Korea on the brain part III: Coming out of the fog
I've shared this photo before.
I used to see this picture as me, the really fat baby wearing some sort of weird vest. I've made fun of it countless times by comparing my size to my cousin's who is only one day older than me.
I can't pinpoint the exact moment when I granted myself permission to finally wonder about my real Korean identity, instead of refiling the thoughts, but I can tell you where I found it...Facebook.
There is a group of American Korean adoptees that formed a Facebook group where they chat about all things Korean adoptee. I found it by chance at the beginning of this year and have described it to my friends as the scene in Toy Story where Buzz Lightyear learns he is not a unique toy. He watches the commercial and sees there are thousands more just like him, waiting to be bought at the store.
It was freeing...such a relief.
I read the posts and, like when I read Nicole Chung's memoir, I was floored at the similar experiences we shared. This closed internet group on social media happens to be the first place on Earth where I felt like I effortlessly fit in. I don't know any individual personally, but knowing that any one of them could understand exactly how I feel about being a Korean adoptee is comforting and encouraging in a way I have never felt.
The adoptees in this group are amazing.
Some have taught themselves Korean and help others translate letters and birth information searches. They list sites that will help us learn too if interested. There are many brave adoptees who have gone back to Korea for extended stays or lived there and proudly immersed themselves in the place that gave them away. They suggest places to visit or eat if we ever find ourselves back in the country.
They share books, recipes, TV shows, and movies. They share podcasts and projects of other adoptees who advocate for all of us.
There are those who have mapped out the search process for finding birth families for those of us who haven't started. Some have found their birth families and have regular contact. Some have been searching for years and still have nothing. Some have hit a final dead end and have to accept they will never have their questions answered.
But most importantly, the adoptees share their every day feelings and experiences including the joys and the heartaches that only another Korean adoptee could truly understand. They offer support to one another and to me...giving me a plethora of information that makes me feel less lost about where to begin searching. They've helped me to feel brave.
We are a group of people who do not fit in completely in our American worlds and certainly wouldn't fit in completely in a Korean world either. We are in between worlds, but we are not alone.
I know if I had attended heritage camps when I was younger, it's possible I would have discovered this network way earlier than 40. But I can also forgive myself for rejecting all of it because I was only a child trying to protect my heart...I just didn't know it then.
After several months of reading all the posts in the group, the picture above came back to mind. Even though I've always made fun of it, there was something in that picture that always made me feel off. I found it and looked again, closer. The date of the picture is only about a month after I arrived in the cosmopolitan city of Tulsa, Oklahoma. I would have been 6-7 months old. I looked at my face, my furrowed brows, my frown. I still get that look now when I'm deep in thought about something serious or sad. I imagine my parents and my aunt and uncle were all doing the silly things parents do to make their kids look at the camera and smile. Even though my cousin isn't looking at the camera, she seems to be aware she's being talked to, even if distracted. I wouldn't look up though. Are they calling me Jennifer? Little goose? Whatever other prairie chicken farm animals my Dad always called us? Maybe no one was calling to us. Maybe it was just a candid shot.
I know if I had attended heritage camps when I was younger, it's possible I would have discovered this network way earlier than 40. But I can also forgive myself for rejecting all of it because I was only a child trying to protect my heart...I just didn't know it then.
After several months of reading all the posts in the group, the picture above came back to mind. Even though I've always made fun of it, there was something in that picture that always made me feel off. I found it and looked again, closer. The date of the picture is only about a month after I arrived in the cosmopolitan city of Tulsa, Oklahoma. I would have been 6-7 months old. I looked at my face, my furrowed brows, my frown. I still get that look now when I'm deep in thought about something serious or sad. I imagine my parents and my aunt and uncle were all doing the silly things parents do to make their kids look at the camera and smile. Even though my cousin isn't looking at the camera, she seems to be aware she's being talked to, even if distracted. I wouldn't look up though. Are they calling me Jennifer? Little goose? Whatever other prairie chicken farm animals my Dad always called us? Maybe no one was calling to us. Maybe it was just a candid shot.
Was I just tired, upset about something else or just being a normal infant in my own world? Or was I still trying to figure out what the hell was going on and why everything was so different...who were these people? Is this a captured moment where I was thinking I was alone and grieving a lost life?
I can't say.
Knowing what I know now and the research that has been done on trauma in adopted children, and seeing the same behavior in my own son when we brought him home...it's entirely possible, but I just don't know.
I don't know anything!
I very recently watched a virtual Long Table talk with a panel of Korean adoptee women. One woman, KaeLyn Rich, spoke about her love of stories and writing. She talks about how stories are about journeying and discovery with a beginning, middle and end but says that her life story begins with blank pages at the beginning and starts jarringly in the middle.
I've never thought about it like that.
Even though I was adopted as an infant, the beginning of my story is also incomplete. My origin is questionable because another thing I've learned from the group is that all of our stories on paper are the same variations: "A young, unmarried mother was unable to keep her child for whatever reason..."
Many adoptees who have reunited with their families have learned very different stories.
Where did I come from? What is my beginning? I don't even know if my Korean name is my family name given to me by my birth mother. I've learned that some of us were named at the welfare center much the same way stray dogs are named at the pound. (See Ennis and Ranger below)
When we went to pick up Alex back in 2012, I had tried to search for my birth mom through my adoption agency since I would be in the country. They did a search and said that the woman they found with their equivalent of a Korean social security number was not the right woman. Was this true? Why?
I was actually relieved that was the answer though. I wasn't ready to meet my birth mother on top of picking up my own child to bring home. That was going to be too much to unpack. I was happy to say I tried and be done with it all.
But this year, after reading more and more, I decided I would try again...this time with DNA testing.
Then Covid-19 happened.
I still plan on searching.
I have learned more about Korean culture this year than ever before thanks to the KADs.
Vivek and I watched our first K drama (twice) and loved it. We have been cooking more Korean food, and Alex and I have lazed around and talked about how we think our lives would be if we lived in Korea. It turns out, we wonder about the same things. He has verbalized the same questions, worded exactly how I think about them without me ever telling him how to say it.
I'm not saying I wear hanboks now or hang out in Koreatown every day or eat my meals with chopsticks. I'm still me. I am undeniably all American. I still know pretty much nothing about Korea. And I definitely still don't know how to do my eye makeup.
But I have the right to try and learn what happened in my beginning, to fill in those blank pages, as KaeLyn described. Doesn't everyone deserve to know where they come from? I understand that no matter how hard the circumstances were or how great of a life I've had (and it has been great), my Korean identity was taken from me the day I was put on a plane and flown here. Maybe my search for answers will yield something and maybe it won't but I do know that if by chance my birth mother is looking for me or waiting to hear from me, our time frame left for exchanging information is not as big as it once was.
The answers won't change who I am, it will just make me feel complete as a person.
The experts call this period of coming to terms and realizations about one's adoption "coming out of the fog". I laughed at this when I first read it because I imagined a very dramatic scene involving, well...walking out of a literal foggy place. But then the joke was on me because this is actually the perfect description for how it feels. They're not called experts for nothing.
Maybe some adoptees allow themselves to emerge from the fog before they're in their 40s, but I've always dragged my feet in making choices.
I understand I still have a lot to work through, but my heart feels lighter about it now and I'm feeling better equipped for the journey ahead.
I can't say.
Knowing what I know now and the research that has been done on trauma in adopted children, and seeing the same behavior in my own son when we brought him home...it's entirely possible, but I just don't know.
I don't know anything!
I very recently watched a virtual Long Table talk with a panel of Korean adoptee women. One woman, KaeLyn Rich, spoke about her love of stories and writing. She talks about how stories are about journeying and discovery with a beginning, middle and end but says that her life story begins with blank pages at the beginning and starts jarringly in the middle.
I've never thought about it like that.
Even though I was adopted as an infant, the beginning of my story is also incomplete. My origin is questionable because another thing I've learned from the group is that all of our stories on paper are the same variations: "A young, unmarried mother was unable to keep her child for whatever reason..."
Many adoptees who have reunited with their families have learned very different stories.
Where did I come from? What is my beginning? I don't even know if my Korean name is my family name given to me by my birth mother. I've learned that some of us were named at the welfare center much the same way stray dogs are named at the pound. (See Ennis and Ranger below)
 |
| Elvis and Paco from the pound |
When we went to pick up Alex back in 2012, I had tried to search for my birth mom through my adoption agency since I would be in the country. They did a search and said that the woman they found with their equivalent of a Korean social security number was not the right woman. Was this true? Why?
I was actually relieved that was the answer though. I wasn't ready to meet my birth mother on top of picking up my own child to bring home. That was going to be too much to unpack. I was happy to say I tried and be done with it all.
But this year, after reading more and more, I decided I would try again...this time with DNA testing.
Then Covid-19 happened.
I still plan on searching.
I have learned more about Korean culture this year than ever before thanks to the KADs.
Vivek and I watched our first K drama (twice) and loved it. We have been cooking more Korean food, and Alex and I have lazed around and talked about how we think our lives would be if we lived in Korea. It turns out, we wonder about the same things. He has verbalized the same questions, worded exactly how I think about them without me ever telling him how to say it.
I'm not saying I wear hanboks now or hang out in Koreatown every day or eat my meals with chopsticks. I'm still me. I am undeniably all American. I still know pretty much nothing about Korea. And I definitely still don't know how to do my eye makeup.
But I have the right to try and learn what happened in my beginning, to fill in those blank pages, as KaeLyn described. Doesn't everyone deserve to know where they come from? I understand that no matter how hard the circumstances were or how great of a life I've had (and it has been great), my Korean identity was taken from me the day I was put on a plane and flown here. Maybe my search for answers will yield something and maybe it won't but I do know that if by chance my birth mother is looking for me or waiting to hear from me, our time frame left for exchanging information is not as big as it once was.
The answers won't change who I am, it will just make me feel complete as a person.
The experts call this period of coming to terms and realizations about one's adoption "coming out of the fog". I laughed at this when I first read it because I imagined a very dramatic scene involving, well...walking out of a literal foggy place. But then the joke was on me because this is actually the perfect description for how it feels. They're not called experts for nothing.
Maybe some adoptees allow themselves to emerge from the fog before they're in their 40s, but I've always dragged my feet in making choices.
I understand I still have a lot to work through, but my heart feels lighter about it now and I'm feeling better equipped for the journey ahead.
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