Sarah Owens, who specialized in helping adopted kids work through identity, attachment and family trauma.

With Dr.

Owens’s help, our family had started having completely open, honest conversations about Austin’s adoption, clearing away the secrecy that had smothered our home for nine years.

We took out the courthouse photos, his original newborn footprints and his legal adoption decree and let him look over every single document with his own hands.

We answered every question he had about his birth mother with complete honesty, sharing the few details we knew about her life and admitting it when we didn’t have answers.

During one of our quiet afternoon sessions, I had formally apologized to Austin once more for waiting so long to tell him the truth about how his life began.