When Adoptees Become Adoptive Parents: Gene Trowbridge's Multi-Generational Story

Most people experience adoption from one perspective. Gene Trowbridge has lived it from every angle. Adopted as an infant in the 1940s, he married a fellow adoptee, adopted two daughters, and now co-hosts "Hey! Am I Adopted?" podcast with his daughter Emily. His story spans seven decades and three generations, offering rare insights into how adoption shapes families across time. In this episode of Voices of Adoption, host Donna Pope Gene shared experiences most adoptees recognize but rarely discuss openly—the fear of rejection that prevents search, the loyalty to adoptive parents even in difficult homes, and the questions that persist for decades. His conversation with host Donna Pope reveals what happens when connection is delayed, denied, or finally discovered.

The Sister Who Vanished  

Gene's understanding of adoption's fragility began in third grade when his parents brought home a girl his age named Mary Beth. She shared his bedroom, wore a matching school uniform, and sat in his classroom. Then, one day, without warning, she disappeared. Gene came home from school to find every trace of Mary Beth removed from the house. His parents said only that the placement "didn't work out," offering no explanation, no goodbye, and no acknowledgment that she had ever existed.

The incident left Gene with a child's logic and a suitcase full of determination. He packed his belongings and told his father that if Mary Beth could go back to the agency, so could he. His father's response became a principle Gene used throughout his life: "If it's a good idea today, it'll be a good idea tomorrow. Why don't you take off your coat and we'll have dinner?" By the next day, Gene had reconsidered, but Mary Beth's disappearance taught him that adoption could be conditional and fragile. According to research from the Donaldson Adoption Institute, approximately 60% of adoptees have searched or want to search for birth families, yet many wait decades before taking that step. Gene would wait 50 years.

Too Afraid to Knock

At 16, Gene received an unusual gift—his mother's apron strings, symbolizing his independence, along with his complete adoption papers. Those documents included his birth mother's name and her last known address in St. Paul. Gene had what he needed to search, but two fears stopped him. First, he worried about hurting his adoptive parents, even though his relationship with them was strained. Second, he feared disrupting his birth mother's life, imagining her horror if he appeared at her door and destroyed the family she might have built. These twin fears kept his adoption papers in a drawer for nearly five decades.

The decision to search came in his mid-60s. Gene calculated that if his birth mother had been 19 when she had him, she would likely be in her 80s or deceased. With both adoptive parents also gone, he felt free to pursue connection without risking anyone's feelings. He submitted DNA to an ancestry website and waited. Two months later, an email arrived saying, "Call me. I've got a surprise for you." The surprise was bittersweet—his birth mother had died, but Gene had six half-siblings. Four welcomed him warmly during a visit to Minnesota. Two in Arizona remained suspicious. Despite initial enthusiasm, Gene found little lasting connection with his biological siblings. They shared DNA but no common experiences, and today, he occasionally communicates with just one sister. Research published in the Journal of Family Psychology indicates that about 40% of birth family reunions result in ongoing relationships, while others remain sporadic or end after initial contact, proving that biological connection alone doesn't guarantee lasting relationships.

Amy's Fear and Emily's Path  

Gene and his wife Kay adopted two daughters, Amy and Emily, three years apart. Both girls knew from their earliest memories that they were adopted, with the family discussing adoption openly and emphasizing that all four family members joined their family through adoption. Amy struggled with what Gene believes was a fundamental adoptee fear of rejection. Starting at 14, she began using drugs, beginning a 17-year cycle through treatment facilities, jail, and life on the streets. When Amy expressed interest in finding her birth mother, Gene took her to Catholic Social Services where they completed the application together and Gene wrote the check. They prepared everything except the required letter from Amy to her birth mother. Amy never wrote it, later explaining she couldn't risk her birth mother "saying no again." That fear defined Amy's relationship with adoption until her death at 34. Gene speaks with unusual honesty about feeling relief alongside grief—after 17 years of waiting for calls about overdoses or arrests, there was finally certainty. Amy's organs saved three lives through donation, her final act of generosity.

Emily took a different path entirely. She maintains little interest in searching for her birth family, though she initiated the adoption podcast with her father and has co-hosted it for years, interviewing adoptees about their experiences. Recently married, Emily and her husband are now pursuing foster-to-adopt, continuing the family's multi-generational adoption story. According to the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption, approximately 135,000 children are adopted annually in the United States, with a growing number of adoptive parents being former foster youth or adoptees themselves. Emily's decision to adopt places her among adoptees who choose to build families through adoption, demonstrating that adoption experiences, even when complex, don't prevent people from seeing adoption as a valid path to family.

Twenty-Five Years of Grandpa Gravy  

While Gene's biological family reunion produced limited connection, his wife Kay's experience demonstrates what a successful reunion can look like. Kay was adopted by her stepfather after her biological father lost contact due to unpaid child support. In 1994, Kay looked up her father's name in the phone book, called, and said, "Dad, this is Kate." Within days, Jim and his wife drove to meet Kay's family, beginning a 25-year relationship that enriched everyone involved.

Jim became "Grandpa Gravy" to Amy and Emily, teaching Emily his technique for making Thanksgiving gravy and attending every holiday. For Kay, reunion meant her father knew she had graduated, married, and built a life—he was no longer absent from her story. Gene credits Kay with another practice he believes all adoptive parents should follow: every year, Kay sent current photos of their daughters to Catholic Social Services with updated contact information, maintaining an open door for biological family members who might need to make contact for medical or personal reasons. The Child Welfare Information Gateway reports that states with open adoption policies and registries see higher satisfaction rates among all adoption triad members, suggesting access to information benefits everyone involved.

Advice From Every Angle  

After years of hosting an adoption podcast and living adoption from multiple perspectives, Gene offers specific guidance for each member of the adoption constellation. For adoptees considering search, he emphasizes confronting fear directly rather than avoiding the question indefinitely, understanding the risks include potential rejection or disappointing results, and recognizing that choosing not to search is valid if it's an active choice rather than fear-based avoidance. For birth parents, Gene urges letting go of guilt if placement was the right decision and considers initiating search rather than waiting to be found, acknowledging that adoptees may feel they carry the emotional burden of reunion alone.

For adoptive parents, Gene's advice centers on practical openness: tell children about adoption from their earliest memories, keep doors open through registries and DNA databases, send annual updates to adoption agencies with current photos and contact information, and acknowledge that love doesn't guarantee smooth outcomes. His own experience with Amy demonstrates that even adoptive parents who are themselves adoptees and understand the psychology deeply cannot prevent all adoption-related struggles. Yet he doesn't regret the adoptions or believe different parenting could have changed Amy's outcome. Instead, he sees her story as evidence that adoption comes with inherent complexities families must acknowledge rather than deny.

Continuing Conversation  

Gene's story reminds us that adoption conversations need multiple voices to capture the full complexity of the experience. His willingness to discuss both tragedy and triumph, failed connections and beautiful reunions, provides a complete picture that helps others navigate their own adoption journeys. Whether you're an adoptee weighing the decision to search, a birth parent wondering about the child you placed, or an adoptive parent trying to support your child through complex feelings, Gene's multi-generational perspective offers hard-won wisdom worth hearing.

Ready to hear more adoption stories from every perspective? Subscribe to Voices of Adoption wherever you listen to podcasts. Each episode brings honest conversations with adoptees, birth parents, and adoptive families who share real experiences that books and agencies don't always cover. Join a community navigating adoption with honesty and compassion. Listen to Gene's full episode and discover why keeping doors open matters more than you might think. This episode offers perspective from someone who has lived adoption from every angle.

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