Today’s blog is going to be quite a bit more personal than the others, but I do feel I have a responsibility to continue to share this side of my life. To educate and enlighten people on the (sometimes very) raw beauty of my situation.
Tomorrow, I embark on a 10-day visit to Bogotá , Colombia. Why?
I’m adopted.
Those of you who have known me awhile are aware that I’ve always been very open to discuss my adoption and my feelings about it. In fact, once upon about 3 years ago, I had a blog where I documented my entire story very publicly. This documentation was unfiltered, emotional, and personal.*
*Disclaimer: This blog is no longer available to be viewed by the public eye. Someday, I’d love to use my entries to write a memoir. For now, I have my words private to me.
For those of you who are new, let me do my best to provide a brief summary!
A Brief Timeline
I was born on March 2, 1992 in Bogotá, Colombia as Angélica Maria Cuchimaque Urrea.
On March 6, 1992 the papers were signed and I was officially put up for adoption in an orphanage called Ayúdame (Asociación Amigos del Niño).
On June 15, 1992 I was presented to Leslie and Steven Schreier who would soon be my adoptive parents.
On June 22, 1992, I was officially adopted from Colombia by those two selfless, loving, and adoring parents. On that day I gained a 23 year-old brother! A couple of short years later, I would gain a little brother, also Colombian adopted. I would love on him like he was one of my dolls, more than he cared to be adored. We’d grow to (kind of) get along! 🙂
23 years later
In January 2015, I submitted my post-adoption services paperwork to Lutheran Social Services, the adoption agency my parents used to adopt me. This would be the first step on a 1.5 year-long journey.
At the end of January, I was connected with a social worker at the Colombian Family Welfare Institute (ICBF) with whom I would email on a monthly basis throughout the search process. She would quickly become someone I equally loved to hate, and hated to love.
Between January 2015 – May 2016 I would endure 16 of the most treacherous months of my life. Hurdle, after hurdle, this process and its complications mountained. Without a compass, I navigated these deep and dark waters alone. When I say it was tough, I mean that I truly do not believe many people have the emotional stamina to continue through some of the things I endured. However, thanks to therapy and close friends who let me use their shoulders to cry gut-wrenching, heartbroken, frustrated tears, I made it.
Finding Her
On Tuesday, May 17, 2016 I located my birth mother Olga Lucia.
It was short and direct, but it was an email that stopped my heart and flooded my eyes with tears:
“Hi Mary, After dialing one of the phone numbers again, I made contact with Olga Lucia. She came into my office for two hours, very excited to receive this news she wrote a letter for you. She brought her son Nicolas, has a daughter studying in Argentina, and I’m not sure but she may have two other smaller children. Olga Lucia created an email address so you can communicate, she will send it to me, and included her cell phone number on page 2. I hope this news brightens your day and reuniting is positive for everyone.”
I spent so much time preparing for this moment, or so I thought. My entire life, searching for this incredible, indescribable moment. And then it just…happened. I found myself pulling back, trying to stomp the breaks.
I wept. Not the “pretty girl” tears that sparkle and run gently down a porcelain face. No. These were tears that I had put on hold my entire life for this exact moment. Hot, fast tears of overwhelming joy, incredible pain, guilt and excitement. My entire body shook, my face buried in my roommate’s shoulder as she held me.
Olga wrote me a 4-page letter. My roommate (who was also a Colombian adoptee) and I spent the entire night crying and translating it. It was very emotional and heartfelt. She kept calling me “bella” (beautiful) and “princesa” (princess) and “Angélica” (my birth name).
In this letter, she answered many of my questions. She said she wanted to give me adoption as an act of love. She wanted me to have the opportunity to live a life with a bright future, to give me a family, to give me a home. Olga mentioned how grateful she was, to God and to my parents, for welcoming me into their loving home. How miraculous it is that God wanted us to connect. One snippet reads:
“Beautiful and always loved Angélica Maria, Today has been a different day, a day of happiness. I have received news about you, my Angélica, my beautiful and sweet Angélica, my tender and beautiful doll. I only have one word for you: I LOVE YOU. I have always loved you, since before birth. I wanted to give you love through adoption. Thank you princess, I carry you in my heart, you will always be there, until the day it stops beating, I love you, I will always love you. God is love, He is great, his goodness is infinite towards you and towards me, that he wanted us to have contact today through this little letter. Hugs to your two angels, mom and dad, and for you a world of love from me.”
On that day in 2016 I gained a 21 year-old half sister, a 17 year-old half brother, and a 5 year-old half sister.
Finding Him
Throughout my (then) 24 years of not knowing my biological family, I always thought, “If I find my birth mother, I’ll be happy. I will be peaceful knowing that she is okay.”
Never in my life did I ever think I would find my birth father.
On Sunday, May 22, 2016, days after making my first contact with my biological mother and family, I received a friend request on Facebook from a man in Bogota. But I didn’t know who he was.
I asked my birth mother about my birth father, and then asked her if she knew this man by name. She asked me to send pictures.
After receiving the photos, she confirmed that this was indeed my biological father.
On that day in 2016, I gained a 23 year-old half sister, a 15 year-old half brother, and a 12 year-old half brother.
Then What?
I ALWAYS HAD A FAMILY.
My story was never about finding my family. I already had a mother, a father, two brothers, and a plethora of extended family, all whom I love very dearly. It was about finding my biological family who would enter my life as strangers, and I would hope to get to know better.
The day after I located my biological family, I met with my adoptive mother, who had asked not to be involved in the search for my biological family.
My mother, the woman who raised me, will ALWAYS be my mother. Olga understands, encourages and admires this. She gave me a couple of messages that I relayed to my mom. She and I cried and hugged for a long time. I showed her the letter and let her read the translated version. More tears. More hugging. We had a very long conversation about my adoption, about how I was meant to be in this family here, and about how this news does not eliminate the love I have for my family. For my brothers.
The weight of wanting to take care of everyone and their feelings was heavy on my shoulders. It was my choice to take this journey, so I felt the need to take on the emotions that everyone else has. I cautioned myself on this – Wanting to take care of everyone else but myself is a very common “Mary” trait. By nature, I am a caretaker. I didn’t want to hurt anyone, but I also had to realize that this was still my journey, my story.
The Years After
In March – April, 2017, by the grace of God and many beautiful humans who made it possible, I was able to fly down to Colombia to meet my biological parents. For the first time in the history of ever, me geneology would all be in the same hemisphere/country/building.
Reuniting was emotional. How emotional, you ask?
On this trip, I was able to meet my half brother and one of my half sisters on my biological mother’s side, one half brother on my biological father’s side.
I had to conquer many mountains. The strides I took were not easy, and through it all I started to discover a lot about my ability to persevere. Life didn’t stop for me to conduct this search. While I gathered documents, took tests and put together portfolios to prove I was the same person as the infant whose Colombian passport I was renewing, traveled to and from Chicago twice, life did not stop. I still had bills, multiple jobs, chores, appointments and everyday life to tend to.
More than anything, reuniting with my biological family meant that I was able to celebrate a world where love exists in abundance. I was enlightened to a world where white and brown melted together to become a single family, where pride was set aside and decisions were made selflessly. I experienced a euphoria knowing that it wasn’t that I was unloved, it was that I was so loved.
That’s an unbeatable feeling!
And Now?
Here I am. Leaving for Bogotá once more. This time around I am feeling…less nervous. Look, I think each time I go I am going to have a sting of nerves. Obviously, there’s the “Looks like this, sounds like that” battle where natives will look at me and speak Spanish, and my brows will furrow as I attempt to understand, and then their brows will furrow because I don’t speak Spanish fluently. Beyond that, I just want my biological family to like me. I know, I know. They do, they will. Call it an irrational insecurity, but I have a haunting thought that says they gave me up once, who’s to say they won’t do it again?
Irrational? Yes. A valid emotion to experience? Yes!
I’m also SO excited! Being in Colombia gives me a sense of belonging. The language, the food, the music, the people and the beauty in Colombia feel so natural to me. Speaking Spanish, while sometimes difficult, feels strangely normal.
So…HERE WE GO!
