Transcript
Full shownotes: https://www.adopteeson.com/listen/17
Haley Radke: You are listening to Adoptees On, the podcast where adoptees discuss the adoption experience. This is Season Two, episode 2, John. I'm your host, Haley Radke.
I have just a couple of things to chat about before we get started today. I know some of you have heard my husband was just laid off from his job of over 10 years, and I want to thank you so very much for all of your kind notes you've been sending me over social media. We appreciate your support so much.
Speaking of support, I have been blessed to welcome four new partners of the show. You ladies know exactly who you are and I will respect your privacy, but thank you times a million. In a time like this when things feel very uncertain, knowing that you're able to partner up with me, that just means everything. So if you're wanting to join these four generous women, I'd love to have you as a partner too. You can see all your options at adopteeson.com/partner.
Last thing before we jump into this interview: I want to remind you I'm doing a listener survey. It's two minutes max. to find out just a little bit more about you, and you can give me your thoughts and comments on the show. That will help me tailor the podcast exactly towards the things you'd like to hear. You can find it on adopteeson.com/survey, and you will be entered to win an awesome prize pack of recommended resources as my thank you gift. That's adopteeson.com/survey.
Today's interview with John is really special to me. I don't want to spoil anything for you. So the only thing I want to mention before we get to his story is that John's birth mother has secondary infertility, meaning that she was never able to have another child after relinquishing John. I understand that this is actually fairly common with first moms, and it's just one more heartbreaking cost of adoption that society doesn't ever hear about. This is my bad. I totally forgot to ask John about this. So you'll hear us chat a bit about her and his relationship with her, but this piece of information, I think, will help you understand that section a bit better.
We wrap up with recommending two podcasts for you, so stick around for that. And, as always, links to all of the things we'll be talking about today are on the website, adopteeson.com. Alright, let's listen in.
I am so pleased to welcome to Adoptees On, John. Thanks for agreeing to share your story with us.
John: Thank you for having me.
Haley Radke: Oh, it's my honor. I would just love it if you would start out and tell us your adoption story.
John: I was born during the mid-sixties. At the time I wasn't aware that I was given up.
I didn't learn until much later in life until around 10 years old. And I'll go a little bit more into that as we go. I was given up in Colorado. My birth mom had a relationship with another individual and she, of course, got pregnant with me and told her family of the pregnancy. And immediately her parents were quite upset. When the time was getting close for my arrival, if you want to call it arrival, they placed her into a home for unwed mothers.
The birth father didn't want to have anything to do with the pregnancy, he kind of just left her on her own. And so it was kind of left to her. There was a little discussion at the time, I learned much later, that maybe one of her siblings might adopt me, but that didn't come to pass. So she had me out of wedlock and was placed in a home for unwed mothers.
One of the interesting things I found out much later after we discovered each other was that she put a requirement through the adoption agency that when I would turn 18, my records would be open to me to find her. So she wanted me to locate her at a much later date and for us to discover each other. And so she was quite upset at the time when I turned 18 thinking this would come about, but it didn't.
So anyway, there was a period of time where I did not know where I went to, but my adoptive parents adopted me about nine months later. They went through the adoption process. My adoptive mom couldn't have children of her own. And so it came to be that my parents went through the adoption agency and I was taken in.
Haley Radke: So you say there's nine months when you don't know where you were.
John: Yeah, I don't know where I was, who I was with, how I was cared for. And, you know, after learning more and doing research and talking to other adoptees, reading the studies about that first year when a child is born and that bonding process, I just wonder if that's something, part of my makeup, of me not having, that I don't know. It's certainly something I'm always kind of curious about.
Haley Radke: I'm sure, yeah. So it sounds like really traditional “Baby Scoop,” except I haven't heard that before: A birth mother requesting the age 18 to share records. I mean, I wonder if that's something the agency promised but they weren't actually going to deliver on, right?
John: Yeah, probably not. Because at the time all those records were sealed and it didn't matter which side wanted them open. They were going to keep them sealed. One of the things, thanks to your podcast, is that I learned, being that I was born in Colorado, that they just recently opened those records. I've been toying with requesting those records. I haven't done it yet.
It's still an emotional rollercoaster for me, but that's one of the things I want to know. And eventually when I get that courage to do it, I'll send for the records and maybe they'll show that, and maybe they'll also show that request in there too. I'm not sure.
Haley Radke: Oh, that would be interesting. So did your adoptive parents adopt any other children?
John: They did. I have a sister. They adopted her a year later. And again, at the time we both didn't know we were adopted. We were just treated, you know, as their own. And not too much later we find out that we were adopted. It is quite painful to me, too, because it was such a traumatic event for me.
Haley Radke: Yeah. Tell us how you found out.
John: My father was in government service, so we moved quite a lot at the time. There was a time where I was around seven years of age. Again, we had a normal kind of family background, nothing too traumatic. But at the time, when I was around seven years old, we ended up in Maryland and my grandmother from my adopted father came to live with us. Her husband had passed away.
Again, not knowing a lot of things about the family background, not knowing this past that occurred, I'm just doing normal childhood activities with my friends. And one day my friends just started teasing me out of the blue. It was just really weird.
They just started saying I was adopted. And, you know, you hate to use the term [censored] child. But that was the kind of words and toying with me. And I'm getting quite upset. And I'm like, Why are you even saying these things? And of course I'm arguing back, No, I'm not. And then they said, No, your grandmother told our parents. And I'm like, What?
So, immediately I ran home to my mom and I just laid it on the line. She said something very blankly, like not even a second thought. She says, You know, your grandmother, she drinks. And I'm like, Oh yeah, she does. You're absolutely right. At the time I never thought about questioning what my mother was saying to me. I just believed everything that she said to me. And I'm like, Yeah, you're right.
So I didn't give it a second thought and just went on my way. And that was kind of like the last time my friends were teasing me. So I didn't think much of it till about two to three years later, till I was about 10 years old and we moved again. And now, you know, you get to the age of curiosity. And I’d seen this lockbox that I'd never seen before, and I'm like, What's in this?
So I open it up and, lo and behold, there was my adoption decree saying, “Hereby known on this date, November, your name is changed from Derek to John.” And I was just floored. That's the day I will never forget.
And there were two papers. One was the adoption decree and this other one was a little description of my birth parents. And I just stared at that for hours on end. It was not much of a description, just giving a little bit of background on my birth mother and father. Just what their educational level was, their height, their religious background, and what their hobbies were. And that was it. That's the only information I had.
And I immediately went to tell my sister of this, and she was floored as well, but she handled it a lot differently. She internalized it, while I struck out. I immediately went to my adoptive mom and I was just crying no end and then yelling. It was just back and forth, and she didn't know what to do. She didn't say anything. She didn't take me aside. She didn't discuss how it came to be. She had no words for me.
A couple hours later, my father came home and I immediately started yelling at him: “I don't have to listen to you. You're not my real father.” And, again, no comforting words from either one of them. It was just left up to me to figure it out on my own what has happened, how I came to be in this world.
And then from there, you know, all the fantasy starts going through your head. Maybe my parents were, I don't know, killed in a car accident and I was saved, or maybe I was born of celebrities. And every little fantasy you think of, you start coming about.
And from that time forward, my relationship with my adoptive parents had changed for good. Anything discussion-wise with my mom, I couldn't trust her. I couldn't believe anything she would've said. And then things I started noticing and having more discussions with my sister about things. We'd seen things from other families with mothers and how they raise their children and the love that they would give and discussions and communications between each other. That was just not there with my adoptive parents.
Then at the time, I didn't think of it, but there was no “I love you,” “I miss you,” or “How are things going?” It was just more like a regimented system. Here's food on the table, here's clothing, here is take you to school. I mean, they weren't bad parents, they didn't treat me badly, whip me, mistreat me badly. It was just there was no love there. And it's hard to say, at the time.
Haley Radke: Was there ever any discussion after that, even years later, about why they chose not to tell you?
John: There was never a discussion why they chose to not tell us in the beginning or hide it from us. It was not like maybe at another time when we were teenagers, at a time that maybe we can understand. There was never, ever that discussion.
Every so often, I would have these emotional outbreaks because I was a lost child. I was completely lost. At one time, I felt like this is who I was. This is where I grew up. This is who my family was. This is my history. You know, they named me after my father's middle name and his grandfather's middle name. So it showed a little history about where I come from. And then after that, my genealogy just went out the window, and I just didn't know who I was anymore. And it's weird to say that. It was rough.
And then at the time, a couple years later, my parents went through a difficult time in their own relationship. My father became an alcoholic and decided to leave the family. And so it was just my adoptive mom raising my sister and me. And then I became this kind of rebellious kid. I wasn't rebellious like criminal, I was just anything my mom would say to me, I didn't listen to her.
I mean, I would still do schoolwork, I would still go attend school, still trying to be a good student. But between our relationship, there was none. I just couldn't trust anything she said to me. From there forward, I would actually catch her in other lies. She was just an individual that rather than have a straight communication of “Hey, this is on the mother. I'm the parent. This is how things are.” She would make up lies to get away from those difficult conversations, if that makes sense.
Haley Radke: It sounds kind of manipulative. I mean, I'm kind of flabbergasted. Honestly, John, I just can't believe it. You know, it's like, how can you not tell your kid? But there are a lot of late discovery adoptees, people that find out when they're adults. Some find out when their adoptive parents die, and they go through their files and they're like, What? What is this?
John: Wow, that's unbelievable. How do you go through life? Just going to a doctor, you know, like do you have a history of cancer in your family? And, you know, ever since then, I'm like, I don't know. I don't know. And then for those adoptees that don't know until after their parents are gone, oh, I can't imagine.
Haley Radke: I mean, age 10, like that's really uprooting you, just like you said.
John: You know, it’s certainly an age where you're impressionable. Sometimes I think about when is a good age to tell an individual? And the more I think about it, I just think it's when you start talking to your child. You should have some type of discussion. There has got to be some type of counseling to inform the child that they have been adopted, what information they have, and constantly care for that individual.
And then provide them outside counseling to understand emotions that they're going through. There's no simple answer, but I think maybe if my adoptive mom would've been straightforward from the get-go, when that first day came about when I asked that question prior to me reading it, finding it in a lockbox, and she had taken me aside, or something like that, and showed love. I'm certainly going to have feelings of loss, but, you know, I still feel I'm going to have that safety net still.
And still, even to this day, when my birth mother and I found each other, I try to have that discussion with my adoptive mom, and she just won't have that discussion at all. She just said, That's part of your life. That's not part of knowing, which hurts me deeply. Here I'm trying to have a communication with her. And if you're going to raise a son, you just can't split parts that you want to know. It encompasses everything and not just the parts they want to be part of.
So, even to this day that still hurts, and she just won't have that discussion.
After my father left he was dealing with his own personal demons. And it wasn't until much later when he found that he has an alcohol problem and he got himself counseling, go through AA, go through the 10-step process, and he tried to amend. One of those steps is trying to amend with the people that you've hurt.
And it was when I became an adult and I had my own family, my lovely wife as of today and the children. He reached out at a time when I was around 24 or 25, and I felt obligated. He should know that he has grandchildren. You know, he should know that he has a daughter-in-law and so I allowed him to come meet. And that in itself was very difficult for me.
One part of the adoption is that my own adopted father left us. I kind of had to fend for myself as a crawling boy without a father, and I had to deal with those demons. And so we tried to reconnect. He tried. I don't fault him in that, but at the time, I wasn't emotionally ready to accept his apology.
I allow him to be part of my son's life, but as far as communications, I just wasn't emotionally ready to accept him yet. And so we just kind of went our own separate ways, that is about the easiest way to say things. You know, we try every so often to still do Christmas cards, stuff like that.
But even after that, we kind of just broke off communications until I called my adoptive mom. You know, one thing I have always done, I always called her for Thanksgiving and Christmas, and I called her one day at Thanksgiving. She notified me that, Hey your father's been trying to reach out to you. He wanted to let you know that he's got a terminal disease and to give his contact information.
And of course, my mom, being the way she is, she just says, I don't know if you can trust him or not. But I'm like, I very much doubt if someone's calling you saying they're dying, that they're making it up. But again, that's just the way she is.
And so I took the information and I talked to my sister too, and she had already reached out and started communications with him, and I started communications with him. I tried to have communications about what happened, you know, what did he know of my birth parents.
And, I found him to be credible during those discussions, a little bit. He didn't know much. And he just said, We went through an agency and we adopted you. Now, this was through a three-week period before his ultimate death. It was a very short period of communication and went by so quickly.
But because of the past relationship that we had with each other, I couldn't go see him. I couldn't drive and meet up with him in the hospital. My sister did. I'm very thankful to my sister for her doing that, you know, give him that opportunity. But I couldn't go through that emotional rollercoaster.
So we just strictly kept it to communication through telephone calls. About three days before his death, we had our–this is gonna be really emotional to me too right now–we had our last call and he said something that, to this day, is unbelievable. Just unbelievable. And we got back on the subject of my adoption and my sister's adoption.
And he just flatly came out and said, Look, John, your mother didn't want you. It was I that pushed for adoption and she doesn't love you. And she never did and she didn't want to care for you. And I just became quiet and I'm just burning up inside and just eaten up inside.
I'm like, How dare you say this as the individual that left us, our family, when I was 12 or 13 years old? And to say such a hateful thing on your deathbed, it just floored me. It was just unbelievable. And that was our last communication, that little bit of information.
We didn't talk about anything after that, you know, I just said, Okay, thank you. I didn't argue with him about it. I didn't say, How dare you? I'm not going to start yelling at someone on their deathbed. But to have their last communication to me, to say that someone doesn't want you?
Yeah. It was traumatic to learn how to be adopted and traumatic my relationship with my mother and my father. But that was unbelievable. And after that call, of course I talked to my sister. My sister and I had good communications and my sister took the opposite approach. She was like, That's absolutely how our mother is, she doesn't love us. She doesn't show us love.
And my argument back to her was, Well, that could be. She grew up in an era within her own family that didn't have that love and support. I'm trying to give her a little bit more benefit of the doubt here. But my argument has always been that she didn't have to continue to support us.
She could have just given us up to the state if she didn't want us. How dare our dad say something in his final last words.
And so, my sister from that day forward stopped all communications with our adoptive mom and me. That put more of a load on communicating with her. And so, after that communication with my sister, I took it upon myself to fly out to my adoptive mom, for a four-day, little mini-vacation with her, and one evening I just basically told her what's happened with the communications with our adoptive father. And again she's one of little words, but I could tell she got physically upset about what was presented to us.
She didn't defend herself saying, No, that's not the case or anything like that. She just got, as she always did, completely quiet, didn't know what to say. We went back to the house because I said this over dinner. Maybe that was not the right place to do it out in public, at a restaurant.
That was probably not the best place for me to throw this at her, but I didn't know any other way to do it. And we went back to her place and she showed me some letters that my sister wrote to her. And from there she just won't ever talk about it.
And as I explained before, after discovery and reunion with my first mother, she just won't discuss it with me. She won't have any communications about it. There was only one time I remember her actually willing to help in searching for my birth parents. It was when I was, like, 17 years old.
I was going through an emotional time at that time, again, and I brought it up, and she said, I'm willing to help you. But I didn't want it at that time. At 16 and 17, I'm so rebellious. I didn't want anyone’s help, especially her help. And so I just let it go. But that was difficult and still difficult to this day to deal with those emotions and with my adoptive parents.
Haley Radke: I'm sure. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry that those things happened and it's very upsetting for your adoptive father to end your relationship like that, just before he passed away. That's very sad.
John: Thank you. But no son, adopted or birth son, should ever have to have that kind of communication with their father.
Haley Radke: No. Oh my goodness. So, right now it sounds like you are still in relationship with your adoptive mom, but kind surface level and infrequent?
John: Yeah. I check on her at least monthly just to make sure she's doing well. But they're like five-minute, 10-minute phone calls at best. They're just very quick. How are things? What have you got new going on down there? How's your health? That kind of thing.
We have never gotten into deep communication on any type of subject. It's all just, like, you say superficial kinds of things. And how's the weather? How's retirement? Things like that. But anything of substance, forget it.
And then, partially, the need to blame too. Like I said, it's hard for me to have a substance conversation with her because I don't know if I can trust what she's telling me is true or not. And so I try not to get into the things where I would have to think if she's telling me the truth or do I have to try and prove it?
Haley Radke: That's really tainted everything.
John: It's sad, too, because I want to share parts of this reunion and tell her, explain the feelings I'm going through on this other side, and she just doesn't want to deal with it.
Haley Radke: Well, we would love to hear this story, so why don't you share it with us.
John: So, this is not the typical way of searching and discovering your birth parents. I'm very lucky how this came about. It's a very happy story, I can say. It wasn't a traditional way of searching and discovering.
So growing up I always wanted to know where I came from but I didn't have the nerve to go search. I didn't know how to go search. When I was growing up in the late seventies and early eighties, we didn't have the internet at the time. I was living in Pennsylvania, which is a world away from where I was born in Colorado. I didn't know how to go about it.
Plus, I was really scared about what I would find. You have those happy thoughts of “Oh, maybe this is how I was given up or relinquished.” But then I also had the other side of the thought process that was “Oh my God, maybe they were, I don't know, drug addicts” and, you know, bang.
I was concerned on the both sides because I already went through this one side and I've already had this difficult relationship with my own mom and father and I didn't want to find out it could be worse. So I didn't take an active role in searching, but every so often I would just have these urges. I need to know, I need to find out.
And so in the early nineties, the internet started to come about and before the internet, you had these online services with CompuServe, Prodigy, America Online. And so one of the services I signed up for was Prodigy. They had this little forum, this little group of adoptees searching for their birth parents.
And it wasn't much of a forum, it was more like a database, and you would just put your information in there. You would just put in where you were born, what day you were born, the city you were born in, and your contact information. And so I just did that one day. This is not the time now where I'm worried about stalkers getting my information, but at the time I just threw it in there that I was born in Colorado, gave my information up.
And, you know, when you first do it, you're kind of constantly looking at the forum. Oh, did someone reply? Did someone reply? No. And then you see other people posting and after a while you're just, Ugh, all right. You get discouraged. Okay, you tried. And I just came about if someone's searching, then hopefully they would look at this as well.
So I didn't think much of it after a couple months, three months, just kind of forgot about it. And four years later, I mean, literally around four years later, I was coming home from work, coming up in the driveway, and my wife just suddenly bolts out the door onto the driveway and waving me down.
I'm like, Oh my God, something's wrong with the kids. Because she had never done that before. And she said, I just talked to your birth mother. I'm like, What? I got very quiet, got very shy. I just talked to your birth mom. And, you know, thank God my wife took that phone call because she said, Look, I verified everything.
She verified things that I wouldn't even be thinking of doing. She was posing all these questions just to make sure that it was her. And she explained it, and I was starting to break down. I'm like, Oh my God. Oh my God, listen, oh my God, what do I do? You know, every emotion that came out of me from the last, this was 1997, so I was in my mid-thirties.
I would just weep with emotions and she said she's going to call back in 30 minutes. Which gave me time to kind of compose myself a little bit and think how I was going to handle this. So she called it back in 30 minutes. She explained how she got my information from that Prodigy service from four years ago, that she just went in there and found it and she couldn't believe it.
And as I explained earlier, during a phone call, she said she requested the adoption agency to open up adoption records when I turned 18. And it was such a heartfelt moment between each other. She explained what happened, how I came to be, how she, through all these years from my birth, just had this love for me.
She was thrilled to death. I was thrilled to death. It was very emotional, not knowing what to say, how to say things. I just kind of let her run things and she talked all about her family. She talked about her parents. One thing she stressed a lot is not to get upset with her parents because it was a different time at that time.
She was concerned that, you know, she didn't want me to hate them for putting her in a home for mothers. She talked about her siblings and her family history and it was just unbelievable. And from there on, we talked almost every day. We started exchanging emails. And then, let me back up for a second.
So, after that phone call, of course I called my sister. That was the first person I think that I called was my sister. The first thing she said to me after I told her the story was does this mean you're no longer my brother? And I was just like, Oh my God, no. You know, this doesn't change anything. I will always be your brother. It was just such a heartfelt thing for her to say.
And then I called my adoptive mom next. And, true to form, she just says are you absolutely certain? And I try to explain how we verified everything. And she said, Make sure she's not after your money. And I'm like, Okay, thank you. Thank you for that heartfelt emotional support you give me.
And the third thing she said was don't tell your grandmother, her mom. My grandmother is the most lovely person on earth. But absolutely I didn't do that. Those were the three things she advised me through it all.
After those phone calls and emails, there was a lot of discussion about what my history was, what happened to me, what her history was. And then after that, I got a ton of letters from her family side. I got letters from her mom. She was battling the disease at the time where she was losing her memory, but it was such a heartfelt letter to receive from my birth grandmother and then these letters from her siblings.
It's just all these welcoming letters to me. It was unbelievable the communications that had occurred. In a million years, I would never have guessed to have a reunion as loving as that was. It was unbelievable, these heartfelt letters I was getting. And then her brother lived close to us on the east coast and he opened his home for us to come visit him and meet him and his family.
And I declined because I said, as much as I appreciate your offer, the first person I need to meet is my birth mother. And so he understood that. And he was gracious about it. And then one thing I didn't disclose is that I was in the military at the time. And in the military, you know, you get transferred every three to four years.
And the year that we found each other was a year of my transfer again. So I got transferred to Virginia and my birth mother raised enough money through her own friends and family where she lived. She lived in Idaho and flew out that summer to meet me and my family and stayed for three days, and it was a wonderful occasion.
I couldn't be more blessed. The only thing I'll say about all the communications we had from that spring when we discovered each other through that summer when she had her first visit. One of the things I never asked was who the birth father was, what kind of individual he was. I didn't know how to handle that.
And it was the same struggle I had before. I didn't know if I wanted to know. I still don't know. I never asked those questions. I never probed those questions. I'm just concerned maybe that might be offensive to ask those questions. I don't know. So I kind of became standoffish, that's a good word to use, about not knowing that side yet.
But one of the things from her family side they do is they have family reunions every three years. And her father/my grandfather was a sibling to three other brothers. And so these four brothers would get together and have these big family reunions, you know, they're Midwestern family reunions. And the following year they invited me and my family to this reunion.
Let me step back. So my birth mom comes out, we have this lovely reunion, and then the following summer I was invited to meet her parents and her siblings and my cousins back in Colorado. And so my family took a week-long drive across the country to meet them.
And it was a wonderful reunion. And, of course, I was scared out of my wits, didn't know what to say, didn't know what to do, didn't know how to communicate, you know. I just let things flow how it was. It was great. And if anything, they were just so open and loving. I'm probably more the standoffish guy.
I didn't want to ruin anything. I didn't want to scare anyone. You know, I wasn't after anything. I just wanted to know who they were and their personalities and their history. And so we did that mini-reunion. Then the following year, I went to their big reunion. And it was even more love from that side with the other brothers and the other second cousins and third cousins.
Every three years we get invited again and communicate even more, you know, through Facebook and through Christmas cards. And it's incredible. It's hard to describe the openness that side of the family has shown to me and towards my wife and family.
Haley Radke: That's so beautiful.
John: Yes. But it's scary on the other side too. There's things that come about where I didn't have to think about. And I don't know if it's right for me to think about these things. This past summer my birth mom was asking for a little bit more personal information, you know, social security numbers and wanting to put me on her life insurance.
And I was like, Huh. I really didn't want that, you know, but I felt like, Look, that's what she wants. That makes her happy. Okay. But I was really concerned about doing that and even said I don't feel comfortable. But yet, I didn't want not to please her.
So at the end I'm like, Okay, if it makes you happy. But I just felt, Oh my God, now I have these other obligations. I don't know. Those are things I struggle with a little bit, you know, compared to my adoptive mom. I don't know if that makes sense.
Haley Radke: No, it totally makes sense. You're trying to weave your family of origin back together and those are things that are tricky in a regular, I don't know how to say that, a “regular” family.
John: Right, right. Even with a regular family you have those discussions. And when you have it from another side where I'm like, I don't know how to handle this. And my wife was so supportive and said, Do what you feel is best.
I'm like, it can't hurt me, I guess. But again, I'm not here for anything, you know, except for understanding and to get to know this family and be, you know, and slowly I'm becoming part of it, you know. Even this past fall, my birth mom still lives in Idaho, but we've moved back to Colorado and so I still see some of my cousins out here.
And then my uncle and aunt and we did a little family outing together and we went up to the mountains and they introduced me to one of their longtime friends as their nephew. And I'm like, that was just like, I was like, wow. To hear them introduce me as their nephew and it was just unbelievable.
You know, over 50 years old. And to be introduced that way, just put giddiness inside me like that, like wow. That's awesome.
Haley Radke: I can relate to that because I remember the first time that my bio dad introduced me to someone as his daughter.
John: And that's special.
Haley Radke: Yeah. Yeah, it is. You know, I'm so happy that you've had this positive experience because it seemed like you had so much hurt when you were younger. So I'm so glad for you.
John: It's amazing how things sometimes occur, and I still deal with emotional things and the loss and understanding of my own biological makeup, that kind of thing, as we grow.
Haley Radke: Are you comfortable at all talking about any of the effects that you might have experienced that you would relate back to the trauma of adoption?
You were just saying that there are things you're trying to reconcile and the feelings and those things. Are you comfortable talking a little bit about that?
John: I have a hard time, and this is maybe a little obvious, with trust. You know, when I first meet new friends or individuals or people at work, I have a hard time trusting anything without verification, that kind of thing.
And I guess this stems from the adoption and not being open to me from that. And then part of it is, again, I don't know if it's because I lacked that bonding when I initially was born and I was somewhere for nine months, but I have this awful concern every time I meet someone. It’s an insecurity about myself. Will they like me? Did I say something wrong to that individual? You know, how do I come across that individual?
So it's a lack of security on my part that I deal with every day in family matters and friendship matters and even professional matters. I'm constantly judging myself on those things and it's difficult at times because sometimes, I think instead of just proceeding and acting in a normal way, I'm catching myself and re-analyzing, thinking things. And I shouldn't, I just should just be myself and just not worry about those things. You know, it's like this open wound in me that just never heals. I don't know.
I had gone to a couple counseling sessions and I still remember the first one. That was just scary. That was unbelievable. But I remember after the end of the session, the counselor just said, Look, you're gonna kill yourself. You need more help than I can give you. And that just threw me for a loop.
That was just an unbelievable counseling session. And then I had another one who had a little bit more understanding, but still, I don't know if they got the breadth of the emotions I've gone through.
Haley Radke: It's really hard to find a counselor or a therapist that gets it. It's hard to find a good fit anyway, and then add on the layers of adoption and all of those things. It's hard.
John: Right. And then as a father, it was, you know, you try to throw it all into one hour. I kind of wonder on the other end how the counselor's taken in all at that time and how to weave through something where I, myself, have been dealing with over years and years, a painful information stuck inside me and that I'm trying to navigate through. It's difficult.
Haley Radke: But that's a good point. It's years and we just can't unpack that in such a short time. Like there's probably multiple years of work to undo those things.
Oh. And my dog's back. How perfect timing. Okay. Breaks up the deepness. I don't know?
You're like, okay. Okay. We're done with the feeling stuff.
John: Yes.
Haley Radke: Is there anything else that we didn't touch on that you want to get to or share with us?
John: I don't think so, as I take a deep, heavy breath.
Haley Radke: You're like, I'm gonna make an appointment for tomorrow.
John: Yeah.
Haley Radke: Okay. I really appreciate you sharing those insights with us because often we cover those things up and we pretend everything's okay. But the things that we experience in childhood affect us for a really long time. And I'm still thinking about your nine months, and I hope you do get an answer for that at some point.
John: You know, I talked about my sister, who's also adopted, and I talked to her about if she wanted to search and look for her biological parent. And always at the time, she's very quick to come back and say, “No, absolutely not. If she wanted me, if they wanted me, they wouldn't have given me up.”
She has changed a little bit after seeing the effects, the positive effects that have occurred with me and my reunion with my birth mother and her family. They're friends on Facebook and so she sees some of the photos. You know, I always worried about some of the photos that come out because I don't want to hurt her again, to exclude her.
She's still my sister and always will be my sister. And just recently I explained to her about listening to this podcast. And hey, you know, if you like, we can put the form through and open up your records. And I provided her that information. She hasn't done it yet.
She really would like me to do it, and I explained to her, I said, Look, I can't sign the form for you. You have to sign the form. I can submit it, but you have to do it. But it's kind of opened me up now, too, as well, to finding and then discovering a little bit more of my past.
And again, the wonderfulness of your podcast, of just listening and hearing other people's stories has opened me up even a lot further than it had previously. It's just a wonderful thing.
Haley Radke: Oh, I'm so glad. I'm so glad. Maybe that sounds like something you and your sister can do together. You can both fill out your paperwork together. It's a family activity.
Okay. Speaking of loving podcasts, let's move into our Recommended Resource segment because I think we both have podcasts to recommend.
John: Yes. I'm a podcast junkie.
Haley Radke: Me too. That is one reason I started the show 'cause I'm an addict and now it's just one extra way to get podcasts in my life.
Okay, so the podcast I have to recommend is called Born in June, Raised in April. Have you heard this podcast before, John?
John: No, I haven't.
Haley Radke: Okay. I just discovered it and I don't know why, because now that I've discovered it, I've seen other people post about it and I think, What? Where was I? So it's done by April Dinwoodie. On her website it says, “April Dinwoodie is a nationally recognized thought leader on adoption and foster care, and she is the chief executive of the Donaldson Adoption Institute,” which you probably have seen some posts by them. Anyway, once you hear that name, you'll see it kind of everywhere.
But April Dinwoodie, her podcast that she does is called Born in June, Raised in April because her given name at birth was June, and then her adoptive parents changed her name to April. And it's a monthly show and it's between 10 to 15 minutes long and there are these little vignettes.
April just does a little, could be a story from when she was younger and she weaves it together with her adoption journey. And it could be about her search. There's all these different things, little topics that she has each month. And it's been out for a year so there's 12 or 13 episodes at the time that we're recording.
And it's very nicely produced. The sound is excellent and it's just one more way to get to know another fellow adoptee. I'm really enjoying it, if you can tell.
John: I definitely have to subscribe to that.
Haley Radke: So the only problem is because there are only 10 to 15 minutes, it will not take you very long to binge listen.
John: That's good because there are some times where some podcasts are like two hours. Okay, but my drive is not that long.
Haley Radke: Speaking of podcasts with a large catalog that you'll never catch up on, what's your recommendation?
John: Yeah. So one of the podcasts that I first discovered because I was looking for a self-help kind of thing on different things other individuals go through, emotional things, and I came across this one called the Mental Illness Happy Hour.
And I just love that title. “Happy Hour.” It's by a comedian named Paul Gilmartin. They are a little bit lengthy podcasts. They come out weekly and he interviews different individuals. Sometimes he interviews therapists and counselors too. So those are informative.
But he interviews a lot of individuals that are going through disorders, mental illness, you know, like the title of the podcast says. And besides interviews, he also does emails from listeners, which it's actually quite interesting to hear because these little email segments are really quick and to the point.
They'll just have two or three sentences about some situation that’s occurring and I can relate to and stuff like that. Not all the podcasts are relatable. You know, some deal with drug abuse, alcohol abuse, sexual abuse, you know, things that are deep, deep things.
But then there's other things where, you know, I can relate with insecurities that I deal with at times. And I can understand what the other individual is going through and think of those things in my own life.
Haley Radke: Are there any episodes in particular that you remember that were really meaningful to you?
John: There are a lot. And I don't know how many years he's been doing this now.
Haley Radke: I scrolled back through the feed when you had emailed me that you were gonna recommend it, and I was like, Whoa, there's so many. But they're titled so it would be easy to look for something specific, like depression or anxiety. So if there's one particular issue, like you were saying, someone could find a specific thing. If they just kinda scroll back through.
John: Yeah, I'm just looking at it now. And he's up to 314 of these, but you're right they're very clearly titled. One has “Social worker in training,” one “Learning to love myself,” then some counselors, as I said, “My suicide attempt as a wake-up call.”
You know, it's a variety of different issues. And again, he's a very good host. He's very clear and it's somewhat enjoyable. He's not trying to make fun or light of it, but yet he's raising these issues with a little flare. But don't take it like, Oh, this is a comedic, happy hour kind of thing. It's not that at all. It's not a joke every two seconds.
Haley Radke: Right, right. Just like this show is not all happy reunion stories. I think people will have the full range of emotions when they listen to your story today.
John: I hope they enjoy it.
Haley Radke: I'm sure they will. Thank you. Thank you so much for your time. Thank you for your candor with us. I know that everyone will find great value in hearing your story, so thank you.
John: Thank you and thank you for all the hard work you put into this podcast.
Haley Radke: It's my honor. That's my tagline, I guess. If people want to connect with you online, where can we find you?
John: I am on Twitter. I have a weird username. I am a huge John Wayne fan. He was kind of like my role model. Growing up I imagined I want to try to be someone, and maybe this is life for people growing up in the sixties and seventies to have a role model. Mine was John Wayne, and so I use his movie title. Xtruegritx is my Twitter handle.
Haley Radke: That's so perfect. I love that. Now I know why you're called that. Oh, that's so good.
Okay, I will link to all of these things in the show notes so people can find you on Twitter and find those shows that we talked about. Thank you again for your time. I am so pleased to get to share your story with our listeners.
John: Thank you.
Haley Radke: Please don't forget to do that listener survey for me. It's just two minutes and you will have a chance to win three of our recommended resources. So go right now, adopteeson.com/survey. And I really want to be able to hear more of your stories, but there's almost a year-long wait list to be a guest on the podcast.
So another way you can share your story with me is in our Secret Facebook Group. I'm building this safe space for you guys, and if you love this show and want to join me in building this adoptee community, I would be honored if you would partner with me. There's some amazing rewards in it for you, like access to that Secret Facebook Group, and adopteeson.com/partner has all the details.
And if you have any questions about it at all, send me a note on the adoptee on.com website.
My very last thing for today: Would you tell just one person about Adoptees On? Perhaps another adoptee that struggles in relationship with their adoptive parents? Maybe hearing John's story will help them know they aren't alone.
Thanks for listening! Let's talk again next Friday.
