The Twinkie Chronicles … The Isolation Tank

This girl. She sat in the classroom, mostly alone between two seas … one black and one white. Listening … always listening.

Giggles would explode from one group or another. I would often laugh with the white girls, in hopes of “fitting in.” But when the tables turned and either group would make an Asian slight, I was utterly alone … and left laughing nervously with everyone, hoping it would end.

Recently, at the American Adoption Conference (AAC), I had a similar experience that Lost Daughter sister, Amira Rose documented. It went like this …

“Whoa, there was a hospitality suite? How did I miss that?!” (This was me, joking.) 

“Yes, we have been waiting just for you to arrive!” exclaimed the black bartender. I returned his warm smile and said a “thank you.” But then from the only other couple in the room … 

“Can’t you read?” asked the white man, deadpanned.  

“Yes.” I replied. 

“It was in here the whole time. Did you not read this?” he says as he points to the conference schedule book. “I mean, you appear to be an educated woman … ” There was a slight smile and hushed giggle from the white woman. At this, I just needed to flee. I had been here before. 

When discussing the many incidents at this predominantly white conference, I messaged this incident to Lost Daughters founder, Amanda Woolston. I had already heard excuses about why the man was “defensive,” how I needed to get a tougher skin and how I needed to get out more. But Amanda changed me. She said the words no other white person had ever said, “If [you] were white, would he have felt so free to be rude, specifically question [your] abilities and intelligence? The power imbalance of a white male speaking that way to a woman of color in a space where most people are white is incredibly hostile and racist.” When I read her words, I sobbed uncontrollably.

My perforated soul … each blow pierces my heart and bruises my self worth. Each time someone says something demeaning, I shrink … go into my hidey-hole. 

At the AAC, my fellow adoptee Lost Daughter sister, Angela, asked why I laughed nervously sometimes. I couldn’t really answer her. She then said, “You seem fragile.”

I am. I was. I have always looked at women like Angela and wished that I could feel as strong and empowered, like the united front of black girls from my high school with their confidence and bravado. In the 1980s, I longed to emulate them and Lisa Bonet. Having finally secured a job where I could buy clothes, I began to morph into Denise Huxtable. I shrank from the white girls group that I had once coveted. I found my isolation tank.

The most validating moments of my senior year in high school came from the black girls. They wrote me beautiful, sincere notes in my yearbook.

In the Dear Wonderful You video, I speak of this cyclical self I created. Over and over again as I entered a new environment, I began my cycle as an outgoing, white wannabe. I did whatever it took to assimilate. Polo shirts … check. Join a fraternity little sis group … check. Be the graduate school student representative on committees … check. 

But none of this worked. The off-hand comments, the “you almost look normal,” the references to Yoko Ono or Connie Chung, the tokenism of being the “model minority” … all served to place me below the white privilege. Eventually, I would shrink and hide. 

In this solace of aloneness, I would find my voice again and reemerge strong, yet guarded. Each new environment or new acquaintance began the cycle again. 

Today, Twitter has allowed me the freedom to speak strongly and hide, while here on my blog, I reveal more of my vulnerabilities. Having these two parts of myself is exhausting. 

Each tweet or means of speaking out gives me so much validation and relief, but then, the adoptee guilt and adoption loyalty set in. In public spaces, I use walls, podiums and my reading glasses to separate myself, protect myself and hide in the open. I use laughter and my comical façade to mask my pain and humiliation.

As the Lost Daughters take to the road and do more speaking engagements, I fear the notice. I hide in my room. I realize I like the loneliness and isolation. It’s comfortable and safe.

And yet, I know that by hiding I am not claiming my space to be heard.

The valve on the radiator has held back long enough. There have been long pshhhhhhhhts and short, angry spurts of steam. Pressure is building.

This cartoon from Empathize This illustrates what is brewing in many of us.

Shared with permission from Empathize This.

The Lengths of Loyalty

At this moment, my father is intubated and riding in an ambulance to Knoxville, Tennessee. This is the man who I highlighted in this tweet.

Seriously, I have THE. BEST. DAD. EVER. What you say? You do? Uh, NO. Te amo, Papito. #adoptee
— mothermade (@mothermade) May 21, 2014

This tweet came about after my last conversation with my father about my adoption search. As always, he reassured me and punctuated my right to know about my original country and family.

Loyalty is a legacy. While I had discussed my search with my father many times, my husband wanted me to discuss my open search with my father one more time. My husband feared that such actions would hurt my father.

I knew this to be untrue. Too many times, my father and I had discussed the possibility of my search. Books on Korea, his Korean dictionary, his affinity for Korean food were shared with me. I have never felt that I was not his or he mine. But loyalty works its way into my entire family.

Earlier this year, as my daughter was lamenting how far we are from family, she sighed and said, “Mom, I wish I had cousins.” I, of course, began rattling off the names of my sister’s daughter and my sister-in-law’s children. My daughter said, “No, I meant genetic cousins, like in Korea.”

And yet, after our visit to Puerto Rico, my daughter’s loyalty began to show.

“I want to know the heritage (Korean), but I don’t want to know my genetic family. I have cousins already. You can’t neglect the family you have. I don’t need to be blood-related to have family,” she told me.

I asked her how she felt in Puerto Rico.

“I felt out of place at first … as a different race. But then, I realized they (the Puerto Rican family) are enough. What if they (my original family) don’t want to find you? What if they don’t like you or are bad? I don’t want to see you hurt,” She continued.

Obviously, the media, adoption agencies and some adoptive parents reinforce this idea of “being loyal.” Adoptees are asked why we can’t be “grateful.” We are told that our adoptions are “gifts.” Perhaps it is a level of guilt that all families have. Guilt, loyalty and love are all wound up in the fabric of family.

Take for example, the movie, August: Osage County.  I saw the pervasiveness of guilt and loyalty spill out in these quotes:

“Mama was a mean nasty lady. That’s where I get it from.”
“Smug little ingrate … ”
“Your father was homeless for six years!”
“Stick that knife of judgement in me. You don’t choose your family!”

I am realizing that we all have this level of loyalty. My father’s loyalty to me is that he wants to shield me from hurt too. Just before my mother and my grandmother died, both my mother and my father withheld their medical conditions from me. They wanted me to enjoy my life and not stress about things they felt were out of our control. But in the end, the white lies hurt more. I couldn’t understand why they wouldn’t tell me. 

Now, I realize so much more. I have that loyalty. The loyalty to lie. The loyalty to protect. The loyalty to love.

Shame vs. Trauma

In my home state of Tennessee, a federal judge granted an injunction on the state’s gay marriage ban. It was a small victory in my eyes, and I gleefully posted an article by a local news agency on Facebook (FB). In my post, I asked out-of-state friends to read the comments so that they could understand the level of discrimination.

This brought a flurry of comments, utter disgust from non-Tennesseans, and confusion from Tennesseans. A cousin and two schoolmates felt I had misrepresented our hometown, where they still live.

My cousin was the most upset. She interpreted my comments as a sign that I was ashamed of my family and where I grew up. I understand her confusion. My days in my hometown seemed idyllic. I loved time with my family and did well in school. But there was trauma.

My mother knew it from my first day at the local elementary school. I was nine-years-old. The teacher had directed me to the lower parking lot where my mother was parked. My sister was little, so it was difficult for my mother to walk and meet me. As I walked down the hill, a group of children gathered around me. They encircled me and began chanting, “Me, Chinese. Me play joke. Me put pee-pee in your Coke!” All I remembered were large faces with eyes pulled to slants, laughing and looking down at me. I curled into a ball. 

Within seconds, my mother, toddler slung on one hip, rushed up and began screaming at the kids. She wanted names, but they scattered and screamed back, “Come get us, you big, fat hippopotamus!”

My face was wet with tears, but my mother’s was red and hot. Her anger was frightening. 

From that moment, I wanted to protect her. I kept my shame silent. Shame was knowing my family and I faced discrimination because I was different. I wanted my family to be buffered from the hurt I would endure each day, as someone would pull their eyes or make a ching-chong reference. 

So, I must admit, I was taken back by my cousin’s question of my shame. Was I ashamed of my hometown and family? No.

Traumatized by the racist comments? Traumatized by the marginalization? Traumatized by the hatred? Yes.

When I read the hate-filled comments on the recent same-sex marriage decision, it brought back the trauma of victimization. I felt the trauma of losing my friend, Patrick, to gay bashers. I felt the trauma of being discredited because of my Hispanic name. I felt the trauma of never being “normal” enough to date. 

Many do not believe this to be possible. The two classmates assured me that I would be surprised at the progress made in our small hometown. I agreed to go out with them when I returned for a visit to see it in action. But even today, I know Asian adoptees in Tennessee who suffer the same trauma I did. When you are white and local, it is difficult to see the hurt and hatred that lurks in the school bathroom or a nook in the library. I do not fault them for this blindness, but I do ask them for consideration and understanding that my lens was different from theirs.

While the conversation also meandered around a rural versus metropolitan theory, I just listened. Perhaps it may appear that racism and same-sex marriage discrimination occur primarily in rural areas, but if you are a person of color (POC) or a gay or trans person, you know differently. 

This is the year where my Twitter activism and my personal FB page have intertwined. With that, there will most likely be more discussions of race, gender, sexual orientation and adoption. My FB page will no longer be a celebration of a perfect life; instead, it will be a realistic view of my life. 

As adoption loyalty has fallen away, my shame will no longer be silenced.