Pamela Affolter poses in front of a Mural in Monteverde, Costa Rica in 2007. (Photo courtesy of Pamela Affolter)
By PAMELA AFFOLTER – Staff Writer
Since I was a toddler I was told that I was adopted. When I’m 17, I plan to go back to Guatemala and find my birth mother.
“Do you want to meet or find your birth mom?”
“Someday I might, maybe when I’m older.”
I have had this short conversation my whole life with my friends and family because I’m adopted from Guatemala. It’s risky to go back to Guatemala which is full of crime and drugs. So maybe someday I might go back and try to find my birth mother but it will be difficult.
According to osac.gov, in 2013 there was an average of 101 murders per week in Guatemala. There’s also a high rate of theft, assault, armed robbery, carjacking and kidnapping.
I have never been the kid to lash out at my parents and say I want to go back to my “real” mom. I was never lied to about my adoption or how I might not get to meet my birth mother. In my family, we don’t naturally sugar coat things to feel better. As a seven year old I didn’t fully understand what was being said to me, yet I knew that it wasn’t something I should be worried about.
I have the great opportunity of having parents that are very knowledgeable about Latin America. Ever since I was three years old, I have travelled to different Latin American countries such as Panama, Costa Rica and Mexico.
But, for me these were always bittersweet trips. I would feel a freedom of being viewed as one of the people in Costa Rica or any other Latin American Country while I was running into the ocean like any other person on the beach and laughing and not being an outcast because of how I was brought up, not having my “real” parents. The bitterness came from people who assumed I spoke Spanish and they would speak it rapidly to me. The words I couldn’t understand scared me and made me more shy than I already was.
I’m generally a laid back person, so I never considered my adoption to be something I should worry about. I accepted the possibility of being rejected by such a special person that I didn’t know.
I plan on going back to Guatemala when I am 17. Of course, the primary goal would be to find my birth mother, but the main person I want to find is my foster mother, Norma. She cared for me until I was 4 months old so I don’t remember much about her. From pictures I’ve seen she always wore red lipstick and had curly black hair.
I have actually started part of my journey by contacting my foster brother. My parents had met his adoptive parents in the airport traveling back to the United States and, coincidentally, found out we both came from the same foster mother. I met him when I was seven and then again when I was eight.
I don’t know if Norma will be able to tell me where my birth mother is, but I can accept that. I will never have complete closure if I don’t find her but I will be able to move and keep living my life–I’ll come up with different goals that I want to achieve.
But, if I do find her it will be a big part of my life that I will cherish. Hopefully there’s a happy ending and I keep in contact with her.
Until then all I can do is wait.
