My first name is English. My last name is Jewish.

I’ve lived in Michigan for 18 years of my life. I am a US Citizen.

I only speak English with a little bit of Spanish knowledge from high school.

On paper, anyone would easily assume that I’m white. However, I’m not white. Not one thread of DNA in my body contains even an inkling of white genes. I am 100 percent Chinese, despite what may appear on paper.

I was adopted from a large city called Changsha, China, when I was only six months old. I have no recollection from my days in China. My life in America with my white adoptive parents is the only thing that I have ever known.

One common question I get is, “Did you always know you were adopted?”

Yes, I did. I never thought it was abnormal that my parents were of a different race. Though onlookers may have perceived it to be strange for two very white parents to have an Asian child, it never crossed my mind that our racial differences were significant. They must have started telling me that I was adopted from a very young age because I never once believed otherwise. It wasn’t some huge secret that they sat me down to talk about—it was simply a norm from the beginning.

The backstory of who my biological parents are and how I got to the orphanage in the first place is completely ambiguous. The orphanage staff never told my parents, and they probably didn’t even know in the first place because there are so many Chinese babies that go in and out of the orphanages. An educated guess would be that I was given away because of China’s one-child policy—maybe I was the second child, or maybe I was the first child and they wanted a boy. Maybe they left me at the orphanage in person or maybe the left me on the street for the police to find and take to the orphanage—the latter, however shocking it may be, is plausible in Chinese society (my friend who was also adopted was found next to a river bank).

I never felt alone in being an adoptee. My older sister was also adopted from China (no, we aren’t biologically related), and my parents always took us to a “Chinese Culture Club” in my town. There was a community of families with adopted Chinese children that gathered once every couple months and for Chinese holidays like Moon Festival and Chinese New Year. Additionally, I would attend reunions with a group of girls who were adopted from the same group as me. I even befriended the girl who shared a crib with me.

Looking back, I appreciate the effort that my parents put into surrounding me with other kids who not only shared my heritage but were also adopted. I’d assume that Asian adoptees who weren’t as privileged as me to have opportunities like this around their town may have felt more segregated in everyday life.

I get a lot of the same questions about being adopted. One that never fails to show up is some variation of, “Do you know who your real parents are?” followed by, “Do you want to meet your real parents?”

To answer the first question, yes. I know who my real parents are.

They are in their sixties. They were born and raised in Michigan. Both of them traveled halfway across the world to adopt two little Chinese girls not because they were infertile, but because they loved Asian culture and just wanted the opportunity to adopt and raise a Chinese baby. They raised me no differently than they would have raised a biological child and gave me a home—something that my biological parents didn’t give me.

Those are my real parents.

I know that the people who phrase the questions in that manner aren’t being rude. They’re just ignorant and aren’t thinking about the words that come out of their mouth. I know they are talking about my biological parents, but it’s important to know that I consider my “real” parents to be the parents who raised me for 18 years. Not the parents who possibly abandoned me on the street.

So, to answer the intended meaning of those questions, no. I don’t know who my real parents are, and I don’t care to meet them. From what I said earlier it might seem like I hold some amount of bitterness or anger toward them for abandoning me, but I don’t. I’m indifferent. They brought me into life and that’s it. I was never attached to them, so the fact that we have no relationship couldn’t bother me less.

I’ll admit that I am curious as to who they are. A part of me wants to know what they look like. Were they poor or rich? Did they have an affinity for the violin like me? Are they stubborn like me, and do they look like me? Are there any genetic predispositions to diseases that run in our lineage?

I’ll never know the questions to those answers, though. And that doesn’t bother me. They are mere curiosities, but at the end of the day, I’m not losing any sleep over them.

My home is in Michigan. My family is not within the people who gave me my DNA and gave me life, but within the people who gave me a loving home. It’s the people who raised me and allowed me to live a life that I might not have been able to cherish had they never adopted me.

If the day ever comes where you want a child of your own, I encourage you to look into adopting a child from China. If you decide that you want to go this route, it will be an experience like none other.

You’ll love them like your own because they are your own; and to them, you will always be their real parents.