At What Age Is Grown-up?

This is a question I've been thinking about for a while now.  It started at the beginning of my first reunion when I started emailing my first mother.  At 22, I felt this odd, child-like sensation as I would tell her about my childhood and my favorite memories.  It's such a hard feeling to describe, feeling like a small child again looking for Mother's approval.  As time went on, that feeling faded, only to reemerge when I started talking to my first father, though not as bad the second time around.  Listening to other adult adoptees, it turns out that it's not completely unheard of, the regression I was feeling.

Being back at home with my parents has brought this question up again.  My mother does my laundry (her one household chore).  My parents refuse to accept rent from me (when I offered I was laughed at).  A lot of the same rules are in place for me now as when I was in high school, though in some areas I have a bit more freedom.  It's challenging to step back into that role and still maintain that I'm an adult (which I am).  But my parents don't see me that way, so it gets pretty complicated around our house sometimes.

I can own my own car like an adult, work like an adult, get paid like an adult, be treated like an adult when not with my family, but in the eyes of the state and in the eyes of my adoptive family, I'm still a child.  The state sees me as a child in that they won't give me my birth documentation.  Everyone else has theirs, I just can't get mine because they don't trust me as an adult to make what they see as the "right" decision.  My adoptive family (extended now) also sees me as a child, as witnessed this past weekend.

My uncle adopted two daughters later in life.  Their father died when they were young and he helped to raise them.  He was always their "dad" but nothing was official until both girls were in their 30's.  At that point, it was a step-parent adoption because he married their mother the day before they started the paperwork.  So my grandparents have eight grandchildren and four of us are adopted.

My older cousins do not act like cousins, or at least not in the way that I'm used to.  My family is very close.  We all get together on a regular basis (not just the holidays), call each other, support each other, and are there for each other.  My cousins don't call.  They bail on family parties.  They haven't called my mother once to see how she's doing.  They don't call my grandmother.  They don't act like her grandchildren.  So it's a sore spot in our family.  My uncle is insistent that they be treated like everyone else, but they don't treat the rest of us the way everyone else does.  If that makes sense.

My uncle threw a Christmas party last weekend.  A "family" party.  Which was a big deal because even though he lives less than an hour away, nobody's ever been to his house before.  So like an idiot, I called him to get the details.  I do all the planning in our house and I wanted to know what time so we could plan our weekend around it.  Well.  I was told that I wasn't invited.  I could go to a separate party with my cousins on another day.  It was a party for just his brothers and their wives.  Hm.  Ok.  Fast forward to the actual party.  My younger cousins never got the memo they weren't invited.  So they showed up.  I'm so glad that they did!  But here's the kicker.  My uncle's kids were there.  With their kids.  Who are teenagers.  So basically, my uncle threw a party for his brothers, their wives, and his family, and just excluded his nieces and nephews.  But because my cousins showed up, my entire family was there except for my sister and I.

So at 24, my uncle does not see me as an adult.  It was an "adult" Christmas party, yet at 24, and my cousin at 22, were not invited.  So at what age is grown up?  Eighteen?  Well, that included all the cousins with the exception of one.  Twenty-one?  Still includes my cousin and I.  Twenty-five?  Ok, that would make sense, but how do you come up with that number?  What can't I do at twenty-four that I can't do at twenty-five other than rent a car?

Adoptee triggers galore these days.  Seriously.  Not cool.