Hamster in a Wheel

At times, it starts to feel like we as adoptees are hamsters in a wheel--thinking we're getting something done, but in reality getting nowhere, and in the meanwhile, folks are watching our every move sometimes for research, other times for what they call enrichment, and still other times for a form of educational entertainment, not unlike a reality TV show (and I don't make that comparison in a complimentary way).

But what can I say? In part, I open myself up to it--no one is forcing me to blog my heart out. I do it of my own accord. However, I will say that, of course, I did not choose to be an adoptee. And if I could un-choose it, I would.

It's this odd contradiction--I both despise and embrace being the hamster. Aka, I both despise and embrace being an adoptee. I despise it, because if I had a choice, I'd choose not to be an adoptee. But because I can't not be an adoptee, I choose to embrace it--that is, to a certain degree.

I embrace it as much as I'm willing to talk about it via blogs and the cyber world. But in "real life"--every day life outside of this cyber world adoption community--it's almost like my secret identity. I rarely talk about it to a soul, but I FEEL it every day, I DEAL with it every day.

Another part is that I simply don't want to be "the adoptee." I am an adoptee, but I am not ONLY an adoptee. And yet, there is this constant tension of wanting the hardship and pain of being an adoptee to be recognized and acknowledged and yet also wanting it to be forgotten.

I both want to belong and not belong. I feel dizzy even trying to explain the constant back and forth and tug-of-war that takes place in my mind.

As I wrote in an email to a fellow adoptee:

To add to that for me personally, I'm also still generally insecure, even at 36 years old--I still never assume or believe that anyone would even want to know me...So, a lot of the time I don't attempt to initiate, because I often feel that doing so would be adding a burden to that person's life...furthermore, I loathe being boxed in or identified with any one particular label, and yet I also long to "belong" in some small way...if I've figured anything out about my adoptee experience, it's that it's full of contradiction...

As I share thoughts and experiences like the ones above, I know I often direct them to adoptive parents. I think in part I do this, because I think they need to know--because, well, their kids are going to grow up to be adults who just might think critically about their adoptions one day.

I know AP's can feel a lot of pressure from adult adoptees, but adoptees feel just as much pressure, if not more, to perform and be a certain way. I figure the least an AP can do is give an ear to adult adoptees. Maybe that's presumptuous. But, hey, if it's not presumptuous to assume that a child would want to be removed from his or her birth country and people to live in a foreign country among foreign people with a set of strangers...

...Not that one presumption justifies another--exactly, I think you get my point...

But setting aside AP's and other adoption community members, really I wish your every day person would listen. I wish the every person I encountered could read adult adoptee blogs so that conversations like the following didn't feel so laborious and uncomfortable:

"Is your mom Korean?"

"Uh, well, no, yes, I mean [oh crap, here we go], uh, [awkward smile] I'm adopted [inward rolling of my eyes at myself for still fumbling and not knowing how to handle this question]."

"Oh, really."

"Yeah, but I reunited with my Korean family two years ago--"

"Oh. But your adoptive parents are your REAL parents, RIGHT?"

"Oh, right, yes, of course [churning, sinking feeling in my gut]. I mean, well, I see it as I have four parents, or well, six or seven if you count all my in-laws, but really it's very complicated, it's hard, it has been quite a journey--[cut myself off, I'm such an idiot, why do I even bother?]"

Gah.

Chances are, though, even if your average person was to read this, he or she might still shrug shoulders and say, "Huh?"

But I guess it would be the effort and thought that would count for something--comprehension would be like the cherry on top...or really, maybe more accurately, it would be like finally getting to eat my spaghetti and sauce with a fork in my hands instead of with my mouth while my hands are bound behind my back. That's messy and hard to do--you get up from the table even hungrier and more frustrated than when you began...

I'll grow up to be just like Mommy, right?

Once I officially became a Chatham, I never looked back.

I never thought of Korea or of who my Korean mother or father might have been. I never fantasized about their appearance or whereabouts or imagined their distant pining for me. It never dawned on me to even entertain a thought about either one of them. As far as I knew, I had never seen them or touched them. I had no memory of either one. They were more like two people who had never existed. So, I forgot, or rather, it was more as though there was nothing to remember and therefore, nothing to forget.

I moved on.

I became the "typical little American girl” who attended school in ruffled dresses and shiny white shoes, who played with Barbie Dolls and Cabbage Patch Kids, who played dress up and tried to walk in her Mommy’s high-heeled shoes. I loved Minnie Mouse and Miss Piggy. My favorite fairy tales became Cinderella and Snow White.

During these younger years, I watched my Mom every morning with awe and anticipation as she sat at her vanity, curling her golden hair and lining her big blue eyes. I hoped to grow up to be just like Mommy one day—except for the fact that I had hair like obsidian, eyes like almonds, and a nose that didn’t slope, that I was not genteel or graceful and that I did not know how to maintain emotional serenity.

Although I had all but erased any awareness of my Korean origins, as I grew up as the only Asian among not only a family but a community dominated by White culture and standards, it did not take long before I began to encounter interminable reminders that growing up to be just like Mommy or like anyone else around me would require more than what I had to offer.

Actually, my mom is white--so do you accept me now?

I realized recently, as ironic and hypocritical as this is going to sound, that I find security in being able to tell other people that my Mom (Mom=American mom; Omma=Korean mom) is White, as though I will be more readily accepted and/or my perceived status will somehow be elevated once the listener knows this fact. It's as though I believe that since I am Asian having a White mom is necessary in order to legitimize my status and existence in the eyes of other Americans.

What made me realize this was a recent interaction I had with someone that asked me if I lived here in America. I proceeded to proclaim that not only do I live here in America but that I am a U.S. citizen, that my father is a retired naval officer, and that one of my brothers is currently serving in the army. I also made a point to mention that my Mom's first husband died in the Vietnam War, yet I felt compelled to clarify that she was not Vietnamese but Caucasian American. (And of course, all the meanwhile, I was also feeling guilty, conflicted, and purposefully misleading by conveniently omitting mention of my Omma, yet also feeling--or rationalizing?--that it would not be beneficial, helpful, or understood if I opened that can of demons in this particular conversation.)

I know, appallingly hypocritical on so many levels.

Yet although I felt ashamed that I went out of my way to mention all of this, I must admit that I also felt comforted that I was able to flash my "White Mom card" like credentials to silence this guy's doubts about my "American-ness."

But ultimately, this all reveals that I am just as influenced by prejudices and biases as anyone else when it comes down to it. It also reiterates how uncomfortable I still am, even as I approach 40, with my own Korean heritage. There is still a shame and embarrassment that I experience regarding the undeniable fact that I am Korean. Deep down it's still as though I think, believe that White is the superior skin tone and genetic inheritance, and that if I myself cannot look or be White then at least I can claim "White-ness" by proxy through my White mom and White family.

I am sobered and humbled by the ugliness that this look in the mirror has revealed.

Even with the birth of our son, I find myself inwardly consoled that he is not 100% Korean, but that he is also Mediterranean and Caucasian, or White. And then, I shake my head and scold myself for having such a thought.

Yet, conversely enough, there are other moments that I am compelled to reject my "White roots" and flash my "Korean card." Those moments are more rare, but increasing in frequency, especially now that I have reunited with my Korean family.

In a similar way, I find both relief and discomfort as an Asian woman married to a White man. Just as being able to claim my White mom makes me feel more accepted or somehow elevated, being able to claim my White husband does the same. However, on the flip side I also fear being perceived as the stereotypical "foreign Asian bride" who "connived her way into a White man's heart to escape an oppressive and empty life in my home country," accompanied by the matching stereotype that my husband married me, because he has some sick fetish for Asian women and their perceived image as exotic, compliant sex objects.

Overall, basically, I see that I am susceptible to doing what I loathe--when it is convenient or beneficial I find myself flipping back and forth in staking my claims to one or the other to manage my insecurities and legitimize or elevate my perceived status among others based on prejudices and stereotypes that pervade in American culture. (Wow, that's a mouthful of a run-on thought...)

It's ridiculous, I know. And it cries out hypocrite. But it's honest.

I know folks would say, and I even say it to myself, "C'mon, Melissa, you're over thinking it. Really you're both, you're not one or the other. Just let go of the perceived stereotypes and embrace the whole of who you are. Don't waste your brain space concerned with how others might see you."

Well, folks, I haven't quite figured out how to do, be, embrace both. And I have a hard time shaking off how others perceive me, because in reality their perceptions affect how they interact with and treat me.

So, for me at least, the overused cliche definitely applies--much easier said than done.

Although, I suppose one could argue that just by living each day I cannot help but do, be, embrace the different parts of who I am. But it's less a dilemma of acknowledging the different parts of who I am than it is of merging all these fractured pieces into a whole that, although may appear whole to outsiders, continues to feel painfully and irrevocably divided and broken...

But she LOOKS Korean...

It is a complicated question, you know—when you ask someone, So, where are you from?

Seems simple enough. I'm from Dallas, Texas. Or…I was born in California, but I grew up in Chicago. Or…my mom grew up in Ohio but she's actually Brazilian, and my dad was born in New York but his parents came over from Ireland. They met in college and after they got married, they ended up moving to North Carolina, where I was born. But when I was ten, we moved to Atlanta. Then, well, they got divorced when I was sixteen, and I went to live with my mom in Florida because she had family down there. Now, I visit my dad and his wife in New York for Thanksgiving, sometimes. And my mom and her boyfriend live in Arizona.

This is a complex, often fragile, question these days—when you ask someone of his or her origins.

I never really know what to tell people, because I never really know for what exactly they are asking. Do they want to know where I was born? Are they inquiring in response to the color of my skin, the blackness of my hair, the shape of my eyes? Or do they want to know where I have spent most of my life?

In their minds, it is a very simple question.

However, a simple question does not indubitably produce a simple answer.

Honestly, I don't even really know what to tell people most of the time. So I just say, everywhere and nowhere.

Sometimes, an uninterrupted stream tumbles out in a single breath—Well, I was born in Korea, but I was adopted by an American family when I was an infant, and my dad was in the Navy, so we moved around every one to two years, so really, I didn't grow up in any particular region, but I'm basically American, because I was raised by Americans.

And I feel just as idiotic every time I blurt out my little synopsis of origin. I'm basically American, because I was raised by Americans? I make it sound as though I’m some kind of Tarzanette or the lone human infant raised by a pack of wolves.

But it all seems that complicated in my mind.

Do I view myself as Korean? Or more specifically, do I feel Korean, do I think like a Korean? Absolutely not. Especially when I am in the presence of “real” Koreans. I always refer to Koreans as "they," never "we." "They" are so nationalistic. "They" are so exclusive. "They" this, "they" that.

Now, do I view myself as an American? Or more specifically, do I feel American, do I think like an American? Perhaps, more so than I feel or think like a Korean. But even so, most often I refer to Americans as Americans. "Americans" are so arrogant. "Americans" are so spoiled. "Americans" this, "Americans" that.

Something in me wants to be identified with neither one. I do not want to be identified as the Korean. I do not want to be identified as the American. Yet, inevitably, I demonstrate characteristics of both.

But she looks so Korean, doesn't she? She doesn't act like a Korean though, don't you think? Or maybe you don't look Korean. But then you all look the same anyway, isn't that right? Where did you say you were from?