I am not a history buff. I never have been. But this summer, I attended my first adoptee conference, The Korean American Adoptee Adoptive Family Network (KAAN) Conference. I still think about my experience attending the conference, and it makes me ruminate on the past. My thoughts center not only on my own past but also those of my adoptive family, my birth family, and even South Korea. I reflect on those adoptees who came before me. They have occupied my mind since the conference.

One panel that still resonates with me is the Anti-Asian Hate, Asian American, and the Adoptee Experience. One presenter mentioned that we, as adoptees, do not all have to advocate in the same ways, while another presenter had us consider where our energy was best served within our communities. These words caused me to contemplate my role in the bigger picture of the Korean American Adoptee and Asian American communities, especially given the United States’ societal response to the Atlanta shooting in March 2021.

As an adoptee, I do not care for labels, nor do I consider myself an activist or a social justice warrior. But I try to help my community by giving my time and by being a part of a support system. I give my time in multiple organizations: some for profit; some non-profit. I strive to contribute positively to those in my orbit. As I think those who came before me in the adoptee community, particularly the Korean Adoptee Community, an unexplainable sense of pride swells within me. I have not met every adoptee in the world, I could not give you names of every individual, but my spirit has been touched by them through their lived experiences, their activism, and their advocacy.

Our communal experiences and voices as adoptees are instrumental in showing and telling another side of adoption. Even if we all had wonderfully amazing adoptive parents, a massive hole would still exist in our chest, tears in the fiber of our being from the loss we have all experienced. I view it as a collective loss and a collective sorrow. Though we might be strangers, we share the hardship from the burden we carry because of this insane, overwhelming sense of loss. Like a phantom limb pain, we cannot explain the agony because a portion of our history is gone, but we feel it nonetheless. With more time, maybe the pain will ease or become manageable, but it will not completely go away.

As I slowly start to figure out my place in the adoptee community and the AAPI community at large, I acknowledge this is an ongoing process, years in the making with many more years to come. I will be patient with myself and others along the way. I will be a friend to those in need of extra support and care as we uncover what adoption means to us. Hopefully, as a collective, we will all find ourselves on the other side. And it will be thanks in part to those who came before me.