By Lakshmi Cashmore, intercountry adoptee
I don’t look like anyone I know. It lands deeper than people realise. It’s in the small moments, catching your reflection, not knowing where your smile came from, not knowing where your dark eyed gaze comes from and when you fall ill, is it genetic, what do your genes hold for you? Watching families interact and seeing the subtle similarities, the shared expressions, the inherited habits. Hearing someone say ‘You laugh just like your mum’ or ‘You have your dads smile’ and knowing that no one will ever say that to you in the same way. There is a quiet grief in that. Not loud, not always visible, but constant. Not something that others understand. How important, special and grounding that connection can be. I don’t have the comfort of being explained by someone else. It’s all questions I can’t answer.
Because of this, every part of who I am, feels self-generated, even the parts that aren’t. And that can be disorienting. To not know what is inherited and what is learned, what is instinct and what is adaptation. It makes identity feel less like something you discover, and more like something you are always trying to prove. Always feeling like you are starting behind before you even start.
And the world notices the difference, even when it doesn’t understand it. ‘Where are you from?’ It sounds simple. Harmless in a way even, not meant to be nasty (most of the time), but it lands like a question I can’t fully answer. Because what people are really asking is: Why don’t you look like you belong here? It’s like a smack each and every time – and this would happen at least once a week still.
I have spent my whole life in Australia. This is home. This is where my memories live, where my relationships exist, where my life has been built. And yet, I am constantly asked to explain myself, to justify my presence in a place that already holds all of me, that holds my journey, that has given me the space to grow. It’s a subtle kind of othering. The kind that doesn’t always look like racism on the surface, but feels like it underneath. A quiet reminder that no matter how integrated your life is, your appearance can still mark you as ‘outside’. And when I don’t have a clear answer, when I can’t give the neat story people expect, there’s often disappointment.
Confusion. Sometimes even more questions. Questions that go deeper. Questions about my adoption. There’s an assumption that adoption is a story meant to be shared, that it’s open, accessible, even inspiring. People ask about it with curiosity, sometimes excitement. They say things like ‘That’s so amazing’ or ‘You’re so lucky’. I understand where that comes from. I really do. But what they don’t see is that adoption didn’t start with gain. It started with loss. A loss so early I don’t remember it. There is a part of me that was separated before I had language for it. A part that doesn’t have memories, but still carries the imprint of something missing. And when people ask me to explain my story, they are often asking me to access something that doesn’t have clear edges, something that feels more like a wound than a narrative.
There are questions I don’t have answers to. There are details I will never know. And there is a grief in that which doesn’t fade, but it has changed shape over time. Sometimes it shows up as curiosity. Sometimes as sadness. Sometimes as a quiet, persistent ache that sits just beneath the surface of everyday life. And sometimes, it shows up in ways I didn’t expect.
There is something profoundly confronting about the possibility that I may never have someone who looks like me. That I may never see my features reflected back in a child’s face. That the one opportunity I might have had to create a biological connection, to finally recognise myself in someone else, might not happen. It feels like a door closing on something I never fully had. And that grief is layered. Because it’s not just about motherhood, it’s about identity. About continuity. About the longing to see yourself belong, somewhere, in a way that feels undeniable. To not have that, it can feel like being unanchored.
But even in all of this, in the not knowing, the not belonging, the unanswered questions, there is also love. Real, tangible, chosen love. I have people who have shown up for me, who have supported me, who have made space for me in ways that are deeply meaningful. And I hold that with so much gratitude. I am aware, in a very real way, that my life could have been different. Harder. Smaller. Or perhaps not a life at all. And that awareness shapes me. It makes me appreciative. It makes me grounded. It makes me fiercely protective of the relationships I have. But gratitude does not erase grief, they coexist – constantly.
I can feel deeply thankful for the life I’ve been given, while still mourning the parts of my story that are missing. I can love the people who raised me, who chose me, without diminishing the reality that something was lost before that choice was ever made. Both things are true.
So I have decided to live in a way that doesn’t necessarily make the pain disappear, but in a way that tries to honour it. I want to honour the birth family who gave me life, even without knowing them. I want to make it worthy of the fight that must have existed for me to be here at all, the unseen decisions and impossible choices that shaped my life before I ever had a say. I want to be worthy of the love of my chosen family and friends who continue to stand by my side.
And I carry a quiet responsibility to live well because of that. To be someone to be proud of. To build something meaningful from something uncertain.
All of it shaped by the questions I can’t quite answer.
Lakshmi Cashmore is an Indian intercountry adoptee based in Melbourne.