Empathy and Living In an Adoptive Family
On Empathy and Adoption
Let me take you back about two years. It was 11 at night and I’m sitting at a table at a café with my best friend Emily. She and I are both adopted and have adopted siblings. Our families are big and our siblings have traumatic backgrounds including prenatal exposure to hard drugs, sexual abuse, neglect, and fetal alcohol syndrome. The reason why Emily is my best friend is because she just gets it. We both experienced the guilt of being the “normal” babies of the family. In other words, we don’t have to suffer from the consequences of our birth parents’ choices but are surrounded by those who do.
It’s incredibly easy for me to empathize with my friend Emily. Like I said, she just gets it. So, we sat together, contemplating life and wondering what in the world we’re doing and what we’re meant to do. We talk about our families, the most recent drama, and how if we hadn’t learned empathy as children, we would not be able to handle our siblings and their realities with grace. It was then that I appreciated how invaluable empathy really is. I realized that, if I could master empathy, I would be pretty satisfied. Alas, empathy is an incessant teacher.
I have been able to enhance my understanding of empathy and how to utilize it. To be able to look at a situation, ideology, or experience through the eyes of someone else is an incredibly powerful skill. Now more than ever, I am able to ask myself the question: if I were that person and I had experienced the experiences that they have, would I be able to make a decision that was close to or as good as they made themselves? Usually, my answer is no.
When I ask this of myself, I know my heart is in the right place. When someone has wronged me or is hateful and I can’t seem to understand it, that question helps me to see what I’ve experienced through a different lens. I’ve learned that rapport is precisely what I strive for in my life. Nothing matters more to me than nurturing the relationships I have with other people in healthy ways. Being skilled in empathy is crucial for creating and maintaining such bonds.
