Twin
When my twin sister and I were born, my birth mother left us at the hospital.
The adoption agency, figuring they could get more money from two separate kids, decided to split us up.
I was sent to an orphanage; she was adopted right away. After that, I lived in the orphanage for three years before an American couple adopted me.
I remember when my adoptive parents came and got me: I looked at them and ran down the opposite hall screaming. But they played with me and then took me home.
I wouldn't answer to my new name Maggie, so my adoptive parents called me Leanie. I was a wild child. Very wild. Probably because I wasn’t used to so much freedom. I had nightmares and anger issues. I was violent.
I went to therapy, but that didn't help. It just made me feel worse. It felt like my whole family turned on me for some reason and, in turn, I became a very depressed kid. I was taken to different hospitals for research - poked, prodded and put into machines for testing. The doctors wanted to know how the brains of adopted children were different from those of non-adopted children.
I was referred to a psychologist as a kid and was diagnosed with ADHD, severe ADD, severe RAD, dyslexia, and severe PTSD. I took pills, but then secretly stopped.
I didn’t have a bad life with my adoptive parents. It just wasn’t a good fit.
My biggest issue has been trying to figure out who I really am. I feel so tied to Russia and feel very out of place here. I also feel a part of me is missing since my twin sister was taken from me.
At times, I don't have anywhere to turn and my adopted family doesn't understand.
So I just put it behind me. I have dreams of her though.
I’m sharing my story because I want people to know how devastating it is to lose a twin. How you feel so out of touch when you can't find or ever talk to the person who's a part of you. How even though you are adopted and feel loved by your family, sometimes you just feel disconnected.
"Mi Hija"
I am a Guatemalan adoptee. I was born in Guatemala. I do not remember much about my adoption, and I have lived most of my life in the United States. I do know that, a few hours after I was born, I was placed into foster care, where I would spend the first five months of my life until I was adopted. I only saw my birth mother once more before I was adopted, and that was so a DNA test could be performed.
I had a happy and healthy childhood. I grew up in a single parent home, and I have another sibling who is also adopted from Guatemala (we have different birth mothers). As a child, I cannot recall a time where I was bothered by the fact that I was adopted. I believe that my mom always spoke about my birth mom in a respectful manner, and had explained to me that I was adopted because my birth mother loved me, but could not care for me at that time in her life, and wanted me to have a life full of many opportunities and privileges. Although such an explanation may not have had as much meaning to me as a child, I realize that now it does, and is one of the reasons why I decided to search for my birth mother.
When I was 14 years old, I ended up finding my adoption documents. I learned a lot from the documents, including my birth mother’s name, date of birth, a brief summary of her life, and the reasons why she decided to place me for adoption. Later on I found the DNA test summary, which included a photo of my birth mother holding me when I was about three months old. I was happy to have that information about my birth mother, but I didn’t know how to feel. She was a complete stranger to me.
Around this time last year my mom gave me information about an organization that conducts birth mother searches for Guatemalan adoptees. I was interested, but I was studying for my final exams and decided that after the school year was over, I would start the search process. The school year ended, but I was still busy, as I ended up doing a lot of traveling last summer. One of my trips was a service trip with other teens to Guatemala.
At the same time, things that I had been told all my life by family members (such as [If I would have stayed in Guatemala,] “you wouldn’t be able to read or write, you wouldn’t have gone to school, your life would be caring for children and cooking and cleaning”) were disproven, and I learned that, although this is the case for some children, it’s not always true. Some Guatemalans may live in poverty, but they are rich in character and spirit.
Toward the end of last year, I started the search for my birth mother, and she was able to be located. When I received the news that they had found her, I was excited and numb and in a daze, but a few weeks later, I started to feel strong and powerful emotions characteristic of grief and mourning. I had no idea that I could love and care about someone so much who I had no conscious memories of.
In January, I ended up reconnecting via social media with many members of my birth family, including my birth mother, and this enabled me to start communicating directly with everyone. Although I am glad to know my family members, I feel very much like an outsider, and have struggled with my identity. I have lost my heritage and customs that my birth family still maintains. I am learning Spanish, but I am only semi-fluent, and this language barrier has led to miscommunications and makes speaking to my birth mother hard and awkward at times.
Overall, I believe that reconnecting with my birth mother and family has had a profound impact on me. It has tested existing relationships; it has created drama and tension; and it has created a rollercoaster of emotions. It has unearthed heartbreaking details, such as the fact that my birth mother tried to get me back, that she prayed to God for forgiveness, and that He would return her daughter one day. However, I have also tried to educate myself on adoptions, and I have done research so that I can try to understand the three points of views that make up the adoption triad. While I am not opposed to adoptions, I think that open adoptions are very important, and I think it is important for adoptees to know that their feelings are normal and should be acknowledged.
I hope to meet my birth mother soon, but that is not the end of my adoption journey. For now, I call her once a week so that we can chat and so that she can help me practice my Spanish. Our phone calls allow us to get to know each other, and I am extremely grateful for them. She addresses me as “mi hija/mija/mijita”, which means “my daughter” in Spanish, and while it may seem like a no-brainer for her to call me this, it is very meaningful to me.
My story is personal, exciting, painful, and new. While it is extraordinary and unique to me, many other adoptees also have a story, just as everyone in this world - regardless of where they come from. No two stories are the same.
The Kids Slept In Cages
Here is my story:
I was born in Voronezh, Russia, to a woman whom I don't have much information on, but enough to partially understand. She was doing drugs while I was in the womb, and that caused complications during my birth (and well after).
When I was born, she gave me up immediately.
After that, she ran away and was nowhere to be found, so my paperwork was slim-to-nothing. But, what I do know is that she gave birth to five other kids. Three died due to complications, one is still living in who-knows-where, and the other is me.
As I said, I was born with complications. I was taken to a place for sick babies. Once I got better, I was then transferred to an orphanage in the woods right outside of Voronezh.
The orphanage's living conditions were terrible. The kids slept in cages at night, and there was little food. Like most orphanages, we shared clothes and did small chores. There was physical abuse and not enough love to pass around.
I was there for a little over three years before I got adopted. The orphanage tried to find my family members first, but none stepped up, so my adoptive parents got there wish. I was scared and confused as to why people whom I had never seen were taking me away from the only place I had ever known.
My parents told me that, every chance I had, I fought them so I could escape.
But, they eventually took me home on a plane and my new life started.
There were many challenges growing up. Therapy upon therapy. Language tutors - since I spoke Russian when I came. Constant fighting at home. My parents believed in physical punishment to "fix " the problem, but that led to more fights and terror around the house. How could I trust people that lashed out at me? As the years went on, things got much better. Our relationship is still struggling, but it's getting better.
There were also challenges with being adopted. Especially international adoption. It's not like I can search in the United States for my family; my family is overseas and there are other challenges that I still deal with - like not knowing who I really am and wondering why I was given up every other day.
Sharing my story is very important because I know what it's like to be stuck in the dark and have no one else around you that understands. I felt that way until I found the Russian Adoptees Worldwide group where we can share our experiences and connect. I'm hoping I can help at least one person out there, not just by sharing my story but by coming in contact with them and talking about our past and our present.
Second Chance
From what I remember, my birth mother was great.
But she had a bad case of lupus, so the only time that I got to see her was at the USC hospital. The week before my twin sister and I's fifth birthday, she passed away.
In fact, we weren't even allowed to take pictures with her. To this day, we don't know where she's buried.
After she passed, my sister and I were moved to my uncle's house. Our pre-school teacher ended up calling the police on him.
I have nightmares and anxiety just thinking about it, and I've built walls just because of what he did to us.
My childhood was a rollercoaster. I had to grow up pretty fast.
My uncle abused and molested us. When they picked me up from pre-school, they didn't even know that I had a twin sister. No one around me knew what I was saying because I only spoke Spanish. I was confused and frightened. I was worried they would leave her behind.
They eventually picked her up, though, and from the time we were six years old to the time we officially got adopted, we moved around to different foster homes.
When we were eight years old, we were adopted. Everything changed from there, for the better.
Not to say that I didn't still have struggles - I did. I developed learning disabilities because of what happened with my uncle. People made fun of me because I found learning so difficult.
I enjoyed getting to know my new family members, though, and I'm glad that adoption gave me a second chance at life.
In 10 years, I hope to do the same. I want to give some child a second chance.
Adoption is a wonderful thing. You can change a child's life. It's important to share and be open about your struggles because it does help to heal the wounds you have from being an orphan. It's certainly changed my life for the better.
Too Old To Be Adopted
I want to share my story with you because life is not all rainbows and flowers. It’s hard.
I was born in Surgut, Russia. It is in Siberia. I was born into a Muslim family. At home we spoke Tatar, but when we went out in the world we spoke Russian.
I lived with my mother, grandfather, and grandmother. My grandparents raised me because I had a single mom who worked often and spent a lot of time outside the house. My grandfather worked in the tundra as a lumberjack. He was a tough guy and wanted me to be tough as well. I always thought he was picking on me by making me work hard, or by making me cry, but now I think he was just trying to make me stronger. My grandmother, on the other hand, worked inside the house: making the most amazing Russian dishes you can think of. It wasn’t a bad life, by any means.
Then, everything changed: my grandpa's only son, Marseille, was murdered on a public bus. About three years later, when I was nine years old, my grandfather left my grandmother for a younger woman. She was devastated; she died from a heart attack about a year later. Meanwhile, my mom got a new boyfriend and became pregnant, giving birth to another daughter. Approximately a year after my grandmother passed away, my mom's boyfriend stabbed my mother in the heart. On her deathbed, she made me promise that I keep my two younger sisters and I together, no matter what. We ended up in an orphanage. Even though we had family near, they didn't want us.
Prior to being adopted, I lived with my two younger sisters in an orphanage. As a child I took care of them, and never really had time to be a child myself. Orphanage gave me that opportunity: I didn't have to cook, clean, or watch the little ones. I didn’t have to worry about food. It was all taken care of. I met a lot of different people there and maybe also picked up some bad habits, like smoking. I started smoking when I was only twelve years old.
The orphanage even took us on vacations, which, for me and my sisters, was unheard of. We spent one summer in Bulgaria. It was amazing. The hot springs, the Black Sea, the sun!
I lived in two orphanages. "Zazerkalie" and "Na Kalinke." My sisters and I were there for a little over two years, and I was eleven years old when we were sent there. My sister was five years old and my younger sister was only six months old. It was hard to adjust to being institutionalized, but you get used to it. Used to chaos, perfectly making your bed, and eating three meals a day (which we could not afford after my grandmother's death). The constant rotation of people. The saddest stories you’ve ever heard. It all becomes normal.
I was thirteen years old, too old by orphanage standards to be adopted. I had two younger sisters, who were seven years old and two years old at the time. The year was 1996, just a few weeks after my birthday in June.
I did not want to be adopted, because my personality had already formed, and I couldn’t imagine loving and calling someone a mother and a father, after what happened to my family. But I promised my mother that I would keep my sisters and I together, so I agreed to the adoption anyways.
When I got adopted, I didn’t know much about the family that I was about to join. I got some photos of them about two weeks before they arrived to pick us up, but that was it.
The first challenge that I ran into, of course, was that I did not speak English. The next challenge was to form a relationship with my adoptive family. We are still not very close. I see them at Christmas, if that. I moved out when I was seventeen years old, and took guardianship of my middle sister when she turned seventeen as well.
I thought that adoption meant you get a loving family.
Now I believe that you can only receive unconditional love from your biological parents.
We didn’t get along at all. My middle sister and I fought with our adoptive family. They always treated us like we did something wrong. All the time. I’m glad to be out of that household.
I never felt love for them, only ashamed and guilty.
I miss Mother Russia tremendously, and right now I’m saving money to visit the remaining family I have in Russia.
1 out of 30,000
As a child in Romania, I didn’t understand the concept of poverty.
I didn’t worry about making food or money like my parents and older siblings. I was content with my role within the family. I was looked after by everybody. At times I remember being hungry and cold, but I don’t remember being unhappy. I didn't worry about getting water from a well instead of getting instant city water from the tap. I didn't worry about the outhouse in our backyard.
My name is Georgiana and I was born in Bucharest, Romania. I always felt safe there. It will always be home for me. Two major events took place when I was only three years old: my parent’s divorce and Romania’s 1989 bloody and televised revolution.
Shortly after the divorce, my mother moved out of the house and I stayed in the custody of my father, who had parental rights over us. My mother paid child support to him. My parents had nine children together, and my mother had one more son after the divorce. Even though I was closer with my father, I knew that both my parents loved me. Even after my mother moved out and I rarely saw her, I never questioned it.
My oldest sister ended up taking on a more authoritarian role within the family and started making more decisions around the house. I remember going to church with her often. I was being raised as a Roman Catholic, and I wholly embraced the songs of her church. My father didn’t attend the Catholic church because he was Orthodox; Orthodox and Catholics celebrate different traditions and beliefs.
I was not raised in an orphanage. The priest of my sister’s church was in contact with many orphanages, and he attempted to assist several families financially, including my own family. He also helped the families create "adoptable children."
I will not use the term “orphan” in my writing without the use of quotations because, otherwise, it breeds the incorrect impression I’m trying to make and contributes to the "paper orphans" the adoption industry creates today in order to prey on vulnerable families. The definition of “orphan” was recently changed by UNICEF to include children who have at least one living parent; aka: single parents who struggle financially.
Furthermore, I will not be using any qualifiers in front of my family—I won’t be using words such as birth, biological, natural, or first—because my family was the only family I knew before adoption came unexpectedly into my life. I will be calling the people who adopted me, "the people who adopted me.” I will also refer to the people who adopted me as "the woman who adopted me" or "the man who adopted me." Today, I prefer to use their first names when discussing them but because I want to keep their identities as anonymous as possible, I can't in this piece of writing.
I don't call them "my adoptive parents" because I could have been any child, and they could have been anyone’s “adoptive parents.”
Before I turned five years old, I was adopted. The idea first came to my oldest sister from her priest, and she told my father about the American women who were looking for "adoptable children." The women came to our house with a translator. The priest told them that my family had been praying for somebody to adopt their children because of the social stigma of poverty.
Communism had suppressed many people, and although my family struggled like most Romanian families during that time, we were more "well off" compared to other families who had placed their children in institutions. Most of the time, the institutions were not used for adoption purposes; instead, the institutions were used during the colder months of the years for the child to be cared for, much Americans would use daycare facilities. The intent was to bring the children home after the cold months were over. Things changed dramatically after the end of communism.
Roelie Post, European Civil Servant and author of Romania for Export Only has documented the changes that have occurred in Romania's adoption history. Before 1989, adoption was uncommon in Romania; they were personally and privately approved by President Ceausescu. Not many laws were in place for adoptions in Romania after the revolution. That’s why, in mid-1991, Romania closed international adoption for a few months because of child trafficking happening under the guise of “adoption.” Many adoption agencies and "do it yourself adoptive parents" still found loopholes within the law, and organizations used this to promote their own agendas. After Romania's revolution, many North Americans and Westernized Europeans came to Romania to adopt the children they had seen on 20/20 and other news documentaries that had filmed the worst institutions in Romania. The women who visited my family had seen these images and visited several orphanages and institutions looking for children to adopt. Only after five weeks of first meeting the women, I left Romania with them.
My mother was opposed to adoption because she had heard about children who were sold to black markets for child trafficking or the removal of their body parts. My mother didn’t want that happening to us. She was correct in her assumption that, in the hands of strangers, anything could have happened to us. She went to court to express her concerns but her rights as my mother were permanently terminated.
My father thought adoption could be a great opportunity to have an American education; and after achieving this, he believed I'd return to Romania to be with him and the family.
My father’s dream for my life didn't turn out how he imagined.
Although he agreed to the adoption, it was only my mother's loss of parental rights that was necessary to complete the adoption during that time. The women then proved my siblings and I were "orphans" even though we still had living parents by claiming that my parents had been abusive and couldn’t financially care for us.
Before leaving for the United States, my oldest sister asked me if I wanted to be adopted and to go live in America. It appealed to my imagination. I had been told stories about having everything I could desire. I “agreed” to her question without a full understanding of what it really meant.
If I had known the consequences and permanence that adoption would have over the rest of my life, I never would have agreed.
I went to America with two sisters. The older of the two was adopted into the same family as me while my other sister was adopted by a separate family in the United States.
My siblings in Romania told me everything would be “better,” and for a while, everything was. Everything was new and bright. There were different smells and sounds. I was definitely a foreign child, and I’d often be punished for my mistakes of not understanding my surroundings and the new rules that applied.
The first house I lived in was in Oregon State.
I remember taking an apple from the kitchen—a nice, bright, beautiful, and smooth-looking apple. I took a bite out of it and realized that there was no flavor like I was used to in Romania.
I instantly disliked this apple.
I didn’t know how to articulate my dislike for it, but I knew I didn’t want to eat it. I didn’t know what to do. My new surroundings confused me, so I took the apple with the bite-mark and threw it down the toilet. We didn’t have a flushing toilet in my house in Romania. I had never experienced one before. The swiveling water looked amazing, but also terrifying. Where did that water come from exactly, and where did it go to? I watched the apple go down the toilet, and water fill up to the rim of the toilet edge. I had never seen a clog before, and I left the room without saying a word, thinking everything was fine.
Everything was not fine.
When I was beat for clogging the toilet, I vowed to be better. I vowed to not make so many stupid mistakes again.
I remember at dinner time, having to eat everything on our plates. If we didn’t, then we couldn’t leave the table. We were told to eat it or we would be sent back to Romania to starve. These types of statements were made often when the people who adopted me talked about Romania. The country of my roots was frowned upon. I was made to feel like it was a disgusting place to go to or, worse, to be from. I was made to feel that I should never return to it. That my life of privilege should be embraced because, if I chose to ignore the life that was thrust upon me, I was disposable. I was a girl ripped up by her roots and everything she used to know. Nobody realized that I was grieving the only life I longed to return to.
I learned quickly that speaking Romanian in our new house was not allowed and I didn’t want to draw attention to myself any more than necessary. We weren’t allowed to talk about Romania unless it was to a news reporter about how we were "rescued from our life of impoverishment." My sister and I were given attention because both of us were “new” to the family. The people who adopted us already had children of their own, and I now had two American brothers close to my age and two American sisters who had moved out already. My sister and I didn’t get along with our new brothers.
I became tired of people touching me. Doctors poked at me, and strangers picked me up when I didn’t want to be. Reporters came, took pictures of us, and asked us silly questions. I didn’t understand any of these things, but I wanted to. I wanted to be a good girl for my father. I wanted to feel accepted and safe. I didn’t want to let my parents down, and I was starting to become confused as to who my parents were anymore. Were they the people I had spent the first years of my life with, or were they the people I was now forced to call "mom and dad?" Were they the people who were physically taking care of me by supplying me with food, shelter, and clothing, or were they the people I missed so ardently that I had left behind in my country of origin?
I felt abandoned by my Romanian family. I wanted to go home, but I couldn’t. Because I wasn’t allowed to talk about Romania, I would hide in my room.
I was striving for perfection. I became the perfect child that hid in the background, never complaining and never causing trouble. I became secretive. The people who adopted me didn’t know how to console me, and I don’t think that they understood my depression, even if they noticed it. They no longer cared about my origins. They told me on several occasions that it didn’t matter. I was "saved," and I should feel grateful to be in the United States.
As I became older, I wondered why I was "chosen" for adoption instead of a child already in an institution. I not only had a family but I lived with them. I still fail to understand this.
I maintained my charade of perfection for years. I kept it up when letters arrived from Romania from my oldest sister and my father. When I responded to the letters, I always stated how fine everything was. I never said how I really felt. I never stated how much I missed them and didn’t understand why I couldn’t be with them. I also apologized to my father for no longer knowing the Romanian language.
When I was seven years old, my brother came to the United States. I was happy he came to live with us. He was 15, a year older than my sister, but he quickly learned the rules, too. He helped me translate the letters from my family that I didn’t understand, but always in private. My siblings and I became US citizens before I turned nine years old.
I remained a good girl through everything: my name change, getting a new Russian brother, continually moving from house to house, my older siblings moving out, my father's death, and my changing body. The woman who adopted me always stated how disgusting my body was and picked at my skin until it bled.
The people who adopted me then divorced. I was unwanted by either of them but they fought over their sons.
The people who adopted me moved into separate places. I decided to go to friend’s houses more often because I dreaded returning to my uncertain future with the house of the people who adopted me. I stayed with the man who adopted me when I wasn’t at friends’ houses only because he had custody of me. He didn’t have a house of his own and, because he was a car salesman, we often stayed the night at the dealership. He’d lie and tell his coworkers that he arrived early. I of course, said nothing. I was always the good girl.
A year later, I moved in with the woman who adopted me because she now had custody over me. I sold my horse and left the farmland I lived at for more than 5 years, which is the closest place in America that I have considered calling my "hometown;" I don't because it's a town full of dead ends and bad memories. We stayed at the farm longer than a year, which was a record. I felt extremely sad at selling my horse, who I considered my best friend since he didn’t—and couldn’t—judge me. I felt sad at leaving my school friends behind, but I did it all anyways.
I went to my new school and made new friends. I had extremely high marks and was doing excellent in my classes. I believed that education could really be the key to my salvation.
Everything was going well, until a package arrived at the house of the woman who adopted me.
Inside was a suicide note from my brother. All extended family arrived, search and rescue was called, and within the week they found my brother in the mountains with a bullet hole through his chest.
I was 15 when my brother died and that’s when everything changed. I stopped caring about my classes or homework, or anything of material value. His death made me realize how precious our time with people we care about is. His death made me realize how the material things didn't make up for the emotional support I had been craving and lacking for a great extent of my life. I started to smoke cigarettes and dabbled in drugs and drinking. I started to talk back to the woman who adopted me when she verbally attacked me. A chord inside of me snapped, and I didn’t care anymore.
The only person I looked up to had killed himself, and I wanted to join him.
The woman who adopted me couldn’t take my wild behavior anymore and told me that I was moving out. She stated that she didn’t care where I lived, that I could be homeless, as long as I no longer lived with her. She brought me boxes and I packed my things. I took a train to Washington State and moved in with the man who adopted me and his new Russian wife.
My behavior didn’t change much until close to my senior year of high school. I fought with the man who adopted me and his wife constantly. I fought with everyone. When I turned 18, the man who adopted me sold his house, moved, and left me to graduate high school on my own. I suddenly found myself with no real friends and no real safe place to go to. I had a job and, thankfully, I had bought a car in order to make it to work and school. I stayed with some guys who violated me, and eventually found myself a boyfriend who invited me to live with him.
I thought life with my boyfriend couldn’t get any better. Things seemed good, but they weren’t. He was more than 15 years older than me, but he told me he was “divorcing his wife.”
When I realized he had no intention of leaving her, I felt trapped in the world I had created. My first home with the first person I really cared about stopped being a home. Again, I felt rejected, which only fueled my depression. When our relationship ended, I found a place where I had my own room. I vowed that I would concentrate on fixing myself and I would stay out of relationships since my first real relationship had ended disastrously.
I was extremely depressed when my housemate introduced me to a guy and persuaded me to go on a date with him. He was two years older than my ex but with many more problems. The relationship was violent from the start. I moved in with him because I still didn’t have anybody and I was finding it even more difficult to leave the unhealthy relationship that I didn’t want.
One week before turning 21, the violent man and I were married. Things only continued to get worse, but then he committed a serious crime and was arrested. He was charged with attempted homicide, his second felony of the same nature. Part of the agreement in his plea bargain was to take medication to help him level out his severe bipolar disorder.
Things improved tremendously. When I felt safe enough, I asked for a divorce and moved out. He didn’t stalk me and he didn’t fight me. He signed the papers and allowed me to divorce him. I was 23 when my divorce was finalized and I took back my original name.
The first moment I held up my new ID with my Romanian name on it was the first moment I felt true freedom.
It was one of the happiest moments of my life. I will never forget it; it was the first step to accepting who I was, and who I am.
Emotionally I was also in a better place. I was learning how to set boundaries and learning how to state how I felt. I had become homeless not long after my divorce and to this day I’m still homeless. I lost my job and didn’t have enough money to afford my own place.
Finding my own way in this brutal and abrasive world has caused me to absolutely accept and trust myself; it has caused my sense of self to grow.
I’ve accepted my temporary life as a homeless person. One day, I won’t be homeless. One day, I will find my true home, and can feel safe staying in one place for a while. Being homeless has taught me a lot of things, but mostly it has taught me that, in a way, I have always been homeless. I was an imposter in the family that adopted me. I was abandoned by all who have claimed to have loved me. Homelessness has taught me patience and resilience. When I found a job that could have allowed me to save enough money to find a place, that job went away. I decided college could be my way out of the mess I had found myself in. I graduated with my Associate’s Degree in pre-law in June 2016. I enjoyed college and hope to attend another university to obtain my Bachelor’s Degree, though I have no idea when that will happen. I have been having difficulties with the transfer process, but I know my resilience will eventually win out or I will find a steady job that will allow me the security I deserve. Either way, I am proud of the degree I now have because I am the first person in my Romanian family to have a college education; I worked hard for my grades and scholarships paid for my classes. Strangers believed in me and that helped me to believe in myself.
College helped me grow. It helped me to learn about Romania because I could study and write about Romanian history, culture, or politics for my class papers. College helped me to get the courage to accept my sister’s invitation to visit our family in Romania together. I spent just over two weeks there. My visit was too short to say the least. I wish I could have communicated better with my family but since visiting, I have been studying the language and I know I will be able to communicate better next time.
I wish I could have had a heart-to-heart with my mother and told her not to blame herself for my adoption since ultimately she had no say in what happened to us. I had no say in what had happened to me either.
I wish I could have told her that adoption meant nothing to me until it happened to me. It was the one life-altering event that keeps on giving me grief, heartache, misunderstandings, language barriers, cultural barriers, family disconnections, and identity issues.
Adoption has also given me strength to fight for myself and to fight for others who are less fortunate than I am. It has given me resilience and a lust for fighting injustices worldwide. This injustice has caused me to open "Romanian Adoptees Worldwide - RAW" on Facebook. This site helps connect adopted people and expose the hidden side of adoption practices. Adoption has forced me out of my comfort zone, but it has caused me to search for what I find comfortable. It has caused me to not settle for anything less than I deserve. I wish I could have learned this prior to being adopted, but I know the effect of my learning wouldn’t have been as successful unless I went through the emotions myself.
I decided to share my story because I know it will help others come to terms with their past. I know my story will help shed light on adoption practices and the corruption that exists within the adoption world. When I tell my story, it ends up having less power over me, and I can then end up owning it.
It’s important to me that I be looked at as the 30-year-old adult I am today instead of that 4-year-old "orphan" created by adoption.
I want to show the world that there is hope and strength in accepting oneself. I want the world to know that I am one of approximately 30,000 children who were adopted from Romania between 1989 and 2007 before Romania closed international adoption to apply the same laws and standards as the rest of the European Union. Romania is working towards meeting all EU standards per their membership.
My story could be anybody's story. I want the world to know that my voice should be valued more than somebody else speaking on my behalf. I deserve to tell my truth, instead of an agency, an adoptive parent, or an illegal photograph of an institutionalized child. Every adult deserves to share their truth regardless of what their origins and history are.
My history continues to write itself, and my story doesn’t end here. It doesn’t end with me in homelessness. My goal is to achieve something greater with my life. I don’t know where my life will take me, but I am willing to take chances if I see opportunities that will help me to improve my life.
The only thing holding me back are my own destructive demons I have yet to conquer.
Survival of the Fittest
My American name is Anthony Callaghan. My Russian name—the name I was born with on March 3rd, 1987, in St. Petersburg, Russia—is Ruslan Valentinovich Markov.
My story starts in an orphanage referred to as Detsky Dom #2. That's as far back as I can remember.
My life in the orphanage was basically survival of the fittest. You had to fight over sharing clothes and shoes. If you needed to use the toilet you would go in a pot in the middle of the room, where we all slept. The first one there would always win while the rest of us were left to fend for ourselves.
None of us received loving care, the type that children need to feel safe and wanted, but in the cold culture of Russia that was to be expected.
My life completely changed once I got adopted.
I was mistaken very quickly.
No one told me I was getting adopted until that day when a nurse came in to the hospital and told me that my new parents were to take me home. No words could ever describe the feeling of a family wanting you. I ran as fast as I could around that corner and there they were. I knew nothing about them but at that moment I thought nothing could be better. I couldn’t have been more excited to get adopted in to a better life.
I found out later that it was my adoptive brother who picked me out of all the other kids in the orphanage. I’m not really sure what he saw in me, but a huge thank you goes out to him.
My life changed again when, after a year of being adopted into my new family, I was physically abused for the next five in every way you can imagine. Instead of being in that field of roses, I was beaten for wetting my bed when I was still a kid. I had to re-engage the skills I had learned in the orphanage to survive again. During that time I stole, lied, and did everything I could think of to avoid getting beaten. I even forged my teacher’s signatures.
As time went on, Child Protective Services came out twice only to take my dad away the second time. He was tried and sentenced to prison for his crimes.
Only then did my healing process begin.
I was very emotional during the years that followed. Trust me: It was a rough patch in my life. Police were called on me because of violence. I even went through a straight week living at a courthouse testifying my story. I had a lot of pent-up anger that I let out on anyone I could. I knew it was make-or- break for me. I felt that anger would eventually hold me back from bigger and better things.
It was one of the lowest moments in my life and I didn't know how to handle it. No one was there to show me how to process all that had happened to me.
Nowadays I'm a very different person. In 2015, I was diagnosed with cancer. I went through chemotherapy and radiation.
Several things that I would like to pass on to fellow adoptees: You’ve got to let these life changes be life lessons because without them you won’t grow as a person.
You have to understand that you are as strong as you will allow yourself to be.
No one is here to hold your hand.
I promised myself that I would stand up and hold my ground until my last breath. Why? Because I stand behind what I believe and don't let anyone tell me otherwise.
Today, I'm a truck driver and love every aspect of it.
Don't let your past stop you from your future because then you’re on a leash made by your own fears.
Let loose.
Care about the people who matter to you because in the end those are the people in your life that are there for you.
Choices
Our decisions are what make us unique, but sometimes we don’t get to make those choices ourselves. Instead, they’re made for us by other people.
This is true for me and so many other adoptees. Let me tell you my story, and you will see that sometimes we have to take what is given to us and make the choice to grow from those challenges and experiences.
My birth name was Vera Sergeevna Perminova. I was born in Ivanovo, Russia to two parents and an older sister named Nadya. When I was seven years old, police came to our house to take my sister and I out of the custody of our parents and into two different orphanages. We were taken away from them due to alcoholism and neglect.
For the next two years, I was moved through three different orphanages with their own unique challenges, trying to survive the bullying and waves of instability. I was adopted into an amazing family in 2004 by incredible parents and an older sister named Jenny.
I was rebellious with my adoptive parents. I challenged them on every authoritative decision and fought with my adoptive sister almost every day.
I learned that I suffer from Fetal Alcohol Syndrome because my birth mother decided to drink alcohol when she was pregnant with me. In school, I discovered that I suffer from forgetful memory in small daily tasks, short focus, as well as other symptoms that often affect my life in a small way.
It was a challenge to accept that I have to suffer the consequences of choices my birth mother made when I wasn’t even born.
As an adoptee who had just suffered the loss of her native language, family, culture, and certainty of her future, adjusting to a new language and culture was not an easy thing.
Walking into a new family who had already created close bonds with each other was difficult.
Without the background of being birthed into that family, it was hard to feel loved, wanted, appreciated and—most importantly—understood. It took my family eight years before they finally realized that my anger of being adopted was getting in the way of me moving forward and accepting the situation I was in. I sought counseling, and it was the most amazing thing that ever happened to me. I released all that built up anger, embraced my family with a new love and appreciation and looked to the future with a new hope.
With this new view on life, my family relationships improved. My adoptive sister and I are best friends. I can approach my mom with any question and know that she will always want the best for me as well as offer her extensive wisdom, and my dad and I like to spend quality time together as he passes down his wisdom to me. My vision of the future became clear in what I wanted to do.
Currently, I am studying to be a Social Worker at Northern Arizona University. I have the goal to help adopted children like I was know that they can be loved, cared for and that they can have a bright future. I want adopted children to feel that their past doesn’t define who they are, but rather gives them a strength that no one else in the world has but them. I want to use my experience to empower children to know that they themselves can be just as successful as anyone else in the world. If dealt with properly, their past doesn’t affect their future.
In May 2016, I found my birth family on a Russian media site and reconnected with my older sister. I had the amazing opportunity to Skype with my parents even though we could hardly talk to each other due to my limited Russian. With a translator, I finally had the thing I most wanted in the world, and that is to get some of questions I have always wondered answered by the very people I thought didn’t want me. While this journey has been incredibly challenging and rewarding at the same time, I realize that I am beyond lucky to get that chance.
I want to encourage other adoptees that it will be okay.
You are strong enough to get through anything when given the right tools and the right attitude of wanting to heal.
Those of us adoptees who are empowered should empower others.
Let our voices be heard!
Once A Survivor, Always A Survivor
I started Overcoming Odds in order to help others overcome their own odds, and show people how I’ve tackled my fears of judgment and rejection.
I hope that by sharing my story, you'll be able to share yours.
I was nine years old when I became an orphan.
Before I was an orphan, I grew up in a small, cold, and empty apartment in Russia with my older sister, and my mom who was an alcoholic. We were born into poverty.
Living without a father and an alcoholic mother forced me to make difficult decisions at an early age in order to survive.
I slept on the street.
I stole food.
I knew I couldn’t do this all of my life.
So, at the age of nine, I decided to enter an orphanage thinking it would bring me to a better life.
Living in an orphanage had its own set of challenges.
For the three years I was there, I was told to forget about my family.
I was told to keep my mouth shut.
I was too afraid to speak up when other kids were abused.
Despite all of the challenges, it was through the orphanage system that I was able to find my adoptive parents.
12 years ago, I walked into a new family, in a new country, to start a new life.
When I was adopted, I knew that adoption was a step closer toward a better life, but I didn't know the things I would have to give up in order to have that better life.
You see, kids who are adopted, have no option, but to change. They have no option, but to give up pieces of themselves, such as:
Birth Name
Family
Friends
Native Language
Culture
Memories
You see, adoption can save lives, but it can also ruin them.
It took me 11 years to realize that I never gave up the pieces of my past, but had to figure out how to fit them into the new puzzle of my new life.
Most adoptees don't realize this, most adoption agencies don't teach this.
Today, I am 24 years old.
Today, I am still an orphan, but I am no longer scared; no longer alone. I am no longer defined by a word.
Today, I am living a life that I didn't know was possible.
Today, I am on a mission to ensure that every adoptee and foster youth can live the life they have always dreamed of, despite their hardships and misfortunes.
Coming to the U.S. from Russia, meant coming to realize new opportunities. Since being here, I've:
Gained proficiency in English, as well maintained my native tongue
Created a network of close friends
Developed a strong relationship with my adoptive parents
I was lucky enough to be adopted into a stable, supportive family who sent me to a good school, and taught me to trust in myself and my abilities.
But, not all orphans are as lucky as I am though.
It was difficult to accept all of the changes at first, and that's what they are. Not losses, but changes.
Without the hardships - without the changes - I would not have been able to find my true purpose in life.
My purpose in life is to help others, specifically, adoptees and foster youth.
I understand the struggles adoptees and foster youth go through, such as:
Learning a new language
Learning new cultural norms
Relationship building
Creating friend groups
Feeling accepted
Accepting themselves and their past