"Enter"

When I was little, my parents got a phone call from Leo, the liaison who had helped them through the process of my adoption. He said that my orphanage in Cali had called and told him that my birth mother had passed away. Leo also said that often orphanages will relay that message to the new family so that the child won’t come back to look for his/her birth parents, but he really couldn’t be sure in our situation.

My parents immediately told me. I was always grateful for their honesty and openness about my adoption. As far back as I can remember, they were always reading me children’s books on adoption, asking if I wanted to know more about what it meant and how I felt about it, what I could say to other kids who didn’t understand why I looked different than my parents and brother (kids could be pretty brutal and say nasty things- even today, I still get childish adults saying nasty things), etc. Truthfully at that age, I don’t remember how I felt finding out about my birth mother possibly passing away, but it has always stayed in the back of my mind.

As I grew up, I chose not to believe it. I didn’t want to think that I could never find my birth family. I’ve always wanted to look for them, but have been scared for multiple reasons of which I’m sure will come up in upcoming blogs.

Today I decided to do more research. I read on a random forum that if you have someone’s cedula (Colombian ID card) number, you can enter it into the Colombian election registration database and see whether or not they’re registered to vote. I found the link, entered the number I have for my birth mother and paused. I hesitated because I didn’t want there to be nothing at the end of the link. I thought about it, realized I was thinking way too much, and pressed ‘Enter.’

Sure enough, my birth mother registered to vote 2 years ago in Cali…the same city I was born in 28 years ago, and the same city I walked around in for the first time 8 months ago. I was so emotional because it was the first time I had confirmation that as of at least 2 years ago, she was alive. She exists…and that to me is priceless information.

The next step is to locate a lawyer I can trust who can search for more information using her cedula. Then I’ll know if there really is someone at the other end of “Enter.”