"Can you imagine not knowing who you are because your mind has been manipulated so much growing up that you question your very essence? To me this is the worst form of child abuse." ~ paraphrased from a FB friend of a FB friend.

The preceding quote was stolen off a Facebook comment.  I paraphrased because A) I didn't ask to take it,  B) she was referring to something *completely different* from how I'm going to use it, and C) the topic it WAS referring to is way above the pay grade of this blog, LOL.

The comment garnered several "likes" in agreement.  And yet if I had posted it about adoption, I'm *sure* I would have gotten a big argument.  Yet, that was the FIRST thing that came to my mind.  Many older adoptees reading this (if there are any among my 3 readers) would agree with me.  The closed system and lack of good empathy for the less powerful members of the adoption triad,  common among adoptions of the baby-scoop era, has messed with our minds. Manipulated us to a point that we question our very essence.

Of course it was not intentional on the part of the adoptive families (at least in most cases, I'm not talking about purposefully mean people here), which makes it even more difficult to talk about.