Healing Together as an Adoptee and Spouse

When Adoption Affects Marriage

Adoption doesn’t end with childhood, it continues to shape identity, relationships, and the way adoptees experience love throughout adulthood. In this heartfelt episode of the Because She’s Adopted podcast, Kristal Parke sits down with Marisol and her husband, Will, to explore what happens when adoption trauma enters a marriage. Together they share an honest conversation about relinquishment, grief, transracial adoption, losing parents, faith, belonging, and the patience required to build a healthy relationship while navigating lifelong adoption wounds. This episode offers encouragement not only for adoptees but also for spouses, partners, and loved ones who want to better understand adoption trauma and walk alongside someone they love.

Adoption Doesn’t Stay in Childhood

Marisol was adopted from Bogotá, Colombia, as an infant and raised in rural Pennsylvania by loving adoptive parents. While she describes her mother as deeply compassionate and emotionally available, she also reflects on growing up without cultural mirrors or people who looked like her. Like many transracial adoptees, the questions about identity didn’t disappear with age, they simply became more complex. As adulthood unfolded, so did deeper questions about belonging, race, grief, and what adoption had quietly shaped beneath the surface.

How Loss Reopened Adoption Wounds

The conversation takes an emotional turn as Marisol shares losing both of her adoptive parents at a young age. After her father’s death during college, she later experienced the sudden loss of her mother, her closest confidant and greatest source of emotional safety. These profound losses intensified feelings that many adoptees know well, and rather than healing in isolation, Marisol explains how grief eventually became the doorway into understanding her adoption trauma more deeply.

What It’s Like to Love an Adoptee

One of the most powerful aspects of this episode comes from hearing Will’s perspective. When they first met, he knew very little about adoption. Over time, he began to recognize how deeply relinquishment had influenced his wife’s life, emotions, and relationships. Instead of trying to “fix” her pain, he learned something even more important: to stay. Will shares how listening without defensiveness transformed not only their marriage but also his understanding of trauma, empathy, and unconditional love. His reflections provide invaluable insight for partners who often wonder: How do I support someone with adoption trauma? What if I don’t fully understand their pain? How can I love them without trying to solve everything? His answer is beautifully simple: Presence matters more than perfect answers.

Finding the Adoptee Community

For years, Marisol believed she simply had to carry these feelings alone. Eventually she discovered adoptee writing groups, podcasts, and online communities where, for the first time, people understood experiences she had never been able to explain. Finding fellow adoptees didn’t erase the pain. It gave language to it. That sense of finally being seen became a turning point in her healing journey and reinforced the importance of community for adult adoptees.

Faith, Healing, and Hope

Throughout the episode, faith remains an important thread woven through both Marisol and Will’s story. Rather than offering easy answers, they describe faith as something that carried them through unimaginable grief, difficult questions, and seasons of waiting. Their story reminds listeners that healing is rarely immediate. Instead, healing often happens slowly, in safe relationships, honest conversations, supportive communities, and people willing to stay when things become difficult.