An immigrant family that was unwilling to give up on an abandoned orphan.

My facility experience has made me tough. I don’t cry over small things.

I learned how to pronounce my Korean name, and realized that it’s beautiful.

My oldest son got me a DNA test, and it stated I’m 100% Japanese.

As a child, I often dreamt about what I saw the night I was abandoned.

Our extended relatives made it clear. My sister and I were “add-ons.”

I’m grateful, truly, to be alive today. That’s why I tell my story.

My biological parents wanted us to be together with a Christian family.

There’s no information about me, my birth, my family in Korea. Nothing.

I don't talk much about growing up in an orphanage—my darkest moment.

It made me embarrassed, that I had to explain my existence to other people.

When I met my birth mom, it wasn't under the best circumstances.

Maybe even more as an adoptee, I’m afraid of losing my parents.

As of today, I do not know who is telling the truth, and who is not.

My college essay was called “My Lucky Number”— my case number, K90821.

My adopting father told me he met my mother, and he negotiated with her.

I enjoy traveling. When you travel, you’re not supposed to belong.

What I’ve learned through my faith in the Lord, is that it happened for a reason.

My mother simply asked me, “Would you like to go to America?”

All of a sudden, I saw real Koreans, who weren’t speaking Danish.

When I walk into a room, do people look at me and say, there’s the Asian girl?

If I wasn’t adopted, I’d be working a rice field. I’m not really an outdoor guy.

I have chosen to see adoption as a part of my life, not the driver.

It was an unspeakable act. I wanted to forget it. But I couldn’t.

There’s a different layer on life when someone chooses you.

My adoptive parents are Korean. I found out I was adopted 3 years ago.

We always felt we were Danish children, with Danish values and norms.

I did 23andMe. My second cousin on my birth father's side contacted me.

I did a total 180 from not hanging out with Asians, making up for lost time.

It wasn't until college that I started to sort out my multiple identities.

I’ll embrace the sorrow I still feel, and one day I will heal and forgive.

That pain never goes away. I take my pain, and I put anger over it.

In Korea, I can feel the way people look at me, and I lose confidence.

I’m most likely a foundling, left near a police station.

I miss Korea and my birth family. It’s a sadness that I carry with me.

I got married after my husband promised me he’d never mention my past.

Yeah, I’m black and Korean. But first and foremost, I’m black.

It’s important for me to share, to encourage others who’ve been victims.

After that, I kind of realized…okay, I’m a child born of rape.

I remember, vividly, the morning my mother gave us up. She was crying.

My mom told me herself that I was born on the floor at home.

My earliest memories are of living in one room with my birth mother.

I was 7 and a half when I was adopted. I was told that I had two sisters.

I am a man who should have died a long time ago, but I have a family now.

Because I’ve chosen to become a single mother, I think about my birth mother a lot.

Adoption includes the first family. The child did not appear from nowhere.

I didn’t get the answers I wished for, but I am more at peace with that.

I want to be as good a parent as my mom was for me. I’ll try my hardest.

My biological father is standing there, leaning over a motorcycle.

I didn’t have problems during childhood. I am who I am, Dutch Korean.

Mild curiosity grew into a need to connect with adoptees and Korean-Americans.

The email said, “We found your mother. You have to come to Korea now.”

For the first time, I saw other adoptees who looked a bit like me.

My adoptive parents are Korean. I grew up speaking Korean.

My teacher told the class, “This is her last day. She’s going to America.”

He puts his little hand on my face. “Momma, we have the same eyes.”

I was in the orphanage for the undesirable children. I was not adoptable.

My husband and I are both Korean. Our son inherits our Korean heritage.

My mom’s comment to me was, “You should be dating your own kind.”

I think that’s why God gave me my daughter, so I wouldn't be alone.

If I were to be given another life, I would want to receive parental love.

My mother thinks that I’m happy all the time, not how I have struggled.

Five Korean adoptees getting together, then 12, 15, 20, hundreds.

I see a lot of Chinese babies who are adopted. We kind of blazed a trail.

I sold hard taffy, physical labor. Those jobs were my ticket to survival.

What if I find out something I don't want to know? That scares me.

The woman on the phone says, “We think we found your mother.”

Korea never left me. Korea is inside of me. I eat, breathe, and live Korea.

My birth mother has remarried, and her husband can’t know that I exist.

It was like opening Pandora’s Box, this piece of paper in my hands.

I don’t know how to put it into words. I wish I could live like everyone else.

I don’t remember much, except the crying—all those unhappy children.

I meet facility alumni. Some are successful, some have gone astray.

God, why am I here? Why did you put me in this household?

People say my happy appearance is impressive, given my childhood.

I remember looking in the mirror, trying to see what made me a target.

I have both my birth family and my adoptive family, and I love them both.

Would I have been better off in Korea? I think the answer is always, no.

I was born to have an identity complex, being adopted and transgendered.

In the Holt records, it says that I was left on the doorstep of a man’s house.

I remember walking down a dirt road in Korea, and crying.

I’ve been homeless 15 times, from 1987 to the present—5 years in NYC.

What I had been looking for in my birth mom, I found when my son was born.

I learned that I was incredibly lucky to have grown up in Denmark.

We have to stop turning ourselves into victims.

A feeling of detachment, and an inability to connect with anybody.

Learning Korean really made me the most in touch with being Korean.

Mixed-race kids were seen as human refuse, a scourge on their culture.

When I married, I hid my history. Afterwards, the truth became known.

I was the baby—the first choice to give up for adoption. I understand that.

It took my birth father 35 years of searching. He finally found me 3 years ago.

My adoptive parents loved me so much, before they even had me.

I ask myself a lot of questions about my ability to be a mother.

It’s good to feel like you can acknowledge the complexities around adoption.

She gave me a ring she was wearing and said, “We have the same hands.”

I feel my friends hold the concept of finding birth parents closer than I do.

I never really discussed racism with my parents. I didn't want to relive it.

It’s not a job, but getting married that’s a challenge.

I grew up feeling like a Martian who had arrived from outer space.

Why is Korea still sending children for adoption abroad?