168 [Estrangement Series] Kirsten Weatherford
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Full shownotes: https://www.adopteeson.com/listen/168
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 adopteeson.com/partner.
You are listening to Adoptees On, the podcast where adoptees discuss the adoption experience. This is Episode 168, Kirsten. I'm your host, Haley Radke.
We are starting a short series on the topic of estrangement. I think some of you know that I'm experiencing this myself and it's something I've wanted to talk about and learn about, but it's just been too close to home. So I want to acknowledge that just as many of our conversations here on the podcast are deeply personal, emotion-filled, could be activating or challenging for both you and me to hear, this again will be hard. It's really interesting to me that even after this conversation with Kirsten, I felt heavy and sad with my own grief and also the knowledge that there are so many of us who have dealt with the same and way worse, way worse. [00:01:00] This series isn't meant to be a how to undo estrangement or how to break up with your family. It's once again in the space of hoping to let you know you aren't alone. I see you. I acknowledge how hard and lonely this can be. With that, let me share what you're going to hear from our guest, Kirsten Weatherford.
We talk about how a memorable trip, a pilgrimage, helped Kirsten come out of the fog, how reunion with her first mother likely accelerated her estrangement from her adoptive parents. And we also wrestle with what it would take to even broach the subject of reunification if that was ever on the table. We wrap up with some recommended resources, and, as always, links to everything we'll be talking about today are on the website adopteeson.com. [00:02:00]
Let's listen in.
I'm so pleased to welcome to Adoptees On, Kirsten Weatherford. Welcome, Kirsten.
Kirsten Weatherford: Thank you. I'm happy to be here.
Haley Radke: I would love it if you would start and share your story with us.
Kirsten Weatherford: All right. I was born in Pennsylvania to a single mother and immediately relinquished in January of 1971. I spent three months in a private foster home before being placed with my adoptive parents. I was raised an only child, center of the world at all times.
Haley Radke: Me too. You just said “center of the world” and already I was like, oh my goodness, I hear you.
Kirsten Weatherford: Yeah. It's a thing, isn't it? It's a big deal. We moved across the country from Pennsylvania to Oregon when I was four. We moved again from Oregon [00:03:00] to Colorado when I was five. I spent most of my childhood in Colorado and I kind of grew up there. We moved to Montana when I was a freshman in high school. And other than one year of college back in Colorado. I have been here ever since then. I have been married for 30 years. My husband and I have five children together, ranging in age from 10 to nearly 30.
As far as my adoption journey, I started coming out of the fog in January of 2010. I took a pilgrimage trip with my husband and some other folks from our church in April of 2013. That was a big deal. That's where I found the pit of my soul and my journey really took off from there. I came home from Scotland knowing I had to search and try and find my birth mom. [00:04:00] We found each other. I found her. It took until February of 2017. And we started communicating. She was actually located about six months prior to that, but it took us until February of 2017 to start communicating. I traveled to Pennsylvania that summer, July of 2017. We met for the first time in person. Six weeks later they came to Montana to visit my family on our turf, and we have been in reunion, continue to be ever since then. My last exchange with my adoptive parents was about a year after the reunion with my first mom. In June of 2018 there were some letters exchanged between us. And the last face-to-face conversation was in August of 2018 when I walked out of their home for the last [00:05:00] time.
Haley Radke: Thank you for sharing that. There's a lot of different ways we could go. So you've been in reunion with your first mother for a few years. And you lit up when you were talking about her and so I get the sense that is going well. I'll let you say.
Kirsten Weatherford: It is more than I ever expected. I have a very large first family on my maternal side and I was welcomed home by all of them with open arms, and they are amazing and incredible and gracious, wonderful people that helped me find my way back home to myself, not just to them, but to the center of myself as well.
Haley Radke: That's profound. Oh my goodness, I got goosebumps. Okay, so I asked you to come on because we're going to have this really hard conversation talking about estrangement [00:06:00] and so I'm sad that we're not going to dive into your beautiful reunion and how you did it and all those things. But I think you mentioned this before we got on and I've experienced the same. I've heard from so many people, so many adoptees who are estranged from their adoptive families. And it's wild. It's wild. It's something I never thought was going to happen to me either, and I'm experiencing that with you as well. So I'm curious, as you've talked to other adoptees and as you look at your own situation, yours happened during the beginning of your reunion, and do you think that had an impact or what have you unpacked there?
Kirsten Weatherford: I think if you asked my adoptive parents, they would lay blame on the reunion as a defining event that broke our relationship. [00:07:00] In all honesty, it had been probably 30 years in the making. We really struggled as I became an adult and tried to establish some independence as my own person with my own family; those boundaries were not honored. It took me a long time to even place any boundaries with them. I received unsolicited advice, not really advice, meddling and directives as to how we were raising our family and choices we were making. There was little to no autonomy in our relationship but, as I mentioned, I think they would blame the reunion. I would credit the reunion with giving me enough strength in myself to place those boundaries. [00:08:00] I had spoken to you about that. That allowed me to say, “No.”
I even placed some boundaries as I was in reunion. I didn't even tell them that I was searching. When I was actively searching for my first mom, I didn't even tell them because, for me, it felt like it was my story and my journey, and I didn't want them to invade that–that was mine. It was something I had ownership over and I suspected they would twist things to make it about them and how violated and hurt they were. Which eventually is what it came around to, was that I had hurt them and I was no longer grateful for all they had done for me.
Haley Radke: Oh dear. Okay, so I want to frame these questions and just say, we are not just going to bash our parents the whole time. [00:09:00] That's not what this conversation is about. I'm not saying that to you, I'm talking to our listeners so you guys know, we're not just going to complain about all the things our parents had wrong. But I'm curious for you, when you talk about this was 30 years in the making, and you had tried to become your own autonomous person as an adult and build your own family and make your own decisions, do you remember some things along the way? Things that they did or a certain event or anything like that, that you were like, “Whoa, like you are really stepping over the line.” Or is it more like you're looking back on it now and seeing that, “Oh, that was really over the line.”
Kirsten Weatherford: I think that there was some ability at the time to recognize it. Certainly now in a more reflective state I see it much more clearly. [00:10:00] In preparation for recording this, I went back and read those last letters that were exchanged between us and I'm seeing them even differently now than at the time I received them. So yeah, there were definitely moments where, specifically – and this doesn't necessarily speak to a gun/non-gun issue. I am in Montana. We hunt here; we're outdoors people. My husband grew up hunting. I was raised around guns just as a target practice–those types of things–but I did know how to use firearms. I'm not an anti-gun person by any means, but I'm also not gun-toting; I try and walk in the middle. I guess that is where I'm at. But my parents had asked if they could give our oldest son, who was six at the time, a .22 and we said, no. [00:11:00]
Haley Radke: For those people that don't know what a .22 is, can you just explain it to us like we're six?
Kirsten Weatherford: It's kind of the initiation into a small rifle. It's easy to handle, a first gun for a kid, so to speak, beyond a BB gun, a step into a first actual firearm. They asked if they could get him one. We said no and assumed that would be honored. It was not. Our son received a .22 from my parents with a gleam in their eyes and almost a “Ha, ha, now what are you gonna do?” kind of attitude, which left especially my husband in a position to take away something that had been gifted by grandparents. [00:12:00] It left us to be the bad guys, which is often how it felt, like we were put in the us versus them, what are you gonna do about it now? kind of situation.
Haley Radke: Oh boy. You don't want to be the bad guy but, yikes, that's total overstepping: to ask ahead of time and then completely not respect that. That's shocking to me.
Kirsten Weatherford: It happened a lot.
Haley Radke: So okay, when those things happened, did you have conversations with them about it after? Were there fights?
Kirsten Weatherford: No. I wasn't in a place to have those conversations at the time. Again, a lot of what I can talk about now was not what I could talk about in that time and in that space. I was not comfortable enough in myself that I could say, “Absolutely not.” Especially in the moment I couldn't stand up and say, “No.” We said no, you can take this back.” It just wasn't possible. [00:13:00]
Haley Radke: I understand so much because just having the conflict and having to try and stand up for yourself. And especially in the moment – goodness, yikes. I don't think I would be able to do that.
Kirsten Weatherford: Especially when it involves your kids.
Haley Radke: Oh yeah.
Kirsten Weatherford: That just made it feel exceptionally violating.
Haley Radke: So did there come a time prior to the reunion and just the last few years where this all kind of came to a head? Did there come a time earlier than that where you were like, “Okay, I'm seeing some bad patterns of me not being listened to. I really have to start doing X, Y, Z with them to make sure my family and my feelings are respected.” Like where you set out some boundaries whether or not you told them but just had them in your mind. Did there come a time like that?
Kirsten Weatherford: Oh, absolutely. It was probably mid 2013-ish. So I was back from our trip to Scotland. [00:14:00]
Haley Radke: And you would call that a pilgrimage?
Kirsten Weatherford: Yeah, definitely. The island of Iona, Scotland, is often regarded as a holy place. It's a very small island in the Outer Hebrides. It's credited with being the birthplace of Christianity for Scotland. It's this incredible, quiet, small place that really gives you the opportunity to do some reflection. And yeah, it was honestly an experience I still, this many years later, can't appropriately give words to. It's where I found the pit of my soul. It's where I really began to understand what being a child of adoption meant for me. I broke down. [00:15:00] I just recently was able to put some phrasing to it and say that I tried to call, crawl into the loneliest part of myself while I was there, and, like I said, came home.
So we had been home from Scotland, not even actively searching really yet. 2013, we would've still had four kids at home. We had gone out to dinner with my parents and as had often taken place when we would go out to dinner something would go wrong. Somebody's food wouldn't be right, or the service wasn't appropriate, or something of that nature. And that night in particular, my dad unleashed a personal assault on the server who really had no control over the situation and he was doing the best he could. They were quite busy. He was the only guy on that side that was working. [00:16:00] Things were taking a while but, you know, we try and be understanding people. However, my father was not understanding and just verbally assaulted this poor waiter. And I was seated there. It was a large table because it was my husband, myself, our four kids: at least one plus one, and my parents. So it was a pretty big table and my husband and I were at opposite ends of the table. And I know I physically slumped over and I just had this sickening feeling in my gut. My husband at the other end, I think we were telepathically communicating with each other. Had we been able to make eye contact or had I chosen to do that, I believe in that moment we would've gotten up and left. It was embarrassing. I did not want to ever, I never did. That was a defining moment. I never subjected my kids to going out to dinner with them again. I don't believe that service workers [00:17:00] are at all deserving of the treatment they often get. And that was such a personal attack on a stranger who was just trying to do his job. That was a pretty defining moment though. So that was a big boundary; we decided then and there that we would never go out to dinner again with them.
Haley Radke: So what happened the next time they asked you? Did you just say no? Did you always just put it off and say no, or did you tell them?
Kirsten Weatherford: I think they knew. That was so bad. There was very little conversation the rest of that meal. And as was the typical pattern after my dad would blow up and make a scene, the following day my mother called and wanted to apologize and gloss things over and smooth the waters in the hopes that we would forgive and forget, and there just was not any going back from it that time. We were done. [00:18:00]
Haley Radke: Oh my goodness. So going back to this experience you had in Scotland, which sounds incredibly profound to repeat the word I said before, but then you decide to search and things but you said you were keeping that to yourself because it wasn't maybe safe to share with them. Probably wasn't safe to share with them.
Kirsten Weatherford: No, it was not something I even considered mentioning to them. I had no hope that they would understand that it was something that I needed. It was no reflection on the difficulties of my relationship with them. It was very much about me and what I needed, and what I felt very deeply as something I needed to try and solve. Maybe not solve, but find peace with and find answers to. It was just this deep longing [00:19:00] for the unknown. And, I also came to a place where I really wanted to know and have a different story that maybe I could tell myself versus what I had believed to be true fundamentally about myself. I wanted to be able to get to a place where I could understand myself and accept myself as a more positive entity in the world versus something somebody had discarded.
Haley Radke: Oh, I feel that too. Okay so, I don't know, are you okay with this? Do you want to walk us through what happened? Did you try and set up some boundaries and they weren't respected? What were the last kind of things that happened before it was like, “Hey, the letters and we're done.”
Kirsten Weatherford: Yeah. One of the last defining moments: My husband and oldest [00:20:00] son and son-in-law were coaching the youngest son's baseball team. So, you know, these are little kids–they're like six, seven years old at the time. So it's an entertaining free-for-all for the spectators to be watching these kids. It's a happy environment. My oldest son had brought his dog with him, as he often did, and the dog was sitting near my father-in-law and was perfectly content. She was a real sweet, gentle dog. And, my mother came up and made a comment and coddled over the dog about how she couldn't get anywhere and everybody was being mean, and she very much believes that she's the only one that treats animals well enough. Nobody else does it [00:21:00] well enough. She's the only one that cares for them enough. And so the comment of “Oh poor Jazz, you just aren't being taken care of.” My oldest son was there and he said, “Why don't you just take care of it? Nobody else ever does it right.” And that made her angry. That made my father angry. My father-in-law, the poor guy, just sat there dumbfounded, didn't say anything. I also didn't say anything. I let it happen. It was a boundary that was put up via my oldest son, who at that point is an independent adult himself as well. So I let it happen, and they went and watched the rest of the youngest son's baseball game from their car and didn't talk to anybody else after that. They stopped coming to the games. [00:22:00] They didn't interact with us near as much after that. There was one phone call about what had taken place. I was put in a position to maybe defend myself and my lack of reaction And I wasn't willing to give in. I wasn't willing to back down into the sheepish role of still being their small child.
And that was the last defining thing that then led to the letters that were exchanged. After the baseball thing probably took place in like April or May, I had placed a phone call to them to invite them to the Mother's Day brunch that we were going to be going to with husband and I and our five kids and my in-laws, we all live in the same town. [00:23:00] We're all here. It's all very local, and I called to invite them to that as well. And I received, I think, what I've called a verbal assault and a go-to-hell message from my dad on that phone call. And it's really the last time I've spoken to him directly. There was never any other conversation between the two of us after that.
Haley Radke: First of all, I'm sorry that happened. That sounds really painful. And just when you're describing it, just the event, at the baseball field or whatever, it doesn't feel like that kind of big of a deal. And yet from the stories I've heard from other people, and something from me too, it's: that's the last straw, you know?
Kirsten Weatherford: Oh, for sure. Yeah. The event with the [00:24:00] dog was in the grand scheme of things minor, but it was like the last time we wanted to be diminished.
Haley Radke: Can you talk about having your son be the one to be giving his grandma a little sass? What did that feel like for you as a parent because you know he's grown up with her?
Kirsten Weatherford: Yeah. And I was actually proud of him. Honestly. He grew up with the most influence from them for the longest period of time of all of our children. He has spent time in therapy as well, and he created those hard boundaries before I could. And so I really have to say that I was proud and I learned a lesson from him in that healthy boundaries are [00:25:00] necessary and need to be respected. And when they're not, when those boundaries are violated, that's a clear message.
Haley Radke: Yeah, it definitely sounded like, especially just his words, he was just like really calling her out on something
Kirsten Weatherford: I cleaned it up for broadcast here, there were some choice words, some colorful words that were exchanged. It was pretty clear.
Haley Radke: Oh, that's too bad. My editor loves beeping things.
Okay, I wonder how you're feeling now. You just said you reread the letters that you exchanged, and you even have a different perspective on it now, and you're a few years out from these events and having contact with them. What does it feel like for you?
Kirsten Weatherford: I don't miss them. I don't miss them. I don't miss the constant [00:26:00] turmoil that it caused in my own household. I miss the idea of them, but them specifically, I don't miss. I'm saddened by the fact that for them it became an either/or they couldn't do both/and. They met my first mom the first time she came here and it was cordial. My dad was able to have some conversation with my stepdad. Everybody's from this small little community back in Pennsylvania and so there are common people they know, some of the same people, and those conversations were good. And what could have bonded my adoptive dad and I in a deeper way because [00:27:00] once I had visited, we could have conversation about these locations and it's where he had grown up as well. And so we could have had this deeper connection over place that we were both from. And instead of that we now have basically no connection. It didn't have to be an either/or. That was their choice, and I think it was their inability to see it from my perspective and see it as what I needed that had little to no reflection on them at the time.
Haley Radke: As an adopted person, how hard has it been to even know what you needed?
Kirsten Weatherford: [00:28:00] Well, let's see. I started coming out of the fog in 2010, and I have much clearer vision now. But at the same time, things will catch me off guard in a moment. It's right below the surface. Being an adopted person is always brewing right below the surface, and sometimes it catches me off guard. And so yeah, to know what I needed or what I wanted or even being able to communicate maybe what that was for me was something I struggled for a long time. And I'm still a work in progress. I think I always will be.
Haley Radke: You said, “I don't miss them.” And when you hear me say that back to you, what is that? Do you feel anything inside? Are you like, “Oh boy, what if they hear that?” Do you have [00:29:00] any of that stuff, or can you confidently say, “No, you know what, I know what I feel now and I don't miss them and I've reflected on this.”
Kirsten Weatherford: I can confidently say that I don't miss them. I don't miss the constant – yeah, it's a repeat of what I said earlier. It was just such a constant state of turmoil for my own household that it's much more peaceful without them in our lives. And, as I said, they live less than two miles away from me. I had somebody asking me the other day like, “Aren't you worried you're gonna see them at the store?” And I used to be. I haven't seen them out and about, which is okay. I did probably two weeks ago. I am pretty sure I saw my dad in Walmart, but he didn't see me. I kept on walking. He was in line checking out and [00:30:00] I just kept on a walkin’ because I'm not willing to go there.
Haley Radke: So correct me if I'm wrong, it seems like you both are just like, “Yeah, I'm not gonna reach out.” Seems like they're very angry, too. It was like a big blow up. You're nodding your head. Okay. So, where am I going with this? As I said, this is my first conversation about estrangement and we're going to do a little series on it, but what are your thoughts on reconnection and reconciliation and if that's even something you would want? What would need to happen for you to even consider that? Or is that something that you're like, “Nope, I'm not even gonna go down that road. I don't even wanna talk about it.” And even just asking the question, I feel a little bit like I don't want to bring it up like we're having this conversation and the point of it is, at some point, we all just want to be reconnected and fix the relationship and that's the goal. I'm not saying that. I'm curious about your thoughts. [00:31:00]
Kirsten Weatherford: I am not willing to reengage with them unless and until they're willing to do some work on their part. I would like them to have some ownership of how we got to where we are today instead of it being a bunch of finger-pointing. I would love to see them have some openness, an ability to see their part in how things ended up. Realistically, we're talking about people who are in their late seventies, early eighties, and my 50 years of experience tell me that they're not going to do anything differently. It's not in their makeup of who they are. [00:32:00] So I think I've gotten to a place, for me, where I can say it wasn't about me personally. Whoever landed in their home as the kid who won the lottery and ended up placed with them, it would've been the same. It was about who they were. It wasn't about who I was. It was who they wanted or needed or expected me to be. When I tried to live out my own person as my own person, instead of the reflection of who they hoped I could be for their sake, that's when things fell apart. And so I just don't know that they have it in them to see it any other way. They have no other lens other than their own.
Haley Radke: I think. I don't know. [00:33:00] Here's my two cents, and it's just the same as what this podcast cost you to listen to: it's free. I love how you express that so beautifully. So many of us work to discover who we are. A lot of you that are listening especially, we have been going through therapy and finding our identity and just becoming. A lot of the times that includes just becoming a better human. And what I see just in the grand scheme of things in the world, when you have a human who's going through therapy and improving themselves and you're moving further and further away from the people that are just staying stagnant and aren't willing to change and improve, the tension just keeps building as you find more of yourself.
So I'm really happy for you, Kirsten, that you are able to see things that way. [00:34:00] I feel like it sounds like you're coming from such an empowered place in that decision, in that you don't have to feel like, “Oh shoot, what if I would've said this, but this would've held us on a little longer.” Or those kinds of little regrets that some of us have.
Kirsten Weatherford: Sure, yeah. Of course, leading up to this, my husband and I had been talking about defining events in that relationship and he reminded me of the first and last time he saw me really stand up and defend my position as a mother and our position as parents in relation to our middle daughter who we struggled with tremendously. But we worked through a really difficult situation, not just in our relationship with her. We were trying to help our own kids navigate their relationships with each other, but we tried to do it in a [00:35:00] respectful way and allowed them to navigate that space, and we wanted to have our ability to navigate that space, and everything's good now. At the time that I stood up, my mother was insistent that I should do this and I should do that, saying “you should make him talk to her and here's what you need to do.” And I just said, “No, let us do this. Let us figure this out. If we're not doing it the same way you are, that doesn't mean it's wrong. Respect us enough.” I don't know. I'd like to say at this point that we weren't navigating things wrong because it's all come back together and we're all in good space with each other. But her interference was unwelcomed, unnecessary, and it was damaging at the time. Keith looked at me and he said, “Wow, she might wish that she was dealing with her husband instead of dealing with me.” [00:36:00] Because it was the first time that I really stood up to her. And he had corked off a few times before with her as well. But it was really the first time that I unleashed and opened the file and verbally vomited all over.
Haley Radke: I don't know. How does it feel? Like even thinking back you look like you sat up a little bit, like you just looked empowered and it's like, “I'm an adult now.” Because I think so many of us are still stuck in powerlessness because of our adoption. We had no choice in it. And then we didn't get to pick the people who took us and all that. It's like, “Okay, I'm an adult now, so what are you going to do?”
Kirsten Weatherford: Yeah. It was about no longer being that kid who was afraid in the corner and standing on my own two feet as [00:37:00] an independent autonomous adult and making choices for myself and for my own family. Right or wrong, give me the space to do it and figure it out. I don't know if it was like this preventive mode, that she was going to protect us from everything or try and prevent bad things from happening. Let me figure that out. And we've tried really hard to do that with our kids, too. Respect, respect each other enough to allow autonomy and space.
Haley Radke: Thank you. Okay. Before we do recommended resources, I just want to give you a little space to give us advice or say what you'd like to say to other people who might be in a similar situation. And I don't know what that looks like. Do you want to talk about it? You had mentioned to me, I don't know if it was in the recording or in a different conversation we had, but you said, “It was a long time coming, maybe this should have happened sooner.” [00:38:00] Is there something like warning signs of things like “If I had set up these boundaries earlier,” or “If I had done this or that.” I mean hindsight, whatever. I'm not exactly sure what I'm trying to ask, but I want to help other adoptees stand up for themselves, but I don't want to have things break down either. It's like this really confusing kind of space talking about estrangement.
Kirsten Weatherford: Yeah, I wish I'd had the ability to create those boundaries sooner. Truth be told, it couldn't have happened any sooner. I can say that, in reflection, I wish it had happened sooner. I can say that because of where I'm at today, but there's no way it could have happened any sooner because I was not confident enough in myself and my space and the ownership of who I am to be able to do it any sooner. [00:39:00] I know it's a huge balance. There's this whole societal messaging of being the good adoptee or the ungrateful adoptee–one I hate even more–or that the only adoptees who search are those who have had a bad experience with their adoptive parents. I don't think that's fair messaging, but it's the reality of the world we live in as adopted people. We're usually the last ones thought of.
As I said, I don't miss them. I have no regrets other than I wish it could have happened sooner. I wish I could have come into myself sooner and had more time to live into this person I feel like I am now. I wish it could have happened sooner, but, you know, midlife is what it is. And I had a friend tell me that 40 was a magical number and I thought [00:40:00] she was talking crazy talk, but now at 50, I can tell her, “Oh man, you were so spot on.” There were so many things that happened in my forties that really brought me to where I am now. And I just don't think I had the strength or the ability to do it any sooner. It's not an easy space to walk, but for me, it's been so worth it.
Haley Radke: I am so happy for you.
Kirsten Weatherford: Thank you.
Haley Radke: I want to just interject a little thing before we do recommended resources. So, Kristen and I said the word “boundaries” like 30 times, and I could have asked her what she meant by that or her specific things, but I didn't on purpose because boundaries can be any sort of line that is personal to you. Maybe we don't want input on [00:41:00] how we parent or on my personal appearance or physical health or any of those kinds of things. I don't want any input or conversations on my search or reunion or lack thereof, et cetera. It can be anything that's not safe for you to engage with them about. So insert as needed as you look at your own relationship and think about boundaries, not just with your adoptive parents, but with anybody in your life. They're so personal to you and what's safe for Kirsten might not be for me, et cetera. So anyway, that's my little insertion.
Do you have thoughts on that before we do recommendations?
Kirsten Weatherford: Boundaries are important, and creating and establishing those boundaries, for me, was empowering and it helped me believe that I have value. [00:42:00]
Haley Radke: Yes, that's so good. So good. Okay, we're going to do recommended resources. And I told Kirsten ahead of time that I was going to make fun of her because when we do this guest application process and all the things, I'm like, “OK, make sure you pick something new.” And she didn't. So she's going to talk about something she loves and she wants to talk about it so much. We've talked about it before on the show, but now you're going to hear why Kirsten thinks that you should check this out. Okay. Go ahead.
Kirsten Weatherford: Well, shout-out to my now friend Anne Heffron and her book You Don't Look Adopted. I had her book for quite a while and was honestly afraid to pick it up. I wasn't sure. What I was going to find.
Haley Radke: Really?
Kirsten Weatherford: Yeah. I had it and it sat on my shelf because I just wasn't sure what was going to be in there. I was trying to do some of my own writing at the time, and [00:43:00] I didn't want somebody else's voice to come through in what I was working on, and I just had to get to a space where I felt comfortable picking it up. It was one of the best windows into my own soul as well that I could have read. I would sit there and just shake my head and, “Oh man, me too.” And I was in awe of finding words that I had struggled to find. They were right there on those pages. So, very recommended. I know a lot of people do that, but for me that book is self-love.
Haley Radke: Oh, that's so good. That's so good. I love Anne. I talk about her a lot too, so that's okay. I'm so glad you did that. The other thing I'll plug is Anne and Pam Cordano–who's a therapist who's been on the show before as well–they are doing some weekly classes called “Flourish” and they're live. [00:44:00] You might see Kirsten in there, I don't know. They're live; they're not recorded, so you have to be there. And they do some writing prompts. There's some discussion. I was able to attend one. I really enjoyed it. And if you follow Anne or Pam on Instagram or Facebook, you can find out how to sign up for those. But I am going to take us in a totally different direction because like last year was a whole thing and we're not going to go down that rabbit trail. But I very much enjoyed on Off Script, which is the Adoptees On Patreon podcast. And Kirsten's been a supporter for a long time. Thank you. So many of you listening are and I really appreciate it. That's how the show continues and. My co-host on that, Carrie Cahill Mulligan, and I were reading all these adoptee-authored books last year and I really tried to find [00:45:00] more books from people that aren't like me so that I can learn, especially from people of color, because I really wanted to learn more about racial injustice and how I can be an ally and I was very challenged and it's good. It's really good for me to be challenged.
So I want to just recommend to you an author that I loved reading. Oh my goodness, you have to follow her on Twitter. Her name is Shannon Gibney. Her Twitter handle is (at)gibneyshannon. I read two of her books. The first one is See No Color, and it is about a transracial adoptee and it's a YA novel. I really loved it. It's got baseball and race and there's siblings and it's not your typical adoptee reunion kind of a story. I really loved it. It's so good. And I also love Shannon's novel that has nothing to [00:46:00] do with adoption: Dream Country.
I don't know if you've read either of these, Kirsten, but when I read Dream Country, I learned so much about Liberia. I had no idea. I'm Canadian so I don't really know a lot about United States history. I know Canada. But I learned so much. It's this huge epic story of different families, different time periods, and she just weaves everything together so beautifully. I loved it. So Shannon Gibney. She's a fellow adoptee and a wonderful author and I really recommend you follow her. And gosh, this book, it's not about adoption, but it's great. The title is Dream Country. Check out that cover! It's so beautiful.
Kirsten Weatherford: That is beautiful. We have a “book problem” in our house, so I'm going to add, well, some people would say it's a problem. We have books all the time and they're coming in almost daily sometimes. So I will add those to my list for sure.
Haley Radke: Yeah. [00:47:00] I'm describing the cover for the audiobook, that's great. But if you color code your bookshelf and you need more red books, it’s got a red spine with some blue on it. That's very, I don't know, that felt like a 2020 reference, like when you were bored in quarantine, you color code your bookshelf, I dunno.
Kirsten Weatherford: Yeah.
Haley Radke: Anyway, where can we connect with you online, Kirsten?
Kirsten Weatherford: I am on Facebook as Kirsten Weatherford. I'm also on Instagram as No More Misfit, that is from my blog page by the same name, No More Misfit. There is one blog entry entitled “Misfit” that kind of explains where the no more misfit handle came from. So yeah, I would love to have people reach out, connect with me wherever they're comfortable.
Haley Radke: I really enjoyed reading your blog. I especially like the one entry that's called “Claimed.” [00:48:00] And you wrote, and it was especially meaningful to me to read this before we talked about estrangement. There's a line in here: “Our adoptive families certainly made every attempt to claim us, make us 100% theirs. The problem with that is we adoptees know better.” And you go on from there. But yeah, if you want to hear more about Kirsten's story, I definitely recommend you check out her blog: nomoremisfit(dot)com.
All right. Thank you so much for sharing your story with us. I just had such a great time talking with you even about such hard things and thanks for being willing to talk about the hard stuff, the real stuff.
Kirsten Weatherford: Thank you, I really appreciate you giving adoptees the space to speak and have voice. It's been a lifesaver for me, so thank you. I appreciate you as well. [00:51:00]
Haley Radke: This is heavy stuff, you guys. It's just heavy, heavy stuff. So thanks for hanging in with me and listening to Kirsten's story. This is a first: I actually cried before we did the interview instead of during. So I was pretty proud of Kirsten and me for holding it together and just trying to talk facts. So just know, if you're like, “Oh, Haley wasn't super emotional.” I was very emotional before and after, but managed to hold it together for you during.
Anyway, I'm thankful that you're here. If you're experiencing estrangement or some other really challenging things, I hope that you are able to get connected into community–whatever that looks like, even if it's your in-real-life friends and not adoptee-specific. It's really important for us to be talking about this and getting support about it. I know from personal experience what stuffing all that stuff down does to you. So I'm really good at it. And that's not anything to brag about. Yeah, it's heavy. [00:50:00]
I want to thank Kristen again. She's one of my Patreon supporters, as I mentioned, and without her and my other supporters, I wouldn't be able to keep podcasting. So I'm so excited that I get to make the show for you every week and that it's free, you can listen wherever, whenever and feel like you're with other adoptees as you listen and feel supported in that way. But I can't do it without people like Kirsten that are willing to financially support the show.
So if you want to join Kirsten and some other really incredible people, you can go to adopteeson.com/partner to find details of what you get when you support the show. There is a weekly podcast that's called Adoptees Off Script, and we're in the middle of doing a Book Club. Middle? We're starting Book Club this year. We just had a really fantastic chat with one of our Book Club authors, which was really fun. [00:51:00] And so there'll be more of those throughout the year. If you want to join us, again: adopteeson.com/partner for the details. Thanks so much for listening. Let's talk again next Friday.
