Transcript
Speaker: We all have a story, and at times we feel we're walking it out alone. Let's pause and think. Join us for honest conversations about adoption and parenting as we lament, encourage, give hope, and explore our true identity and worth in Christ.
Speaker: Hi, my name is Jackie Darby and welcome to our podcast once again called Pause and Think. I am sitting here in Guatemala City and today i have an amazing guest with us all the way from Southern California. I want you to meet Marianne McMillan. Welcome Marianne.
Speaker: Hi, thank you. I'm so excited to be here today. I'm super excited to have you today. um i met Mary Ann in Lancaster, Pennsylvania at a FILED gathering. FILED is an amazing gathering of women moms, caretakers, adult adoptees, adult foster kids who, who have now grown up. And it's just an amazing gathering that Jamie Finn leads. And that is where I met you, Marianne last year. And I heard your incredible story. You were on the main stage last year.
Speaker: You shared your story. So i just want you to give a little, um, Introduction about yourself because there's so much. There is a lot.
Speaker: Well, I am Maryann McMillan. I go by Maryann. Some of my students call me Dr. McMillan because I'm a professor as well and a researcher a humanitarian. Lots of titles. um I was born in Pennsylvania and I was placed in foster care at five months old and then was adopted around six years old.
Speaker: I'm the youngest of five sisters and eight brothers, and that's with both biological and adopted family combined. I had an open adoption, so I know um my birth family. Didn't really, wasn't really close with them growing up, but I would check in with them once or twice a year. i was adopted by the same race parent, so I'm Black, so she is Black. um And yes, so I grew up in Georgia. I was born in Philadelphia, grew up in Georgia. and Yeah, so life has just taken me on this roller coaster journey in life of processing my adoption, um learning how to heal in healthy ways. And now I'm at a stage in life where I just want to help others get to that place in life where they can start processing their own journey and healing as well.
Speaker: Yeah, I so appreciate your story because... That's why we're here sitting here today, Marianne, because you and I both know it's a long process. um Healing takes time. And back, back, way back when we were little children, there's a lot of things we couldn't express and we didn't even understand that we needed healing in. But I would love for you to take us back.
Speaker: way back in your story whenever you want to begin it. and go ahead and tell our listeners more about your story and why why you're here sharing today. So if you could take us back, that would be Yes. So as I shared, you know, i was placed in foster care at five months old. My birth parents weren't in the a great healthy place to be able to care for me and my siblings.
Speaker: And so i after getting my adoption records a few years ago, I found out that I was in probably four or five different foster homes before I left landed in my last family.
Speaker: foster home. Foster care was very tough. There were some homes that were great. There were some that were overcrowded. There's one home where I remember having to eat on the floor where the dog would come and eat out of my cereal bowl because there was no room at the table for me to sit.
Speaker: um I went through a lot of just abuse and mistreatment growing up in life. several different forms. And so i truly believe that if you're going to walk into the pain of a child who has come from a traumatic background, that you yourself need to work through your own trauma and pain. Otherwise, it's just going to be a really rough combination with both of you together trying to heal and parents trying to parent a child from a hard background. And so, um but the only way that I knew to get out of that situation was to go to college. Had no desire to go to college. I just wanted to just move and live on campus.
Speaker: And my first week on campus, I was invited to a Christian organization where I started growing in my faith my first semester in college and accepted Christ.
Speaker: um And had campus pastors and leaders invest and pour into me. And I took that path of really growing in my faith and really living for the Lord for the last 20 years of my life of being in ministry and um and really growing in my faith.
Speaker: And so... So i have spent probably the last 12 years of my life in therapy. I got to a place probably about 10 years ago where I just literally hit a wall and I've really felt the Lord say, you have to process what you're working, process what you went through. i deal with a lot of anxiety and low levels of depression sometime. And so landed in therapy and I've just been on this healing journey of
Speaker: realizing that, yes, I am further along in life than what I thought I was going to be, but I still have a long way to go.
Speaker: That's so good. You said so many things that as you were sharing, i you know, have so many questions I could ask you. But, you know, I love that you brought up that, you know, about, you know, 12 years 10, 12 years ago, you, started therapy and it shows that you were an adult and you didn't start going to therapy when you were a child, but as an adult that you began to really, um, process and you were confronted with all of this anxiety and depression. And, um, it took a, it took a lot of honesty and vulnerability for you yourself to, um
Speaker: you know admit and want help in this area. And so, you know what what my question, I have a few questions here.
Speaker: What do you wish that people understood about foster care and adoption that maybe maybe they don't really understand? What is something that you could share?
Speaker: Yes, I think one of the biggest things that I've shared a lot is that a lot of adoptees and former foster youth will always live in this place of grief and gratitude.
Speaker: um And so a lot of us are are excited, are excited we were adopted um and had a great life, have great family, great parents, great lives. But then there are a lot of us who did not.
Speaker: And we have struggled, struggled a lot with who we are, belonging, identity. um And it's it's very hard. It is very hard. And even those that are grateful that they have been adopted also live in this space of, I'm still grieving who I am, like who I was supposed to be. Grieving that I don't know my family. I don't know my culture, my background. And for people to know that
Speaker: we're going live in the space forever. We don't have to be grateful. We don't have to be angry or frustrated the whole time. I mean, our whole lives. And it's okay to just be in the middle.
Speaker: And I think that's where i am. I love the life that the Lord has given me. um I've had a lot of great opportunities, but then there are a lot of times where I just think back at looking at my other siblings that weren't adopted, that aged out of the foster care system. And I'm like, why me?
Speaker: Why was I given this opportunity? And it's been hard.
Speaker: It's so true. um The conference before last year was and the the and sign and how you said grief and gratitude. We can be, we can have both.
Speaker: We can be grieving, but yet we can be grateful all at the same time because because of our stories, there was a separation from our biological families. And so when you and I think back and we have all these questions and we're wondering about our identity and like you said, belonging,
Speaker: there's grief, there's there's doubt, there's why, you know, why was I given up? Why didn't I stay with my original family? Some kids have more information than others. um We didn't. And so it leaves a lot of doubt. There's this big old space that we wonder. And so that's where the grief comes in. But yet we can also be very grateful that God provided an adopted family for us and we can be grateful for where we're at today.
Speaker: But again, there is grief and gratefulness, just like beauty and brokenness all in the same sentence. And so, uh, that is so true how you brought that out. And, um, I think our listeners, you know, sometimes It's one or the other, or we feel like it should be one or the other. And if we feel the other, we feel guilty. Yes. And so I really hope our listeners understand from us that there can be both and there's nothing wrong with that.
Speaker: There's nothing wrong with that. um Okay, so... I have another question, which is really kind of related to what we just talked about, about can we be a person that's grateful for ah our adoption and yet still be grieving? Maybe you can explain a little more about that, maybe using your own personal life, like um give an example maybe of how you were grieving maybe the loss or even maybe if you could
Speaker: give an example of like what age kind of this hit you at. um But yet being grateful all at the same time. Yeah. Oh. um Thinking through just kind of early loss. We're not just losing our families, our parents. We're losing our culture, we're losing our history. Some of us are losing the country that we were born in, that environment. um We are losing not being able to have access to that medical history.
Speaker: um And later on in life, we have some some some condition we're like, well, we don't, I don't know. i cannot tell you what's happening or any of my family history because I don't know it. And so that's ah that's a piece of grief that people don't think through. They just think of, oh, you just lost your parents. Yes, that is a a big part of grief that we ah we go through, but we're also grieving the small things. There are a lot of transracial adoptees who were adopted into you know predominantly white families, and they may be Asian or a different race, and they don't have the opportunity to celebrate the holidays. or yeah the the holidays or you know just traditions and they just their parents just didn't know or didn't feel comfortable incorporating those things or didn't feel like they should incorporate those things into their lives because they were adopted into their family and their past is in the past and so that's also another form of grief and
Speaker: I talked to a lot of other adoptees and they're now in their 20, 30s and 40s or older trying to figure out who God created them to be and being okay with having two identities of this is who God created me to be. I'm learning more about myself, but also it's okay for me to identify with my adopted family as well.
Speaker: um And so still living in this place of grief and gratitude, um it's hard. And as I shared before, um i am am, there's parts of me that are very grateful for having to, having had been adopted. You know, college, going to college, living overseas for a while, the work that I've done, i don't think that I would have been given those opportunities. Right.
Speaker: So Marianne, that's so true about, well, first of all, you mentioned our, you know, health histories, at you know, as children, whenever we went to the doctor and then we heard our moms say that, our adoptive moms, but even as as grown women now, every time I go to a doctor and I have to fill out the whole health history yes and, you know, the...
Speaker: But the doctor literally goes through it with me when they're talking, doing you know that pre-exam or just going over my health history. And they ask me and I always say, I always immediately say I'm adopted. I don't know anything. So that's a constant reminder that I don't know anything. I have no idea who has high blood pressure in my family or if there was cancer. And those are things that I wish I knew yes because it makes me feel like I belong to a family. So when I'm like, I don't know, I don't know. There's just so there's just a reminder of all those questions constantly, no matter when we go to a doctor whatever.
Speaker: whatever we have to fill out, you know, what are you, what, what culture, what ethnicity, you know? um So yes, I'm, I'm Korean, but I was raised in the United States. I look Korean, but I'm really not, I don't carry any of the, any of those cultural things. And,
Speaker: at all because I was raised in the United States, but now over 30 years I've lived in in Guatemala. So there's always kind of like a confusion in my mind, but what culture, what culture do you represent?
Speaker: And, you know, can you share, can you share about that? So yes, I'm Black. um And my birth family is also Black. um I grew up in a Black family. um ah But I grew up in predominantly white spaces.
Speaker: um So yes, embracing Black culture, family, everything. But all of my friends, the schools I went to from K through grad school have been like the only Black person in my classes. Some of the jobs I've had have been in predominantly white spaces. And so there was a season where i really... um lean more towards white culture, the way that I dress, the way that I carried myself, the music that I listened to. And even though I grew up in a black family, and I got teased so much by my family members, because I wasn't black enough.
Speaker: I wasn't black enough for my family. And then my friends are like, you're black, but you're too white. And I'm like, who am I? Where do I fit in here? I'm not perfect. And so I don't fit into any space, um which, you know, in the past, that has been really hard for me trying to figure out who I am. But i actually love that because I feel like I can fit into any spaces.
Speaker: which is why it's been easy for me to live overseas, to live in different places, because I can blend in. I can um connect with different cultures really easily and and can just contextualize very quickly. So it's not a bad thing for me, but I know there's a lot of there's a lot of adoptees and former foster youth that are still walking through or feel like they have to just be one thing.
Speaker: That's right. And i feel like I can relate a lot to you. I can identify with what you're saying. Because back, you know, back when we were teenagers, and like you said, i was made fun of even by your family. Yes, yes.
Speaker: That's, that's not comfortable being made fun of. I hate i hate being made fun of. i despise when other people make fun of others now, because it just it makes me cringe. um remembering when I was made fun of. But now that's the beauty of God, you know, and his healing, because the things that once really bothered us. um Now we see is almost blessings, like, wow, we can be such chameleons, we can go and change colors and, and fit in and appreciate other cultures and skin colors and just ways of life because of
Speaker: because of our stories, because I'm not understanding our, where we truly came from, maybe culturally our race. But now how God's made us to be more flexible in those areas and and more accepting to other people and definitely understanding the heart of foster kids in a and adopted children to the point that, Hey, we can share our story and give hope to others. But
Speaker: What, speaking of others who, like you mentioned, who who might not be where we are in that process, what um what would you say if there was somebody listening right now, um maybe somebody who's aged out of foster care or who is an adult adoptee who's still really struggling? Because I'm sure you have too, but I have um come across people who have reached out to me who are really still struggling. What would you say to them?
Speaker: Starters, the first thing I would say... Sorry, this is a little sensitive. That's okay. Make sure that you find community.
Speaker: um May not be family, maybe chosen family, but you cannot go through life being isolated. You can't go through life being alone. Otherwise, you're going to be very depressed. and you just, you can't like find safe people to be able to help you. If that's help like resources from housing to food, to helping you find a job to inviting you to their homes for the holidays, find people that will love and care for you and see you for who you are and not see you for just your past. um Know that you are loved, you are cared for, you should have been cared for and know that you are here in this place and on this earth for a reason.
Speaker: So find find your chosen family. Yeah, God didn't create us to be alone. Correct. And so that's so important. Community is so important. And so i want to um ask you another question that I know ties in because we're sitting here today because of our faith.
Speaker: And I'd like for you to share how your faith has played into your healing process. Yes. So I accepted Christ in college, as I shared earlier, when I was invited to a Christian organization my first week in college, um because I thought college students were supposed to just party and drink and have a great time. And I was going to do that, never done that before. And the Lord was like, no, I have a different plan for you. And so, yeah, college literally changed my life. Accepted Christ. I'm in this Christian organization.
Speaker: um After graduating college, moved overseas as a full-time missionary. And I've always had this kind of servant heart of others, but also wanted to have a relationship with the Lord as well. And so for me, the Lord is everything for me, my father, my protector, my provider, and every season in life where I feel like I can't make it or I can't keep going a He always reminds me that he is there with me. He knows exactly what's coming next for me. And um I would not be where I am in life without having a relationship with the Lord. So. therapy and Jesus are enough for me. It is not one or the other. It has been both for me. Because as I have been a part of churches, been in Christian communities, I've had so many just great people in those seasons that have invested and poured into me. But also therapy also has been really great for me to to heal as well. And also being in some adoptee support groups. Those have been Some adoptee support groups have been really helpful for me on this journey. So it is Jesus and therapy.
Speaker: I love how you bring out the mixture because it's not just the Lord. The Lord is everything. Like you said, he is everything. He's our heavenly father. He's our protector. He's our provider. He's been...
Speaker: everything and more than maybe a human being hasn't been. yeah But yet God it also has provided community for us. and because of the community gathering that we attended is how I was so privileged to hear your amazing story and hear all the brokenness, but yet now the beauty too. And so it is so important community, community,
Speaker: um your Our faith in God, our relationship, our personal relationship with him who's been there for us and, you know, how God has even been in therapy.
Speaker: He's used that person who's been able to speak into our lives and help us with those therapies and processing um things that, know,
Speaker: that maybe we don't hear on a Sunday morning. Yes. you know Or maybe we don't get through our friendships. or you know So all of it combined. is really, really important. And I absolutely love how you brought that out. But Marianne, i our time's coming to an end, and I would like for you to share. Well, I'm going to share first because I have it. Marianne, for those of you who don't know, is an author. She just came out with her first book, and I don't know if you can see it because of the... um
Speaker: because of the ah maybe glare, but it's called Bridging Resilience. And so i want Marianne to tell you, tell the listeners about your book. Yes. Her first book.
Speaker: Yes, thank you. So this is my book. You can see it a little bit better. So that i it just came out almost a month ago. And this title is titled Bridging Resilience, a Guide to Healing for Adoptees, Former Foster Youth, Parents, and leaders who are coming along alongside helping those in this community. And the book is divided into three sections because I didn't just want to talk to just one audience. I wanted to talk to everybody because it was really hard for me to write. And I said, if I'm going to do this, I'm going to it once and I'm going to talk to everybody. And so I just literally walk through just my healing journey, my process, but also there's added in research um and and just um other resources that will be really helpful for all of you. So you can find it on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, bridgingresilience.com, and in any of your local bookstores.
Speaker: Yeah, and I got mine on the Kindle app. Yes. So it is digital as well. Yeah, so it's digital and audio too. So congratulations, Mary Ann. I hope everybody who is listening runs out and gets this book because like you said, it's not only only for us as adoptees or for adult foster kids who have maybe aged out or were part of the system. but it's for caretakers, parents, everybody. The audience is very broad and I highly recommend your book. And I am just so thankful and grateful that you were vulnerable and wanted to be a part. And i hope um I hope people are very blessed in hearing your story. So thank you, Marianne. And so i just want to continue to encourage you to be part of our Pause and Think podcast. Aisha couldn't be here today. We're kind of dividing and conquering today, but you can look us up on whosami.org. And if you if this video helps you, this podcast helps you, please help us out by giving a like. See you again.
Speaker: Thanks for joining us for this episode Pause and Think. For more resources and information, go to whosami.org.
