【An adoption social worker’s journey】My life is changed by a photo – part I

Will a social worker’s life changed by a person he/ she helps with? Will a photo change his/ her life dramatically? As a social worker, I can for sure say “YES” to those two questions. Why? It started from my first encounter with Julia on August 13, 2015. 

That day, I saw a friend of mine shared Julia’s article posted on August 11, 2015 titled “ISO Birthmother: I was born January 15, 1974 in Hualien, Taiwan. I was adopted through The Mustard Seed Mission” （Julia's ISO Birthmother）. As soon as I read the word “Adoption”, my curiosity mode automatically got turned on and I could feel adrenaline kicked in. My heartbeats were faster and my breaths became shorter. Without much rational thought processing, I typed “If there is anything I can do further, please let me know” in the common and hit “reply”. Furthermore, my professional hat got put on so a thought “not giving up” led me sending a personal message to Julia, just in case she did not see my reply.

However, after excitement passed, I started to have a sense of regret because thoughts came across my mind.

“What on earthy did I think I was?”

“I am nobody, just a social worker.”

“Yes, I may have extra passion and willingness to do things out of my normal life, but it will not change the fact that I am nobody” 

Soon, fear emerged. I fear to let Julia down. I fear after raising her hope up but then search hit dead end, just like a few others I have helped. I fear disappointing either party if they are not on the same page about the search. I fear that my involvement opens the door of long hidden hurt and I have no ability to handle. I fear…

Why did I experience a sense of fear? I wondered! I have learned as much knowledge and theory as possible to help me be more effective and sufficient “good” professional helper. I have been trained to keep emotional out and to be as mutual as possible. So when I read Julia’s message, what exactly happened to me?

I re-acted purely based on my emotion! The other horrified part was that I did no assessment! As soon as I realized that part, I knew when I had fear. As a social worker, I do expect myself to help people make positive changes in their lives and solve their issues. I feel positive about myself when I know my help is effective. So to re-act rather than to respond is highly possible leading me to fail my own expectations, not to mention to fail a person’s expectation on me. I then was overwhelmed by too many “what if” questions to the point now I was too embarrassed to admit that I acted without thinking and practical planning.

While I was still regretting my action without thinking, Julia replied. She sincerely shared her feelings, thoughts and wishes for her roots search. Then she wrote:

…I started attempting to find her in May. I had read a story about a man that had been searching for his twins from Korea for over 42 years. He was very emotional. It made me want to find my birth mother, just in case she needed that peace. I thought it would be sad if I had it in my power to bring her peace....but never even tried to find her. I have always wanted her to know that I'm ok. I just really didn't know how to begin searching for her. One thing led to another...& now I'm talking to you.

When I read “just in case she needed that peace…I always wanted her to know that I’m ok”, from my past experiences of working with the birth mother, I knew those words would be so comforting for most of the birth mothers to hear. My thoughts then went crazy. Too many scenarios went through my mind.