ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author interviews young people and explains how important it is to listen to them as they try to make sense of their feelings and experiences relating to the loss of their birth parents and the pressure on them to adapt to new families and environments. One young person describes her desire to run away and the power or “draw” of her birth mother, whom she has not met since being abandoned as a baby. The author identifies what she has come to understand as the “call of the wild” for adoptees when they enter adolescence, influenced by new drives and desires, and how some may start to feel more connected to the adults who conceived them. Most adopted children and young people will talk about feeling conflicted or “divided” during their adolescence, but she unpicks some of the additional challenges for those who are adopted, as they search for meaning and identity.
