I would like to share this quote from Eve Sedgwick's Epistemology of the Closet (1990) pg. 75. Dr. Sedgwick is remarking on how homophobia is quite distinct from other oppressions. In doing so, though, she also touches upon - to me anyway - the dilemna of an adopted person (perhaps even especially one who was adopted under a 'sealed-records' policy). The quote reads:

"Vibrantly resonant as the image of the closet is for many modern oppressions, it is indicative for homophobia in a way that it cannot be for any other oppressions. Racism, for instance, is based on a stigma that is visible in all but exceptional cases...; so are the oppressions based on gender, age, size, physical handicap. Ethnic/cultural/religious oppressions such as anti-Semitism are more analogous in that the stigmatized individual has at least notionally some discretion -- although, importantly it is never to be taken for granted how much -- over other people's knowledge of her or his memebership in the group; one could "come out as" a Jew or Gypsy, in an heterogeneous urbanized society, much more intelligibly than one could typically "come out as" say, female, Black, old, a wheelchair user, or fat. A Jewish or Gypsy identity, and hence a Jewish or Gypsy secrecy or closet, would nonetheless differ again from the distinctive gay versions of these things in its clear ancestral linearity, in the roots (however tortuous and ambivalent) of cultural identification through each individuals originary culture of (at a minimum) the family.

Epistemology of the Closet (1990)
E. K. Sedgwick



Now, although you will most likely see the connections, I have added/suggested the word "adoptee" - along with some other stuff I thought relevanti - in square "[ ]' brackets. Dr. Sedgwick is specifically, however, referring to the plight of a homosexual person. Imagine being BOTH gay and adopted ?! I am...

My annotated version reads:

"Vibrantly resonant as the image of the closet is for many modern oppressions, it is indicative for homophobia [ or adoptees?] in a way that it cannot be for any other oppressions [(sic)]. Racism, for instance, is based on a stigma that is visible in all but exceptional cases...; so are the oppressions based on gender, age, size, physical handicap.
Ethnic/cultural/religious oppressions such as anti-Semitism are more analogous in that the stigmatized individual has at least notionally some discretion -- although, importantly it is never to be taken for granted how much -- over other people's knowledge of her or his memebership in the group [ and perhaps adoptees here too?].
One could "come out as" a Jew or Gypsy, in an heterogeneous urbanized society, much more intelligibly than one could typically "come out as" say, female, Black, old, a wheelchair user, or fat.
A Jewish or Gypsy identity, and hence a Jewish or Gypsy secrecy or closet, would nonetheless differ again from the distinctive gay [or adoptee?] versions of these things in its clear ancestral linearity [often adoptees too have no access to their ancestry, or birth parent lineage...], in the roots - however tortuous and ambivalent - of cultural identification [do adoptees necessarily feel a cultural identification with their adoptive families?] through each individuals originary culture of (at a minimum) the family [ again, are adoptees secure in their "originary culture of their adoptive families?].