When I started the search for my biological roots, I was innocent and naïve. It hadn’t crossed my mind that my family would deny and reject me. I thought the most significant hurdle would be just locating them. I had little information; being adopted was like that. It was the proverbial needle in the haystack. 

I thought about my biological mother when I started searching. My fantasy was that she had been looking for me and had spent many years thinking about me. I dreamed that she would want a place in my life.

I met my biological mother and realized that she had not thought about me over the years. Her life went on after she gave me for adoption. The memories of me had all been buried and left behind. 

However, it was important to me that she knew none of this mattered. I hoped we could leave the past behind and build a relationship. If she got to know the person I had become, maybe she could find a place in her heart for me. However, this is not what happened; our relationship did not grow.

Twenty years after finding my biological mother, I found my birth father. He said he did not know my existence, which might be true. Yet I found it odd that he didn’t ask a single question. He didn’t seem to want to know anything about me. Finding a daughter fifty years later seems like a significant life event, yet he has nothing to say. My father chose to continue with the secrets and deny his firstborn daughter. He did not want to have a relationship with me at all.

I never knew rejection until I found my biological family. They should have rejoiced in finding a daughter, a sister, a niece, but instead, they banished me.

I never envisioned my story unfolding as it did. I’m sorry that it hurt people, yet that is often the consequence of secrets and lies. The collateral wounds caused to my siblings are regretful. I did not intend to disrupt, cause chaos, or divide the family. I did not expect to be the cause of arguments between my brother and sisters. Nor did I want my brother and sisters to be at odds with our father because of me, but that’s what happened. In the end, it caused me pain, but I needed to end the secrets and lies. Everyone deserves the truth, even adopted people.