Renewed Life

        I feel resolve to protect myself from my fragile sense of self, and feel like I woke up to seeing how terrible it was when I let other's actions toward me control my self-esteem. Such as when people looked down on me in the store for being meek or shy. I realized that I have a right to my feelings, and not owning them made others be able to make me feel small for them. Because I got triggered so easily by rejection or perceived differences that made me feel like an outcast, people did not understand how to treat me. Nancy Verrier says in Coming Home To Self that adoptee's friends and family do not know who they are, because they are such chameleons and people pleasers that, when you spend time with them you begin to get the sense that "nobody's home" and one can just pass through them. I used to feel there truly was nobody home, it was my biggest fear, so I ran and ran from my self and feared exposure. I think back of this and dread how awful it feels for us adoptees to feel this way. Now I know that it is not true, and we are worthy people that are not just some "charity cases" without worth in society because we are adopted. It angers me greatly that so many people still see adoptees as such, so ignorantly. All humans are equal, and going through losing birth parents as an infant does not make one less-than others. We are orphaned and that feeling stays with us and needs to be felt, until we can be strong enough to move on. I no longer blame myself for not being able to move on in life, for being stuck in a limbo state and not believing in myself at all. I now see that it was all the work of my subconscious to protect me from further hurt, and it is not needed anymore. Knowing where the painful feeling stems from makes me able to discard it and feel whole and human again. So, I welcome myself to life in renewed innocence and wonder. I wonder where life will take me, but I know that I am in control of my reactions and feelings as long as I live. Failure is inevitable and part of the human experience.

         The only way we can become non-egotistical is to acknowledge our ego. Not hiding it in our shadow. Reality is that adoptees are on a low developmental stage because of the stump in their early life.