The child that I adopted is not my adopted child

Adopted is a verb (past-tense in this case). Adopted is not an adjective. My daughter was adopted. But she is not my adopted daughter. Are you following me here? Or are you sitting there going “huh, say what”?

My daughter was adopted. She was born to another woman who made the unselfish decision to allow her own flesh and blood to be raised and loved by another. I adopted Mari. We will always celebrate this act. The start of our family is amazing and while there is truly grief associated with what Mari has lost, we will always celebrate that our family started through the action of adoption.

My daughter is not an adjective. She is not my adopted daughter. She is my daughter.

What’s the difference?

My daughter will be always shaped by the start of her life. She has suffered some incredible losses, many which she will not comprehend until much later in life and may never come to terms with. Emotions, attachments, friendships, familial relationships - all will be influenced by the fact that she was transplanted into a family and culture that were not originally hers. There is no changing the fact that she was adopted and that this action will contribute to the person she becomes.

But she is not an adopted person. She is a person. She is not solely defined by the fact that she was adopted. The action of adoption did not make her a better person than she would have been and it did not make her less of a person than she would have been. She is very special because she is my daughter, not because she’s my adopted daughter.

I absolutely celebrate adoption and think it is the most wonderful event that has happened in my life. But I refuse to let it define my child and how she is viewed. I’m tired of her being introduced as “Jill’s adopted daughter” (not to mention that it’s a little bit obvious). I’m worried that one day she will grow up and think that the only reason she is special is because she was adopted.

Mari is special because she is super-intelligent, hilarious, engaging, charming, determined, passionate, and just plain awesome. Adoption did not make her special; it does not define who she is. It is one small chapter of her story and one that she may look back on with a sense of loss of her identity or that she may chose to celebrate as a rebirth. But she is so much more than just an adopted child. She is a normal, amazing child who just happened to be adopted.