#adoption-reunions

[thepersonalwords]

Blood can help make family, but family often transcends blood.

DaShanne Stokes

[usuallysublimepenguin]

The first of my two claims for Lord of the Rings Secret Santa @lotr-sesa this year - @balrogballs asked for "something set on a beach, involving one or more of Celebrían, Elrond, Maglor, Maedhros, and Arwen".

I pounced on that prompt, and enjoyed myself a lot drawing this! Discovering Ms Balls' wonderful Celrond work in the progress was an unforeseen joy and inspiration 💜

The Sundering Sea, the accompanying short fic, can be found on AO3.

[rystiel]

finally watched that daryl show

[druidonity2]

'whatcha got there?''a smoothie' meme but its Sylvanas and Alleria sneaking Anduin into the Windrunner family reunion in Midnight.

[felineuniverse]

I wonder how the window shelf is still standing…

[michimonie]

The first post of Pride month! Here's a lovely 2017 couple.

[red-envelopes]

reunion/meeting/re-meeting/getting to know your birth family is not smooth at all and I wish that non adoptees knew this and could hold more understanding and empathy for us who are trying our best to navigate this situation when all the barriers are stacked against you

it's not smooth like you see in the media, in your films and your games, and I wish that people could take their time to understand how different and difficult and easy and smooth and heartbreaking and simple and complicated it can be for so many of us.

please don't take your information for granted

[bruciemilf]

I really, really love Dori in the Batman. No reason either. She's just an old lady who most definetly knows Bruce's knightly secret and...Doesn't tell anyone about it, in my mind.

But it got me thinking. She's the only staff we see besides Alfred. Headcanon that, as Bruce got older, employees started to slowly leave. People Bruce knew since he started walking and speaking.

Not because they hated him, oh no. Because he started looking more and more like his parents.

[snipersiniora]

I have a question to the rottmnt au community: how can y'all make such a character/oc so precious? I thought i would have enough adopting Rise Raph & casey jr as my kids and now - or before - we have people making such great characters or OCs that i want to adopt!!

What's your secret?! How can you make such great characters and can i adopt them?!/aggressive platonic affection

God i don't have enough money to raise them!! STILL I WILL ADOPT THEM/hj/lh/pos

[stardust948]

Rivers in the desert AU

Ozai: And then he hugged me.

Ozai, tearing up: Why didn't you tell me our son is so cute?

Ursa: I did! Multiple times! Why didn't you tell me our daughter is so talented and brilliant?

Ozai: I did.

Ursa: You said, and I quote, "She’s just like her father."

Ozai: Exactly 😌

[ethanzlittleplayhouze]

i missed you

[momofmysquad]

do we think Scary and Linc beat teen pregnancy?

[supernovasilence]

Diversity win! Your girly fashion game is abolishing gender norms with gender-neutral wine tankards!

[moongothic]

You know we all meme about how Luffy doesn't give a shit about his parents/Dragon, how he seemingly has no interest in learning about the man or meeting him at all, and like yeah that is a Luffyism

And for a long time I figured Baby Luffy would be the same too; that Luffy in his naïvete just accepted he must've spawned from the ocean itself into Garp's care or something, not realizing he should in fact have parents, thus Luffy's seeming disinterest in them

But you know what

Luffy did spend most of his early childhood alone

Sure, he had Garp, but it seems like Garp wasn't always there to look after him every day, he had his duties as a Marine too. Had Garp been there 24/7 all year then Garp would never have allowed Luffy to interact with Shanks (a filthy pirate) to begin with. So yes, Luffy had his grandpa, but not all the time. And sure, Luffy also had Shanks, but Shanks didn't spend all his time in Fuusha Village either, he came and went whenever he pleased too until his final departure when Luffy was just six years old. And yes, there was everyone else in the village too, people who cared about Luffy and were helping look after him. But Luffy's early childhood was one without a stable family.

It wasn't until Garp yeeted the child into Dadan's care that Luffy actually gained a proper family, where after months and months of trying Luffy managed to win Ace's trust and gained Sabo as a brother too. But as we know, by that point Luffy already hated being alone

All of this to say; Luffy growing up essentially orphaned would explain why he's so afraid to be alone, the way he clings onto people

In some ways Luffy's POV is meant to be the reader's POV, to some degree Luffy's feelings and thoughts are meant to be how we the readers feel and think about whaveter is happening in the story. Not a 100% by any means, but somewhat at the very least.

Perhaps Luffy's lack of interest in Dragon isn't just "Luffy not giving a damn about blood family because chosen families are better" nor "Luffy is too stupid to understand where babies come from". Perhaps Luffy, who may have assumed he didn't have parents at all (as in "might've assumed they were dead or had intentionally abandoned him"), doesn't know what to think about the fact that he does have a father out there, one whom he has never as much as met. Because yeah, Luffy doesn't know why Dragon left him with Garp, why he never got to be with his dad. Should he be angry at Dragon, hate him for being left alone? Or did Dragon have a good reason for it, does Dragon wish things could've been different?

Perhaps Luffy's seeming disinterest in Dragon isn't because he doesn't care about blood family, but because much like us the readers, Luffy doesn't quite know what to make of Dragon, and figuring those feelings out hasn't been relevant to the plot yet.

[quiescentdestiny]

thinking about the fact that if Neil had died in Baltimore, literally none of Andrew's family would even know he was broken as much as he was by it. Like they saw him choke Kevin, but even after Baltimore, Nicky assumed it was just a fling.

[red-envelopes]

any other adoptee who is undergoing reunion/met their birth family get really unsettled after being in contact with them?

i love speaking to my birth family. i hate not understanding them. and even whilst talking to them i felt myself becoming unsettled and overwhelmed, and here I am dealing with the fallout

what's this called? This desire to be closer yet fearing it and also wanting it so much but yet the unsettling feelings are too much. I feel dysregulated for days after being in contact. For me, it usually comes up with regards to phone contact/video calling. I'm okay with messages, it's actually seeing them and speaking to them that causes the emotional (and sometimes physical) dysregulation.

It's very jarring actually lol

The many joys of being an adoptee