Have you ever been treated differently because you only have a mother? Do you only have a father? Do you have neither? Or were you put into a different family like me?

I was born on March 21, 1992. I was adopted on April 9, 1992.

When I was in second grade, I was told that I was adopted. At the time, my aunt and uncle decided to adopt because they had just gotten married and they wanted a little girl. When my mother told me their plans, she asked me, “Do you know who else is adopted in our family?”

I said my sister because I felt like we didn’t look anything at all like each other. She said, “Yes, but there is someone else too.” I thought for a little while, and I couldn’t figure it out. Finally, I asked her who it was. She told me it was me!

I was so shocked. It took me a while to gather it in my mind. It actually took me a few days to get over the news. My parents were going to tell me at some point, but they thought that now was the best time since my aunt and uncle had decided to adopt my new baby cousin, Natalia. My birth mother was only 18 and not married when she had me. I think that she knew she would not have been able to take care of me. My birth mother’s only wish was that I would be adopted into a loving family with another adopted child so that we could share our feelings. It was important to her because she and her brother also were adopted.