What Happens When Parents Wait to Tell a Child He’s Adopted

A predictable sequence of events nearly always ensues after I mention to someone that I’m adopted. First, people blink, then quickly apologize for whatever assumption forced the clarification—that it must be my dad who’s tall, or that it must be my mom who passed down her olive skin to me … that some distinctive feature of mine must run in my family. Then come the questions: “Do you know your birth parents?” “How old were you when you were adopted?” And, almost without fail, “When did you find out you were adopted?” Whatever conversation was going on before the subject of adoption came up, I am always sorry to find, is now lost to history and forgotten.

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