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China’s adopted children return from overseas to seek their roots
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China’s adopted children return from overseas to seek their roots

AFP

DIANJIANG, CHINA—At an empty concrete lot in southwest China, Loulee Wilson scoops a handful of stones into a bag—a memento from the site where she believes she was abandoned as a baby.

Wilson, an American college student, was born in China but given away by parents presumed fearful of violating the country’s one-child policy, under which families were punished for having additional children until the strategy was ended from 2016.

Soon after her birth, she was found outside a now-demolished factory in the town of Dianjiang, brought to an orphanage and later adopted by a couple in the United States.

Now 19, she is among a growing number of Chinese adoptees returning to their birth country to trace their biological parents and understand where they came from.

The photo taken on June 7, 2024 shows Corinne Wilson (R) and Loulee Wilson reacting as a woman looks through Loulee’s childhood photos, in Dianjiang county, in southwestern China’s Chongqing municipality. Wilson, an American college student, was born in China but given away by parents fearful of violating the country’s “one-child” policy, which punished families for having additional children until its abolition in 2015. (Photo by Jade GAO / AFP)

“If I (find them), that would be incredible. But I don’t know if I’ll be able to,” she told Agence France-Presse (AFP).“It’ll help me to find out more of my story.”

Over 82,000 children born in China have been adopted by American families since 1999, according to State Department figures—mostly girls, owing to a Chinese cultural preference for boys.

The photo taken on June 7, 2024 shows Loulee Wilson sobbing outside a now-demolished factory where Loulee believes she was found as a baby, in Dianjiang county, in southwestern China’s Chongqing municipality. Wilson, an American college student, was born in China but given away by parents fearful of violating the country’s “one-child” policy, which punished families for having additional children until its abolition in 2015. (Photo by Jade GAO / AFP)

Many were handed over in the 2000s when Beijing more tightly enforced birth restrictions and laws around overseas adoptions were comparatively lax.

As those children reach adulthood, they are creating “very, very big demand” for reunions with their birth families, said Corinne Wilson, Loulee’s adoptive mother.

The photo taken on June 7, 2024 shows Corinne Wilson (L) talking with locals in the hope of finding her adopted daughter Loulee’s biological parents in Dianjiang county, in southwestern China’s Chongqing municipality. Wilson, an American college student, was born in China but given away by parents fearful of violating the country’s “one-child” policy, which punished families for having additional children until its abolition in 2015. (Photo by Jade GAO / AFP)

She is the founder of The Roots of Love, one of a cluster of organizations set up in recent years to reconnect adoptees with relatives in China.

“There is a part of them that is proud to be Chinese,” she told AFP.

Traumatic past

In June, the Wilsons set out to search for birth families in rural Dianjiang, about 150 kilometers from the megacity of Chongqing.

They handed out flyers bearing Loulee’s and other adoptees’ names, ages and photographs, and urged people who gave away children to provide DNA samples.

Finding a match is unlikely due to patchy record-keeping, language barriers, fading memories and local vigilance against potential scams.

The photo taken on June 7, 2024 shows Loulee Wilson looking on as a woman looks through her childhood photos, in Dianjiang county, in southwestern China’s Chongqing municipality. Wilson, an American college student, was born in China but given away by parents fearful of violating the country’s “one-child” policy, which punished families for having additional children until its abolition in 2015. (Photo by Jade GAO / AFP)

And some communities are wary of dredging up the traumatic past hidden among the sleepy villages and rice paddies, where birth quotas were once zealously enforced.

Under the one-child policy—in practice, a patchwork of varying birth restrictions—couples in Dianjiang were often permitted a second child if the first was a girl.

But officials cracked down hard on unsanctioned births, threatening to demolish homes, confiscate farm animals and impose astronomical fines, villagers told AFP.

The photo taken on June 7, 2024 shows locals reading a flyer bearing Loulee Wilson’s photographs and a message in the hope of finding Loulee’s biological parents in Dianjiang county, in southwestern China’s Chongqing municipality. Wilson, an American college student, was born in China but given away by parents fearful of violating the country’s “one-child” policy, which punished families for having additional children until its abolition in 2015. (Photo by Jade GAO / AFP) / To go with ‘CHINA-ADOPTION-POPULATION, FOCUS’ by Celia Cazale and Matthew Walsh

“We were forced into it. We didn’t have a choice,” said carpenter Yi Enqing, 57, who hoped to track down an infant daughter put up for adoption in the early 1990s.

“I’m scared she wouldn’t accept us now. She must have some resentment in her heart,” he told AFP at his sawdust-caked workshop.

In one village, a middle-aged man spat into a beaker while his wife tearfully recalled a daughter they last saw as a baby in 1990.

Identity issues

“I’ve looked for so long but can’t find her,” she said as a Roots of Love helper carefully sealed and packaged the saliva sample.

“I never wanted to send her away,” she added. The couple requested anonymity to protect their privacy.

The photo taken on June 7, 2024 shows Loulee Wilson (L) taking a photo outside a now-demolished factory where Loulee believes she was found as a baby, in Dianjiang county, in southwestern China’s Chongqing municipality. Wilson, an American college student, was born in China but given away by parents fearful of violating the country’s “one-child” policy, which punished families for having additional children until its abolition in 2015. (Photo by Jade GAO / AFP)

The samples are sent to a laboratory where their DNA is extracted and compared with existing databases.

If there is a match, The Roots of Love puts long-lost relatives in touch, such as last year when twin girls reconnected with their birth mother after a nearly two-decade separation.

Reunions can trigger complex emotions for adoptees, who experts say often struggle with mental health issues around identity and racial discrimination.

See Also

The photo taken on June 6, 2024 shows a local woman reading a flyer bearing Loulee Wilson’s photographs and a message in the hope of finding Loulee’s biological parents in Dianjiang county, in southwestern China’s Chongqing municipality. Wilson, an American college student, was born in China but given away by parents fearful of violating the country’s “one-child” policy, which punished families for having additional children until its abolition in 2015. (Photo by Matthew WALSH / AFP)

“A lot of Chinese adoptees do express racial (or) cultural dissonance as a result of growing up in very homogeneous, white settings,” said Grace Newton, a researcher at the University of Chicago who studies transracial and transnational adoption.

“It is losing your identity, your birth culture, your birth language, your biological family,” said Cassidy Sack, an adoptee volunteer with the US-based Nanchang Project, which has matched dozens of birth families since 2018.

“That was the life you were supposed to live. And then out of your control, decisions were made for you, and you were taken to a new country.”

The photo taken on June 6, 2024 shows a middle-aged man giving a DNA sample in the hope of finding his long-lost daughter as his wife stands next to him in Dianjiang county, in southwestern China’s Chongqing municipality. Wilson, an American college student, was born in China but given away by parents fearful of violating the country’s “one-child” policy, which punished families for having additional children until its abolition in 2015. (Photo by Matthew WALSH / AFP)

Baby bust

China launched the one-child policy in 1979 amid fears its population would grow unmanageably large.

It is estimated to have prevented hundreds of millions of births, but has been condemned for enforcement that in some areas included forced contraception, abortions and sterilizations.

The policy was also blamed for driving up infanticide rates, spurring child trafficking and permanently skewing China’s ratio of men to women.

The photo taken on June 6, 2024 shows Corinne Wilson sticking a flyer in the hope of finding her adopted daughter Loulee’s biological parents on a faded billboard with a slogan that reads “A daughter is like a slice of heaven, she’ll take good care of you when you’re old”, which used to promote China’s “one-child” policy in Dianjiang county, in southwestern China’s Chongqing municipality. Wilson, an American college student, was born in China but given away by parents fearful of violating the country’s “one-child” policy, which punished families for having additional children until its abolition in 2015. (Photo by Matthew WALSH / AFP)

It “caused serious mental trauma to many Chinese people,” He Yafu, an independent demographer, told AFP.

Beijing officially eased birth restrictions from 2016, and Chinese couples have been permitted to have three children since 2021.

But the country’s birth rate has continued to fall, leaving a diminishing number of young people to look after a soaring elderly population.

For the Wilsons, the search for Loulee’s birth parents goes on.

“I just want them to know that I’m happy and healthy, and grateful for the life I’m living,” Loulee said.


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