Today’s positive adoption term is “was adopted” and its counterpart is “is adopted.”
At Adoption STAR we believe that once you have adopted a child, he is part of the family just like a biological child would be and that the adoption “process” is in the past. Being adopted shouldn’t be who the child is but rather just a fact on how the child joined one’s family, so “he was adopted” rather than “he is adopted.” “I was adopted”, rather than “I am adopted.”
While adoption is a lifelong journey for birth parents, adoptive parents and adoptees, it is important that the emphasis be on positive self identify and who you are today, both by birth and by adoption ~ not just on the fact that you “are adopted” but rather you “were adopted.”
The same thing with being born, you “were born” to your biological parent, not “I am born” to my biological parent. Small details like adoption language end up being important details as an adoptee begins to examine his identity.