A comprehensive list of adoption resources including books, podcasts, search angels, organizations, and events.
EVENTS
Woman of Interest a Memoir
Tracy transforms her pandemic-era search for her Korean birth mother into a genre-defying detective story, earning widespread critical acclaim pre-publication.
Abandoned at Birth: Searching for the Arms that Once Held Me
BJanet challenges adoption’s “happy ending” narrative through her exploration of the primal wound theory and her personal journey of discovery through DNA testing.
The Girl With Three Birthdays
Patti’s DNA test launches an investigation into sealed records and family secrets, revealing how adoption secrecy shaped her understanding of identity.
The Girl I Am Was and Will Never Be
Shannon, a transracial adoptee, blends adoption memoir with speculative fiction in this Printz Honor Book, exploring parallel lives while incorporating official documents and family records.
Crossing the Cherry Blossom Sea
M. Rosales recounts her journey as a Korean adoptee, taken from her homeland at age five. Her search for birth family after 29 years illuminates the complex emotions and cultural identity challenges faced by international adoptees.
Adoption Songs
Lori weaves together fifteen adoption stories, sparked by a chance encounter that led to an epiphany about the need to share these narratives. Drawing from her own experience as an adoptee who kept her adoption secret for years, she explores the universal theme of belonging that runs through the adoption community.
Adoption Unfiltered
This book reveals the candid thoughts and feelings of those most directly involved in adoption. The authors interview dozens of adoptees, birth parents, adoptive parents, social workers, therapists, and other allies, all sharing candidly about the challenges in adoption.
Hole In My Heart
In the days before Roe v. Wade, an ambitious young journalist, abandoned by her beau, leaves Michigan for a dream job on the city desk of a Rochester, New York newspaper. Burned once, she’s eager for love, but as the only Girl in the newsroom, she’s more concerned with finding allies and making friends.
When a new leading man appears, she recognizes a kindred spirit. Soon her bylined stories claim front-page space. However, when she becomes pregnant, she must switch her attention from deadlines to decisions.
With adoption on the horizon, she pushes her man to make a commitment. Sadly, he wants her, but not their daughter. Will Dusky ever find the little girl she longed to raise, and if she does, what will be the fallout from their years apart?
God and Jetfire
God and Jetfire is a mother’s account of her decision to surrender her son in an open adoption and of their relationship over the twelve years that follow. Facing an unplanned pregnancy at twenty-two, Amy Seek and her ex-boyfriend begin an exhaustive search for a family to raise their child.
Goodbye Again: A Memoir
The first time to adoption and the second not long after reuniting with him. In this heart-wrenching and heart-warming memoir, Candace Cahill offers an intimate view of child relinquishment and child loss, the definition of motherhood, and how two things can be true at one time.
If you know of an event you would like added to this list, email me at patricia@myadoptedlife.com.
PODCASTS
Adoptees at Work Podcast: Guest Patricia Knight Meyer
A conversation with Peggie Ardvison on Adoptees at Work Podcast about how being adopted impacts my work life and has influenced career choices and direction.
Adoption Uncovered: Guest Patricia Knight Meyer
A conversation with Charlyn Speiring about my adoption story and (at 20 min in) the healing power of writing to heal adoption wounds.
The Secret Son Podcast: Guest Patricia Knight Meyer
UPCOMING – Adopted when he was 3 months old, host Mike Trupiano was forever changed by his search for his birth family. Mike is the creator of Secret Son, an adoptee podcast about searching, identity, and secrets. I really enjoy his interview style and was thrilled to be asked to be a guest on the show. Our conversation is scheduled to release mid-September.
Claiming Your Voice: Patricia Knight Meyer Part 2
She was a black market baby who was given to a Texas couple through the workings of an attorney. In part two she talks about reuniting with her birth father.
Claiming Your Voice: Patricia Knight Meyer Part 1
Guest Patricia Knight Meyer is an author, journalist, and content creator. She was relinquished for adoption by her birth mother. In her adult life Patricia was in reunion with both her birth mother and father. Her website is myadoptedlife.com where you can learn more about her adoption story.
Adoptees On
This is not the usual adoption talk. You will find real, raw, and deep feelings addressed in these interviews. No sugar-coating here! Come and laugh, cry, learn and heal with us. I promise you’ll have a “me too” moment. Adult adoptees share stories of search, reunion, and secondary rejection. Adoptees On also curates recommended resources to encourage and educate the adoption community about adoptee issues.
Adoptees at Work Podcast: Guest Patricia Knight Meyer
A conversation with Peggie Ardvison on Adoptees at Work Podcast about how being adopted impacts my work life and has influenced career choices and direction.
Adoption Uncovered: Guest Patricia Knight Meyer
A conversation with Charlyn Speiring about my adoption story and (at 20 min in) the healing power of writing to heal adoption wounds.
The Secret Son Podcast: Guest Patricia Knight Meyer
UPCOMING – Adopted when he was 3 months old, host Mike Trupiano was forever changed by his search for his birth family. Mike is the creator of Secret Son, an adoptee podcast about searching, identity, and secrets. I really enjoy his interview style and was thrilled to be asked to be a guest on the show. Our conversation is scheduled to release mid-September.
Claiming Your Voice: Patricia Knight Meyer Part 2
She was a black market baby who was given to a Texas couple through the workings of an attorney. In part two she talks about reuniting with her birth father.
Claiming Your Voice: Patricia Knight Meyer Part 1
Guest Patricia Knight Meyer is an author, journalist, and content creator. She was relinquished for adoption by her birth mother. In her adult life Patricia was in reunion with both her birth mother and father. Her website is myadoptedlife.com where you can learn more about her adoption story.
Adoptees On
This is not the usual adoption talk. You will find real, raw, and deep feelings addressed in these interviews. No sugar-coating here! Come and laugh, cry, learn and heal with us. I promise you’ll have a “me too” moment. Adult adoptees share stories of search, reunion, and secondary rejection. Adoptees On also curates recommended resources to encourage and educate the adoption community about adoptee issues.
Adoptees Dish
Adoptee centered podcast elevating experiences and the lived experience of those impacted by the complexities of adoption. Amy & Marcela are both international & transracial adoptees as well as licensed clinical social workers. Their insights are both personal and share a clinical lens.
Adoptees Crossing Lines
In this podcast we deconstruct the romanticism holding up the adoption industry and expose the lies, abuse, and pain that gets silenced. We’re here to unwrap the shiny bow around adoption and speak our truths as adoptees.
If you know of a podcast you would like added to this list, email me at patricia@myadoptedlife.com.
BOOKS
A Real Nobody a Fake Somebody and Me: A Memoir of Forced and Closed Adoption
Author Sherry Bridgette Healey, a victim of forced adoption, exposes how government policies legally erased birth identities. Her raw memoir draws powerful parallels to historical human rights violations.
Adoption and Suicidality
Beth Syverson and Joseph Syverson, an adoptive mother and adoptee, collaborate to address adoption’s hidden mental health crisis. Drawing from groundbreaking research, they combine personal stories with practical resources to support families and professionals.
Woman of Interest a Memoir
Tracy transforms her pandemic-era search for her Korean birth mother into a genre-defying detective story, earning widespread critical acclaim pre-publication.
Adoption Memoirs: Inside Stories
Marianne analyzes 45 adoption memoirs, identifying patterns in how adoptees, birth parents, and adoptive parents process trauma, race, and reunion experiences.
Abandoned at Birth: Searching for the Arms that Once Held Me
BJanet challenges adoption’s “happy ending” narrative through her exploration of the primal wound theory and her personal journey of discovery through DNA testing.
In Better Hands
Brandi shares her Appalachian story of adoption intersecting with poverty, addiction, and trauma, offering practical healing strategies while highlighting rural America’s unique challenges.
Woman of Interest a Memoir
Tracy transforms her pandemic-era search for her Korean birth mother into a genre-defying detective story, earning widespread critical acclaim pre-publication.
Abandoned at Birth: Searching for the Arms that Once Held Me
BJanet challenges adoption’s “happy ending” narrative through her exploration of the primal wound theory and her personal journey of discovery through DNA testing.
The Girl With Three Birthdays
Patti’s DNA test launches an investigation into sealed records and family secrets, revealing how adoption secrecy shaped her understanding of identity.
The Girl I Am Was and Will Never Be
Shannon, a transracial adoptee, blends adoption memoir with speculative fiction in this Printz Honor Book, exploring parallel lives while incorporating official documents and family records.
Crossing the Cherry Blossom Sea
M. Rosales recounts her journey as a Korean adoptee, taken from her homeland at age five. Her search for birth family after 29 years illuminates the complex emotions and cultural identity challenges faced by international adoptees.
Adoption Songs
Lori weaves together fifteen adoption stories, sparked by a chance encounter that led to an epiphany about the need to share these narratives. Drawing from her own experience as an adoptee who kept her adoption secret for years, she explores the universal theme of belonging that runs through the adoption community.
Adoption Unfiltered
This book reveals the candid thoughts and feelings of those most directly involved in adoption. The authors interview dozens of adoptees, birth parents, adoptive parents, social workers, therapists, and other allies, all sharing candidly about the challenges in adoption.
Hole In My Heart
In the days before Roe v. Wade, an ambitious young journalist, abandoned by her beau, leaves Michigan for a dream job on the city desk of a Rochester, New York newspaper. Burned once, she’s eager for love, but as the only Girl in the newsroom, she’s more concerned with finding allies and making friends.
When a new leading man appears, she recognizes a kindred spirit. Soon her bylined stories claim front-page space. However, when she becomes pregnant, she must switch her attention from deadlines to decisions.
With adoption on the horizon, she pushes her man to make a commitment. Sadly, he wants her, but not their daughter. Will Dusky ever find the little girl she longed to raise, and if she does, what will be the fallout from their years apart?
God and Jetfire
God and Jetfire is a mother’s account of her decision to surrender her son in an open adoption and of their relationship over the twelve years that follow. Facing an unplanned pregnancy at twenty-two, Amy Seek and her ex-boyfriend begin an exhaustive search for a family to raise their child.
Goodbye Again: A Memoir
The first time to adoption and the second not long after reuniting with him. In this heart-wrenching and heart-warming memoir, Candace Cahill offers an intimate view of child relinquishment and child loss, the definition of motherhood, and how two things can be true at one time.
A Real Nobody a Fake Somebody and Me: A Memoir of Forced and Closed Adoption
Author Sherry Bridgette Healey, a victim of forced adoption, exposes how government policies legally erased birth identities. Her raw memoir draws powerful parallels to historical human rights violations.
Adoption and Suicidality
Beth Syverson and Joseph Syverson, an adoptive mother and adoptee, collaborate to address adoption’s hidden mental health crisis. Drawing from groundbreaking research, they combine personal stories with practical resources to support families and professionals.
Adoption Unfiltered
This book reveals the candid thoughts and feelings of those most directly involved in adoption. The authors interview dozens of adoptees, birth parents, adoptive parents, social workers, therapists, and other allies, all sharing candidly about the challenges in adoption.
Braving the Fire: A Guide to Writing About Grief and Loss
A road map for the journey of writing honestly about grief and loss. Useful to the memoirist just starting out, as well as those already in the throes of coming to terms with complicated emotions and the challenges of shaping a compelling, coherent true story.
What My Bones Know: A Memoir of Healing from Complex Trauma
A searing memoir of reckoning and healing by acclaimed journalist Stephanie Foo, investigating the little-understood science behind complex PTSD and how it has shaped her life.
No Bad Parts
Discover an empowering new way of understanding your multifaceted mind – and healing the many parts that make you who you are.
Braving the Fire: A Guide to Writing About Grief and Loss
A road map for the journey of writing honestly about grief and loss. Useful to the memoirist just starting out, as well as those already in the throes of coming to terms with complicated emotions and the challenges of shaping a compelling, coherent true story.
Adult Adoptees and Writing to Heal: Migrating Toward Wholeness
Adult Adoptees and Writing to Heal shares the framework and method of using writing as a practice for adult adoptees, therapists, teachers, and researchers interested in learning how to migrate and heal embodied trauma. It analyzes lived experience and the author’s own writing to develop a methodology for moving toward wholeness by writing and speaking the truth of internal adoptee experiences.
The Story You Need to Tell
A practical and inspiring guide to transformational personal storytelling, The Story You Need to Tell is the product of Sandra Marinella’s pioneering work with veterans and cancer patients, her years of teaching writing, and her research into its profound healing properties. Riveting true stories illustrate Marinella’s methods for understanding, telling, and editing personal stories in ways that foster resilience and renewal.
A Real Nobody a Fake Somebody and Me: A Memoir of Forced and Closed Adoption
Author Sherry Bridgette Healey, a victim of forced adoption, exposes how government policies legally erased birth identities. Her raw memoir draws powerful parallels to historical human rights violations.
Adoption and Suicidality
Beth Syverson and Joseph Syverson, an adoptive mother and adoptee, collaborate to address adoption’s hidden mental health crisis. Drawing from groundbreaking research, they combine personal stories with practical resources to support families and professionals.
Woman of Interest a Memoir
Tracy transforms her pandemic-era search for her Korean birth mother into a genre-defying detective story, earning widespread critical acclaim pre-publication.
Adoption Memoirs: Inside Stories
Marianne analyzes 45 adoption memoirs, identifying patterns in how adoptees, birth parents, and adoptive parents process trauma, race, and reunion experiences.
Abandoned at Birth: Searching for the Arms that Once Held Me
BJanet challenges adoption’s “happy ending” narrative through her exploration of the primal wound theory and her personal journey of discovery through DNA testing.
In Better Hands
Brandi shares her Appalachian story of adoption intersecting with poverty, addiction, and trauma, offering practical healing strategies while highlighting rural America’s unique challenges.
If you know of a book you would like added to this list, email me at patricia@myadoptedlife.com.
SEARCH & SUPPORT
Search Angels & Organizations
- Angel Search Network: A dedicated team of search angels offering adoption search support and assistance. They have a wide network of resources and volunteers ready to help individuals in their search for birth parents, adoptees, and other relatives.
- Search Angels Worldwide: A global community of search angels providing support and guidance to those involved in adoption searches. They offer various services, including document research, DNA analysis, and emotional support throughout the search process.
- Adoption Reunion Registry Search Angels: This organization specializes in reuniting birth families and adoptees through their search angel network. They provide personalized assistance, access to databases, and expert guidance to navigate the complexities of adoption searches.
- DNA Detectives: A group of experienced genetic genealogists who offer their expertise in using DNA testing and analysis to uncover family connections. They specialize in adoption-related searches and can help individuals interpret DNA results and navigate genetic genealogy databases.
- Search Squad: Composed of volunteer search angels, Search Squad assists individuals in finding their birth families through research, public records, and social media platforms. They have a dedicated online community where individuals can seek guidance and support throughout their search journey.
- Find My Family Adoption Search Angels: A team of passionate search angels dedicated to helping adoptees, birth parents, and siblings find each other. They provide personalized search plans, access to databases, and emotional support during the search process.
- Adoption Search Consultants: A group of professional search consultants who specialize in adoption searches. They offer comprehensive search services, including record retrieval, genetic genealogy research, and expert advice on navigating adoption laws and regulations.
- Birth Parent Finder: A network of search angels with expertise in locating birth parents and facilitating reunions. They offer personalized search strategies, document retrieval, and emotional support for both adoptees and birth parents throughout the search process.
- Search Angels of Adoption: A nonprofit organization comprised of dedicated search angels who volunteer their time and expertise to assist individuals in finding their biological families. They provide guidance, research assistance, and emotional support to individuals searching for their roots.
- The Seeker’s Heart: A group of search angels committed to helping adoptees and birth families find each other. They offer a range of services, including record searches, DNA analysis, and personalized support throughout the search and reunion process.
“Who in the world am I? Ah, that’s the great puzzle.”
-Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland
ORGANIZATIONS
Woman of Interest a Memoir
Tracy transforms her pandemic-era search for her Korean birth mother into a genre-defying detective story, earning widespread critical acclaim pre-publication.
Abandoned at Birth: Searching for the Arms that Once Held Me
BJanet challenges adoption’s “happy ending” narrative through her exploration of the primal wound theory and her personal journey of discovery through DNA testing.
The Girl With Three Birthdays
Patti’s DNA test launches an investigation into sealed records and family secrets, revealing how adoption secrecy shaped her understanding of identity.
The Girl I Am Was and Will Never Be
Shannon, a transracial adoptee, blends adoption memoir with speculative fiction in this Printz Honor Book, exploring parallel lives while incorporating official documents and family records.
Crossing the Cherry Blossom Sea
M. Rosales recounts her journey as a Korean adoptee, taken from her homeland at age five. Her search for birth family after 29 years illuminates the complex emotions and cultural identity challenges faced by international adoptees.
Adoption Songs
Lori weaves together fifteen adoption stories, sparked by a chance encounter that led to an epiphany about the need to share these narratives. Drawing from her own experience as an adoptee who kept her adoption secret for years, she explores the universal theme of belonging that runs through the adoption community.
Adoption Unfiltered
This book reveals the candid thoughts and feelings of those most directly involved in adoption. The authors interview dozens of adoptees, birth parents, adoptive parents, social workers, therapists, and other allies, all sharing candidly about the challenges in adoption.
Hole In My Heart
In the days before Roe v. Wade, an ambitious young journalist, abandoned by her beau, leaves Michigan for a dream job on the city desk of a Rochester, New York newspaper. Burned once, she’s eager for love, but as the only Girl in the newsroom, she’s more concerned with finding allies and making friends.
When a new leading man appears, she recognizes a kindred spirit. Soon her bylined stories claim front-page space. However, when she becomes pregnant, she must switch her attention from deadlines to decisions.
With adoption on the horizon, she pushes her man to make a commitment. Sadly, he wants her, but not their daughter. Will Dusky ever find the little girl she longed to raise, and if she does, what will be the fallout from their years apart?
God and Jetfire
God and Jetfire is a mother’s account of her decision to surrender her son in an open adoption and of their relationship over the twelve years that follow. Facing an unplanned pregnancy at twenty-two, Amy Seek and her ex-boyfriend begin an exhaustive search for a family to raise their child.
Goodbye Again: A Memoir
The first time to adoption and the second not long after reuniting with him. In this heart-wrenching and heart-warming memoir, Candace Cahill offers an intimate view of child relinquishment and child loss, the definition of motherhood, and how two things can be true at one time.
A Real Nobody a Fake Somebody and Me: A Memoir of Forced and Closed Adoption
Author Sherry Bridgette Healey, a victim of forced adoption, exposes how government policies legally erased birth identities. Her raw memoir draws powerful parallels to historical human rights violations.
Adoption and Suicidality
Beth Syverson and Joseph Syverson, an adoptive mother and adoptee, collaborate to address adoption’s hidden mental health crisis. Drawing from groundbreaking research, they combine personal stories with practical resources to support families and professionals.
Woman of Interest a Memoir
Tracy transforms her pandemic-era search for her Korean birth mother into a genre-defying detective story, earning widespread critical acclaim pre-publication.
Adoption Memoirs: Inside Stories
Marianne analyzes 45 adoption memoirs, identifying patterns in how adoptees, birth parents, and adoptive parents process trauma, race, and reunion experiences.
Abandoned at Birth: Searching for the Arms that Once Held Me
BJanet challenges adoption’s “happy ending” narrative through her exploration of the primal wound theory and her personal journey of discovery through DNA testing.
In Better Hands
Brandi shares her Appalachian story of adoption intersecting with poverty, addiction, and trauma, offering practical healing strategies while highlighting rural America’s unique challenges.
If you know of an organization you would like added to this list, email me at patricia@myadoptedlife.com.
