Today I remeber my mother R.I.P.

I guess you could say that this is the day that changed my life forever. It was on this day 26 years ago, three days before my first birthday, that Honduran officials stormed the safe house where I was staying with my mother. At the time my family were fighting as revolutionaries in the Salvadorian Civil War.

We don't know the exact details and probably never will. We think my mother was not in the house when it happened and was able to call my grandmother one last time. We will never know exactly what happened but what I do know is that this was the last time I was with my mother.

While searching the safe house Honduran officials found me in a back room. I was placed in an orphanage for a year before getting adopted.

Its a little strange to think that one moment in time completely changed my life forever. Had my mother left the movement like she wanted too maybe I would have never been lost for 16 years. Its hard to say what might have happened. But I don't spend too much time thinking about that any more.

However for many year I did think about what happened and this day always was very hard for me. I felt like this was the day that everything went wrong, the day I lost the most important person to me. My mother.

A few years ago that started to change for me, when I realized how fortunate I have been in my life. I started to let her go.

I still think of her on this day but its not the same. I think about what she had to give up. The strength it must have taken to put her self and her family in harms way. How impossibly hard it must have been. If I would have done the same. Most of all I think about how the sacrifices she made for me gave me a life and opportunities I might have never have had otherwise.

This may seem a bit off topic but I'm a big Harry Potter fan. I suppose that part of me identifies with that character. His mother died for him so that he could do great things. I see that in my own life and its the reason that I try to live everyday to the fullest. I wanted to share a quote that J.K Rowling uses in the final harry book. To me it says, even though the ones we love are gone they still live on inside of us.

Death is but crossing the world, as friends do the seas; they live in one another still. For they must needs be present, that love and live in that which is omnipresent. In this divine glass they see face to face; and their converse is free, as well as pure. This is the comfort of friends, that though they may be said to die, yet their friendship and society are, in the best sense, ever present, because immortal. - William Penn, More Fruits of Solitude

R.I.P. Ana Milgro Escobar de Coto. You will always be with me.

My Grandmother - by Nelson/Roberto

About a month or so ago I found out that my grandmother was sick. At the time we did not know what was wrong with her, but she seemed to think this was the end for her. They told me she was tired and was ready to move on.

This was something I was not expecting to hear from her. Over the past couple of trips I had started to notice her aging more than she had before. I had a lingering feeling that one day I would have to say goodbye. However it wasn't until I heard what she said to my sister that it actually hit me.

I am going to miss her. Now I can't say that I am very close to her. Since my Spanish isn't the greatest, we don't talk much.

When I see her it’s for a few hours each trip. She greets me with a smile and asks me about the rest of the family. She never asks me about my life or what I am doing. She loves to cook for me, and I definitely enjoy her food. It’s so simple and in some ways so meaningful.

It’s not talking, it’s not judging, it’s not questioning. It’s just being together.

I'm not exactly sure why this is affecting me this much. I've had other grandmothers whom I loved pass away, and I didn't feel like this. I don't think I was that close to them either. Maybe it’s because without her I would not be sitting here in my sister's house.

I don't think I can put into words what she means to me and how I feel about her. All I can say is that she never gave up on me and because of her hard work I have had so many happy memories.

She is doing much better now, but I know that one day I will have to say goodbye. Hearing those words was a wake up call in some way. I suddenly knew that each time I see her it might be the last. It’s a little sad to think about, but from now on I will appreciate so much more every moment I get to spend with her.

On the road again

Next week I will be flying down to Central America again to work on a project with my fathers business in Panama. This will be a little shorter than my last trip which was a month long. I'll be down there for 3 weeks.

On the trip I will be doing work for a business that I am trying to start up. As part of this business I am trying to show the impact that technology has on developing nations. If you are interested in learning more about the work I am doing take a look at my company's site. www.cotosolutions.com

I'm excited to see my brother and sisters. My grandmother was sick a couple weeks ago so I am looking forward to seeing her as well. Maybe I will get a chance to do a few more video interviews!

Part 1: Impossible decisions

These next few entries I wrote over the holiday season while I was in Central America. This was our 10 year anniversary since we first met. I spend a lot of time reflecting on our story and how it has effected our family. This is the first of 4 or 5 post that I wrote.

---

How do you make an impossible decision. The type of decision can forever change your life and the lives of the people you care about the most. How does you walk away from a husband who drinks to much? Or leave your comrades at arms to raise a family? Hows does a teenager find the strength and courage to run away from his or her parents? How do you leave a business that has been your life's work knowing it might fall apart if you do.

I don't know how we make these decisions. We think and think, yet no matter how hard we think the answer eludes us. We are faced with a choice of doing whats best for us or doing whats best for those around us. You ask your self a never ending set of questions as you struggle to make the right choice. Should you honor your commitments even when you are no longer happy? Are you being selfish or doing whats best for you. When is enough, enough?

I wish there was some easy way to know what the best course of action is, but there isn't. These are things that you must decided for yourself. You can ask for peoples advice and get there input but at the end of the day you have to live with your choices. You must be accountable for your actions and aspect all consequences no matter how undesirable.

Sometimes I feel like our story has been one impossible decision after another. I admire the courage and strength that each of those decisions took to make. There is no right answer. They are impossible because it feels like no ones wins. Even when you know you are doing the best thing for your self you can't help but feel bad for the people it is going to effect.

The moment it all changed

Through most of my life I struggled with the fact that the family that I lived with was not my biological family. I am sure this is something that many adopted persons go through at sometime in there lives. I think much of that came from the fact that when I was younger I knew so little about where I came from and who I was. Your birthday and background are such an important part of your identity and for the first 15 years of my life this was surrounded in mystery.

I think this also stemmed from the fact that I could see my little brother as the child of my parents. He was like them is so many ways and I was so different. Not having people in my life who were like me and who understood me was hard. Then I found my family and I found piece of my self. However part of me would not let go of those child hood dreams of seeing my mother again. How are you just supposed to let go of the one thing you wanted all your life?

In the last interview my sister asked at what point did it all start to make sense? When did everything change for me? I can remember the day. The day where I was finally able to let go of my birth mother and accept who I was.

It was May 2003 and I was in Central America visiting Eva. I was talking with her about our biological mother because May 19th is the day that she was taken from us and a day that I always think about her. It used to be a very difficult day for me. For in my mind this is the day that my world was ripped apart.

I was talking with Eva about this. I was so sad and trying desperately to understand why this happened to us. Then Eva said something that I will never forget. She said that I had a great mother in Margaret and behind her, looking down on us, was our mother.

A few days later I was back in Boston. I think I was still feeling a little down. When I got home Margaret had something for me. It was a letter she had sent me while I was in school. The letter was part of something the school was doing and was supposed to be posted somewhere in school. For whatever reason they received the letter too late and ended up sending it back home.

I opened it up and started to read. The letter said how proud she was of me and what a joy it was to raise both Derek and my self. On the back she wrote "You are my sunshine my only sunshine. Do you remember I used to sing that to you when you were little?"

I broke down. I remembered very clearly when she used to sing that song. I remembered all the difficult time we had. But most of all I remembered how she loved and cared for my over the years. How both adaptive mother and father gave me so much when I was little. How they stood by me when I struggled to understand who I was and what had happened to me. How they always believed in me. How they taught me right from wrong and so many other valuable life lessons.

It was exactly what I needed to hear. My sister was right. Behind my mother was...my mother. I couldn't believe it. This letter I was supposed to receive during school got sent back but arrived when I was away. So I ended up reading it just when i needed it the most. I guess you might call it fate, but from that moment on things got easier. I felt at peace about the situation that I had not felt before.

Looking back years later I can appreciate so much more what my adoptive family was able to give me. Perhaps my longings for growing up with my birth family came from my youthful ignorance. Or maybe it was easier for me to dream of my perfect family then face the difficulties that every family deals with. Whatever it was, I know now I how fortunate I was to have them. After getting to know my biological family more, I see how they struggle with the love and understanding that was given to me unconditionally. How they have a hard time looking past each others short comings and just loving each other for who they are. What I realize now, is that the perfect family I longed for in my youth, I had all along. Not the family that was my blood but the family that became my blood.

Vlob #4 - Interview with Ernesto

Its my last day in panama. Tomorrow I'm off to costa rica to spend the weekend with my sister before heading back to the states. This is a video me and my brother did the other day where we talk about what it was like getting to know each other over the past 10 years.

Video Blog #3 - The past 10 years

10 years post

Its hard to believe that it has been 10 years since we first met. Sometimes people say "its feels like just yesterday" For me it feels like a lifetime. It seams like so long ago that I walked out of the airport into the arms of my father and sister. I don't think thats a bad thing either. I have so many good memories since then that I can hardly believe it was only ten years ago.

People sometimes ask "where do you see your self in ten years? Well I can tell you that 10 years ago I would have never guessed this. I would have never guess I would be sitting in panama in front of the Christmas tree. I never would have guess I would be working with my dad and cousin. I never would have guessed I would have such wonderful brothers and sisters to spend the holidays with. I never would have guessed that my mother would be writing about my story or that people would want to hear me talk about it.

I'm trying to come up with something else meaningful to say about everything that happened and I can't. I really wanted to writing something about how incredible these past years have been and how they have effected my life. I also wanted to talk about what a great family I have both here and in America. Maybe its just too hard to sum up 10 years of memories in a couple paragraphs. I'm at a loss for words. Perhaps I shouldn't even try and just enjoy being here with my family.

All I can say for sure is that I am so lucky to have found these incredible people and to be a part of their lives. I know they feel the same way. I love all of you and you all mean so much to me. Happy 10 years.

Eva and Roberto Video interview #2

Speaking engagement

The other week I was contacted by someone who was interested in having me come and speak to her high school students. This is a first for me. While I have talked to my friends and to others about the story, I have never given a talk about it.

I have to say I am kind of excited about the idea. As I have said in the video and before on this blog I think this is a wonderful story and one that needs to be shared. Part of the reason for starting this blog was to remember my mother and to tell people what my family went through. When my parents were in the war they didn't have a voice so hopeful my sister and I are able to give them one now.

Anyway I just wanted to say that I am very excited speaking to these kids. It means a lot to be able to share our story. This is also an open invitation for anyone else who might be interested in having me come speak to a group. You can reach me at dewittn@anasmiracle.com

Sunny Side of the Street interview

In October during my visit to Coast Rica I met up with a friend from the states. My sister and I met with her and her parents. We shared our story and her father who has a TV show on the local cable network.

He invited me to come on the show and at the beginning of November I took him up on the offer and this is the show. It was an interesting experience. I think I was little nervous to start but it I think it turned out very nicely.

Let me know what you think!



If you want to read more about our story and what it was like for us check out the ebook.

Pro-busqueda press confrence videos

Back in July I was in a press conference with some other Salvadorian adoptees and the organization that reunited us with our families. Here are a few videos from that day.

Traveling woes

Its been a busy week here in panama. I've working with my family help them setup up there computer net work. I finally have some free time so I though I would write about what had to be one of the worst traveling experiences in my 10 years of going to Central America.

It all started last Friday morning at 4am in Boston. Thats when I had to get up for my 6am flight. I'm not a big fan of early flights but it helps in case you miss a connection or something. Anyway I arrived in north Carolina around 8:30. On my way to my next flight I passed one of the monitors only to see that my flight was canceled.

Canceled? I've never had a canceled flight before. Epically ON THE DAY OF THE FLIGHT. When I get to the would be gate no one is there. I guess I was supposed to know what to do on my own. I found a age agent at another gate and she told me to go to the service desk.

The service desk was moving very slowly...of course. Thankfully when it was my turn the agent tells me they are putting me on a 7pm flight out of Miami. I thought "This isn't too bad . At a least I will be there tonight."

I arrived at Miami around 2:30 in the after noon. I signed up to use the internet and settled in for a 5 hour wait before my next flight. As 7 drew closer they made an announcement that there was something wrong with my plane and that we can not take it. Perfect. However they did have another plane and they assured us it would only be a 45 minuet delay.

We finally start boarding the plane AT 7:45. Around 8:10 we are all on and just sitting there The captain informs us that we are waiting for catering. This turns into another 20 min wait. Then it starts to rain and they close down a run way. We finally get out of there around 9.

Oh and the catering we were waiting all that time for, is just drinks. They didn't even feed us.

Once we land I get out only to find an hour and half line for customs line in front of me. Lucky they didn't lose my bags and I my sister was there waiting for me.

We finally get home around 2am my time. By this time I had been up for 22 hours.

I think the only good part of the day was the car ride to my sisters house. My niece and I were sitting in the back seat falling asleep on each other. I had this feeling like: This is the reason I put up with all the headaches of traveling. To be here in this car with my family. Somehow, in that moment, it all seamed worth it.

Off to Central America

I've been running around all day getting ready for my trip to Costa Rica and Panama. I leave tomorrow morning bright and early. This is going to be a business trip of sorts.

I'm working on a project with my family in Panama. My father Luis has an embroidery business that he has been running in Panama for almost 20 years now. (After he left the revolution in the mid 80s he moved to Panama to rebuild his life. I may add a post about this part of the story.)

I'm working to help them create an order tracking system. I would like this to be a pilot for a bigger project of creating open-sourced business resource for Central America. I'll probably put a post up about that when I have a better idea what it is going to be all about.

In the mean time I am planning to do some more video interviews with various family members. Keep an eye out for those sometime next week!

E-Book is done!!

Its been a while since my last post. Thats because I have been working hard on creating an e-book of our story. I took a bunch of our blog posts and put them in order to make the story easier to understand. I also added a couple family pictures.

I was supposed to have this out by the begging of the summer but it took longer than expected. Well thats life I guess. Anyway we hope you enjoy and we would love to hear your feedback.

Ana's Miracle is the story of how our family was separated by death and adoption during the Civil War in El Salvador and our journey to reunite. This e-book is a collection of blog posts written by the children of a family that was torn apart. We are writing this to tell our story, share our experiences and remember our mother who is the inspiration for this e-book and our blog.

Ana's Mircale E-Book (pdf 1.8MB) Right click "save as"

E-Book and Press Conference

Over the past few weeks I have been working on putting together an ebook of our story. I am taking some of the posts from the blog and organizing then in chronological order to take it easier to follow. I hope to be done with this project very soon and I will be posting here for people to download. Be sure to check back!

On a slightly different note I took part in a press conference today. This press conference was setup up to announce the formation the Pro-Busqueda Network that I blogged about earlier. We had a lot of help from Physicians for Human Rights to organize the conference.

My self and two other people who had been separated from their families gave statements. We shared a little about our stories and what we are hoping to get out of the network.

Check tomorrows Boston Globe for coverage!

Derek's First Post

Okay, so Nelson/Roberto has been getting on my case to actually contribute here. I promised I would in January, but then I got into my last semester of college and things were crazy and hectic. But I digress. For those who don't know me, my name is Derek, and I am Nelson's brother. My biological parents are his adoptive parents. I was born on May 30, 1985, two years to the day after my parents took him from the orphanage in Tegucigalpa, Honduras.

For this post I'll deal with the beginning, at least the beginning for me. Obviously I knew from early on that Nelson was 'different' and my parents explained to him and I as best they could about who he was and what they knew, which wasn't much. At that age, it doesn't really matter. Family is family. Nelson was and is my brother in every meaning of the word. He has always looked out for me and I knew that he cared. We were very close, even though he was four years older than me.

My brother has already written about the night when he found out that he had family looking for him, so I won't repeat the basic events. I don't remember any other time, before or since, that my parents sounded so serious when they mentioned that they needed to talk with us after dinner. Right now I'm sitting no more than thirty feet from where I was that night, and I can still remember the look on my their faces and on my brother's. Obviously, when you hear those words as a kid, you think about divorce and my parents were quick to explain that that was not the reason for this talk. In hindsight, Nelson is right to say that it didn't make sense, but as I will reiterate later, the first thoughts of a 12 year-old on anything are not always rational.
As they explained the situation, I probably must have turned as white as a sheet, which is impressive for me considering my normal pallor. My first thought was that now that Nelson's real family had found him, they would want him to live with them and I would never see him again. Looking back, it sounds silly, but I really felt scared for a bit that I would lose my brother forever.

Pretty soon, it will have been ten years since that night and instead of losing a brother, I've gained an entire second family. I can understand the apprehension that somebody might feel in this situation. I experienced a lot of new things and it wasn't always easy, but I'm glad now that it happened. Everyone has been so welcoming, from the very first letters that our parents read to us that night through all of the visits and the other correspondence I have never once felt like an outsider, always like a member of the family. That's enough for now, I'll relate some of my other thoughts later.

Pro-Búsqueda Network

Pro-Búsqueda is putting together a network for families of people that have been reunited or who are thinking about reuniting. This is the brief description of what they are trying to create.

What we wanted to initially do was to put people who have been reunited in touch with each other, so they can share their experiences and look at positive ways to remain involved with their biological families, with Pro-Búsqueda and with El Salvador. We also see the network of 'jóvenes reencontrados' as a good way to pass on information to others in the same situation who have still not found, or made the trip back to meet, their biological families. As I'm sure you know, it's quite a daunting experience to come back to a country which you hardly remember (or don't remember at all), to meet a family which you didn't know existed, so it would be great if there was some more support State-side for people trying to prepare for a reunion.

This sounds like a great idea to me. While meeting my family was a great experience for me, it was also difficult at times. Not difficult because we didn't get along but difficult because I had no idea what to expect from them or from there culture. My childhood in the US was much different from my siblings in Central America. It was also difficult because here are these people who you are supposed to be very close with but you really don't know them at all.

Honestly I don't know if I would have used a resource like this when I met my family but thats just because I was a lot younger back then.

I think this is a great idea and I can't wait to get this going. On a side note it looks like Sunnaze who I wrote about earlier is going to be involved with this as well.

Video Interview with Eva

Moving

Today I moved out of my the house I have been living in for 19 years. Its an odd feeling to see the room that you most of your life growing up in empty. As I walked around the house a flood of memories came back from various parts of my child hood. I have so many memories both good and bad here. More good than bad. Part of me will miss it and part of me won't. I know that everything changes. No matter how hard we try to fight everything will change.

I still have a vague memory of driving up to the house for the first time. I remember looking out of the car window at the stone wall fence across the street. As we drove by my parents said "here we are." I remember having a funny feeling as I looked up at the house. I had a funny feeling again this morning as I drove up to the house for what might be the last time. This was a different feeling however. I can't describe but it was strange looking up into what has been my room for the past 19 years and knowing probably would never see it again.

Its strange to think how much has changed in our lives since we moved there. When I moved in I was just starting the first grade. Now I am all grown and on my own. Half the time I spent there I had no idea I had family looking for me. The other half I spent visiting them.

I find the way people deal with change interesting. So many people are afraid and fight it. But change is like a the great river of life. You can try as hard as you want to stop the river or swim against the current but it does no good. You will most likely drown. However I think the thing we forget is that we need change...we demand it. Its a tricky situation however. We change too much and we lose ourselves. We don't change enough and we become board and lazy.

In the end I guess this is a good thing. In order to be our best we need to forget everything we know and start over. so now...I will start over.