The search for a coherent account of one's life and one's origin may become a particularly powerful organizer of fantasy and memory, affect and conflict, self and object representation in adopted children. Yet relinquishment, unacknowledged affects, and inaccessible history create a rupture in the fabric ofthat narrative. Clinical material is presented to illustrate the impact such disruptions may have on the personal narrative and the developing selfhood of the child, with a particular focus on the impact of inhibited mourning. The evolving play showed that grieving facilitated representation of losses and discontinuities and made possible a more integrated representation of the self.