Relax, You're Home: Secure in The Nothing Place

Secure in The Nothing Place

The Nothing Place.

Where I arrived when I lost my mother moments after birth.

Where I have lived and the place I know well.

The place I reject the woman who tries to take her place.

No one understands this place. I am all alone.

Floating in a void.

Untethered.

There is a black hole between me and the rest of the world.

Home.

Relax, You’re Home

I have been alone my whole life – from the moment I was taken from my mother at birth. It did not matter that a foster parent took care of me for five weeks. It did not matter that I was placed with adoptive parents. No one could replace my biological mother.

Losing her catapulted me out into a void where I have lived and operated from ever since.

Walking through life, I knew I was different. I was in the wrong place; I was with strangers. No one understood me. Everyone around me had a mother, knew what it was like to be given unconditional love, to be understood, to be mirrored, to know their place.

I was always looking across this void, longingly, wishing I could be a part of that world.

When I had my children, I gave them everything I wished I had. Which only brought into sharper focus what I was missing – what I could never have.

Recently a fellow adoptee named this void for me – The Nothing Place - the untethered place where I live.

Your biological mother is your universe, your safety, your home and north star. Adoptees lose this compass the moment we are born.

It seems no one can understand The Nothing Place except other adoptees. We recognize the black hole, the deafening silence. The Nothing Place is my home, my beginning and while I have lived my whole life here alone, I am now finding community and strength with other adoptees that call this place home too.

I have decided I would rather be alone than with others who do not understand or who only want to view my experience from their own perspective and expectations. In The Nothing Place, I have built strength, community and resilience to survive.

Now that I know the name of the place I live and understand how I got there, I am embracing it. The Nothing Place is home because that is where I am, the only person I have ever been able to depend on.

The Nothing Place = Home.

Fellow adoptees are always welcome.