241 Kirsta Bowman
/Transcript
Full shownotes: https://www.adopteeson.com/listen/241
Haley: This podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing stated on it either by its hosts or any guests, is to be construed as psychological, medical, or legal advice.
You are listening to adoptees on the podcast where adoptees discuss the adoption experience. I'm Haley Radke. Today's guest is Kirsta Bowman, also known as Karpoozy too much of the internet. Kirsta is an adoptee advocate who has alerted millions of TikTok viewers about unethical adoption rehoming practices. She shares some of her personal search and reunion story with us today, and we chat about the complexities of reunion when your biological family lives on another continent. And of course we revisit the topic of grief when you're rejected from being reunited and when you find a grave.
Today's episode has mentions of sexual assault and suicide.
Before we get started, I wanted to personally invite you to join our Patreon adoptee community today over on adopteeson.com/community, which helps support you and also the show to support more adoptees around the world.
We wrap up with some recommended resources and as always, links to everything we'll be talking about today are on the website, Adopteeson.com. Well, let's listen in.
I'm so pleased to Welcome to Adoptees On on Kirsta Bowman. Welcome Kirsta!
Kirsta Bowman: Hi. Thank you for having me.
Haley: I'd love it if you would share some of your story with us.
Kirsta Bowman: Awesome. So I was, am a private domestic adoptee. I was adopted and born out of the state of Louisiana. I was born in New Orleans. At six days old, I was taken to upstate New York where I was raised for my entire life. I recently, well, I moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin a few years ago with my husband, so I'm a Midwesterner now.
What makes my adoption a little unique compared to most domestic adoptees is I do have international birth family. I had no idea who my father was until I took a DNA test four years ago and my results came back that I was half Greek.
And I found out very quickly that my birth father is from Greece, and he was a sailor in his day. So he was in America several times during the eighties and nineties working, and he got my mom pregnant while he was in New Orleans. And by the time that she realized that she was pregnant with me, he was already back in Greece.
So there are things that I relate to more with being an international adoptee, even though I am not one, because I was born in America. So I like to joke that I am a domestic product made with imported goods.
Haley: Oh, no.
Kirsta Bowman: So I'm in Reunion with those sides of my birth family. However, my father has rejected me. I went to Athens, Greece last year to meet my family on that side with the hopes of maybe he would change his mind when I got there, and he absolutely did not want anything to do with me. That is his choice. That's a reflection on him, not on me. But for the most part, I've had a very awesome reunion experience.
My mom's side, I never got to meet my mom. She passed away in 2016. I found my family in 2019, but I have two sisters. One was kept, one was also placed for adoption. I have my brother. I have my Aunt Linda, who is the half sister to my birth mom. They never knew each other. I found her on Ancestry three years ago, and it's been a really great positive adoption experience, and I'm honestly really blessed and very, very grateful that 99% of the people that I have found, my birth family want to have a relationship with.
I grew up knowing that I was adopted. My parents never hid that from me. That was something that they did very, very well. I don't have like that concrete memory of them sitting me down saying, you're adopted. It was always part of my language, like they would talk to me saying like, you know, your birth mom, adoptive parents.
I'm not sure how I'd feel about it now. Being, you know, out of the fog and coming to terms with my struggle surrounding being adopted. But they did have a picture book made for me that explained my adoption story. And I remember growing up just really like having that tactile of the book that I could go to that explained my own adoption story.
It used my name, my birth mother's name. I'm not sure how I'd feel about it now. But I really liked having that growing up. My mom never left me a letter. I had very few pictures of her, so I just liked that I had something that I could, like hold onto of her. You know, I did not have a great relationship with my adoptive mother, and I will never call her a mom.
She is my adoptive mother. She abused me in more than one way, and she passed away in 2017, and I hate to say it but, it's been nice not having to hear from them again.
Haley: And you have a good relationship with your adoptive father?
Kirsta Bowman: Yes, yes. My dad's amazing. I love my dad so much. I talk to him every day. It's usually, I usually get a selfie of him and his chihuahua. He loves that dog so much. Yeah.
My dad doesn't know about a lot of the stuff that happened to me as a child. Because a lot of like the bigger stuff would happen when he wasn't home. He worked full-time. And my adoptive mom, like she had way too many medical issues to work and there'd be a lot of times where she'd be like, don't tell your father.
If you tell your father, we'll get divorced and then you're stuck with me. So she knew what she was doing wasn't appropriate by the time I was 10 years old and in the fifth grade, my adoptive mother had a kidney transplant, a pancreas transplant, and a leg amputation. She was a type one diabetic and even when they were in the process of adopting, social workers noted in the home study, Sherry is very needy with her medical issues and relies on the foster care children to take care of her.
My adopted parents did foster care several times before seeking private adoption. Because they went into foster care, only wanting to adopt. And after the fourth child was reunified with her family, my adoptive mother was like, this is too much. We're gonna privately adopt cuz I don't want that to happen.
And I was, my parents' second adoption attempt, privately, they had an adoption fall through just weeks before my birth mom had reached out to them. But my adoptive mother had a lot of health issues.
Let's read some of my notes that I have. This is a home study of my adoptive parents to my, about my adoptive parents. This is a home study from my adoptive parents. This was for foster care, but this was approved during the same year that they were privately adopting. So the adoption agency used this home study because it was the current home study. So let's just read a little shall we?
"Sherry was born and grew up in this town. Her mother and father are also from the same town. Sherry is an only child and claims that she was very spoiled and still is by her parents who give her anything she wants. She was diagnosed as a diabetic but refused to take care of herself.
She drank alcohol and did cocaine a lot at the time, and was charged with a DUI six years ago. Sherry stopped drinking and has not used alcohol or substances since then. She went legally blind from the diabetes and was only able to see shadows. She had an operation on her eyes and subsequent laser treatments, which were successful, and she got her sight back.
Sherry's mother does not feel that her daughter will be able to manage as a foster care parent and has discouraged Sherry from doing so. Sherry spent several months in nursing school studying to be an LPN. She never finished due to her diabetes and does not know if she'll go back to this or not. She has been advised to not have children of her own due to her diabetic condition."
A few sentences later.
"There are no apparent health reasons that would prevent this couple from becoming foster care parents. Sherry has diabetes and suffered many complications from this. She was unable to work outside the home, but a doctor feels that having a foster care child would be good for Sherry."
Yeah.
Haley: Like a pet.
Kirsta Bowman: Like a pet!
Haley: To comfort and care for her? Oh, no.
Kirsta Bowman: I joked that I was an emotional support animal, but I was also a nurse. I actually just made a TikTok right before we hopped on, because one thing I haven't really shared much on, like my TikTok page, are the medical issues that my adoptive mother had because I don't want it to come off as a place of, you know, a point of ableism because that's not my point.
When I, you know, share the medical trauma adjacent that I saw growing up because, you know, there, there are people who have disabilities, there are people who go through, you know, medical treatments like an organ transplant, who love their children, are great parents of their children. So I never wanna come off as it being ableist. But, there were multiple times where I would stay at my second grade teacher's house from weeks to months at a time while my adoptive mother was having one of her transplants or the leg amputation.
We, I was raised in upstate New York, but for the kidney and pancreas transplant, her and my dad flew out to Minneapolis, Minnesota to a hospital called Fairview. So since both of them were gone, I would say at my second grade teacher's house. There were a few other times where I would stay at my best friend Marissa's house with her family.
They would try to have me stay there if it was during the summer, but not during the school year because, you know, they had, you know, they have their own children. Marissa and her brother were also adopted. They were adopted from Korea. So I did have, like, my best friend growing up was also adopted, so I, I really, really loved that I had that. It made me feel less alone. I know many adopts grow up not knowing another adopted person and my best friend was also adopted, so even though we had differences with her being an international transracial adoptee, it was nice having like another friend who kind of got it, but multiple times I either stayed at their house or my second grade teachers house.
And when I stayed at my second grade teacher's house, you know, I drove into school with her. Everyone knew my business. I would get questions like, oh, why can't your mom take care of you? Does your mom not want you? She adopted you and now she can't take care of you. You know, kids noticed that kind of stuff and I used to think that it didn't really have its impact on me, but it did.
Like, I kind of feel like it was, you know, respite care to an extent. There were multiple times where I just was told Your mom can't take care of you, so we're gonna put you somewhere else. Okay. Well, I was always told my birth mother, Reba, like was too messed up to take care of.
Haley: I've seen you share publicly about mental health struggles and and unraveling the impact adoption has had on your life. When did you really start to realize the adoptee issues, or did you kind of always know and then like what led you to create your TikTok account?
Kirsta Bowman: I always knew that I had issues with being adopted. Partially because my adoptive mother was just so horrible to me. Like, you know, if, if I had what I now know as a PTSD attack, like I didn't misbehave as a child. I work with children, you know, I'm a teacher now and even if I was a misbehaving child, that doesn't excuse like what was done and said to me.
But I would, I would just get frustrated at something and cry. You know, I would be emotionally disregulated, as what happens with children, and adults. I mean, who doesn't cry when they're like overwhelmed with something? At least, at least I do.
And if I ever had any sort of emotional distress, I would be called a f--k up with my birth mom. No wonder your mom didn't want you. I'm gonna send you back. I don't want to...
My my adoptive mother just could not handle a child being a child. So I always knew that I had issues with being adopted. I knew that I had siblings that my mom had kept, and I always wondered what was so wrong with me that I wasn't good enough to keep as a baby? Like newborn baby, womb wet. And even then I was not good enough. What was so wrong with me? And that always bothered me. Even as a small child.
I knew that my adoptive mother was not a nice person to me, but I didn't feel like it was safe to really talk about it until she had passed away. Her death was not expected. She had to go to the hospital because she had some sort of infection, and because of her transplants, anytime that she was slightly sick, like she had to go to the hospital to monitor her symptoms.
And they, they gave her like some kind of medication and interacted poorly and she ended up passing away of heart failure. And when my dad called me to tell me, I was at school, was watching second grade eat their breakfasts. I had breakfast duty. I just happened to keep my phone on vibrate that day instead of silent like I usually do.
And my dad called me and said, your mother passed away. He was crying. I didn't expect that to come out of his mouth, but when he hung up, the first thing I thought was, thank f--king God. I never have to hear her voice again. And I, I hate to say that about someone who's, you know, passed away, but she abused me. She mistreated me.
So it was hard emotionally because I was living in Wisconsin and me and my husband had to go back for the services. I didn't feel bad for my adoptive mother, Sherry, but I felt a lot of grieving for my father and my grandma and I did have guilt, like just, okay, I'm here for a week and a half now I'm going back to new to Wisconsin.
It was pretty hardy emotionally in a lot of ways, and this is before I'd been diagnosed with PTSD, and it started bringing up a lot of memories and feelings that I had suppressed for years and years and years. And I struggled greatly with my mental health a lot that year.
I, one day was with my husband's little sister who's also adopted. She's 15 years younger than me, but she shared that her birth mom had found her and she wasn't sure what to do about it. And I just remember thinking, you know, she is, she's a teenager and she's doing what I've wanted to do for so long. So I finally said, I wanna find my family. And this is about a year, a year after my adoptive mother had passed away and my husband had ordered me a DNA a kit for Christmas December of 2018.
And you know, I, I don't know if you've done a DNA kit yet, but when , I was getting very, very antsy for my results to come in. You know, the tube came, I, I sent it the same day. I know some adoptees will like hold onto the kit for a while because once you do it, it's a pandora's box.
But one day, January 18th, 2019, I was like, I bet I can find 'em on Facebook. I bet I can find someone at least who knew my mom on Facebook. So it was a, it was a Friday evening. My husband had not gotten home yet from his teaching position, so I was like, doo-do-doo-doo, let's, let's do what we can do.
And I wrote, I wrote a note on a piece of paper that said, hi, my name is Kirsta Bowman. I was born and adopted out of New Orleans, Louisiana. My birthday's December 4th, Reba McBride was my birth mother, and I'm looking for any biological family. I posted it to a bunch of New Orleans Facebook groups hoping that someone would see it, at least knowing who my mom was. New Orleans isn't a big city, it's less than half a million people, and you know, she lived there for most of her life between that and Mobile, Alabama.
So I'm like someone at least might recognize my mother's name. It got close to a thousand shares. Within two hours, someone messaged me and said, Hey, I knew your mom. So that right there is like, ah, that's the first time anyone has talked to me that knew my mother, who was not my adoptive parents. So that right there felt like my second life started.
And this is just someone who said they knew my mother. It's not a sibling, it's not a family member. They just knew my mom and they weren't like my, my adopted family and I talked to 'em for a little bit and they said, your mom got remarried. Look up Reba Torrance and see what pops up. So I typed that in and lo and behold a few new names popped in onto white pages into Google. So I copy and pasted the first one, a very Greek name. I copy and pasted that name into Facebook, and a woman in her early, early forties, late thirties popped up with straight hair, similar face shape as me. And because of the age difference, I didn't think it, at first it was a sibling or anything, maybe someone who knew my mom.
So I messaged them something I messaged way too many times at this point: hi, my name is Kirsta. I was adopted at birth in America I'm looking for first, family. Reba McBride was my mom. And she responded back within maybe an hour saying, oh my God, Kirsta, you're my sister. And the next thing out of her mouth, well, typing was you were born on December 3rd, right?
I've been looking for you. She had my name spelled wrong and she had my birthday wrong because my mom went to labor on the third. But I was born a little after midnight on the fourth. So within three to four hours of searching on Facebook, I found my sister and it's been amazing ever since then. So long story short, I finally felt comfortable talking about my adoption story on my Instagram account.
Karpoozy is just my Instagram, like that's my personal account. I didn't make a separate adoption account, so I just shared that I was in Reunion and found my siblings and I went down to New Orleans, you know, two months later to meet them with my husband. My husband's been so supportive through all of this.
Shout out to my husband. And when the DNA results came back, it showed that I was half Greek, and my siblings are also on ancestry, so it's really easy to see, you know, who we share and who we don't share. And I was able to figure out pretty quickly like, okay, my dad's, my dad's not American. What's going on?
I have no strong measures on my Greek side. People in Greece don't do DNA tests. They know they're Greek.
Haley: Haha, that's good.
Kirsta Bowman: But, but, but it's true. Like, you know, they don't do DNA tests. They know they're Greek.
Haley: Well, there's a lot of in international adoptees whose searches are very difficult because the commercial DNA kits that we're doing over here in North America are not really popular there.
Kirsta Bowman: Yeah, like I, I know so many like South Korean adoptees who just don't have any information when they do a DNA test because people in Korea know they're Korean. It's very, very similar. The only benefit is the Greek community is very, very small and incredibly nosy. So I started making posts about, you know, attempting to identify who my birth father was.
And at first I was kind of like, I don't really like talking about myself. Like, you know, I, I think that's kind of like an adoptee thing. We're kind of told to like, be quiet and be grateful. I kind of like felt bad talking about myself so much on my own Instagram page, but here we are late here we are, you know, three years later.
But I was just sharing stuff about, you know, trying to identify my birth father and people are just being like, so supportive. And I started, you know, reaching out to other adoptees like online for the first time and realized like, oh, other adoptees feel this way too. It's just not me. Okay, cool. And instagram came out with like the reels feature.
So I started like doing like little, you know, quick 15 second videos and they were getting a lot of engagement and someone's like, you need to get on TikTok. I was like, no, TikTok isn't for millennials, it's for the young people. And then, I don't know, like a year and a half later I was like f--- it, and I started making TikTok and it kind of just like exploded.
What I really like about TikTok is it's really easy to show receipts. One of my favorite comments I ever got on TikTok was, I know when I see you with a green screen, I need to sit down. But it's like, it's, it's true though. Like how, how much more seriously are we taken when we have like receipts like, Hey, this is how people talk about their kids.
I talk a lot about like the adoption rehoming because I was threatened with it all of the time and you know, Micah and James StauStaufferer rehomed their child a few years prior to all of this. I knew that was a reality, but I didn't realize like people didn't know this kind of stuff was going on. So, you know, I, before I even hopped on this podcast, I was going on live sharing screenshots with adopted children getting rehomed.
I have a petition that I keep sharing. I'm trying to get gain signatures on that so I can like present it to, you know, some media outlets we're at like almost 1300 signatures now. I always knew that adoption was a messed up industry and that people made money off my adoption. And it, it's frustrating that people don't believe us until we have like such concrete proof.
Adoption is a traumatic event and a trauma for many of us, and a lot of us do have, you know, heavy ramifications from that adoption trauma. Not all adoptees, you know, not every single adopted person has PTSD. I do, but it's really frustrating that we're not taken seriously until we have like proof, after proof, after proof after proof.
Like, you should just believe that we're struggling because we say that we're struggling. How often are we told, not all adoptees feel that way? Okay, well, the fact that some of us feel that way should be concerning enough for you because even if only 1% of adopted people struggle with being adopted, that's 1% too many because we're told adoption is what's best for us.
Adoption is love. Adoption is forever. Well, for a lot of us, it's not forever. It's not unconditional love. There's, there's con, there's conditions attached to that love to that adoption. It hasn't happened with me, but how many adoptees get like disowned from their adoptive families when they're in contact with their birth families or or attempt to reach out?
I didn't feel safe looking for my biological family until after my adopted mother passed away because. It would've been a s--- storm.
Haley: As you say that, what I think about is something I complain about all the time, is I see, and like I'm thankful for the bestselling books that are about exposing adoption, horrible practices from history that are still continuing to this day, but they're not necessarily written by adoptees. And so I'm like, oh, so you believe that journalist? But if it's an adoptee journalist, then we don't believe them? Okay. So I appreciate you saying that. And the fact about TikTok showing, like receipts, like you have the green screen so you can show videos and things in the background. I'm, I have I think almost a decade on you as well. So TikTok wasn't for me either.
Kirsta Bowman: How old are you?
Haley: I'm 40 this year.
Kirsta Bowman: Oh, you got great skin. Awesome.
Haley: Oh, thank you.
Kirsta Bowman: You go. I would've guessed like a year or two older than me.
Haley: Oh, hmm. '83 baby. But, so that is one of the things, like I only interview adoptees here, right? So I'm really loving that you're an adoptee who is listened to and believed. Can we talk about this? So you talk a lot about rehoming on your channel. You talk about other things too, like influencers using their adopted children for monetary gain on their channels or even foster children and all kinds of really unethical practices.
And what are some of the responses from people, because I know adoptees watch your content, but that cannot be the majority of your audience like mine is majority adoptees. So what are some of the responses you get to sharing some of these things?
Kirsta Bowman: I get a lot of, is this legal when I share rehoming posts and yes and no. One of the issues with adoption in America is there's no federal guidelines in place. Well, sorry, there's a few, but they're not looking out for the best interests of the adopted child. They're looking out for the interests of the adoption agencies, adoption attorneys and adoptive parents.
What is legal in one state can be considered a felony in another state. So there's two different ways that like adopted children get re-homed, un adopted, sent somewhere else. One of them is through a legal adoption, dissolution or disruption, where the child cannot be unadopted, they're not sent back to their biological family or their previous family. They have to be adopted again.
So you can't annull in adoption. You have to be adopted again. So there's adoption agencies that specialize in these types of adoptions. Second chance adoptions being the most well known. They're part of a larger adoption agency called Wasatch International Adoptions. They're based out of Ogden, Utah. Utah has someone the most lackluster adoption laws, protecting first parents, birth parents, and adoptees.
They work incredibly well in the favor of adoptive parents and adoption agencies. They also have another adoption agency program under Wasatch called Kid Teen Adoptions, which used to be called RAD Teen Adoptions. RAD as in Reactive Attachment Disorder Teen adoption. I have screenshots of when that was still their name.
I don't care what a child's diagnosis is, you should not be calling your entire adoption agency based off that. We do not have diabetic teen adoptions. We do not have PTSD adoptions. It should not be the center of how you're describing this child. They changed it though because, you know, I, I have socks in groups. I have socks in groups. Like sock accounts.
Haley: Oh, yes.
Kirsta Bowman: And I've seen adoptive parents be like excuse me, why are, like, what's going on? So it took the adoptive parents to say something to them to change their name. Anyway, so this, this large adopted agency is one of many that's based out of Ogden Utah, and they post on their public pages, this child is being re-listed with a new picture during a slow time of the year. This child is a skinny but muscular kindergarten student. Can someone adopt this little cutie asap?
They posted these to their public business pages that have over a hundred thousand followers. A lot of them post picture, all of them post pictures, and I can't help but noticing that a lot of the girls are in dresses and innocent looking poses, which is beyond creepy to me for multiple reasons as an adoptee and as a teacher.
Now only do they post these on their Facebook page, individuals who work for the adoption agency will then re-share the child's post to private Facebook groups: texas Foster and Adoptive parents, US Kids for Adoption, Foster and Adoptive Parent Support Group, Second Chance Foster Adoption Support Team: Children Not Animals.
That is the name of an actual group on Facebook that has almost six, 6,000 people in it. So all of those are unfortunately legal. And if you notice down at the end of each post, it'll say we cannot adopt to this state, this state, this state, this state. That's cause of that state's own adoption laws. So that's part of the problem.
What's legal or okay in one state is not okay in another state. The other type of re-homing which is literally re known as re-homing according to childwelfare.gov, are the unregulated custody transfers of adopted children. These are not the same as a child being eligible for a second, third, fourth legal adoption where their legal parents are changed.
These are people just trying to transfer guardianship custody of their adopted child to someone else who's not in the child's immediate family, and often they are facilitated over the internet, through Facebook, through Craigslist, Yahoo. I'm starting to see Instagram and TikTok posts.
These happen informally. There's no supervision from a court, a child welfare agency, an adoption agency, a social worker to ensure the safety of the child and the safety of the new placement. There are multiple stories of children being rehomed this way, who are put into trafficking situations, who are SA -ed (sexually assaulted) or tried to be SA -ed.
Reuters did an investigative article back in 2013 and followed the story of one individual that this happened to and on the very first night that she was with her new parents who weren't actually her legal parents, they tried SA her and she ran away. These have been happening for years.
Facebook knows that people have been using its platform for at least 10 years. We know it's been going on longer than that, but Facebook knows that people have been using this platform for at least 10 years to legally and illegally rehome their children. I do not care why a child might need a new home for whatever reason. It should not be facilitated on social media. Through Facebook's own guidelines, like their own terms of service or, or whatever we wanna call it, if you post a picture on Facebook, they own that picture. People are posting pictures of these children with huge stories about them, including identifying medical information, and they'll be like, oh, we'll be changing the name. I don't care. You're still posting pictures of them in these weird dresses.
I've seen some of them, they're posting pictures of kids in their swimsuits. There's no vetting process for anyone who follows these pages or belongs in these groups. The only vetting process is the admin to the mod, like deciding if they want you in the group or not. I, I really don't think that they're doing a background check on people who wanna be part of these groups?
I have a sock account in quite a few of these groups, like a fake account like you, they don't know who I am. Like, how do you know that there's people in there who aren't registered sex offenders or, you know, wanna do nefarious things with these children? It's disgusting and deplorable and, you know, I don't, I don't want children to, to remain in unsafe homes or situations where they're not being loved and cared for, but it shouldn't be happening over social media.
Haley: Absolutely not. So folks are new to this, are, are responding to you, is that even legal? And so that's kind of their first entry and foray into that. So I, I guess I have two questions. Speaking of posting ridiculous things on Facebook that should not be allowed, are there things that you've tried to share on TikTok that people report you for and they get taken down and part two, as you're doing your community building and things and people say, was this legal? Like, how do you get them from that point to being allies and advocates?
Kirsta Bowman: I say this as more as a teacher. I know how to pick my words very carefully. People, people think that like, oh, TikTok, you can do whatever on TikTok has like pretty strict community guidelines compared to other social media platforms.
Like if they think something is sus , they just take it down. You cannot use like any type of accusatory language. So you know, it's, say for example, say I get like a rude comment and when I respond to it, I'll say things like, oh, hi friend. I see you're new to my page. My name's Kirsta. I was adopted at birth. You have to be very careful with how you say certain things.
You have to block out certain words, but there are other times where I'm just like, this isn't worth my energy. Like enough people already know that you're being ridiculous, whatever. When people, I go, I go live as often as I can. When people are like, how is this legal? I, I always say, we need allies if we want this type of stuff to stop. Like, please, please just let someone else know today or tomorrow that this is happening.
Please feel free to take a screenshot. I don't care if my face is in it. Let someone else know that this is happening. I encourage people to contact their local and state representatives and just let them know that this kind of stuff is happening. I hate to say it, but with the concrete proof and the screenshots and just seeing how people talk about children like we're dogs, people take us more seriously.
I wish you would've taken it seriously decades ago before, you know, the internet and people had a digital footprint for everything. But, you know, it's, it's at least starting to change and I, I, I hate to talk so positively about myself and that's the trauma speaking, but way more people know about the adoption rehoming stuff because I've been on TikTok for the past two years, and I'll get someone saying like, oh, well, whats complaining on TikTok have to do... Like people, more people know now!
People know what to look out for. I've had adoptive parents message me on Instagram and email me saying like, you know, the Facebook group that I'm in, the, the adoptive parent group now has like it saying like any type of trafficking looking post will be removed. So they're aware.
Haley: Well, we appreciate your advocacy in that area. Absolutely. I think you've got over, some you're closing in on 9 million likes on your TikTok right now.
Kirsta Bowman: Am I ? I don't know?
Haley: I don't check stats. Who's, who's looking at that? No, you are having an impact. One of the main reasons I started the podcast was so other adoptees would know they weren't alone in feeling confused with identity issues and why am I dealing with this? And Reunion was supposed to be like this beautiful, perfect thing. And why are some of the things hard? And you mentioned you have experienced rejection from your biological father, and then I'm really sorry that you never got to meet your mother.
She passed before you were able to find her. Can you talk a little bit about exploring the grief in that? It's very different having the closed door of finding someone who's passed and then the grief of rejection.
Kirsta Bowman: I do wanna mention this, and I just think it's my own personality. I've never struggled really with a sense of identity, and I know that's a common thing for adoptees, and I genuinely think that it's just my own personality.
I, I know that I'm a little too headstrong and hotheaded at times, but I think part of it is because I always had issues being adopted with my adoptive mother. I think that I just, unfortunately, having that situation kind of like made me know who, like who I'm not. But it, you know, adoption creates all these wonderful situations for us as adoptees to grieve not only for people that we never get to meet, but situations that we never get to have.
How do you grieve for your mother that you never got to know? There, there's no right or wrong way, but it's something that, you know, it's pretty unique to adopted people or even someone who was an NPE (non-paternity event) or donor conceived. How do you grieve for the person who gave birth to you that you've never even talked to? You've never even heard their own voice.
One thing that I really wanted to do to honor my mother that I never got to meet, she never knew her own dad. She had no idea who he was, and I wanted to find that out for her. And also, I wanted to find more family. I, I'm selfish. I want, I want more family. And I within a few, with a few hours of looking one day on Ancestry, I connected to a person who was like, Hey, I think this, you know, this could be the same guy. And they got a DNA test for someone in their family. And it was my Aunt Linda. I found my, I identified my fa, my grandfather, my mother's father. He unfortunately passed away in 2005, right before Hurricane Katrina.
But it felt so great to be able to like give that piece of the story back to my mom. and I never got to know my mom, but I do have my Aunt Linda now and she's amazing. You know, my mom had a sister she never knew about. Linda had a sister she never knew about and they lived about half a mile, half an hour away from each other for a good chunk of their life, in Louisiana.
My aunt's 20 years younger than my mom, so me and her actually have that in common cuz my oldest sister's 21 years older than me. But it's, it's been wonderful getting to know my aunt. I don't know. I don't know if other adoptees feel this way, but like when you're in Reunion, it's happy and joyous. But then when the reunion, the trip's done, you go through a grieving process.
I don't live close enough to my family on either side to go visit them whenever I want. It's like a planned trip. And it's, it's been easier with the New Orleans trips cuz now I go down every year and I stay with my sister now. And a flight to New Orleans on Spirit is not that much money. I know some people don't wanna fly Spirit but you know what? For two and a half hour flight, I'll take it.
But going to Greece, I, last year I went through a huge like grieving period because I went and I met them. But then you come back and it's just a reminder of everything that you didn't have because you were adopted. And even if I had been kept by my birth mother, you know, she was American, but she married several Greek men.
My, my other sister who my mom kept is also half Greek, and that's why her name is Greek. And I still would've been raised with some Greek influences if I had not been adopted. My birth mother spoke fluent Greek. She made Greek coffee. New Orleans has a very rich Greek community. So even if I had not been adopted and did not know who my father, well, my mom knew who my father was, and hadn't had a relationship with my father, my family in Greece, I at least would've known that I was Greek and would've had ways to like connect to that.
And when I got back from Greece, my uncle, my father's brother is very, very loving. He's a huge family man, and he wants to get to know me, but he doesn't speak any English. So a lot of our conversations are just kinda like smiling at each other and you know, I know, I know more Greek than I did, you know, four years ago, but I'm barely conversational.
So I, I will say it's pretty awkward having to explain to your uncle over Google Translate that you've struggled with suicide your entire life and been hospitalized for attempting. So that was something I didn't think I'd have to do, but it's grieving for the relationships that you didn't get to have or just the lost memories, or knowing that you don't have as much time with your family.
But, you know, it's, it's bittersweet and it sounds kind of like, I don't know how to describe it, but it's, it's nice knowing that I can feel all of these things. I had no sense of family until a few years ago. The only supportive family that I had beforehand was my husband's family and like, bless his mother, but she's just, she's very, very motherly and I'm not used to that type of love.
His family's been incredibly supportive, but now I guess I have more family than ever before, and I actually like value having family now. Like I have so many pictures of people in my adoptive family who have been supportive on my walls. My dad, I have so many pictures of me and my dad, my husband's grandparents, his his family, like pictures from our wedding and I just, I didn't value family until I came into reunion and found my own.
Haley: I appreciate you sharing that. And I, I have a comment on the reunion piece. I've been in Reunion with my dad for almost 12 years and absolutely would feel that way after visits. It's just like, oh my gosh. Like I can't believe I missed out on the years and I can't believe the visit's over. And, and especially in the early years, not having a planned next time was really tough cuz if, if there was a next visit planned, then I'm like, okay, well I know in six months or whatever. Right? But I had that point.... But I tell you as the years have gone on and we've worked on lots of things and like we went to therapy in the very beginning and like really worked hard cause my, I had a failed reunion with my birth mother and she rejected me after four months. And I feel like things are more normal now and it's more like other people experience and I don't know, I don't know if that gives any hope, but like, I don't know.
I shouldn't even say hope really, because I think it's good for us to feel the grief as, as painful as it is, it's that acknowledgement of the loss that we've had, and we're not shoving it to the side. We're actually feeling it. So, you know, I think it's like a big complex thing.
Kirsta Bowman: When I wanted to find my birth father originally, you know, people were like, you know, he never, he never married, he never had kids. Like he's probably gonna want nothing to do with you. And people in my adoptive family, my, oh, my adoptive family, I mean like one cousin, because I don't really talk about Reunion with anyone in my adoptive family. But you know, people online, people in the Greek community were like, you know, he's probably gonna reject you.
Like why go through with it? I'm still happy that I went through with it. I rather be rejected. and know that then spend a life of wondering. Like, did it hurt to go all the way to Greece and then my uncle say, text a picture saying, I'm with your daughter. And he's, he's say, I want nothing to do with her.
Did that hurt? Yes. Would I be the, would I be sitting here today if I had not gone through with that? Absolutely not. Like it, it's hurt. I absolutely wish I could say that I've met one of my creators. That's just biological instinct, but it really has just solidified that I do not need him to live my best life.
My family's still kind of hoping maybe he'll change his mind when I go back next June. I'm not holding my breath. I'm not gonna spend energy on someone who clearly doesn't want anything to do with me. Him rejecting me is not a reflection on me, it's a reflection on him. I, like I say to kids, it's a them problem, not a you problem.
He, he doesn't know me like, I think that he's rejected me out of a combination of he doesn't speak English, guilt and shame that he had a, a bastard child out of wedlock with someone he saw beneath him in another country. He did not speak highly of my birth mother. My birth mother definitely struggled with things including substance abuse and she left her impression on people, I'll say it that way.
He did not speak highly of her to my family when they were like sat him down and said, this girl's your daughter. But you know what? She did more for me than he ever will. I wish that I hadn't been place for adoption. I don't think she would've been, I don't really think she was in a place, to parent me. She did what she thought was best for me. And I, that's a hell of a lot more than he's done for me. The only thing he's ever done for me is, you know, give me awesome curly hair.
Haley: Yes, you do have beautiful hair. I appreciate you saying those things cuz I think a lot of us have, you know, experienced some form of rejection and it can be really difficult to reckon with, especially with what you shared at the very beginning, like, Wait, I was an infant and he didn't want, like what was wrong with me? Right? Like it's all so interconnected. I relate to those feelings very much.
Anyway, I guess my last question, let's talk about just adoptee advocates who really wanna move the conversation forward and create more allies, and when we need people to like jump into action, you know, sharing these things. I feel like most of the traction that the viral videos are the ones where it's like roasting these, these horrible things like the PearTree app, we talked about that on on Patreon, on a Patreon episode and like registered and all gave one star reviews and et cetera. Because it's so, so, so, so terrible.
Kirsta Bowman: No, I, I made an account with PearTree with my Karpoozy email, and they blocked within like 15 minutes on my phone. Like I cannot create a new account on my phone.
Haley: I got, I got blocked as well, and I wasn't, I wasn't trying to message anyone, I just wanted to like look at the profiles and see what was there. And I got plenty of, of, yeah, but I, I also got blocked, so anyway. Oh, but you're doing it publicly and so I think those are getting a lot of traction. Like the, the roasting. I don't know. Do you feel that way? What do you see?
Well, two things. You were talking about identity and you have a strong sense of identity and you know who you are, and that comes out, I think, for folks when they follow you, they're like, oh, I know who she is. She's being real. Like, I think that is a big part of what draws people to listen to you and learn from you. And you have such, I don't know.
For me, I'm like, it's such bravery in the way you talk back to people, even respectfully, but also like saying it how it is and like I don't engage with adoptive parents on my Instagram and if they post things I'm just like, I'm not here for you. I'm not doing this. But you engage and you talk about those things, . So having that strength is really amazing.
Kirsta Bowman: I had someone in my LIVE today, and I'm talking about with Rehoming, and someone just keeps commenting, how do I adopt? And I said, friend. And I said, I, I said like I, I'm getting a little heated cuz it keeps saying, I'm like, friend, I'm not the page for you.
I'm not gonna tell you how to adopt. If you wanna sit and listen to how to best support adopted children, feel free to hang out. And they kept saying, how do I adopt? And I said, this is me asking you to respect my boundaries. And they stopped. I, I do think that, again, part of it's just like my genetic personality because my siblings insist I'm exactly like my mother.
Like do not, do not mess with me. But also I just think that being a teacher makes you really, really good at communicating what you need to in a respectful but direct way.
Haley: Mm-hmm.
Kirsta Bowman: This sounds really dumb, but one of the most helpful books ever with learning how to talk to people, for me at least, was a book called, How To Talk So Kids Will Listen and How To Listen So Kids Will Talk. And it was directed at kids, it was a parenting book. But I found it very useful as a teacher. And I think still a lot of it holds true for adults. Like why do we give that more grace to children when we still communicate the same way in many ways?
Like, like one part of the book was like, you know, does someone keep forgetting something? Leave them a note. Don't keep physically reminding them. Verbally reminding them, cuz clearly that's not working. So I'm not gonna lie. There are times where I just leave my husband a note if I want him to do something or remind him to do something instead of like continuing to remind him and I've asked him to do the same thing for me.
Like, leave a physical note, give that tactile, and I, I think that we really should show adults the same grace as we should be giving children. But you know, it's, I try to keep in mind that unless someone is intentionally being a D I C K, in one way or another, like saying something like, no wonder your mom didn't want you, a lot of people don't understand the issues within adoption because they've been spoon fed this happy rainbows and butterflies narrative.
Haley: Yep.
Kirsta Bowman: So I, I try to keep that in mind. But you know, there are times, like someone said the other day, like, you know, well, you should just be lucky, like your mom didn't, you know, un alive you.
So I screenshotted it. I blocked out the word killed because you can't take, show that word on TikTok. And they commented on another one of my posts and I just said, oh, Michelle, thank you for volunteering. So I was like, thank you for this wonderful opportunity to see how adoptive people get talk too. And I think that one reason why it's easy for me to talk about certain stuff is because my adoptive mother was just so horrible.
Like nothing anyone says to me can like surprise me. Like I've already heard it all and. I came into Reunion and kind of dealt with that first wave of grief before I got on TikTok talking about it, and I think that's one reason why it's a little bit easier for me. But, you know, it, it, it does feel weird when someone's like, you're so brave.
Because I don't feel brave. I just feel like I'm being my genuine self. I've kind of always had the mindset like lying to yourself or not being transparent. Like you're just, you're doing yourself more harm than good. I don't sugarcoat. Like I, I actually came into contact with one of my mother's second cousins a few days ago, and she's an older lady and said, oh, well God bless you for being adopted and, you know, having wonderful parents.
And I just said, I did not have a good adoption. I said, I'm not, and I said, I'm not gonna go into details, but my adoptive mother abused me. I'm not gonna let you think that I had a great adoption experience. I mean, I, I did, like, I had certain privileges, you know, because I was adopted that my adoptive, my birth mother definitely could not have afforded me.
No, like I didn't have to worry about like my medical needs getting met. I always had food on the table, that kind of stuff. And I know that my siblings, that my mom kept struggled in other ways that I just did not, but not a good liar. I mean...
Haley: I appreciate it. It's I think when we're vulnerable and we show our real true self in whatever that is, that's what people are drawn to.
But it comes at a cost for some folks if they're still have like a easy to hurt feelings exterior. . Anyway, I know we're coming to the end of the time, so we should do our recommended resource. So I absolutely want people to follow your TikTok account, and even if you're older than me, like you can be on TikTok, you can watch the videos, you repost some of them on Instagram too.
Kirsta Bowman: You know what I like about TikTok? It's a great way to learn from people that you typically would not learn from. There's one account, her name is Crutcher and Spice, Imani. She is a fat, Black disabled person. And I, I, she talk that's like what she talks about in her intersection, and I just love that I can like listen and learn from her because I don't know many people like that in my real life and who I do, you know, get shadowed by abled bodied thin white women.
Dylan Mulvaney is a trans woman who's been going through her journey and I just love getting to like listen and follow and I, you get to listen to a lot of voices you typically wouldn't be able to listen to or, you know, if you need some wholesome content, follow Howie the Crab eating a little piece of cheese.
Haley: Amazing. Okay. Well linked to those accounts for people as well. I also know you did a podcast episode with Francie on the Adoption Advocacy podcast, and you guys talk a little bit more about the predatory practices of agencies. So we link to that so folks can hear a little bit more from you guys on that.
And when, what did you wanna recommend to us?
Kirsta Bowman: Reuters did an investigative study article. 10 years ago, but a lot of it still holds true called the Child Exchange, and it goes into the rehoming practices of children on the internet. Now since the article's been published, some groups like Yahoo and Craigslist have tried to monitor people using their websites for, you know, very suspicious type activity with children.
But Facebook, it's still a lawless land and I think that's a really great article. Even though it's 10 years old, a lot of it still holds very true and it follows the individual story of one girl who had been adopted from Liberia and displaced in that way. It's a quick like good T L D R of the Rehoming practices.
Haley: Great.
Kirsta Bowman: And also just there's a book called American Baby by Gabriel Glazer, and it goes well into the shadow history of adoption in America. And how agencies have treated people in the name of adoption and hide information from people.
Haley: Thank you. Yes. Great. Recommendations. And where can we connect with you online?
My TikTok and Instagram, which are Karpoozy: k a r p o o z y. Karpoozy means watermelon in
Kirsta Bowman: Greek, so I wanted to have a Greek name that was not my Greek surname. And I just, I think karpoozy is just a really fun word to say, so that's why I picked it.
Haley: It is, and it's so memorable. Thank you so much. I really appreciate hearing some of your personal story and hearing about your advocacy work. We really appreciate it.
Kirsta Bowman: Thank you. I appreciate you.
Haley: Friend, I'm so glad you were able to listen to today's episode. If you like and appreciate the work adoptees on is doing, please consider joining us over on adopteeson.com/community, and we'd love to have you as part of the monthly Patreon supporters. And if you are more bookish and readerly, we also have a adoptee only book club, and details of that are adopteeson.com/bookclub.
Thank you so much for listening. Let's talk again next Friday.
