Adoption & Addiction Full Lecture

[@pyewacket99]

I was adopted at 6 weeks of age. I have struggled with anxiety, depression, addiction and low self esteem. This has been the most eye opening lecture I have ever watched. At times I found myself covering my mouth in astonishment at what you just said - I could have said it myself. I finally feel "seen" and realize I'm not the only one that has experienced this.

[@karenwill4825]

I come back and listen to this lecture at least a few times a year. It is so comforting to feel heard and understood.

[@JoGarnerCoach]

As an adopted person this is the most insightful and eye opening talk I have ever heard.

[@yochevedbrachasimon4979]

me too, explains so very much. We adoptees have adapted to so much so early.

[@aliciaboyd7057]

Il 2nd that . He is bang on

[@kadelbach63]

I totally agree. So spot on from the beginning right to the very end.

[@rosshardy6223]

As an adoptee this is the most important discovery in my life bar none, so on point. Thank you Paul.

[@kylatokki22]

I’m adopted. I found this video on a different channel and was urged to leave a comment here to express my gratitude. I have no words for how impactful this lecture was. I stop the lecture every few minutes to think, un pack, and process what is being said. This is truly the most eerie experience, this man is speaking about things that I have never put into words yet identify with so much.

[@AdopteeOutOftheFog]

I hope I can share this link and help this go viral for the entire adoptee community to see, I struggled with binge drinking from age 14 -37, it was pure hell, my parents were always on their own side against me saying “we saved you from foster care, we done all we can” so I never knew it was from relinquishment trauma and being gas lit to believe I was supposed to be grateful for my adoption. It’s so misunderstood.

[@rozzbrookes9078]

​@PattyHwang-yy9tuI don't know, but if you find it please let me know too.

[@Alunanderman]

Just found this today. On my 4th consecutive listen. As an adoptee, Paul's entire lecture is profoundly soothing. This should be a mandatory watch for anyone working with adoption.

[@littlewitch5960]

The first time someone has explained what’s been going on in my head 😢

[@donnatoots]

One of the best talks and explanations Ive ever heard ❤ thank you so very much 🙏

[@dubleffler9451]

Enlightening! Thank you for helping me understand myself. Love to every adoptee out there.😀

[@imnotakittycat]

I had to pause this at 0:49 to make this comment…when you said “wanting to belong and yet fearing belonging” and I’m in tears. I’ve never had my feelings so well phrased and I am excited to hear the rest.

[@rachelblackmer7789]

This gave me so much insight into my children's experiences with adoption. I'd love to see a follow up on how best to help them with their addictions, now that we better understand their roots.

[@Tailsfan12726]

I was adopted and it was a horrible experience, more like a nightmare. Tortured, locked up, s.a and r..ped it was horrific. My whole life is a about survival even to this day I’m struggling with relationships but I’m blessed I’m a mother of two girls and broke that cycle the first one in my family to break it.

[@nataliebrett4204]

Omg you HAVE to write a book at some point this is exactly what an adoptee like myself needs

[@carolinehuxtable7268]

I was a chronic alcoholic (49) in recovery of 4 yrs. 15 plus mental health hospitals, rehabs/detoxes shunned again by society. When fog started to lift awakened to the fact my adopted 'mother' has Narcistic Personality Disorder. Boom!! Double Betrayal beyond words. Have cPTSD, ADD and debilitating co dependence. Thank you for explaining that it's not my fault x

[@cingocia2760]

I think the same....

[@missyemerald]

Same 🙋🏻‍♀️ heroin addict tho...

[@loveoneanotherdonthate]

I fully understand ur struggle

[@iwant2pantsyou]

I feel you. I finally found peace with medical weed. But each to his/her own. ✌🏼

[@KrisBlack-idahogirl]

Love to all of us.

[@rozzbrookes9078]

You knowledge of an adoptees life is profound. I've been an addict since I learnt how to escape reality, which was around the age of 12. Since then I've rarely been straight and I'm now 55. I'll literally take anything providing I'll forget about what life has thrown my way. Thank you for putting my life into perspective, I'm sorry I didn't discover you when I was studying Criminology and Psychology. The academic journals are full of adoption statistics, but you've presented the trauma in a way that we can all acknowledge and understand. Thank you for the years of research you've given to this unspoken pain us adoptees live.

[@sue4341]

I wasn't adopted, There is very much shame teaching within the context of Christiany. In which someone who is struggling with self esteem issues will always feel unworthy ... This is another area that needs to be explored, Children who have been adopted by religious parents add to the child's Shame ETC. I'm finding that most clergy, Reverends and pastors are not equipped to handle these kind of people in the congregation because they have had no classes in psychology or a lack of classes in psychology when they attending seminary School. Thanks for loading this video up on KZbin.

[@rozzbrookes9078]

@@sue4341 unless the Catholic brigade are involved.......it's a whole different level then, believe me.

[@TwiceShyBabe]

Bless you Dr Paul. Bless you for sharing your gift with this world. You have helped so many adoptees after listening to your lecture we each have said...'Yes Yes Yes!!'

[@KrisBlack-idahogirl]

My sister was 3yrs old and I was 3mos old when health and welfare was called and we were removed from my mothers home. She had left us alone for at least 5days this time. My sister was begging food from the neighbors. We were malnourished and had scabies. I had horrible scarring diaper rash and was diagnosed as having "failure to thrive syndrome". We were finally adopted by our foster family. Of course I have no early memories but i do have ptsd, i live in constant fight or flight. I have a string of failed relationships drug addiction etc. This video explains so much Thank you.

[@radhaor]

Poor baby. Love, love love ❤

[@teknik12k]

I was kept secret from everyone in my mother's life and abandoned at the hospital. Spent the first 5 months in foster. At age 50 when I found my mom she's ignored all attempts of contact and blocked me. Her family members will not mention me to her out of fear of damaging their relationships. My father met someone new and was married by the time I was born. He has been troubled by the fact he was unable to raise me and has accepted my fully as his son. It's crazy how much we have in common and I've met my half brother and sister now. It's still hard to deal with the rejections from my birth mother. I would have had a better life being raised by my father and the lies I was told my entire life are hard to stomach.

[@pearlrachel1499]

As an adult adoptee, now 75 years old, I have found this lecture by Paul Sunderland so very helpful in understanding my own experience of adoption and that of many others. This knowledge is crucial in the understanding and healing processes for anyone having such needs in the adoption triangle, biological parent/s, adoptee, and/or adoptive parent/s. I have referenced this video many times to many people. Thank you, LIFE WORKS, for posting it on KZbin for all to experience, learn, heal and grow from. I keep going back to it, now and then, to have another listen--it's so wonderful for this population to finally be understood to a degree of depth never before reached. Before this posting, I had found the "unofficial" posting of the same lecture and had listened to that one several times--so very glad it was there. It's always so healing and deeply moving to hear it. Again, just the fact that it's out there for people who need to hear what it says--is beyond wonderful. THANK YOU, Sincerely.

[@emmasnow6950]

This was really helpful and also hurt me kinda bad

[@Katefleckle]

Thank you Life Works for making this available here

[@DrPatriciaWorby]

Absolutely brilliant! A client of mine recommended this video and I must say it's extraordinarily comprehensive and insightful. At last someone talking about the trauma of being relinquished at birth. A form of complex attachment trauma or wounding. I do however, want to offer a ray of hope in recovery. Not talk therapy (although that undoubtedly helps), but using psychosensory tools like EMDR, havening and in the future hopefully psychedelic therapy, seems to resolve implicit memory (remembered but not recalled( in the limbic system and rewires the meaning attached to the negative beliefs towards self-compassion, the antidote to shame. There are many theories as to why this is so. It floods the brain with serotonin, delta waves, it makes old memories labile and then rewires them, possibly via glutamate receptors in neurones (see the work of Ronald R Ruden). But overall the senses wire directly to the limbic system via the vagus nerve and so touch, sight and sound allow a new input if soothing to overwrite the old one of separation and abandonment. This is particularly so if you work in heart to heart connection with a safe other - hopefully an attuned therapist. I reworked my own trauma that way and now I hope to enable others to do the same. Thank you Paul for your work. I'm going to now watch other videos as this was way ahead of its time....

[@KristyHowell]

I only found this after a failed reunion, a moderately successful one, and a pair of life-changing diagnoses that were incalculably complicated by not having a medical history. I listen to it over and over, because I've never heard a kept person talk about adoption like I do.

[@user-lg8vo9hc9u]

I was adopted twice. And there’s a lot of emotion that comes with the process and the ideas we have around it as children. For a long time I was mad at the system for not trying to reunite me with my biological mother. They pushed for the adoption more than anything. And in the end the first adoption didn’t even last. My adopted mother died and her husband had no idea how to care for a young girl. So I struggled and was traumatized emotionally. My second adoption was just as bad, given my history, I was not a perfect kid. I had problems, and as soon as they came up they gave up on me too. Just to find my self on my own at 14. I would have been better off with my birth mother, I know it. So don’t be hateful towards Statler when she leans on her past, it’s harder than you think to always wonder what if. And to feel abandoned not only by people but by the system too. Did you know social workers make extra money when they complete an adoption. No I bet you didn’t. Statler I stand with you in this type of experience and emotion.

[@rozzbrookes9078]

Are you from the UK?

[@kadelbach63]

Thanks so much for this. From the very first statements to the very end this all resonates very strongly with me. I was especially moved by the early statement regarding the grief of the adoptive family. My parents has suffered a still birth prior to adopting me. Never talked about but obviously there in the background powerfully when I was little. There was a lot riding on me to fill that void and dispel that grief. I have never been aware of that dynamic and I’m nearly 60 now. Thanks so much for this and many other insights.

[@sddjohnson75]

Thank you for telling our story

[@BevChapman-rc2nx]

As an adoptee and a social worker I have found this incredibly helpful

[@pipwaller-beinghuman3337]

So well said. As an adoptee of 58, Relinquished and adopted at 10 days old, I can tick all these descriptions of Relinquishment Trauma Trauma ptsd

[@radhaor]

Thanks LifeWorks for this fantastic lecture! Thank you and thank Dr. Sunderland for his insight and care. It has comforted me so much because i related to every single thing he said and for the first time in my life...age 45 ....i felt understood. I still dont know what the circumstances of my life were except that i was adopted at three months and lived with nuns prior to that. All i know is that i have experienced everything he has described and was told all my life by my adoptive mother to get over it (as loving and generous as she is, she is not a deep thinker and does not know anything about the primal wound i got from the relinquishment).... the anxiety, gastrointestinal problems for decades, not fitting in, always feeling like the odd one out and being left out, afraid to be myself in relationships, terror of abandonment, catastophic thinking all my life, major lung probelems all through childhood and teens due to grief (lungs are linked to emotion of grief), depression, massive guilt and shame from blaming myself for the whole thing etc. etc. Thank you, thank you 🙏💐 I would love another lecture about how to heal from these issues, please.

[@missyemerald]

My birth-mother had scitzophenia & throughout my teenage years my parents almost convinced me I was just like her. I was adopted in the late 70's.... If I had've been born 20yrs later I would never of had to endure this added trauma. 🤬 Narcissistic Alcoholic Mother don't know what kinda organisation would ever hand over a defenseless baby to a woman like this & with a workaholic father 🤬🤬

[@londonpiper]

Thankyou for an amazingly insightful lecture. At the age of 66 I'm finally beginning to understand why my life has gone the way it has.

[@melissacostin4464]

Paul, thank-you from the bottom of my heart. Every word you said clarified confusing feelings in my head..taken at birth (forced adoptee) fron Royal Brisbane Hospital Queensland Australia, always fearful/stressed with identity issue causing attachment fear roller coaster..i had every psyche misadiagnosis in book with every class of psychiatric chemical which made me more unstable. I have a medical degree but can'y practice as my self soothing with cannabis is seen as criminal and insane..so getting law changed and fighting ignorance in psyche/med profession...your excellent insight as an observor of people with those frail roots and damaged limbic systems shows an excellence in empathy, as well as great intelligence..and since you're more credible than me..I'll be sending a link to this summary of primary principles to those who email reply I've yet to face due to my catastrophic thinking...it's very healing to have greater insight into why such feelings exist which need to be self soothed..thanks again and all the best.

[@mojopeep326]

I have lived both sides of the adoption coin. I am adopted and I have my child up for adoption. Definitely left me twice wounded.

[@michelleradford5080]

I've been in therapy ever since I was 20 on and off that's one question no therapist asked me or I ever told them that I was adopted. Now I'm older how do you deal with people that keep on trying to fix you and say you need to get back with your parents and that gave you up for adoption. I really do not have no feelings towards my parents that gave me up for adoption I do not want nothing to do with them anymore got the information and when I feel about my adopted mother I do not care about her anymore

[@danbaber6415]

First time I really watched this makes sense. Love the bit about being brainwashed by other cultures.

[@elleh3495]

I would argue it is more than a triage: the adoption agency/facilitating country has to be acknowledged as the conduit and genesis of this problem. These agencie's actions actually precede the idea of "adoption", precede the physical unwanted birth, and thus are nearly wholly responsible for the "adoption" grift.

[@Gurus2Gods]

I was adopted. Sexually abused by him and whipped by her. At 13 they returned me into care. I've spent my life studying serial killers . Who were adopted.

[@loveoneanotherdonthate]

This is so sad. Do you have a family life now?

[@clarelean3501]

Thank you so much for bringing this into the spotlight. I sincerely hope the lives of adoptees currently and in the future will be significantly less painful because of this awakening in the psychology profession

[@diane4091]

I am so glad I found it when I needed to hear it most. I think any adopted person is going to be pausing and taking notes, and even though I did, I think I'll be watching again. Thank you Paul x

[@darlejdawson]

Entirely fascinating. Thank you for making sense of so much. Lots of things to consider and on which to meditate.

[@danbaber6415]

When I left school at 16 I was so scared and lost and I got major traumatic panic attacks off cannabis because at heart I didn't know who I was and I was scared of the saying take responsibility.

[@dontlookatme8323]

Same here, I never understood why I got paranoid from pot when all my friends did not

[@nickturnbull4105]

​@@dontlookatme8323me too ,smoking cannabis caused me great anxiety and panic attacks ,I'm 63 now and don't think I've ever fully recovered from the paranoia and extreme feelings of terror ,I believe the experience of being torn away from my mother was felt and re-enacted. , total fear with nothing to hold onto ,Terrifying .

[@tFER998]

Kudos, you are getting there. However, there are some major issues with your conceptualization, and in my opinion this stems from the fact that you are not adopted and have not conducted proper research into various aspects of adoption: - "Severance" instead of Relinquishment - As an adopted person, I find the term Relinquishment offensive, as it denotes that the child was voluntarily given up. This is generally not the case, and the current situation in the UK, where 12K are forcefully adopted each year proves this. - Bring Identity Theory into it - Stop saying Interesting and fascinating - alternatives "I feel that knowing more about this aspect of adopted people's experience will be helpful for them" - we are not here for "your interest" - Without addressing the political and social, assertions are weakened. - This is an emotional disorder us adopted carry, not developmental as such. You alluded to this later. Studies show our overall development is largely par with general pop, I would emphasize the emotional and take the word developmental out of the equation. - Acknowledge the sense of injustice we carry, and the ways this can lead to adaptive coping. - Adoption triad terminology, ask the adopted person what THEIR preferred terminology is. Your use of the OLD triad terminology is just that, outdated. - Tribe: the same as Identity theory, focus more on WHY adopted feel like the odd one Dr Toni Sanfilippo, an adopted person.

[@dontlookatme8323]

Do u realize the video is 10 yes old?

[@jenniferhickman9673]

This is all very true, and definitely is what goes through my mind and how I think as an adoptee. My question, however, is how do we overcome these obstacles? I’ve been in therapy for 2 years, and I don’t know how to overcome these adoption issues. Is there any insight on this anywhere?

[@jonnoknowles8164]

Thank you very much. This has been very insightful this lecture. Paul has confirmed and definitely enlightened mw regarding some of my thoughts. Surrounding my behaviour and the patterns in I have had or am still trying to break.

[@danbaber6415]

Love the sound of Paul's voice when he says the cat in the hat lol

[@kstevenson1040]

Amazing. Insightful. Concise. Helpful. Thank you.

[@AF3NI]

It feels like we don't stand chance being adopted it doesn't make any sense to me. We're not seen as individual human beings with out own rights

[@pattyspatio120]

Thank You.

[@soakupthenoise]

35:08 oh my god i need this on a bumper sticker

[@kristenmarie8642]

lol when he said that i slapped my knee and screamed "HA! Ayyyy-ohhh, Paul!" ..and of course i'm alone watching 😅🙅🏼‍♀️

[@ts7071]

Thank you

[@TitusAugust-l6n]

Hall Paul Thompson Kimberly Thomas Helen

[@kearneysmith875]

Everybody wants me to keep reincarnation for the next 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 years until I stop reincarnating and reach nirvana and finally go to heaven. The g train has too many white women especially Polish white women and its bothering me.

[@cingocia2760]

That is?

[@tFER998]

Dear Paul, there's no doubt that some of your claims are true. Yes, adoptees are over-represented in clinical settings. However I see adoptees are creating memes such as "Paul Sunderland says close to 90% of adoptees have ADHD". Where is the actual evidence for this? Have you considered that Pathologizing adoption may not be the best approach. People come to your lecture, or view your video, with certain symptoms that are undeniable, but they then map this (and come to conceptualize their experience) based on what appears to be in in my view, a pathological model of adoption. I do not think pathologizing the adoptive experience is overly useful.

[@loveoneanotherdonthate]

I was also wondering about the 90% ADD percentage an found some footage stating 25% ADD rate amongst adoptees. Nevertheless u might be right at least with some of your stated criticisms - of course in adoption lies a lot of opportunity, that we should of course value but see it through the right perspective in order to get the "most out of it" as a societal tool for parentless children. As an adoptee myself I find it very useful to inform society about adoptees' issues, even if 100% accuracy is not yet the case.

[@tFER998]

@@loveoneanotherdonthate Can you forward me the footage? I'm a provisional psychologist, and no-where in the research literature have I found any evidence of such elevation of ADHD in adoptees... even at 25%. Sure, it might be elevated, but I doubt 25% x

[@dontlookatme8323]

​@tFER998 u are not adopted, obviously, so there is no way u can relate. I think it is higher than that. I think a very important part is when he says "if the mother can tell an emotionally coherent life story of herself, there is a higher chance the adoptee can succeed normally."