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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

We have to stop turning ourselves into victims.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Why is Korea still sending children for adoption abroad?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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