contacted their parents and made sure that it was, again, in everyone's best interest and set up the meetings and drove, a couple states away to have their kids meet each other. And the result of that was profound on my client. It was profound. Because he didn't have to, he didn't have to imagine this, these people anymore.
He didn't have to imagine his siblings. He was able to see them and talk to them and see someone that looked like him.
Haley Radke: Going back to the idea [00:16:00] that reunion looks like a lot of different ways and I recently had Dr. Sue Green on the podcast and she was talking about how they don't call it search and reunion through the organization she's a part of Vanish. They call it “search and contact” because you don't know what. Is gonna happen at that point of contact. You don't know if there's actually gonna be a reunion.
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: Yes.
Haley Radke: So do you have any other thoughts on that? Like not necessarily looking for a reunion, perhaps, when you're taking it slow, as you said with this other client of yours.
What does a slow reunion, what does contact, like slow contact look like? What is a, like a really healthy look at this for a young person to be going through?
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: I think part of it is, it can even just be conversation. So if a young child is talking about wanting [00:17:00] to meet, when is he gonna be able to meet his biological mom. And parents might just be able to open the conversation. “what would you like her to know about you? What would you like, what would you like to share? What would you like to ask her?” So it might just start there. So is that a search? No, it, but it's expressing, it's parents expressing a curiosity about their child's experience.
If parents have information, and again they've done their work and deem that it maybe isn't a bad idea or is maybe even a good idea. It might start with writing letters back and forth, or writing emails back and forth, and that might go on. Again, short, just get to know you and again, progressing.
Progressing if, again, the child is continuously asking for that it's really using the child as the barometer, I think.
Haley Radke: Any [00:18:00] other sort of best practices when you're looking at a younger person asking for information from their adoptive parents versus having them seek it out on their own?
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: I think as a general rule, like I said it's sharing what parents know in an age appropriate way. So we're not gonna talk about concepts that, we're not gonna talk about different concepts that a 7-year-old might not understand. And if after parents assess, is this feasible, let's maybe start, let's have them contact biological family first.
Get to know them a little bit, then start very slowly and again parents are making sure that members of the biological family are gonna be able to show up. Are they gonna be reliable? Are they gonna be consistent? Because again, we know as adoptees that's what we need in our lives. And if we've already endured one separation or in some [00:19:00] cases more than one if we've been in foster care, we need our parents to, to help make sure that doesn't happen again, especially when we're young.
But if it's okay to do so start to, start slow, exchange letters. Sometimes that's all younger kids need is just to know that their first parents are okay. Or that their biological relatives are okay.
Haley Radke: That's interesting. Yeah that's a good thought. Okay, as we wrap up, I'm sitting here as an adult adoptee and listening to this and thinking, “man I don't think I ever would've even thought to bring these questions up” 'cause I just literally did not think it was possible to have a reunion.
Like I was just the daydreaming, imagining kid about picturing what my mother might've been like, who she was, when was she gonna come take me away from the parents that would ground me, but now as an adult and thinking about maybe some of these conversations could have been possible, and [00:20:00] what would you say to someone like me who maybe, do I wanna go back and have a conversation with my adoptive parents and say, “gee, I wish we could have talked about this”, or, I don't know. Is there anything like I'm the word that keeps coming to my mind is like the loose ends, like these loose ends that kind of come apart when I hear a conversation like this. To go back and maybe heal up some of these things that we weren't able to have when we were, pre-teen or teenagers thinking about searching or just thinking about reunion.
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: No, and I grew up in a very similar way that you did. I would've never, ever thought to bring up the idea of searching or information, giving me information. “Do you have information?” It just, it wouldn't. I can only imagine it would've gone more poorly when I was young than when I actually did bring it up when I was in my thirties and it didn't go well. But I guess what I think about [00:21:00] is I imagine what would it have been like, what, and again, we're not, it can't go back in time and change things, but I think it maybe can provide some, what we're talking about now is maybe it could provide some validation to all of the adoptees out there who were thinking, thinking about their circumstances of their relinquishment or their separation from their biological family while they were trying to study for a history test, and it was, interfering in their ability to retain information or that they were, wondering while they're, walking around in a crowd if one of their siblings might recognize them or if their birth parents were alive or dead. I think maybe it can just provide some validation that all of that is really really normal and that it can be different for young adoptees today.
Haley Radke: And I want to give credit especially to listeners that have been outspoken in their experiences as an adopted person.
[00:22:00] Because without people like you speaking up and saying, “we wish we would've had these things” and saying we needed therapy and, saying our true feelings about our adoption experience. Yeah. Without that, this door wouldn't have been opened for adopted children right now to be having these conversations. So. High fives to those of you who have been putting it up there.
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: And high fives to you, as I always say, when I talk with you, I'm just, I'm so amazed by your work and the, just the awareness, support and information that you're providing just through the podcast.
Haley Radke: Thank you so much. I don't wanna let you go without giving you an opportunity to share, 'cause I know you've got lots of support for adult adoptees and teen adoptees and as we said, supporting other members of the adoption constellation.
Do you wanna tell us a little bit about what you've got coming up?
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: Sure. Thank you. I recently launched a new website [00:23:00] slash program, it's called, it's www.askadoption.com, and I am offering virtual support groups for adult adoptees, teen adoptees, adoptive parents, and first parents. I'm currently in a series right now of groups.
So new ones will begin in early January. There are, there's also an opportunity to, I'm gonna be adding some courses that parents can take, adult adoptees can take, one-on-one coaching sessions. Lots of stuff.
Haley Radke: That's so exciting. And you said virtual, so it doesn't matter where you are
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: Doesn’t matter where you are.
Haley Radke: I love that. That's cool. Up in Canada it's a little bit far away from all the very, very fun adoptee stuff that's happening down there. Okay. Thank you so much, Lesli, for your time today. And can you just remind us one more time where we can connect with you online?
Lesli A. Johnson, MFT: Absolutely. [00:24:00] So the site I just mentioned is AskAdoption.com.
My other website is YourMindfulBrain.com. I'm on Instagram at Ask Adoption and Your Mindful Brain and Twitter at Leslie A Johnson.
Haley Radke: Perfect. Thank you.
I am so thankful I keep saying this. I'm so thankful for the adoptee therapists that come on the show and share their expertise with us. Truly, what greater resource can we have than people that actually know what it feels like to be adopted and who are working with other adoptees and actually doing this therapy work, the hard work, digging in with them. I just, my goodness, I just find it such a goldmine. I [00:25:00] hope that no matter what your circumstances are, that you found something interesting and helpful from today's episode. I always love talking with Leslie. She is just a real gem and I'm just so thankful for the adoptees who have signed up to become therapists because man, do we need them, hey.
Something else I'm thankful for of course is my monthly supporters. You guys, I wouldn't be able to do the show without you, so thank you so much. If you wanna join them and make sure AdopteesOn keeps going and keeps growing and keeps helping adoptees around the world, go to adopteeson.com/partner and a totally free way you can help support the show is just by telling one person about it. Just one person. Tell them your favorite episode, how it's helped you, or tell them the episode that made you [00:26:00] mad and you really just wanna talk about it and get it all out. Or tell them about the episode you thought was really funny. Is there a funny episode? I don't know.
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