Adopted Child - Personal Essay

My life didn’t start out like most. When I was born, I spent 336 hours in the NICU fighting for my life. I was born to people who liked to indulge themselves in drugs and alcohol. My biological mother had a drug addiction, which didn’t stop when she found out that she was pregnant with me. The drugs that she loved so much, traveled through her body and found its way into my immune system, which lead me to fight for my life before I could even walk. My biological parents didn’t visit me in the NICU, not once, but my grandparents did. My grandmother sang “You Are My Sunshine” to me every day while I was in the NICU.

They officially adopted me on September 5, 2008, when I was seven years old. I always knew that I was adopted, but my seven-year-old self-didn’t really know what that meant.

When I was in sixth grade, I invited a friend over and she asked, “Why are your parents so old?” That question raddled me and when she went home that day, I asked my parents that same question. They sat me down and told me that I was adopted, but I still didn’t fully understand what that meant, so I asked. They told me the story of how I came to be adopted by them. When they finished, I asked why my biological parents didn’t love me. I can still remember their faces when I asked that question. They had tears in their eyes as they said that my biological parents did love me, but they couldn’t take care of me the way I needed.

Even after talking to them, I was still confused about our situation until I went to the high school youth group at my church where we talked about family. I remember preparing myself to be bored out of my mind, but I was not bored for long. The first thing my youth leader said was, “Family--It’s not just the people who share your blood. It’s the people who said, ‘I’ll be there, and never left. It’s the people who loved you, even when you don’t deserve it. The people who laugh and cry with you. It’s