This picture is of one of the nurses who cared for me at the clinic in Seoul. I do not know why there is a picture of 2 white kids on the wall, but that’s for another time.
In November, National Adoptee Awareness Month changed the way I think about adoption and the traumas associated with it; how history is removed, how culture is removed, how language is removed, how family is removed. Each removal is another scar laid upon the heart of a child who cannot voice dissent. And for many, these scars never fully heal.
We wear these scars no matter our circumstance. I grew up with privilege, with access and opportunity, with love, and still my scars haunted me. I didn’t know what they were then. I didn’t know they were a real thing. But as I’ve heard more adoptees’ stories and read more books about adoptees and started meeting (virtually) so many adoptees, I’ve started to learn about my own scars and how I can reckon with those.
In this picture, I’m freshly scarred, with a few more still to come. Well, baby P, it took 30 years, but you grew up and got to a better place. Love you dude ?