Would you say this is one of the top 5 feelings that adoptees have at some point in their lives? As happy a person as I am, I remember saying “I don’t even belong here” many times, mostly when I was a young teenager and at the height of my angst. I definitely felt misunderstood and I had difficulty relating to my mom. She and I were so different and I hadn’t yet figured out how to appreciate the differences rather than run from them. It wasn’t until I wrote my book and was forced to really think about and explain her feelings and mine from that time that I started to understand what we were both going through. Family dynamics are hard enough but throw in adoption and things can get irretrievably damaged. I was suffering through adolescence, complicated by the fact I was adopted. My mom was also suffering through my adolescence without any idea that I was also agonizing over my adoptee emotions. I was her child but in MY mind, I was starting to toy with the idea that I was actually someone else’s child. As I got older, I learned how to accept things for the way they were and when I couldn’t change something, I adjusted. When I joined the Army, I found a group of strangers that became my family and oddly enough, I did feel like I belonged there. These strangers understood me and were in the exact same situation so we could all relate to each other. When I found my birth mother, I was curious if I would feel like I “belonged”…would there be this intangible click where everything would make sense? Well, although it was amazing indeed, what I learned is there is no magic click, like the sound of puzzle pieces clicking together. It has taken many years of getting to know her and my biological family to feel comfortable and start to build our own history together. What I have learned is that for myself, where I “belong” is where I can just be me and that’s not up to anyone else. Where I’m being me is where I belong.