Adoptee Story: Doriana Gabrielle Diaz

“My name is Doriana Gabrielle Diaz,

When I was born, my birth mother gave me a name: Gabriella Diaz. The women who adopted me chose a new name for me when I was placed in their arms: Doriana Markovitz. The change of a child’s name is common in adoptions. In the last year, I legally changed my name to Doriana Gabrielle Diaz, to reclaim the name my birth mother chose for me, to reclaim my heritage, and to reclaim Puerto Rico as my place of origin. Knowing your own name is power. It is being able to look at a map and point to the place on earth your people originated from. I have identified myself by newly connecting my name to the woman who birthed me. In this process, I have begun to redefine myself and my place in the world as an adopted person.

The following is a poem from my book (page 43) Day 4 July 10th, 2018

Mami calls me Gabriella

She sucks her teeth sweet,

And folds her tongue into

her throat like a quilt.

She smiles into my eyes.

She says it likes she’s never

known me as anything else.

Not many people discuss adoption. Adoptees rarely do in public, adopted parents keep it to themselves, and birth mothers and fathers often times suppress their stories and pretend it didn’t happen. I was in that silent place, I am not any longer. That is why I am here to tell you how I made it out of the fog and began to process my adoption story. It is important to note that this process looks and feels different for every adopted person. I am speaking only from the “I” perspective. My adoption story is mine and no one else’s. I am not here to speak for all adoptees, or to speak for all transracial adoptees. I am here only to speak my own truth.

In this story, I will outline my process, reflections and self-discovery starting from childhood to my recent reunion with my birth mother and birth family in Puerto Rico. Throughout this story, I will also be reading poems from my book to further my explanations.

I was raised by many mothers, many women have poured themselves into me. I am the product of the multi-dimensionality of womanhood. I have only ever known the struggle and hardship, while also the joy and power that women can offer to one another and their children. But I am also motherless because there is a woman out there who I did not know, but whose body was my first home. I knew this from the time I could understand that the women who adopted me did not look like me. Their skin does not look like mine, their hair does not feel like mine, and their bodies are not shaped like mine. Even though I knew this, I felt safe inside that truth.

When I was a child, my parents tried to explain my adoption to me. When they tried the first time, I didn’t get it. I was maybe four or five. When they explained it again, I didn’t want to understand. I might have been nine or ten. The more they tried to tell me, the less I wanted to know.

Now I understand there is not a moment when I’m not an adoptee. When I buy groceries, I am an adoptee. When I go to the doctor, I am an adoptee. I hug my sisters as an adoptee, I brush my teeth as an adoptee. I cannot choose not to be an adoptee. There is no end to it, just like there is no end to being someone’s child.

My birth mother was my first love and my first heartbreak. I was born and then I was surrendered and throughout my life, I have been in pain. When I met her I thought my story would change. I thought the loss I carry would disappear. My trip to Puerto Rico did not change that. But it did teach me that the hole that was left inside me from the separation is where my power resides, and that power is strong and unwavering. It cannot be broken and it cannot be tamed.