Between Two Halves — The Breaking Point
When the Shelter of Family Is Lost
This series does not exist to make you comfortable. It exists to tell the truth that has been buried beneath the dominant narrative of adoption. And to tell that truth, we cannot begin at the surface. We must begin at the end – the final realization of what adoption truly is – and move backward, tracing the fractures to their origin.
Reading in Reverse:
A Reflection of Adoption’s Fragmented Truth
I am publishing this series in reverse order – not as a gimmick, but as an invitation. An invitation to step, however briefly, into the disorientation of the adopted experience. To move backward through a story that has already been written, shaped by choices made long before your arrival. To piece together a narrative that unfolds in reverse, forcing you to sit with the weight of what is missing before you ever understand what was there.
For adoptees, life begins mid-sentence. We are handed a story with no prologue, expected to embrace a present that does not acknowledge its past. The process of discovery – of reconstructing a history stolen, redacted, or rewritten – is never linear. It is jagged, contradictory, and often painful. By publishing these pieces in reverse, I want the reader to feel some of that disruption, that sense of grasping at meaning in a sequence not of their own design.
Once the series is fully published, it can be read in numeric order – offering a reconstructed whole. But to truly understand, you must first experience the unravelling.
Now, we reach the midway point of this series – a threshold between what has been revealed and what remains unspoken. If the first half has been about the descent into awareness, the second half will be about what comes after.
Once an adoptee sees the truth, what do they do with it?
Once the severance is acknowledged, how does one live beyond it?
This is the moment where the ground beneath us gives way.
Because there is no return to what was lost.
The Midway Point:
The Collapse of Belonging
At this stage, the illusions that sustained us have already begun to crumble.
- We have named the erasure.
- We have exposed the severance.
- We have confronted the loss of identity, the vanishing of the mother, the rewriting of the self.
And now, we face the inevitable breaking point.
- The moment when adoptees realised the shelter of the family was never guaranteed.
- The moment the estranged understands, they will never be accepted back.
- The moment when reunion fails, when no resolution comes, and when the search does not end in belonging.
If the first half of this series was about falling, this is the moment where we hit the ground.
What Happens When Family Is Gone?
Adoption, estrangement, and failed reunification are not just personal losses. They are systemic failures.
- Adoption separates families under the guise of love.
- Estrangement happens when survival means choosing truth over belonging.
- Failed reunification is the result of decades of silence, severance, and systemic erasure.
This is the point where many adoptees and the estranged ask:
What happens to me now?
Who am I outside of this loss?
Where do I belong, if not with the family I was given or the one I searched for?
These questions have no easy answers. Because once the ground beneath us disappears, we must find our own way forward.
The Systemic Engine of Family Loss
People do not lose family in a vacuum. Adoption, estrangement, and displacement are not random – they are manufactured.
- Adoption exists because social systems refuse to support struggling families.
- Estrangement happens when individuals choose survival over compliance.
- Failed reunification is the inevitable result of decades of severance and silence.
What if families were never supposed to be broken in the first place?
What if belonging was always conditional?
And what if those of us who have fallen through the cracks are not lost – but free?
Rebuilding from Nothing
The Fight for Identity, Connection, and Truth
To lose family is to lose history, memory, and continuity. But it is also a chance to reclaim what was taken.
- Adoptees reclaim their original names, their ancestry, and their stolen histories.
- The estranged redefine love, belonging, and what it means to be family.
- Those who break the cycle choose healing over silence, even if it costs them everything.
Because once we stop searching for a home that will never take us back, we can begin to build something entirely new.
The Midway Point Is Not the End
It Is the Beginning
This is where the second half of the series begins.
- We have fallen.
- We have been severed.
- Now, we must ask: What comes next?
Is it possible to live beyond the severance?
That is what we must now uncover.
Because the breaking point is not where the story ends.
It is where we begin again.
Hello, my name is Shane Bouel,
I’m a retired, qualified designer, lecturer & e-learning specialist seeking true connection.
I am an adoptee of forced adoption, living in Bali — a place that, like me, holds the weight of displacement and the echoes of histories rewritten. My journey is one of systematic erasure, existential severance, and, ultimately, reclamation.
Adoption is often seen as an act of love, a new beginning, a gift. But beneath that narrative lies a deeper, often unspoken truth — one of loss, identity fracture, and the struggle to exist in a world that does not recognise what has been taken.
I have spent years unravelling my own story, uncovering what was erased, and reclaiming the self that was meant to disappear. It has been a journey through grief, awakening, and profound transformation. And now, I invite you to walk that path with me.
From here, we embark on a journey together.
