And what she’s learned these past five years as my daughter is that I pretty much drop everything to talk with her when she brings up the topic of adoption. When she says “I miss my Abu (her name for her foster mother),” I stop what I am doing, get down at her eye level, offer a hug and wait. I make no apologies for this… it’s what she needs. Except when she doesn’t.

Well, my daughter, whom my husband and I adopted from China, doesn’t look just like my Korean-born cousin, but – to quote my five-year-old Tongginator – they DO have “the same shiny, black, Mulan hair.” Sometimes it takes my breath away to think of how our pasts can so radically shape our futures.

We need to talk. We need to find allies outside the adoption community, not just because there is strength in numbers, because many will understand. The more folks understand, the less I have to yell about grizzly bears.