Every triad members has their own personal and unique adoption story. That story is part of who they are as they move from childhood, through adolescence to adulthood. It is important for an adoptee to come to their own peace with how adoption fits into their lives and find a comfortable balance. For international adoptees, their story began in another country and culture and includes issues of race, ethnicity and heritage.

An international adoption search requires working with a different country, language, laws, and culture. One of the greatest challenges may be understanding the cultural context and nuances.

It is my opinion that the countries currently most pursed by an adoptee are South Korea. My thought process here is this is the country where adoption has been practiced the longest and most actively. However it is also important to keep in mind that international search and reunion is more difficult and complicated which makes the possibility of finding biological family less than likely than in a domestic adoption search and reunion. Records and resources were not always kept in developing countries and commitments to long term record keeping varied greatly from one orphanage to another.

In a domestic adoption search an adoptee is looking for biological family, family history, and answers to specific questions regarding their circumstances of existence. For an international adoption search the search is searching for culture and ethnicity. It may include traveling back to your birth country to see where you were born and experience the rich culture and history that was left behind to begin a life in the United States.

If you are conducting an international adoption search you will be working between two different countries and this requires working through the laws and procedures locally, nationally, and internationally. The laws and practices of another country may be confusing but it is necessary to honor the birth country and to not circumvent the system, government officials, orphanage staff and others who assist you in your search.