The Primal Wound: Understanding the Adopted Child

I will never forget reading Nancy's book for the first time. It was my "aha" book--aha, someone finally has put words to how I feel and think as an adoptee. It brings validation and comfort to the adoptee and is a great wake-up call for the non-adopted. Thank you, Nancy!

The book can be very enlightening and varrifies many feelings/issues an adoptee may have. I like how the author (who does not have a PhD)focuses on the psychological/biological effects of adoption and how it impacts the adoptees thought process.

There is a lot that I took away from this book - and a lot that I didn't. I would urge any reader, as with any self-help book, to read this with an objective and critical mind. Verrier makes a great deal of heavy generalizations, not just about adoptees, but about all involved in adoption. It seems she (prehaps unavoidably) brought in her own biases from her personal experience. I do not like how she lumps all adoptees into one group. Yes, being adopted will have a huge affect on an adopted person as it is the most major event of their life, but it is not going to affect each adoptee the same. It is important to remember that many of the problems she discusses can happen to non-adoptees as well. Also, I find that she makes generalizations about the adoptive parents - it seems they can't win. We all have problems in life, and adoptees have their own baggage to deal with, but that doesn't mean that an adoptee can't be well-adjusted and happy as an child and adult.

I am adopted, have an excellent relationship with my adopted family. I have had/have my issues and problems to work through as a result of being adopted, but I can't attribute all my problems to being given up at birth. I am quite level headed and well-adjusted, just as much as my non-adopted friends and more so than some. I have gained a fair bit of knowledge and insight from Verrier's findings. I took from the book what applied to me and left the rest behind.

A good read for those involved in the adoption process, again, just be a critical reader and reflect on your own situation when reading it.

As an adoptive parent in the waiting stage, this book has scared me to death.

While I can buy into the "primal wound" theory (as contrived and academic as the chosen phraseology sounds), I have a hard time with several elements of the book, specifically:

1. It frequently blames adoptive parents for being ill-equipped to properly handle their child's primal wound of separation from the birthmother. The book was first written in 1991, when adoption may not have been as open a topic of discussion as it is today. A whole lot has changed in adoptive family dynamics since then. I have yet to see a book written about people adopted in the 90's, perhaps because they aren't adults yet. And I have yet to see a book written about adoptees raised by parents who WERE sensitive to their child's needs with respect to the adoption, and whether their emotional issues are as severe.

2. Along the same line of blaming the adoptive parents for how they raise their wounded children, plenty of the parenting problems it describes could easily happen to biological children as well, and specifically several of them happened to me and other people I know (not adopted). This isn't the only adoption book I've seen this in. For instance, it talks about the pressure on an adopted child to be compliant and perfect and how parents can aggravate that tendency. That's not necessarily an adoption issue. There are parents expect that of their biological children as well (again, not to trivialize the feelings that come with that, but the bio kids that deal with it have those feelings too - I was one of them, it's not limited to adoption). Then it mentioned a guy whose parents pressured him to be an attorney when he didn't feel called to it. Definitely not an adoption issue - that could happen to anyone.

3. The book is also internally inconsistent. It talks about how adoptive parents shouldn't refer to their children as "special," because this increases the pressure on these children to be perfect. I don't see the connection there to begin with, and to make matters worse, later in the book it quotes an adult adoptee who complained that his parents DIDN'T ever tell him he was special, so he felt insignificant (which seems to be an obvious outcome - don't most parents tell their children they are special, whether they are adopted or not?). Along a similar line it talks about an adoptive mother who gave her daughter every material advantage but never hugged or kissed her. Again, that's not an adoption issue. That's a parenting issue.

4. The book also assumes that every adoptive family has dealt with infertility and has not worked through the loss of a biological child before adopting. Although there are families dealing with that, more and more these days there are also families who either (1) choose adoption without ever trying to get pregnant in the first place, or (2) have gotten help in working through the emotional impacts of infertility. These parents are overlooked entirely, and there are no reports on children adopted by these parents.

5. It grates me how this book (along with some other experts and non-experts for that matter) insists that adoptees who appear to be well-adjusted are probably really just in denial. I'm sure that's true for some, but the book assumes that every adoptee is the same, and all must have deep-seeded issues, and are in denial if they appear not to. There appears to be no acceptance of the possibility that some adoptees may actually have mitigated emotional issues. Even if the majority of adoptees cited in the book have very profound grief and pain, I wonder who was sought out for purposes of providing information for the book and what percentage of the adoptee population they comprise. I don't say this in an effort to deny the information in the book, but rather to suggest the book seems unbalanced and speaks in near absolutes.

The book basically tells adoptive parents "you will never be good enough because you aren't the biological parents, and besides, look at all the mistakes adoptive parents make along the way" (as if biological parents don't make mistakes). In theory, there may be a point in there somewhere because ideally, yes, every child would have a wonderful home with their biological parents in their country of birth; but the book loses sight of the fact that given a biological family's inability to care for its child, or a country's policies that prevent that, what are the alternatives for this child? And by that I do not mean to trivialize the very real pain of adoption for both the child and the biological parents, but the circumstantial reality seems to be somewhat overlooked in the writing.

Yes, abandonment is tragic, and there have been adoptive parents who are insensitive to their child's plight as an adoptee, but not all adoptive parents are like that, and not all parenting issues are adoption issues in an adoptive family. The book reads as though they are and doesn't offer much hope.

The book also references how a non-adopted person can never know what it's like to be adopted. Conversely, and not mentioned in the book, an adopted person will never know what it's like to not be adopted. That means an adopted person may not realize that a certain family issue is also experienced by non-adopted persons. I'm sure adoption magnifies some of these issues, but it's important to understand that a lot of parenting and growing up issues are universal, and not to automatically assume it's an adoption issue. My concern with that is that an adoptee faced with parents or a therapist who link everything to the adoption, and don't explain to the adoptee that there are some things everyone deals with at certain stages of life, might actually have more limited opportunities for healthy emotional development.

Overall, the book is lecturing toward adoptive parents and over-the-top in its tone, and if you are in the process of adopting and don't remind yourself of why you're adopting and the very real-world outcomes for abandoned children who are not ultimately adopted, the book might talk you out of it, which in my opinion would be tragic.

The Primal Wound is a wonderful, but intense book.
However, as an adoptee, this book really hit home. It felt so gratifying to read this and be able to understand some of my own core issues that I have faced throughout my life.
I believe that this book discusses adoption in a way that our society does not understand or is afraid to understand. Nancy Verrier is very honest and pure about the effects adoption has on all members of the adoption triad.

I am a new adoptive mum of a 16 month old baby, who was excited and ecstatic about our life ahead. After reading this book, I was terrified of the apparent impending disaster which is to lay ahead of us. I do believe much of what she has to say is true, however, each time she mentioned that some adoptees "say" they don't have the feelings she talks about, she says it is because they are in denial. Let's not forget she is not an adoptee. I think it is a valuable tool to have, but I think it could also be a little dangerous.

To be completely honest, I am just confused as to whether to bury this book at the back of the bookshelf, or call it my adoption gospel!