The Adoptee Body, Cash Money, and The Memory Palace of Bones

I asked Dr. Joyce Maguire Pavao to lead a year-long class with me on being adopted and our sense of value and our bank accounts because I have an idea.

Or a dream.

I have been reading a new book by David Lauterstein and Jeff Rockwell called The Memory Palace of Bones, and it has me thinking about my skeleton and the stories that it holds.

I think I have been hearing the whispers (and sometimes the screams) of “There is not enough money,” since I was first named “the baby” by another human being. There was not enough money for my mother to keep me. There was not enough money for my father to help support her or even to send her a card saying something along the lines of Sorry I left you with this mess and assumed no responsibility even though I knew I knocked up up because your friend told me. I don’t know what I heard the first ten weeks of my life because I don’t know where I was. My adoptive parents lived by Central Park and there was never enough money because they were young, New York was expense, and they were just making their way into the world as people who earned their own way. Later, when they were older, there was still never enough money. One problem was they kept adopting more kids. One time when I was married, my husband took me to his accountant to show me there was enough money. But it was his money. That was not enough for me. My bones know “there is not enough money” and so they create a life that mirrors this belief. I could be sitting on a zillion bucks and there still would not be enough because my bones believe the story more than they believe my eyes.

I think adoptees need a bonewash called YOU CAN CHANGE YOUR BELIEF SYSTEM. I want to walk though this bonewash and have the old beliefs circle down the drain and disappear. I KNOW there is enough money. How? Well, I’m fed, housed, and warm. There has ALWAYS been enough money. But my bones hold the stories, and since my bones hold me up, they run the show.

This is so annoying. It’s like being a great person like Prince Harry and being named “The Spare”. I mean, if adoptees are going to go through life with the limiting beliefs that inherently go along for the ride 99.99 % of the time it seems to me such as YOU ARE NOT GOOD ENOUGH. YOU DO NOT BELONG. YOU WERE NOT WANTED. YOU ARE NOT SAFE. YOU ARE GOING TO LOSE EVERYTHING AT ANY MOMENT what not just say, OH, WHY BOTHER, when an adoptee comes into the world and go Fargo on the whole deal and (trigger warning!) chuck them in the chipper?

If a body does not feel valued it is in deep trouble.

Telling the body it is special without addressing the bones is not helpful. My adoptive mother could tell me how beautiful and great I was until she was blue in the face (which I guess she actually did), but my bones heard the whispers of what other bones were saying, and that set the stage for Crazy Town.

My vision and dream is to create this bonewash with Dr. Joyce. I can see it. I can feel it. I FEEL my bones changing, and I see this reflected in the dramatically decreased amount of stress I carry about money. (Thank you, mushrooms and meditation and Bird and etc.)

The birds are singing. People are hungry. I’m going to bring them some food.

(If you’re interested in joining the class, it’s on Zoom starting in May every Sunday from 9-11:30 AM ET. It costs $200. You can email me at anneheffron@gmail.com to save your spot.)