Mother’s Day and Adoption: When the Day Holds More Than One Story

Mother’s Day can stir complex and sometimes confusing feelings for adult adoptees. A reflection on the different threads that can exist within the day.

Some days arrive with a clear emotional script.

The cards in the shops, the messages on social media, the adverts and conversations around us all seem to say what the feeling of the day should be.

But sometimes the feeling inside doesn’t quite match the story around it.

Mother’s Day can be one of those moments for some adoptees.

In the wider culture it is usually presented as a day of appreciation and a time to celebrate mothers and acknowledge the role they have played in our lives. The narrative is simple, and the emotion it invites is clear.

Adoption can make that story more layered.

Even where there is genuine love and appreciation for the mother who raised you, another awareness may sit quietly alongside the celebrations. A sense of another mother whose presence is not part of the day, yet whose absence is woven into it.

Sometimes that awareness sits in the background, barely noticeable. At other times it can come a little closer to the surface, a reminder that the story of motherhood in adoption does not always follow the shape that Mother’s Day assumes.

For some people the day may bring a quiet wondering: Is she thinking about me today?

For others there may be a sense of loss that is difficult to explain, particularly when the world around seems so certain about what the day is meant to feel like.

Where relationships are strained or complicated, the expectations of the day can carry another kind of pressure. Even small decisions - choosing a card, deciding what to write, knowing what feels honest - can suddenly feel surprisingly heavy.

And where there has been reunion, Mother’s Day can sometimes highlight the complexity of having two mothers in the story. The day tends to assume a single, uncomplicated relationship, while adoption may hold something much more layered.

Love for the mother who raised you may sit alongside curiosity about the mother you came from.

Gratitude may exist beside grief.

Different threads of the story may appear at the same time, even when they don’t seem to fit neatly together.

Certain days in the year can bring those threads a little closer to the surface - birthdays, Mother’s Day, or other moments that quietly touch on questions of origin and belonging.

From the outside, Mother’s Day often carries the sense that there is a “right” way to experience it. But the emotional landscape of adoption does not always follow that script.

Sometimes the day simply reveals how many different strands are woven through an adoptee’s story.

And sometimes the most meaningful response is not to resolve those threads, but simply to notice them.