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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Why is Korea still sending children for adoption abroad?

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

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

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

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

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

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.”

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

We have to stop turning ourselves into victims.

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