Pushing Through Fear and Finding Truth
Written By Brittany Kinsey
Adoption Loss is the only trauma in the world where the victims are expected by the whole of society to be grateful.” – the Reverend Keith C. Griffith, MBE
When I meet someone for the first time and we finish all of the normal pleasantries, immediately to follow without a doubt is the question, “So, what are you?” “Where are you from?”. I was taught “what” I was when I was five. To be more correct, I was taught what to say. “I am adopted. I don’t know of my biological parents. I think I am biracial.” At this point, my race becomes a guessing game. People guess and I entertain it. I know how important race can become when it is unknown. I have been Latin, Indian, and from the Middle East.
“The perk to being a blank slate is I can be whoever I want to be.”
“I was raised in an African-American home and I have that culture ingrained in me. I am comfortable with being black, my family is black, and I fit in at home. I must be black. I have a family who loves me. I have had a great life.Therefore, it doesn’t matter who I really am.”
This is the faulty logic I used to comfort myself. Ironically, I was not aware I needed comforting.
A very good friend of mine brought out the truth in me. It’s easy to blow people off when questioned about reuniting with my birth parents. I would tell them casually “In due time.’, yetI had no intentions of looking. This particular friend didn’t buy it. He read through it as soon as I said it. “If you wanted to know, you would know by now. So the real question is why don’t you want to know?” The truth is, I was scared to know. Imagine getting rid of something and going on about your life and then, that thing you got rid of pops up 27 years later. He called me out on the fact that I was scared. I admittedly agreed. I could have cried right there in Fuddruckers. I was afraid to feel unwanted, yet I have always felt that way. I searched myself and realized I had nothing to be afraid of. I was already hurt.
I used to say that one of them did not want a child at that time in their life. But since I was on a path to deal in authenticity, I decided to say what I really felt. One of the two parties involved in my creation did not want me. It feels better to make it personal, to change the “baby’ in this scenario to me, Brittany. Playing a guessing game about who I am is harmless, but being afraid is debilitating. I owed it to myself to find out where I came from. Even if it made the other parties involved uncomfortable. I started my search on a Monday morning, and by the end of the day, I had a name and location on both of them. It only took a day and it only cost 14.99 for a trial membership to an online database that can tell you anything you want to know about someone short of their credit score. I was a couple years too late. It saddens me deeply that my biological father passed away in 2007. After contacting his family, they told me that he wanted me, and that it was hard for him to get on with his life after the adoption. I did not expect the pain involved in losing someone I never knew, yet it is here; thick and tangible. His eyes are like my eyes and it is an unflinching revelation that I did come from somewhere, someone. As an adoptee I chose to think my story began the day I was adopted. Truth is my story began as every ones does, the moment of birth. I was someone before I was adopted. I did not gain a whole lot of answers as to why I was given up; I was not searching for them either. It had everything to do with me. There is no better way to banish your fear then go looking for what scares you. I needed to acknowledge I was relevant, unwanted maybe, but relevant.
I cannot wait to meet someone new, so that I can tell them I am Brittany and I am Black, White and Native American.
