What it's like to find your birth parent (Transcript)

[00:00:07] Mona Chalabi:
So Saleem, this might sound kind of random, but I have been thinking about adoption ever since I found out that about 2% of all people under the age of 18 in the US have been adopted–that is one out of every 50 kids!

[00:00:21] Saleem Reshamwala:
Huh, that’s a larger number than I would’ve guessed.

[00:00:24] Mona Chalabi:
Yeah, one of the reasons why that might be a higher number than a lot of people would expect is because many people don't necessarily have the identity of being an adoptee, Right? They might just feel like, “My parents are the people that raised me. Why do I need to go around explaining biology to a bunch of strangers?” So maybe, we, as a society, continually underestimate that figure.

[00:00:46] Saleem Reshamwala:
It feels like even in that category, there’s gotta be so many different subcategories with their own stories too.

[00:00:54] Mona Chalabi:
Yeah–roughly 1.8 million stories, and that's if you just count the children. Right? It's worth telling these stories for no other reason than the fact that this is a really common experience.

[00:01:06] Saleem Reshamwala:
Yeah… There’s so many aspects of that. Where can I focus in?

[00:01:10] Mona Chalabi:
Well, one of the things that I found kind of interesting was this research that came from the Children’s Bureau, which is a US federal agency, which suggested that having some contact between the child and their biological parents could be good for everyone involved. And by that they mean not just the children, but also their birth parents and the adoptive parents.

They found that it can allow adoptees to develop a greater sense of belonging, and it could help them to develop a deeper understanding of their own identity.

[00:01:41] Saleem Reshamwala:
That makes total sense. You know, that idea of developing a greater sense of belonging is really interesting to me. I’d love to talk to somebody who’s gone through the journey of making contact with their birth parent. What does belonging mean to them? Did they find a sense of connection? Did it, in fact, really affect their identity? And more importantly–how so?

[00:02:06] Mona Chalabi:
Yeah. That has to require an interview with a real human being to understand that a little bit. I mean, statistics just aren’t gonna get you there.

[00:02:13] Saleem Reshamwala:
Ok, let’s do it. I’m on it!

[00:02:22] Saleem Reshamwala (VO):
I’m Saleem Reshamwala, and from the TED Audio Collective, this is a special season of Am I Normal.

[00:02:34] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
I was adopted when I was 18 days old, so I was born May 18th, 1988, and my parents officially adopted me and got off the plane in Santo Domingo on June 8th, 1988.

[00:02:46] Saleem Reshamwala (VO):
This is Amanda Raye Scozzafava. Amanda grew up in Connecticut, in an Italian-American family. She always knew that she was adopted and that she was born in the Dominican Republic. But, growing up, Amanda didn’t have any contact with her birth mother.

[00:03:02] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
My mom always told me that you were loved so much that your birth mother wanted better for you and you… you were given to us. And I always just kind of took that and went with it, you know, and I, and I believed her.

[00:03:20] Saleem Reshamwala (VO):
But not everyone was as understanding as her parents.

[00:03:24] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
Um, I grew up in a very, very white part of Connecticut. Everyone looked the same, came from similar income brackets. So I was the different one. Even when I did everything that I possibly could not to stand out, I still stood out. And I think I was in sixth grade… Do you remember those poster board things that we used to have to have for school? Yup. Those–

[00:03:49] Saleem Reshamwala:
Three panel science fair poster board, for sure.

[00:03:54] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
We had a project. And we also had to bake or cook something that represents our culture. Well, I’m adopted and I didn't know what to do. And I'm not really Italian, but I don't know anything about being Dominican either. What do I do? And a teacher told me, “Well, just do the easier thing. Do, do Italy.”

[00:04:16] Saleem Reshamwala:
Oh, interesting. Wow.

[00:04:18] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
So I did Italy. It was the easier thing.

[00:04:22] Saleem Reshamwala:
Hmm.

[00:04:27] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
I was bullied day in and day out for being adopted. Someone once told me through AIM–when that was a thing–how does it feel that you weren't wanted?

[00:04:38] Saleem Reshamwala:
Oh, over instant messenger?

[00:04:40] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
Over AIM, yeah.

[00:04:41] Saleem Reshamwala:
Wow.

[00:04:42] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
You know, there was a period of my younger years where I just wanted to be invisible, I was like, “I’m not going to cause problems, I’m gonna be quiet.” I just want, just go to school and do what I need to do and leave.

You know, my parents showed me nothing but love. But the hardest thing for me was when we're in school and we're different, you oftentimes can go home at the end of that school day and no longer be different.

[00:05:10] Saleem Reshamwala:
Yeah.

[00:05:10] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
‘Cause your parents are like you.

[00:05:12] Saleem Reshamwala:
Mm.

[00:05:12] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
But not only was I different at school, I was also different at home, too.

[00:05:17] Saleem Reshamwala:
Mm.

[00:05:17] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
My mom not fully knowing how to braid my curly hair.

[00:05:23] Saleem Reshamwala:
Mm.

[00:05:23] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
Why is it that my sister and I can eat the same exact thing and move around the same amount, and she doesn't gain weight?

[00:05:34] Saleem Reshamwala:
When did you first think about looking for your birth mother, and what did your parents think?

[00:05:39] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
I always wanted to find her. That was never a question for me. I was probably eight, nine. Well, my mom brought out a big folder, and it had my adoption papers and phone numbers, and when they were going through the process of adopting me. And well, there was this number. This is where the lawyer we worked with was living. Why don't we give it a call? And I was like, “Okay!” We dialed the number and it rings, and–

[00:06:09] Saleem Reshamwala:
Wow.

[00:06:09] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
There was a man's voice and he goes, “Hola,” and I got so scared and I threw the phone. And I’m like, “Okay, someone answered.” but I didn't speak Spanish then. So…

[00:06:20] Saleem Reshamwala:
Yeah.

[00:06:20] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
–that was kind of that.

[00:06:22] Saleem Reshamwala (VO):
Amanda didn't try searching for her biological mom again until she was an adult.
For context, of course, not every adoptee has the option of tracking down a parent. And even though Amanda had those initial papers, for her, the search started with a lot of dead ends.

[00:06:41] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
Facebook came out when I was in high school, and you had to have, like, a dot edu to sign up for Facebook. But then when I finally signed up for Facebook, I would say like maybe once a year, I would search for her name to see if someone came up. No one ever did.

Um, the 23andme came out, and I did it, and I, I sent it in and… and then there was a part that said you have matches. I had relatives in New York city. But it was second, third, fourth cousins.

[00:07:17] Saleem Reshamwala (VO):
Amanda even took a trip to the Dominican Republic in 2015. And through an unexpected connection with someone at her AirBnB, her story wound up on a local TV channel where they described her search for her mom.

[00:07:33] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
And all of a sudden: I'm on the 6:00 PM news!

[00:07:39] Saleem Reshamwala:
What!?

[00:07:40] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
Like, with really dramatic music with my photo going... Like, it was almost like I was missing. It, it was very dramatic.

[00:07:49] Saleem Reshamwala (VO):
People were interested in her story. It reached a lot of viewers. But nothing concrete came of that either. In the meantime, Amanda was now living in New York City–home to almost EIGHT HUNDRED THOUSAND Dominican-Americans. And she made some Dominican friends, took up Latin dance, really started diving into the culture.

[00:08:12] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
I became Latina in New York. I became me there.

[00:08:16] Saleem Reshamwala (VO):
All along, Amanda was still looking for her biological mother. She went back to the DR a second time in 2016. She told some people she met there about her search for her birth mom. People tried to help her out, but she kept hitting those dead ends. She went back to the U.S. with no new information.

But then… on a third trip to the Dominican Republic in 2017, she met a lawyer… And he promised to help her. They sat down and went through her adoption papers together. Amanda lost touch with him, so we couldn’t contact him to confirm. But she says–

[00:08:51] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
He's like, “I'm gonna go and see what I can do.” The next morning, I get a call from him saying, like, “Hey, I think I found them... They’re in La Vega,” which is in the center of the country.

[00:09:04] Saleem Reshamwala (VO):
So, the lawyer and Amanda make a plan: Amanda will drive with her friends to La Vega to meet the lawyer at her potential relatives’ home. Amanda will wait in the car–and if everything checks out, if it’s the right family–THEN Amanda can come and meet them.

[00:09:21] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
We rented a car. We were in Jarabacoa, and you’re driving down and that, that mountain is another level of steep. I was so scared the whole entire time I was driving. I was scared driving up it, and I'm just trying to take deep breaths and he was like, “Everything’s gonna be okay. And even if you have no luck, you’ll, it’ll still be okay.”

[00:09:41] Saleem Reshamwala:
Yeah.

[00:09:41] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
And so, I, I listened. We were parked around the corner. It was really hot. I remember I was wearing this blue sundress. And then a minute later he's like, “It's them. Come. Come with me.” And I went up and they, they were all receptive to me right away.

[00:09:59] Saleem Reshamwala:
Wow.

[00:10:00] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
They hugged me. And I was asking, like, “Well, where is she? I wanna meet her. I wanna meet her.” And they're like, “Oh, she lives in Rome.” I'm like, “Rome? Is there like a Rome in the DR? Is that a city here?” And they're like, “No. Italia.”

So, she immigrated to Italy in, um, in the mid-nineties. So, that's why she was so much harder to find because she wasn't even in the DR. She was in Europe, of all places–the last place that I would've looked. ‘Cause my last name is Scozzafava, I was raised by Italian Americans. And then I was like looking back at that project I mentioned to you, when I was in sixth grade, “Well, just do Italy cause it's easier.”

[00:10:48] Saleem Reshamwala:
Oh, wow. And that's where your mom was.

[00:10:50] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
Haha. And it's like, huh, she was in Italy this whole time. And so they all take out chairs from their homes, and there was this older man there. It's technically her uncle. Apparently he's the one who raised her raised her. Man, He was so kind to me. He's like, “What's your favorite fruit?”

[00:11:12] Saleem Reshamwala:
Ha!

[00:11:12] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
And I’m like, “Well, I found out that I really like Zapote recently. I think it's like a sweet carrot juice.” But he’s like, “I have some of that. And he goes and makes me this most delicious, fresh drink. And we're sitting down. It’s so hot. And I was like, “Tell me about her, like.” And he is like, “What do you wanna know?” And I was like “Everything, “ I’m like “Yeah, what is she like? What is her favorite things to do?” And he was like, “oh, she loves to clean–and to dance.” That’s something that really hit me because I was neck deep in Latin dance and performing.

[00:11:52] Saleem Reshamwala:
Yeah, up in New York, yeah

[00:11:54] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
And I also like cleaning, too. Like, if I'm stressed out, like I'm gonna grab the broom, and just leave me alone. So they showed me her correct Facebook, which is crazy because I had come across that Facebook numerous times, but it said Italy, so it never occurred to me that, oh, she could be in Italy. And we messaged on Facebook.

[00:12:18] Saleem Reshamwala:
Were you afraid when you sent that message?

[00:12:20] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
Terrified, because she could just ignore me and block me and move on. And there's nothing I could do. Like, it's her choice if she doesn't want a relationship with me.

[00:12:21] Saleem Reshamwala:
Yeah.

[00:12:34] Amanda Raye Scozzadava:
I was as kind and gentle as I possibly could. This is my, my name. And I was adopted h-here.

[00:12:40] Saleem Reshamwala:
Wow.

[00:12:41] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
And… are you her? And she said, “It's me.”

[00:12:48] Saleem Reshamwala (VO):
Amanda was 29 years old when she FINALLY found her biological mother. I really wanted to know how the experience might affect Amanda. Would it change the way she thought about herself and her entire identity? Find out after the break.

[BREAK]

[00:13:14] Saleem Reshamwala (VO):
After years of searching, Amanda connected with her birth mother, Josefina, on Facebook in April 2017. Their connection was warm from the start. Josefina messaged that she was happy to hear from Amanda, as she had always thought about her. They chatted back and forth–and by August, Amanda was on a flight to Italy to meet Josefina in Rome.

[00:13:39] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
I cried all the way–

[00:13:42] Saleem Reshamwala:
Awwww.

[00:13:42] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
–flying from New York to there. and I had all these flashcards And I was just in panic mode. And I'm just like trying to study my Spanish. And this woman next to me is like, “You know they don't speak Spanish in Italy, don't you?”

[00:13:56] Saleem Reshamwala:
And she doesn't know that you're going through this whole other thing that she can't even see! You're not, like, studying phrases to get by at a restaurant. You're trying to have–

[00:14:06] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
No!

[00:14:06] Saleem Reshamwala:
–a real heart to heart with somebody. What was going through your mind?

[00:14:09] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
I was terrified. Like, is she gonna like me?

[00:14:12] Saleem Reshamwala:
Yeah.

[00:14:12] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
What is she gonna be like?

[00:14:14] Saleem Reshamwala:
Of course!

[00:14:16] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
Like, is she gonna be proud of me for what I've accomplished, or did I not do enough? Is she, is she gonna be disappointed that I'm not a doctor or… Um and it's also awkward.

[00:14:29] Saleem Reshamwala:
Hmm

[00:14:29] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
‘Cause you don't know how to act.

[00:14:32] Saleem Reshamwala:
Mm.

[00:14:32] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
I didn't know how to be my authentic self with somebody who knew me first, knew me before I knew me.

[00:14:41] Saleem Reshamwala:
Yeah.

[00:14:41] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
There's this connection that I have with this person that I don't know.

[00:14:46] Saleem Reshamwala:
Is it almost like a connection that just doesn't have history? Like, it's a connection that doesn't have a shared experience.

[00:14:53] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
Yes, and it, and it’s very interesting because your mother, that's the first voice you heard, that was your first interaction in just life was with that person.

[00:15:05] Saleem Reshamwala:
Mm.

[00:15:05] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
And you have a connection with your mother by default, most of the time. I was super scared to experience a connection with somebody who was a complete stranger to me.

[00:15:16] Saleem Reshamwala:
Yeah.

[00:15:17] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
And I wanted her to like me, of course. That's the thing about being adopted and going on a journey to find biological family is like, why are you doing it? Are you angry? Are you trying to find this person to unleash your rage and being like, “Why did you give me up? Why didn't you love me?”

I didn't have those feelings. I kind of went in thankful and happy ‘cause I love my life. And more so it was, “I wanna find you to know who you are. I wanna know who I am. But I've had a beautiful life and I thank you because you helped me have a beautiful life.”

[00:15:50] Saleem Reshamwala (VO):
Amanda lands in Rome. And she’s INCREDIBLY nervous.

[00:15:55] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
I got off the plane. I was sweating, never felt fear like that before. And she picked me up. And I was so scared, I…. But the second she saw me, she just grabbed me, hugged me, wouldn't let me go...

[00:16:11] Saleem Reshamwala:
Wow.

[00:15:12] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
It was beautiful... It was really beautiful and, and we made plans to have dinner that night. And I was so scared that she was gonna bail, so scared she wasn't gonna show up, but she did…. I made her this book, of my whole entire life.

[00:16:30] Saleem Reshamwala:
Yeah, wow.

[00:16:30] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
From my baby photos all the way through to that present moment, about living in New York, what I was doing for a living at the time, all the stuff that she missed out on.

[00:16:41] Saleem Reshamwala:
Yeah.

[00:16:41] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
And I narrated it at the bottom in Spanish, you know, so she knew who people were. And this was me in second grade when I had no front teeth and...

[00:16:50] Saleem Reshamwala:
Wow.

[00:16:51] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
And this is me in high school. This was my prom photo… And that's when I gifted her that book, and she cried when I gave it to her and…

[00:17:04] Saleem Reshamwala (VO):
It wasn’t all rosy. Amanda and her birth mother also had some uncomfortable conversations. For example, Amanda had always hated her name; it was given to her by her adopted parents. So she wanted to know what her birth mother had named her. And the answer was… she hadn’t given her a name.

[00:17:28] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
And that really… It hurt. It affected me for a little while hearing that. But I also know some of that is a cultural thing too. Um, so I wouldn’t take it so personally. I don’t think it was necessarily intentional, y’know, ‘cause I was like, “Oh, you never wanted me. Like you knew from the second you found out you were pregnant, that you didn't want me.”

But when she said that, she was deeply sad by it. She told me that two weeks after she gave me up, she regretted it and went back to try and get me. And she had found out that my parents had already left, like days before.

[00:18:10] Saleem Reshamwala:
Oh wow.

[00:18:11] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
Going on that journey definitely opened up things that were liberating and beautiful, but also really hard too.

[00:18:18] Saleem Reshamwala (VO):
Maybe that’s how it always is when we go looking for answers to big questions. Some of the things we learn along the way are just hard to hear.
But Amanda says, on the whole, meeting her biological mom has been really helpful.

[00:18:38] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
Yeah, yeah it did, I feel more accepted. I feel more sure of myself. Pre-meeting her, I was so lost and confused all the time.

[00:18:49] Saleem Reshamwala:
Mm.

[00:18:49] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
Growing up, I felt I wasn't white enough to blend in with my white peers. But I was also not Latina enough for the Dominican girls in New York to accept me.

[00:19:06] Saleem Reshamwala:
Mm.

[00:19:09] Amanda Raye Scozzafava:
But because of finding her and learning to become Latina, learning how to be Dominican, has been the best thing for me. I feel so sure of myself today.

[00:19:28] Saleem Reshamwala (VO):
When we talked, Amanda was looking forward to spending more time with her biological mother… introducing her to Amanda’s fiancée, maybe spending time together in the Dominican Republic.

There are so many twists and turns in Amanda’s story. But the part that really stands out to me is how her sense of who she is keeps evolving. And, in this case, just like the research Mona mentioned, connecting with her birth parent and her roots did help Amanda develop a deeper understanding of who she was. She finally found her place in the world. And that world is bigger than she ever imagined.

Am I Normal is part of the TED Audio Collective. This special season is hosted by me, Saleem Reshamwala. This episode was produced by JoAnn DeLuna, and edited by Sara Nics. Our team includes Daphne Chen, Constanza Gallardo, Michelle Quint, Banban Cheng, Roxanne Hai Lash, and Jimmy Gutierrez. Jennifer Nam is our researcher and fact checker. Original theme song by Sasami. Sarah Bruguiere is our mix engineer. And of course: thanks to Mona Chalabi for this invite to do this special series!