Author Archives: Admin

Culture Shock

“There is so much more to people who are adopted than the parts that make people immediately pity them. It’s hard to figure out how to explain my story depending on the person or crowd because they already have a scenario in their head about my life which makes it challenging to tell them at all. I miss my family above all else, though I gained a new one but never will forget how my life all started. With pain and a different lifestyle in Ethiopia, I would never give up or forget the memories of my life.”

Brokenness in Adoption

“From the outside looking in, it can appear I have been sent to the most glorious summer camp. I live in the world of endless food, education, opportunity, resources, etc. But from the inside looking out, I am like a child at summer camp who is never allowed to return home — always grateful for what I have but always grieving what I have lost. The complexity of being an adoptee is feeling conflicting emotions. This is okay.”

Birthdays

“Birthdays: they happen every year. For the adoptee, this could be a celebration or it could be traumatic. I first recognized the parallel between celebration and painful trauma when I was 18 years old, turning 19, and a freshman in college. That was a pivotal year for me in shaping my identity and deciding to become a Christian (yes, God chose me). The celebration is being surrounded by friends and family for the year that I was born. The trauma is thinking about my biological mother, my birth country, and my strained relationship with my brother.”

Love and Acceptance

“Feeling loved is something that I have always wanted to feel in life. Growing up, I was told that I never smiled. I wasn’t happy. On the outside I seemed normal. I smiled when I felt like it, but on the inside I often fought back tears and struggled with the pain that I felt. I was different and I knew it. I didn’t have the same life story as all of my friends and family members, and I always wanted to be with my birth mom. I knew that I had two families. I knew them and I knew where they were and how to contact them. I felt abandoned and rejected by them. The people who should have loved me the most weren’t there.”

The Prayer of My Broken Heart

“Truth is that I have been told so often that I am loved, and worthy of so much more — that God offers me freedom and abundant life….but it feels like in this life, actions speak louder than words. The only action that I am constantly reminded of, which plays on repeat in the recesses of my mind is the fact that I was left behind. That I was abandoned.”

Kimchi and Grilled Cheese

“While food brings Korean culture closer to me, I feel part of and separate from it as an adoptee, a tension that’s evident in many small ways. For instance, I remember one of the first times I found myself in a small Korean restaurant filled with only Koreans. It was a new and strange experience to be part of the majority, to blend into a room where I looked like everyone else, where everyone was going about the normal activity of eating dinner.”

My Adoption Journey: From reunions, to struggles, to gaining a new best friend

“The day I met my birthmother in person was completely surreal. We already established a connection from many emails we exchanged before picking a date and location to meet. I was so nervous I thought I would throw-up, which was completely out of character. I think my nerves kept me from bawling when we first saw each-other and hugged.”

A White Adoptee’s Search for Her Birth Culture

“So where do you go to explore your birth family’s culture when you’re white and have a closed adoption? Honestly, I don’t know. I assume that learning about your birth family’s culture is easier if you have an open adoption (at least for getting information—I know it’s certainly not always easier emotionally).”