For thirty years, I believed I was adopted. My father told me that my biological parents couldn’t take care of me, so he and my mother stepped in to give me a better life. But it was all a lie.
As a child, I struggled to understand why my father would constantly remind me that I wasn’t his biological child. He would make comments about my “real parents” and take me to visit a local orphanage on my birthdays, telling me how lucky I was to have been adopted. The message was clear: I wasn’t good enough, and I didn’t belong.
But it wasn’t until I met my partner, Matt, that I began to question my father’s story. Matt saw through the walls I had built around myself and encouraged me to explore my past. Together, we decided to visit the orphanage and see if we could uncover the truth.
What we found was shocking. The orphanage had no record of me ever being there. The woman we spoke to was kind and apologetic, but firm in her denial. I felt like my whole life had been turned upside down.
Matt and I went back to my father’s house, determined to get answers. What we found was a web of deceit and lies that had been spun over thirty years. My father admitted that I wasn’t adopted, but rather the product of my mother’s affair. He had made up the adoption story to cope with his own pain and anger.
I was devastated. My whole life, I had been living a lie. I felt like I didn’t know who I was or where I came from. But as I looked at Matt, I knew that I wasn’t alone. I had someone who loved and accepted me for who I was, no matter what my past held.
As we left my father’s house, I knew that I had a long journey ahead of me. I would have to come to terms with my past and figure out who I was outside of the lies I had been told. But I was ready. I was ready to take control of my life and my story. I was ready to start anew.
