Adoptee Story: Sandy

April 27, 2020

Adoptee Story:

Sandy, born in India, adopted in India

INTRO: Fellow adoptee Sandy reached out to me to share her story and reading it absolutely broke my heart…

My story:

I was never told I was adopted. I started having doubts very early in life. What brought it on, I guess was the fact that I used to be beaten a lot. Yes, when I say beaten, I mean really bad. My adoptive dad and mom would stop only when their hands would hurt. I would be beaten with wooden spoons till they broke, hangers till they broke basically anything they could find. I used to turn black and blue. I guess I was 14 when a relative indirectly mentioned that I was adopted. At age 16 my adoptive mom came up with a story of how she was pregnant and gave birth to me in a toilet!!!! I found this so dumb and unrealistic that I decided to investigate.

After asking everyone I knew I got one definitive answer, your mom was never pregnant. Yes, you are adopted. As told to me by a close family friend she said something about me being brought from Tamil Nadu, India. But my birth certificate has the address of an ashram in another state. As far as I know there are no documents for my adoption as it could have been a case of money paid to poor parents.

Either way I am still searching and don’t really have the resources to do so.

The reason for my adoption / purchase was my adoptive mom wanted so desperately to get married that she faked a pregnancy. Once she achieved her goal I was just in the way. Torn between a mom who didn’t want me and a father who was forced to accept a child that wasn’t his. I grew up troubled, made a lot of bad choices. It’s been a long not so happy life (I am 42).

To this day I remember my lost childhood. It was a lonely, dark place. One incident I remember very clearly was when my adoptive mom ( now deceased) got so furious that I took 2 Mackintosh Quality Street chocolates from the fridge that she beat me up really bad, dropped me to the floor and started chocking me. Saying over and over “Die” I remember swallowing my blood. Eventually she stopped because someone rang the doorbell.

I was only 8.

By Sandy (adoptee)

Sandy is an artist and photographer.

And a true survivor.

You can find her work and follow her on Instagram by CLICKING HERE.

Amanda Medina

I was adopted from Medellin, Colombia to Sweden in 1985. I was about a year and a half when I started my life as an adoptee, and it would take 32 years until I was ready to face what that means, what that has always meant, and what that will always mean.