Thoughts from a Korean-Adoptee

Here are a few of the items that were listed under this woman's article titled below. She was adopted from Korea many years ago and hear are some of her thoughts below. She also wrote another article that I found intriguing as well, click here for that one.

Twenty-Three Things This Korean-Adoptee Thought About as a Child

1. That many times I was embarrassed and ashamed of my birth culture because it was so profoundly different than that of my family and my friends. That too often it served as an easy and irresistible source of teasing and fodder for others - strangers and classmates alike.
2. That instead of always hearing, "You're so lucky to be adopted", that it would have been nice to just once hear "It must be hard sometimes to be adopted."
3. That the insatiable need for me to be perfect was a way to make me feel more valuable, and therefore less likely to be abandoned once again.
4. That the insatiable need for me to control every facet of my environment was a way to feel safe and secure during a time when I felt that I was disposable.
5. That my mind understood why my Korean mother had to give me up, but that my heart didn't.
6. That the message "She loved you so much that she gave you up for a better life" meant that it was sometimes scary to be loved so intensely by my adoptive parents.
7. That I dreamed of going back to Korea just to be able to fit in amongst my peers.
8. That I would have given anything to just once be the girl who was thought of as being popular, pretty and "normal", instead of the one whose sole appearance brought forth so many unwanted questions and assumptions.
9. That often I thought of ways I could make myself look more white, just so I wouldn't feel like such a monster.
10. That I felt so incredibly guilty anytime I felt anything sad or bad about my adoption. That it was much better to hold everything in than to hurt my parents who I know loved and adored me more than life itself.
11. That it was impossible to be angry or hateful towards my Korean parents for leaving me, and yet impossible to forgive myself for being left.
12. That I got to a point where my mind truly believed everything I was saying about not feeling any effects or fallout from being adopted, even if my heart and body felt markedly different.
13. That my tantrums, outbursts and fits of rage were my way of trying to say, "I'm hurting so badly inside and more than anything, I am afraid that you will leave me."
14. That love, no matter how deep nor abundant, can ever erase the past.
15. That what others saw in myself would one day be evident to me as well. And hopefully one day, with God's grace, I would truly learn to love and forgive myself.