Adopted children: The break in childhood

Normally, children are born into a family and grow up loved, supported and attached to it. Children love to know where they come from and where they belong. But not all children have these experiences. For adopted children, there is a break in their life course: At some point, they realise that the question of their own identity is not so easy to answer.

Developing your own identity means creating a congruent image of yourself. An image of being an independent person with certain characteristics and positions in the world, their own congruent story, their own feelings and judgements about themselves. This is how we want to be perceived by others. The feeling of ego identity is a kind of congruence of one's own perceived and felt ego with that in the eyes of others.

Knowing one's parentage is a human right that a person may or may not exercise.

While children form their own identity by imitating their attachment figures and looking for similarities, in the teenage years they begin to detach themselves from their attachment figures and develop an independent self. Questions such as «What makes me special?» and «How do I differ from others?» become particularly important during the teenage years. It is a typical developmental task that we all have to master.

Replacement as a balancing act

Forming your own identity also means setting yourself apart from certain people and groups and joining others to whom you feel you belong. In a family context, this often means setting oneself apart from parents and seeking affiliation with peers .

Separation from parents can be experienced by young people as a liberation on the one hand, but also as a loss of orientation on the other. This can cause uncertainty and anxiety on both sides, for parents and teenagers.

This separation process can lead to painful and heated discussions between parents and teenagers about how to build a new relationship. Letting the teenager go their own way and still being there when they need it is therefore often a balancing act.

Who am I?

When a person experiences that they are allowed to be who they are, that their story is unique and special and that they belong to a group despite their differences, a stable personality can develop. Ideally, this is an independent personality that is aware of its differences and yet is coherent in itself.

Not knowing where you actually come from can trigger major crises.

In addition to the question «Who am I?», most adopted children sooner or later also ask the question «Where do I come from?» These questions are important in forming their own identity. Teenagers in particular who have been adopted increasingly realise that their life story is different from that of their peers and friends. Not knowing where you actually come from, why your birth parents couldn't or didn't want to look after you, where certain characteristics come from and where you belong can trigger major crises.

When a part of your own history is missing

Part of my own origin is unknown: Where should I orientate myself if I can't find matches? In addition to identification with the social parents, there is also identification with the biological parents, who are unknown. Part of your own history is missing.

It is not possible to examine and make one's own judgement of reality. The reaction can be to glorify biological parents, but also to reject both biological and social parents. The insecurities are further intensified if the teenager cannot openly ask these questions about their origins, for example in order not to hurt their caring parents.

Several studies have shown that clarity about one's own history, no matter how harsh, makes it easier to form an identity and find one's place in society. Knowing the reasons and causes for giving up adoption can also have a reconciliatory effect and strengthen self-esteem. In this sense, knowing one's parentage is in itself a human right that a person may or may not exercise.

New legal regulation

Since 1973, adoptions in Switzerland have only been possible as full adoptions and with the identity of the adoptive family kept secret. The links to the biological parents were severed, which meant that the kinship ties ceased to exist. At the time, the legislator assumed that not only a legal but also an informational separation between birth parents and child was necessary for a full adoption to be successful.

Since 1 January 2018, a new regulation has been in force that allows biological parents to claim knowledge of the personal details of their adopted children under certain conditions. Since this revision, the adopted child and the adoptive parents still have a fundamental right to the protection of adoption secrecy.

Limited access to information for biological parents

As long as the child is not capable of judgement or if one parent does not consent to the disclosure of the information, the secrecy of the adoption remains intact. If the child is capable of judgement on this point and the adoptive parents and the child have consented to the disclosure, identifying information about the minor child or its adoptive parents may be disclosed to the natural parents.

The child has a right to certainty.

If the adult child has consented to the disclosure, identifying information about the child may be disclosed to the biological parents and their direct descendants. This includes information that allows direct conclusions to be drawn about the child. This can be personal details, but also information that can be used to easily find out who the child is. This means that direct descendants of the biological parents, i.e. biological brothers and sisters, now also have the opportunity to obtain information about the child given up for adoption.

In contrast to this limited access to information for the biological parents, the adopted child itself has the right to receive information about the personal details of the biological parents. The child is also entitled to know that it has been adopted. The adoptive parents are free to choose when and how they wish to inform the adopted child. However, they are obliged to inform the child and may not withhold this information.

Task of the KESB

If the birth parents and the adoptive parents know each other, they can also decide on an open adoption. In contrast to a secret adoption, in an open adoption there is contact between the birth parents, the adoptive parents and the adopted child. The agreement on the contacts and any changes are subject to approval by the KESB .

The KESB is obliged to make the persons involved in the agreement aware of the implications of their decision. The child must also be consulted before the agreement is approved. If the child is already capable of judgement in this matter, their consent is required. The agreement may not be unilaterally amended or even cancelled.

The adopted child has a right of veto: if they refuse to have contact with their biological parents, they are not obliged to tolerate contact with their biological parents despite an existing agreement. The adoptive parents are also not allowed to pass on information such as school reports or photos against the child's will. In addition to this legal framework, the challenges of an open adoption can also be met with other measures.

Information provided too late shatters trust in carers

In order for the adopted child to understand and accept their life situation, it is important that they receive information about who they are and where they come from as early as possible. This information should be as clear and age-appropriate as possible so that the child can categorise it. Reports from adopted children who only learnt late that they had been adopted make it clear that their trust in their caregivers, especially in the receiving parents, is severely shaken.

Studies show that adopted children whose families were open with their parents of origin from an early age or who knew their biological families personally have better mental health and greater self-confidence. This speaks in favour of giving children - regardless of their circumstances - the confidence that they will understand their story and be able to deal with it with loving openness.

This requires adults who can support the ups and downs of childhood and adolescent ambivalence and who accompany the children with patience and confidence. Even if there are crises and conflicts of loyalty. Because overcoming these is important in order to be able to follow their own path to a stable identity.