Writer, poet, husband and Korean adoptee Nik Nadeau, also known as Im Chang Hoon, 36, talks about how writing has helped him find inner layers of himself and uncover memories. He also shares how he’s unlocking feelings towards his birth mother with the passage of time.
Special thanks to Jacquelyn Wells for original music.
This week, I talk with Rachel Forbes, LCSW, an Korean-American adoptee therapist and educator. We discuss trauma that occurs in the womb and from early parent separation, and emotional disregulation. Forbes, 34, talks about healing techniques and provides a lot of great resources too.
CW: child molestation/incest/sexual abuse
Audio available Feb. 2, 2024.
Marissa Lichwick, 46, is a Korean adoptee and filmmaker, playwright and actor. She is using her past pain and trauma surrounding her family separation, abuse in the orphanage and in her father and stepmother’s home and the haunting loss of a half-sister she’s never met in her art, to process the events of her life and to encourage healing and community with others. Her first feature-length film is a semi-autobiographical look at her life and will be distributed widely this fall.
Audio available on Friday, January 19, 2024.
Korean adoptee Matthew Rodriguez, 43, is trying to make sense of his adoption story. For years, it’s been clouded by stories that were told to him and those he told himself, even if they weren’t always accurate. It was a means to survive. But Rodriguez, whose adoptive parents are white and Mexican American, and who grew up in Alaska (a first for the podcast!), was taught that he needed to excel academically to be valued. Now a parent himself and manager of a venture capital fund, he has a different story to tell.
Audio available on Friday, Nov. 10.
Korean adoptee Jenna Antoniewicz, 40, has been on a whirlwind over the past 24 months since beginning to reckon her adoption history and adoptee identity. While mayor of a town in Pennsylvania, she found herself speaking for Asian America during the coronavirus pandemic about anti-Asian hate. But that triggered an imposter syndrome deep within Antoniewicz, who hadn’t previously given much thought about her adoption from Korea or what it meant to be Korean-American. Fast forward two years, and this wife and mother of two is now living on Jeju-do, off of mainland Korea, not far from her biological father, making sense of her experience by connecting to others and blending her past with her future.
Audio available on Friday, Oct. 27, 2023.
Lee Herrick, 52, is a poet, author, educator and adoptee. He was adopted from South Korea to the San Francisco Bay area in 1971. Herrick discusses how he uses his lens as an adoptee to observe and write verse about life. He also reads from his 2019 acclaimed collection of poems, “Scar and Flower.”
Photo Credit: Curtis Messer
Audio available on Friday, Sept. 29, 2023.
Dr. Kimberly McKee, 39, currently a visiting Fulbright scholar at Sogang University in Seoul, Korea, is a critical adoption studies researcher. This November, her latest book, “Adoption Fantasies: Fetishization of Asian Adoptees from Girlhood to Womanhood” (The Ohio State University Press) will come out. We’ll talk about her latest monograph as well as her 2019 book, “Disrupting Kinship: Transnational Politics of Korean Adoption in the United States” (University of Illinois Press).
Publishing on Monday, Sept. 18, 2023.
Sara Jones isn’t sure whether she’s 48 or 49. That’s because the circumstances surrounding her relinquishment are still a bit unclear. What she does know for certain, is that her father never wanted her to be separated from her family or be adopted overseas. But his worst fears happened anyway, and against most all odds she was able to find her way back. Now, she’s using her voice to help other Korean adoptees whom the system disenfranchised and left vulnerable.
Audio available on Tuesday, May 23 at 7:00 am CST.
“Running” by Jae Jin.
Other music appears under license with Blue Dot Sessions.
Eric Poole, 55, is a transracially adopted Black Korean who has come a long way from his early days as a mixed-race Korean child in a US military camptown in Korea. He’s now a father to three kids, husband, and one of the few Black pilots in the commercial flight industry. But his success story is built on the complicated foundation of being orphaned, outcast, alone and othered. He also shares his experiences being at the Holt orphanage, including being sexually abused by other kids and being groomed for a new life in the US. (Part 1 of 2 part interview).
Audio available on April 25, 2023.
“Running” by JaeJin.
Other music appears under license with Blue Dot Sessions.
Karen Lechelt, 50, is a mother, wife and a returned East coaster after two decades in the San Francisco bay area and a few years in Amsterdam in between. Their childhood in New Jersey was marked with feeling not quite fitting wherever she was, and having to always adapt themself.
Because of the loss of their first family, Karen says there’s always been a feeling of not being anchored. That changed with the birth of their daughter.
“Running” by JaeJin.
“Some Nights End,” “The Sermon,” “Feeling Fine,” “Breaking The Chairs,” by Blue Dot Session under license.
