Authentic & Accepted With Ligia Cushman

[00:00:02] Hello everybody, welcome to another episode of Thriving Adoptees podcast. Today I'm delighted to be joined by Ligia Cushman. Looking forward to our conversation today, Ligia. I am too. I'm very excited to be here. Thank you for having me. Yeah, you're very welcome. Very welcome. So, thriving. What does thriving mean to you, Ligia?

[00:00:22] Ooh, thriving to me, I think over the years I've been working in child welfare for 25 plus years. Don't want to date myself too much. But I would say that over time thriving has looked different. I think now in the season that we're in, thriving to me looks like freedom to be your authentic self.

[00:00:46] Thriving means, you know, being accepted as you are. And it also means, you know, especially in the concept of like family. When I think about family, it means togetherness and in this together. And so for me, thriving has been something that I have strived for.

[00:01:09] And so for, not just professionally, but then also as an adoptive parent, as a mother of an adoptee, I have definitely wanted him to thrive. And a lot of that has to do with, you know, the ways that I've seen him thrive. It's definitely had to do with our openness in adoption, the ways that we talk about adoption. And the ways that we know that this is not our story as his parents, but it's his story.

[00:01:36] And so thriving is also his ability to own that story in ways that matter. Yeah. Wow. So there's a lot, there's a lot there. Let's dive in. You're talking about freedom to be authentic self and accepted as you are. So that seems to me to indicate two bits, right? So the first one is an internal driver, right? Internal, internal freedom.

[00:02:06] And that's accepted as you are, is about the external perspective on this, right? Mm hmm. Correct. Internally, I think that thriving. I've worked with a lot of children as a therapist and as a social worker. I was an adoption social worker for eight and a half years out of the state of seven and a half years out of the state of North Carolina.

[00:02:35] I have seen and witnessed thousands of adoptions take place. And I think when I think of that internal driver of thriving, it's this idea of belonging as you are. And so internally, I always wanted, I've always searched for that myself. I'm the daughter of immigrants from the Dominican Republic, but I'm also first generation American.

[00:03:01] And so I fit in two worlds as our son fits in two worlds, right? He has this, this first family and he has, we have always wanted him to. Well, let me say it this way. The way that I experienced him thriving and see it in real time is his ability innately to know that he is loved by everyone and there's room to love everyone, including himself.

[00:03:26] And so that internal motivator has always been really important for me as his mom, but then also for myself as a woman of color, as a mom, as a professional in the workforce. I'm really helping families know that even in adoption, you can thrive as a family, even in adoption, your child can thrive as a person.

[00:03:54] So that's the internal driver of, I want to strive for this because my child deserves this. My, their first family deserves this. They, we deserve this, but then this external driver, you know, about thriving.

[00:04:11] I think that version of thriving has become a little commercialized by those who glamorize adoption or, you know, so it's this idea of, I think back in the day, thriving was your child is thankful that you adopted them, thankful that you brought them into the space.

[00:04:30] And really, for a lot of us now, especially, I think that thriving is, can you, can you, can you talk about adoption? Can you have really hard conversations?

[00:04:46] And for me as a professional, right, can I have really hard conversations with adoptive parents about how they are not saviors in this space, but that they can actually be a catalyst to building family, to building community, to ensuring that this child has access to their origin and their people, their actual people.

[00:05:11] Right. And so, um, to me, when I think of a family or a young person or an adoptee that is thriving, they've been able to, um, have all the pieces of themselves show up and be well-received and accepted without, um, this idea of, you have to be thankful externally, especially.

[00:05:33] So whenever I've been at conferences and we've brought our son with us, um, I, I, I don't like it when people go up to him and they're like, oh, you should be so thankful. Aren't you thankful? Well, he didn't ask to be adopted. This was not his choice. And so again, when I'm talking about that external piece of thriving, people see a happy 19 year old who's going to college and he's driving his car and he's got this life.

[00:06:00] Oh, you should be really thankful. Cause where would you have been if, and the reality is that I never want our son to feel thankful about us adopting him. I want him. Cause that's external, right? That's, that's for other people to feel good about adoption. I want him to feel whole. I want him to feel seen and I want him to feel heard. And so, um, it's not a popular opinion amongst adoptive parents in my hemisphere.

[00:06:27] Um, but it is one that over time I have grown into because I have listened to adoptees and I've been listening, um, definitely for the last 10 years about what matters to them most. And it's, um, it's acceptance of who they are. Um, so yeah, I hope I answered your question. Yeah. I mean, it's, it's a discussion, right? Um, we sometimes get into this space on the, on the podcast. Um,

[00:06:57] and I like to make a really clear distinction between, uh, spontaneous internal gratification, sorry, gratitude, spontaneous internal, right? Versus forced gratitude. Correct. Correct. 100%.

[00:07:14] And, and I have also never really, I think this, you should be grateful stuff. And this is just my perception. It's bigger in the, it's bigger in the States than it is in the UK. 100%. Yes. Yeah.

[00:07:39] And, and, and I think that might be something to do with the fact that as a whole, uh, uh, Americans are more religious than, than Brits. And, and, and the church has played a bigger role in adoption than. A huge role. Yeah, for sure. A huge role.

[00:08:02] And I would say probably 20 years ago, um, I saw a huge uptick in, um, church members, parishioners adopting at a high level. And I think there was this huge movement of, you know, if one family would adopt one child, um, then you'd have this ability to, um, really save these poor orphans.

[00:08:27] And so not that I like the terminology, but that's really what is the driving force behind that. Um, and for all the ways that that was great, there were also many things that happened during that era and that continues to happen. That's not so great.

[00:08:43] Um, like, um, like, um, I don't see color, like those things that, um, again, so when I talk about, um, an adoptee being able to be their whole person, their whole self, um, that is something that we are still striving and working really hard at.

[00:09:06] I can see it in the younger, the newer adoptive families where there is this acceptance, um, and welcoming of the first family, um, or the family of origin. Whereas 15, 20 years ago, that first of all, that's not even something we talked about. And now I do see, um, families in the States doing the real hard work because the work isn't on the child. And I think we've, I think that's something we've gotten wrong here too.

[00:09:34] It's on the parents to make the safe space, to be uncomfortable in this adoption that they've chosen to step into, like be uncomfortable. We've been uncomfortable for our son many times, um, because it was the right thing for him. And so, um, that's that, again, that's that external piece that, you know, for me to see if a family is really truly thriving in adoption, there are some really key factors we need to see.

[00:10:01] And that's one of them are the parents more uncomfortable than the child because it should be that way. So adoption is not a, um, and people don't like it when I say this either, but adoption is not a, a normal process of growing and becoming a family. We talk about it like it is, but it isn't, it is, it is complicated. It is hard and beautiful. It is, um, love and loss, and it can be all of those things at the same time.

[00:10:29] Um, and so whenever I've trained potential foster or adoptive families, I make it very clear. This will not be an easy walk. This is not an easy thing to do. And, um, there are times that you will feel uncomfortable and you should, and you should. Yeah. And it's okay. And, uh, and as adults or as kids or as teens, we're, we're not, we're not good at being,

[00:10:59] we're not good at feeling uncomfortable. Are we? No, we're not. We're definitely not. And I, you know, before I became an adoptive mother, I was an adoption social worker. So I was training families week after week. I hadn't had children and I was just telling them how they had to show up when I had to live it out loud for myself. That's when I was like, oh, I've been going about this the wrong way in regards to training families.

[00:11:24] I have not acknowledged how difficult it's going to be and how hard it's going to feel and that it is still incredibly necessary for our children to thrive internally and externally. Right. And so, um, when I always tell people the catalyst for me professionally was when I became an adoptive mother, the way I spoke about adoption, the way that I, um, interacted with families was

[00:11:50] different because I, I knew then, um, thriving has to feel and look different in adoption and that every adoption is completely different from the last, like the idea that every adoption is going to feel the same and you'll finalize this adoption in 18 months versus people who finalize in four months. Like that's not real. Every adoption is different and every, um, situation is different.

[00:12:17] And so I've learned to, at that time, I then learned to cater my training, my curriculum, my support, um, to the very unique needs of each family instead of like these cookie cutter, you know, plans of engagement and all of that, everything was unique to the family. And I think, um, we need a lot more of that across the globe when it comes to adoption and post adoption support. Yeah.

[00:12:45] So I just want to go back to that uncomfortable idea because, uh, I've never heard it expressed quite as, um, succinctly as that. And I love, I love your succinctness. Yeah. Thank you. Uh, you know, I, when I get around that, of that space, I think of something like, um,

[00:13:11] growing, growing adoptive parents, uh, capacity to not take their kids trauma personally. Right. You know, um, and, and, and so I, I love the succinctness with which you say that. And I, I'm just wondering what, what you've learned about being, uh, comfortable about being

[00:13:40] uncomfortable. Mm. Um, Ooh, that's a good question. I, you know, I have been uncomfortable many times for our son. So the, I'll give you an example. Cause I like to give stories to the strategy, right? Um, one, I remember when our son had just turned three, we were going into Walmart and

[00:14:06] we lived in a very small town in North Carolina and Walmart is where everybody gathered, right? Cause it's a small town. And so we're going in to Walmart, just our, my son and I, and his mother is coming out and she and I see each other. She had not seen him, um, since he was a baby. Right. And so, I mean, he was still a baby, but he was a bigger, he's a toddler now. And so she's seeing him for the first time.

[00:14:35] I'm uncomfortable because I'm like, Oh, there's this, um, claiming that you want to do like, Oh, this is my son. And the reality is in that moment, like instantly I was like, no, this is our son. And so I brought her in, I was like, Oh my gosh, look, he's so big. He has your eyes. He looks just like you. Um, was I uncomfortable? Absolutely. I don't know many people who give birth to their, to their children and have to share them with other people in the same way.

[00:15:05] Um, and he, our son's always been like super loving and, you know, he's just a, a really a joyous, joyful person. And so even back then he gave her a hug, he gave her a kiss and then he asked her for his drink, for her drink. And it was like this big slushy, um, red dye drink. And you know, all the new moms are like, not red dye. Right. Um, but she handed it to him. Some moms would have been like, Oh no, no, no, no, no.

[00:15:34] I don't let him drink that stuff. But this was from his mother. And so in that moment I was like, Oh, those rules go out the window. I'll deal with whatever comes from this red dye later. He's having this moment with her and I need to respect that moment. Um, and she, you know, I, I think one of the things that I wish people knew about families

[00:15:58] of origin, birth mothers, first fathers is that they are so nervous when they get to be in front of the child that they place for adoption. And that in and of itself is hard. Um, and then as he's grown, she's also been uncomfortable because we've had to share with her some of his trauma, some of his experiences, why he shows up the way that he does in certain spaces.

[00:16:26] Um, the anxiety that he carries, like all of those pieces, um, make her also feel uncomfortable. So everyone's uncomfortable and it's all because we love the same person. Um, and to me, that's love, right? Love. Um, if you've ever heard me speak, you know, that I always say love requires action. And for those adoptive parents who feel like your action was adopting the child, that's great.

[00:16:54] But then there's, you know, we, we, we focus on their treatment, their therapy, their, their mental needs, their physical needs. Um, but then there's this also, who are they as people? Um, where did they come from? I remember him asking us those questions and us. Thank goodness. We had the opportunity that we could reach out to her and ask her directly, like, where are your people from? How, how did they get here?

[00:17:19] Those were things that had we treated her like a villain, um, had we villainized her, he wouldn't have the relationship that he has with her today. Right. Um, and, and, you know, I, I think openness and adoption, at least in the States, it's like the scary thing. And it doesn't have to be, it will be uncomfortable, but it doesn't have to be scary. Um, and so, yeah, that's, that's how I've.

[00:17:47] I think you're ahead of us on that. I think you're ahead of us on openness, um, uh, US to compare to UK. Um, I want to, you, you mentioned love a couple of times, uh, and, and at the, at the outset of one of the first answers you gave, I think you were talking about, um, love, love, loveability, uh, to, to be loved, to feel loved. Can, can you let, let, let's just dive into that. What, what's, what's all this about for you? What?

[00:18:17] Yeah. Um, I, I, one of the things that I never wanted, and again, right. When I became an adoptive mom, I thought differently. I behaved differently. Um, I never wanted him to feel unloved, unwanted. Um, in order for that to happen, it required a lot of work from us. So another story I can tell you at my sister's wedding, our son was the ring bearer.

[00:18:46] He was maybe seven and we're at this wedding. Um, they just finalized the ceremony and everybody's, you know, the, the, the bridal party there's, they're stepping off the stage and coming into the, um, atrium. And he's, he comes right up to me, mommy, mommy, mommy, were my parents married? Right.

[00:19:11] Again, uncomfortable moment at the worst timing ever. Right. He had to go and take photos and he had to go and do all these things. Love in action meant that my son is not going to be in the photos at my sister's wedding, because right now we have to answer this question. We need to give him time to process it. And that's okay. Okay. And so we did that.

[00:19:39] We made time for him to ask us questions and he was seven. Like maybe he asked two questions. Um, but we always were intentional about this is important for him to understand where he comes from. And, you know, you give them the hard information and the reality is no, they weren't. Um, but she loved you enough to make this plan and she's still a part of your life. So if you have any more questions, we will schedule some time with her and you can ask her more questions.

[00:20:06] And I think that that was a real time moment where we were like, oh, we've got to, I didn't even, you never know what they're going to be thinking. Right. Um, and so I, I do think that for us having, um, being intentional and the love and action for us was always about making the time. So another example, a lot of adoptive parents that I've worked with say when you ask them,

[00:20:34] so when was the last time you all talked with her about adoption? They'll say, oh, she never brings it up because it's the child's responsibility to bring that up. No, it's our responsibility, um, especially when they're younger. Right. And, and, and even if they're not younger, but developmentally they are, we definitely had to have the space, um, to make room for that conversation, um, about, um, where did he come from? What does that mean for him?

[00:21:04] And so for us, I do think that we have made and been intentional about bringing up adoption at every phase of his life. He's 19 now. We were just talking about it yesterday. Um, and now he brings it up. Why? Because he feels comfortable enough to do that. Yeah. Yeah. What, what about, um, what about self-love? You know, I was, as you were talking, I was thinking about self-care, you know,

[00:21:34] people talk a lot about self-care at the moment. And, um, I was also, but I was thinking about, you know, loving ourselves, um, kind of role modeling it, you know, leading, leading by example. Yeah. Yeah. That's a good, um, you know, I'm, I'm trying to think of the ways that we've role modeled that for him.

[00:22:02] Um, one is definitely therapy. Um, he knows when we're actively in therapy, my husband sometimes goes to therapy. I do. He's gone. Um, I think just, you know, his mom is a social worker, therapist by trade. So, uh, we're really invested in feelings in this family and being able to talk about your feelings. And there have been moments where he has, you know, come undone about things, whether

[00:22:31] it's things outside in life or the adoption where we remind him, you are loved, you are special, but no one should believe that more than you. And we're going to help you get to that space where you can own who you are. And so part of, part of what parents can do for children is celebrate their wins, right?

[00:22:55] Encourage them when their losses and letting them know, like, this is one mistake you've made, you know, um, um, this is one mistake you've made and here's how, um, this is, this doesn't mean that it defines your whole life. Um, and so we've made that space for him. I think it's working because, um, he loves himself and I, I'm proud of that because I,

[00:23:22] I have seen a lot of adoptees really struggle with that. And again, I think we were intentional about having these relationships. We were intentional about taking breaks from those relationships when he needed it. We were also intentional about, um, how does he fit in to both these worlds? Um, and we're still navigating that every day, right? Every day we're still navigating that with him, but he's, he's in a good place. Yeah.

[00:23:51] What about your, what about your own, just digging a little bit deeper in kind of like your own self, self love, I was going to say self love journey or the, or the, or the moment. So, you know, um, I will, I will say, yeah, go ahead. Yeah. Uh, I was the, the, the, the most profound, um, healing moment that in, in, in my life

[00:24:19] that seems to, uh, that, that, that, that seems to land for people, right. It is, is, is when I tell them about reading a letter from my birth mom to, to the adoption social worker in which, in which I, I felt her love. I felt her love for me. Mm-hmm.

[00:24:45] Um, and, and I felt her pain actually. I felt her pain. I felt which, which opened, you know, which, which led to like a turbocharged empathy. And off the back, on the back of that empathy came, uh, an incredible, uh, uh, overwhelming feeling. Oh, sorry.

[00:25:13] I, I felt her, her love for me, um, as the, as the tears came, came down my, my, my face. Mm-hmm. And people say that time, time is the greatest healer. Mm-hmm. I, I, I don't, I don't think it is, right. If there's no change, then there's no healing. So what is the greatest healer?

[00:25:41] And I, I think it's, I think it's insights for me. It's about insights. Mm-hmm. And the most profound insight I've had is feeling her love for me, right. So people think about insights as quite kind of abstract, heady kind of construct things. But this, this, this was, this was an all body experience. Mm-hmm. Yeah. All body experience.

[00:26:09] And I'm, and I'm wondering what, uh, if, if you've had similar self love moments on your own. Yeah. Um, so I. I am. It's wild. Um, so I am the daughter of immigrants from the Dominican Republic, first generation American. Um, for those who can't see my face, I look like a black woman.

[00:26:39] Um, and I am fluent in Spanish. Um, and so when, um, I went on my own self love journey, uh, separated from my family, because when I married my husband, he's a white man from New Jersey. Um, and so when I was in the United States, um, I would say that that's when my journey of self love, self discovery started.

[00:27:08] Um, and then, um, we got married in our twenties and then right, right around in my thirties. Um, I went back to grad school and I was, um, writing a paper about, um, it was for like our ethics class, but it was, it was focused on cultural and ethnicity and owning your own story. And so I had to go all the way back and realize so many things about our own family. I had a lot of conversations with my parents.

[00:27:37] I interviewed them both, um, separately from each other. And in that process, I got to see glimpses where my father still had an own parts of his own story. Um, and I remember sitting there thinking to myself, I can't let that happen to me. I need to not only love who I am as a person, right? The black side of me, the Latina side of me, the, uh, I lived in the South for 25, for 17 years. So I became a Southerner.

[00:28:08] Um, I had to love all those parts of me and it took a while. It took therapy. I'm going to be honest. When, um, you have a child that, you know, has developmental challenges or delays, there's parts of you that also, um, struggles. I, uh, I have dyslexia. That's not something I go around telling the whole world, but I've had to learn to love all those parts of me and learn to, and therapy has helped.

[00:28:35] Um, having people who love me and support me has also helped. Um, cause I don't, I don't think, and I'm just going to be, this may not be a popular opinion either. I don't think people should be in therapy for decades upon decades. I think that therapy is good for the season and you go back when you need to, and you take a break when you need to. And that, that has been kind of my, my way of self-healing, self-discovery of believing

[00:28:59] that I can be smart, be beautiful, even if other people don't see me that way. And so, um, I'm in a much better place. If you would have asked me this at 25, I I'm, I'm afraid of what I would have said. But, um, now I think, um, I'm, I'm definitely in a space where I love myself and I, and I, and I, I laugh at the quirkiness that's me, but I also am able to, as his mom, I think

[00:29:29] him seeing me love myself, him seeing my husband love himself, that also models for our kids, um, a strong, um, self-concept. Yeah. Yeah. Because we, we can't expect others to do what we can't do. Awesome. Um, I'm going to go back a bit to, on a cultural question on that.

[00:29:56] And it was something that, um, that popped into my head last week, actually, uh, self-love. So in, in, in the UK, historically, he loves himself or she loves him. She loves herself. And it was, it was definitely more of the men loving themselves. Of course. Right. Shocker. It's shocker. Yeah.

[00:30:26] Um, and there's a, yeah. And, and there, that, that, that used to be a criticism or not, it was often a criticism. Right. It was often a criticism here in the UK. Uh, I remember, you know, I can, well, growing up, you know, he, he loves himself as a Christian. Um, was that the same in the, was it the same in the States?

[00:30:56] Hmm. The States. Oh, gosh. It's a massive question. A massive overgeneral. I know. I know. I, you know, I, the race in the States alone is very compartmentalized. And so, um, you know, I, I would say that in our country, um, white men are very confident. They, there is a lot of self-love, you know, there is a lot of that, that you see.

[00:31:24] Um, and just speaking honestly, my husband and I were just laughing about this the other day. I was like, how do you get to do that? Walk into the room and ask for the thing. And we laugh about those things because it's, it's so prevalent in, um, white culture, especially here in the States that, um, yeah, there is, there is those spaces where, you know, especially, um, black women. I didn't see myself as a black woman. Let me say that. Cause that is what really blows people's mind.

[00:31:53] I didn't see myself as a black woman until I moved to the deep South before the South. I grew up in New York city and I saw myself as Dominican, a Dominican American. I'm Latina and I'm black and I'm all those things. But in the South, um, especially where we moved to, there was no, they had never seen a black girl that speaks Spanish. So they, they would always ask me which one of your parents speaks Spanish. And when I would say, well, both of them do, they're both from the same Island.

[00:32:21] They, people were surprised and they're like, yeah, no, but, but really, truly, they would think I was joking. That also messes up with your self-concept, right? It also messes up with, do I belong anywhere? Right. Um, so one of the blog posts I wrote years ago was about how I live in this hyphenated space. Right. So I, I identify as Afro Latina and in that hyphenated space, um, I am many things and that's okay.

[00:32:48] And I think in our country, um, if it makes people feel right, we're going to go back to being uncomfortable, right? People don't want to be uncomfortable with your race. They don't want to be uncomfortable. They don't want to have to think harder than they have to about who you say you are. So, um, when people would say to me, where did you learn to speak Spanish? I'm like, it's the first language. I spoke as a child. I learned to speak English, watching Sesame street with my parents.

[00:33:14] Like I didn't speak any other language before that. Um, and that throws people off. I've had to learn to own my own story and not let people tell me what my narrative is, even if it makes them uncomfortable. Right. Cause again, accepting of a whole person, if you're not feeling uncomfortable, right. Then I would challenge that your, your circle of influence, your circle of friends, um,

[00:33:44] are not really diverse. Um, and so for me, that's where I find the richness, right. It's in that hyphenated space where I, and you can only do this if you love yourself fully, I think, or you're really close to it. Right. Cause I don't know that I'm a hundred percent there, but that I make sure that people understand who I am. Um, my name alone is a challenging name to say, you say it beautifully, but there are people

[00:34:11] who will just say it any way they want and never ask, did I say it right? It took me years to challenge people when they said it wrong years. And I'm talking about probably over the last five years, I've started correcting people. Um, but that comes with my whole self. This is my name. This is who I am. This is how I make up my work. This is how I show up. This is how I parent. Um, this is how I love.

[00:34:33] And so, um, that part of like my ethnicity and my culture, my diversity, um, we're not a monolith. And I think just people in general are not a monolith, right? Um, adoptees all look different. Um, adoptive parents all look different as a Latina. I look different and I can embrace those pieces of myself.

[00:34:58] And I also, um, want to help others embrace those pieces too. And if they can't, then that's not before I used to think it was my problem, but it's not, it's really, oh, they're not in a space where they can move beyond. What they believe that boxes that I should check. Um, so yeah, for me, I checked many boxes and I'm okay with that. Um, so yeah, that's just kind of been my dream.

[00:35:28] Um, and I'm still on it. Honestly, I'm still on it. I'm still trying to figure out, um, when do I push, right? And when do I push back a little? And when do I let some things go? But for the most part, I would say right now in my life, I am definitely, um, owning my own story. Um, because you know what we've learned from history, right? Brits can say this. Americans can say this.

[00:35:57] What we've learned from history is history is only based on, or the story that you get is based on who is telling the story. So I, I, when I do a lot of, um, keynotes, I always remind people like, this is your narrative, own your story or somebody will own it for you. And so I don't ever want anybody to own my story for me. I want to be able to authentically tell you who I am, share who I am and hope that you believe it.

[00:36:24] I think that's one of the hardest things for me in the States is when I tell you who I am and you don't believe it, that's, it's alarming for me, but it used to, it used to like break me. And now I'm just like, oh, you're just not, you don't understand that people look different and come from all walks of life looking different. Um, and that's how the world's always been. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:36:50] What, what would you, what would you say in, in continuing on the theme that we're on at the moment, what, what would you say that you've learned about self-love and transracial adoptee? So our son is of mixed race. Um, and I'll start with that.

[00:37:16] Um, and because I am married to a white man and I'm a black Latina, I thought, and I was an adoption social worker. I thought I got this. I'm going to get this so great. This is going to be fantastic. And, um, no, I didn't, I didn't, I didn't get it right. I, I thought I was getting it right. But you know, um, for our family where we were living was not great for him.

[00:37:46] Right. I had a beautiful home. I could view the mountains. It was the, the cost of living was low. Like it was just ideal for what I wanted, but it was not ideal for raising a mixed race child. And we made the very difficult decision and not a lot of parents do this. And I get, I get all the reasons why we made a very difficult decision to move from the small town.

[00:38:12] We were in, we still stayed in the South, but we moved to a metropolitan area in a totally different state. And we did that right in the middle, middle of, um, what we call here in the States middle school. So it's like secondary, I guess you, I don't know, junior years. Um, he was 13 at the time and he, yeah, it was, it was the, the pinnacle of teenage years. He was like, what are you doing to me? You are ruining my life.

[00:38:37] Um, but I will tell you that I, I believe he, the self-love really evolved for our son when he started to see himself in the community he was living, not just a parent or the janitor or, and not that any of those things are bad. None of that is bad, but he had never had a black teacher in his life until we moved here. He had never realized that there were black scientists.

[00:39:03] And while we thought we were teaching him, while we were doing things well for him, the reality was that, um, the community also influences your child's ability and concept of self-love. And so if my child was one of two mixed race children in the whole school, one of two, um, I'll never forget the day was Martin Luther King's birthday. He had the day off. We had the day off and we were on our way to some, you know,

[00:39:33] like historical event that we were going to take him to. And he, he's sitting in the back seat and he says to us, Hey mommy, you and I are from the wrong part of town or the wrong side of the tracks. And that is a very American way of saying them versus us, um, white versus black. And we put, he was probably eight. So we pull the car over. Cause my husband was, he had never, um, heard him say anything like that.

[00:40:03] So we pull over and we turned to him and we're like, where did you hear that? It's like, Oh, at school, we're reading a book about world war two. And in the book, it talks about us, you know, black people are from the wrong side of the tracks and white people are from the right side of the tracks. And he looked at my husband and he goes, so daddy, what does it feel like to be from the right side of the tracks? Wow. We didn't teach him that, but his school was teaching him that. And of course I was irate.

[00:40:32] Of course I called the school. Of course I had a meeting with the principal. Um, and there's the school solution was, well, Ms. Cushman, why don't you come in and you teach the kids how to do this? Well, right. And I thought, wow. So not only, and they weren't being condescending. They thought it was a great idea. Yeah.

[00:40:56] And I, I, again, when I talk about love and action, even teachers, even school systems need to show that they really, truly love and care for our children. So what does the love and action look like? And I said, I cannot come in and do that work for you, but I can, I can direct you to the books. I can direct you to the, you know, X, Y's and Z's. Um, I can direct you to questions to ask the children after they read a certain chapter that's talking about that.

[00:41:24] So there had been no conversation, right. To tell kids we don't, in our country, we don't function like this anymore. They just let the kids keep reading. And, and so, you know, I challenged those pieces, but there are times where self-love is about, um, especially for him. I, I needed him to see himself in his community and he didn't until we moved here.

[00:41:48] Um, and as hard as it was to sell our home, to leave jobs, we love to leave our friends behind, to leave family behind. Um, I can tell you we're now here six, seven years. We do not regret it at all. And every time we go back, we're like, wow, we lived here. This is wild. Um, but with that came the freedom. So I do believe that it's, it's not just how you're raising your child, but your community is going to ultimately influence.

[00:42:16] And it ultimately influenced my self-concept of love, right? Some of the most hardest racially charged moments in my life happened in that small town. Um, haven't happened since in the same way. And, but it has forever changed me as a person.

[00:42:35] Um, and it taught me also that I had to face some real hard moments, um, to explain to people, there is value in my life. There is value. And the reason why there is value is because I believe it for myself. Not just my mom, not just my dad, not just my siblings, my husband, but I have to believe it for myself. And so if we can show our son that by relocating, right?

[00:43:02] And we remind him when, when we talk about the move, cause we still talk about it. Um, when we talk to him about the move, we say, we did that for you. We needed you to have something different. And I think he's happier for it. I think he's more balanced for it. I think he can see himself in the community that he's grown to love. Um, and, and so, yeah, that's, that's how community is, is an influencer on self-love as well.

[00:43:30] And it was healing for me to be around people that look like me and people that didn't. It was healing for me to have both. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Have you heard the phrase existential wrongness? Have you heard that? No, I haven't. It blew, I didn't hear it within an adoption context. Mm-hmm.

[00:43:58] Um, but it, it, it, it was, it, it kind of summed up how, you know, I, I, I say this, the, the, if, if there is a primal wound, wound, there isn't one primal wound.

[00:44:18] Uh, mine feels like a paper cut and, and, and somebody else feels like, you know, somebody else look, feels like a, a, a, a, an attack by a great white shark and it's taking a chunk out of the leg. Right? It's huge. Mm-hmm.

[00:44:36] Um, so the existential wrongness for me was a, a, a great, horrible, but a very horrible, very horrible, but very succinct way of summing up somebody with a really bad, um, um, really large primal wound.

[00:44:59] And I'm thinking the wrong, why I brought it up is the, you talked about the wrong side of the tracks. So we, we use the wrong side of the tracks here in the UK as well, but it, it would, in the UK, it would normally be actually economical. So it would be, it would be income. Yeah. Income. It would be about income rather than race. I think. Right. And this is just a mass generalization.

[00:45:27] And I live in a very white area, very white area. So it might just be me and my privilege and my thing, just putting it in the wrong way. Put the wrong side of the tracks. But are you making a, are you, are you joining two dots here? Or am I, am I joining two dots here that don't exist between, um, self-love and, and race? Oh, no, no, no. They go hand in hand. They're married together. They're embedded together.

[00:45:56] Um, you know, I just, I was recently interviewed by the imprint news, um, social work magazine newspaper here in the States. And, um, they were asking what, what, um, what are my thoughts on transracial adoption?

[00:46:21] And I, I said, um, that's been, it's been a big deal in the States. I don't know if it's a big deal, um, in the UK, but in the States, um, a lot of adoptees, adult adoptees, many of these adult adoptees work for me. So they have definitely shared their frustrations about, um, um, my parents loved me. My adoptive parents loved me. They gave me the care that I needed.

[00:46:49] And they also didn't see me as a black woman, or they also didn't see me as a Latina. Um, and so, um, when I talk about love and action as an adoptive parent, I mean, do not rely on your black child to be your gauge on what race, you know, to be your teacher on race and ethnicity. Uh, a parent who truly loves their child is going to buy all the books.

[00:47:19] It's going to go to all the workshops. It's going to make time to educate themselves and to challenge what they were taught as they grew up. Because once you adopt a child that doesn't look like you, that doesn't have the same background as you, you become a multicultural family.

[00:47:35] And I will tell you that the deep South in the United States is still significantly problematic when it comes to multicultural families, um, let alone multicultural couples. Right. Um, my husband and I, we've experienced our own very real, um, moments again in the deep South, um, that, you know, these were two kids from, you know, New York city, um, New Jersey, who had friends from every walk of life.

[00:48:05] And then we come into the South where people judge our relationship from the, from the jump. And so we knew when we, when we were raising a family that it would, our children would also struggle, um, and they would struggle in a different way. So my son is much lighter than I am. He is, he is what we would call a little bit more white passing than I am. Um, and so as I was trying to teach him about these hard things, people may stop you and they may say all these things.

[00:48:32] He hasn't experienced that in the same way that I have, I'm darker skinned. I, um, I just look different. And so I, I've also had to teach myself that, oh yes, he's a, he, he is seen as black. He is seen as all these other things. And he's also white in a very white world. And so how do we teach him to love both parts of himself?

[00:48:57] I have met, um, mixed race children who have chosen one side over the other. And I think that is damaging also. Um, we wanted him to have this balanced love for himself, but then that meant that I had to have a balanced love for myself. I had to embrace and love the African side of me. And I was not raised to love that part of me. I was actually raised to hate that part of me, to ignore that part of me, to whenever anybody confused me with being a black person.

[00:49:27] And for those of you who can't see me, I'm blackety black. Like, um, if anybody wanted to challenge that, um, that I would push back and say, no, I'm Hispanic. I am not what you're saying I am. Well, in the South, I got really tired of that up North. It did not happen even half as much as it happened in the deep South. And so, um, owning my story, being able to explain to people who want to hear it, because not everybody cares, um, who I am, where I come from.

[00:49:56] We have to do that with our children too. So, um, for our son, we, we also did his DNA with the DNA testing and, you know, as an adoption social worker who was working in, um, North Carolina, we, uh, adoptions are closed in North Carolina for the most part. Um, it's up to adoptive parents, how open it's going to be or how closed it's going to be, but legally you don't have to have an open adoption. Um, but we chose openness.

[00:50:24] And I say that because for my son to see he's raised by a black mom, for him to see his white mom with very blue eyes showing up and also loving on him. I think between my husband, you know, his mom and myself, we've been able to really cultivate a space for him where he can see that all people can love each other. Even when the whole world doesn't necessarily agree with it.

[00:50:53] Um, and for transracial adoptees in particular, the ones I've been listening to the ones I've been, been, you know, I'm, I'm going to challenge every adoptive, every adoptive parent from the sound of my voice. Um, and I think that's the one that I've been listening to the other day. And I think that's what I've been listening to my parents. I think that's what I've been listening to my parents. When we do that, we remove our judgment, we remove our feelings from it. And we just listen.

[00:51:18] Um, I think one of the things for all the things that quarantining during the pandemic was not good for a lot of people's mental health. For me, it was good in this sense that it forced me to just sit and listen to adoptees. It forced me to, um, just hear them out with on social media without replying, no comments, no backlashing, not taking a personal, just hearing from them about this very real.

[00:51:49] Issue we have in our country about, um, who are people? How are they showing up? What makes you black? What makes you white? What makes you Puerto Rican? Um, and that, you know, for our son in particular, he'll tell you I'm black and I'm white. And I always wanted him to love both parts of himself. And so, for example, for my husband, loving his white side has been a challenge, especially in this country.

[00:52:13] Um, he also had to get to a place where he loved himself so that he could teach his son about, um, what it means to be white in America. What does it mean to be, and so that I can teach him, what does it mean to walk around with this colored skin in this country? Um, and that, that, yes, our country is racially fueled. There is, I mean, if people can't see that now, um, yeah, I don't know. They will see it. Um, it is racially fueled.

[00:52:39] Um, and when you adopt transracially, you are unknowingly, for a lot of adoptive parents, you are stepping into that space. And teachers are going to treat your kid differently. And sometimes it's not your child's fault, right? Sometimes it's just how they look.

[00:53:00] And that's hard in our, especially in the, um, United States where we, for a long time, believe that we were colorblind as a nation or that we, um, have come so far, um, as a, as a country.

[00:53:15] Um, there have been many moments in the last 10 years that where people have kindly, not so kindly reminded me of my place in this world or reminded me of, you know, don't talk too much about, um, you know, you're upsetting adoptive parents. When you say this isn't about you, but it isn't right. For a lot of us who have adopted, it's very selfish. We did a selfish thing and then we get to be patted on the back for the rest of our lives for doing a selfish thing.

[00:53:46] Um, and I've had to reconcile that too. That's part of that self-love, right? I am his mom and I love my son. And I, as an adoptive mother, I would not have it any other way. So you're never going to hear me say like, oh, I wish he would have, if it would have been best for him, I would have loved for him to have that life with his family of origin. Um, and I also have to own the decision I made to adopt him. And, and love him wholly as he is.

[00:54:12] And for us, that's always meant welcoming all the parts that make him him, the black, the white, the brown, all of it. Beautiful. Beautiful. That sounds like a really good place to bring it in, Leah. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you, Leah. Thank you. Thank you, listeners. This has been great. Thank you all. We'll speak to you again very soon. Take care. Bye-bye.