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Being Adopted

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By A PersonPublished 6 years ago 3 min read
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Take a deep breath, close your eyes and think back to when you were ten months old. Do you remember anything? If you say yes, you’re lying. Few adults can remember anything that happened to them before the age of three. A new study has documented that it's about age seven when our earliest memories begin to fade, a phenomenon known as “childhood amnesia.” Sounds like a stupid question, right? Yeah, well you’d be surprised. 99 percent of the time I tell someone I adopted, I immediately regret it. I was born in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and was adopted when I was ten months old. So, please don’t ask me if I speak Amharic or if I remember what Ethiopian food tastes like.

Being adopted is probably one of the best things that will ever happen to me. It is very possible that I could have been in an abusive foster home right now. Or in a village where my family would have to fight for food and water. I was especially lucky because neither of my parents knew what I would look like. They just decided they would find out when I got to the U.S. and for that, I am very grateful. Cute, right?

So, one of the most annoying things is when someone says, “Oh, my god. I’m so sorry you were adopted.” Yes, thank you so much for feeling bad for the fact that I am with a wonderful family and have lots of privileges. It’s absolutely awful.

Oh, here’s a good one. “Do you ever want to meet your real parents?” No joke, people have asked me that question in front of my parents. I mean, they feed me, clothe me, love me, yell at me, ground me. But, no, they’re fake. I know, I am being very sarcastic, but I won’t lie, it is a little inconsiderate to ask these kinds of questions without thinking.

One of the more sensible questions I have been asked is if I would ever like to go back and visit Ethiopia. Of course, I would. However, if you had asked me this question about four years ago, I would have said no. I was under the impression that my birth parents purposefully abandoned me. You see, my parents had told me about this sort of arrangement between the women and police in Ethiopia. The women who couldn’t take care of their babies would leave them somewhere where the police could find the within minutes. So, I was put out on the sidewalk.

Well, my parents quickly found out that telling your 12-year-old daughter that her biological parents dumped her on the sidewalk was bound to be taken the wrong way. But, later I took into consideration that my biological parents lives may not have been easy. Or maybe they were awful people. Whatever. My point is, adoption does not mean abandonment. However, it is still a sensitive topic and can be very personal for many people. Especially since their have been some controversial arguments surrounding the topic.

Wow, that got pretty dark, pretty fast, didn’t it? So, to sum all of this up, next time you meet a person who was adopted, shower them with impossible questions. Ask them what they remember from being an infant, and definitely don’t forget to apologize, because nothing is worse than being adopted.

Thanks for reading! This is a piece I actually wrote a few years ago, but I still enjoy reading it. So, I made a couple revisions and, there it is. And although this is satirical, everything I’ve said still stands true! Hope you enjoyed it!

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