Growing your Family - Adoptees and In-Laws

My father-in-law is in the backyard, putting last minute touches on his winter garden. My husband trails behind him, matching his pace as they rake dirt and mark out the boundaries of a future vegetable garden.

My father-in-law digs up a clump of clay and shakes it loose over the ground. He nudges it around with his shovel, and they both drop into a crouch to examine the earth more closely. Each of them scoops up a handful and pokes at it, comparing what they see, pulling out rocks and roots while they talk about how this patch of soil will affect their plans.

I find it adorable.

From my spot by the window, I sip my tea and watch them stand and walk the outer boundaries of the garden bed. With their backs turned to each other, at almost the exact same moment, they each pause to clean their hands with an identical motion: four quick slaps of their palms together, then a brisk swipe of their hands, front then back, on their jeans to remove the last of the dirt.

I freeze for a second, startled by the perfect synchronization.

As they pick up tools and return to work, my husband says something that makes them both laugh. A laugh spreads across their faces in perfect harmony - the same smile. The same pattern of throaty laughter, the shoulders heaving in tandem. Even their eyebrows quirk towards the temple at the same moment.

This was all shortly after biological family reunion, when life circumstances pushed me to live with my in-laws for a few months. I loved spending time with them. I recognized my husband in their personalities and started to understand the family dynamic that colored my marriage dynamic. My husband joined me at their house after I had lived there for a few months. All of us together was a treat. I enjoyed witnessing the way they slipped into an easy rhythm together, seeing their similarities and their long, shared history. There was a trace of my husband there in my mother-in-law's love of adventure and the pride she takes in her work. There he was, in my father-in-law’s careful problem solving and paternal care for the rest of the family. In such close proximity to each other, their everyday motions and speech patterns began to blend together.

I was fascinated, until the intrigue faded into grief.

Watching that genuine back and forth in his family forced me to face the distance and isolation in my own. I watched from a window, an outsider looking in, painfully reminded of everything I never had. I did not grow up seeing a face that looked like mine, or a laugh that sounded like mine, or a gesture that felt familiar in that primal, biological way. My husband's family shared a deeply rooted closeness that made me quietly worry about my ability to fit in and connect with my husband in the same way. They had a shared history written into their bodies. I did not.

On top of that, my husband and I are making different choices than his parents did. Their relationship dynamic was arranged in a very traditional fashion: one breadwinner and one homemaker. This pattern worked well for his parents. It does not work for our marriage. My partner and I are always struggling to learn how to share both paid work and house work, economical and emotional labor.

As an adoptee, straying from a family pattern to build a family from scratch is terrifying. I feel lost. Both my examples of family dynamics (adoptive and biological families) did not leave a healthy example to follow. So much of what my partner and I are creating together feels like trial and error. I do not have a script to copy. I do not automatically know what family traditions should look like, what economical choices to make to ensure long-term career satisfaction, or how conflict is usually handled in a safe home.

In this adoption-induced limbo, I am endlessly asking myself, Do we want this? Does this feel safe? Does this feel like us? On good days, this self-scrutiny feels freeing, because we get to decide what our life together will look like. On hard days, it just feels like a gap, a reminder that I did not get the same foundation so many others take for granted.

So I sit at the window with my mug and watch my husband and his father move together in the garden. I let myself feel both things at once: the sweetness of their connection and the sting of what I missed. I notice the grief and make room for it.

Then my husband looks up, catches my eye, and smiles. It is his father’s smile, but it is also the smile he saves for me. For that moment, I remember that biology is one kind of bond and chosen family is another. Our marriage, our home, and the way we are learning to do family together are real too. We are building something of our own, step by step, even if we did not start with a clear blueprint.