We have to stop turning ourselves into victims.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Why is Korea still sending children for adoption abroad?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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