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My Fiancé Was a Pedophile—Then I Became an Alcoholic: A Thai Adoptee's Journey to Sobriety · Babes, how did you get here

• 0:14
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• 0:33
  me um to meet with the victim and be support during this because there is despite everything that happened we're all women we're all women and when a crime against a child happens it doesn't matter what kind of sure you know stuff you might have had going on um and so they made a statement and um
• 0:56
  It was, for me, I never got to stop. My momentum was go, go, go, make sure the right thing is done. And with that, like I literally never took the time to process how it was affecting me, myself. And I didn't realize how debilitating the guilt was.
• 1:14
  I was about to ask. Yeah, I held on to it. And it wasn't until I really that's when the therapy became something that I knew I cannot not do this for myself when I got sober because I'm holding on. I used to cry every single night when I first moved to L.A., probably for my relationship. I had another relationship with a very sweet man when I moved to Los Angeles.
• 1:41
  And my drinking was the only way to facilitate me allowing myself to cry. Because I was that repressed emotionally. And I'd always been repressed emotionally. The guilt that you were feeling, is that because you felt that you should have known? Yeah. I said, how did you bring this person into our lives? How did you not know? And the guilt actually got worse when I got sober because...
• 2:02
  Then I said, well, maybe if I wasn't drinking, I would have been able to see these signs, you know, because I was compromised. And then is that also what, like, fueled finding the justice and keep going, even though people are putting up barriers when you're trying to make these reports because you felt that you needed to do something wrong?
• 2:20
  I think I always had a very strong sense of what's right and what's wrong. I used to be one of those kids in school that would stand up to the bullies, you know, like I'd form my own posse. And so I always had that sense of like, OK, we've got to stand up for for ourselves and stand up for others. OK. And my family is very different in that respect where they understand what's right and wrong to the core. But if
• 2:48
  if standing up may jeopardize their security or their losing face, they're not going to do it. My brother had actually told me, you shouldn't get involved. Okay.
• 3:04
  And I said, absolutely. I'm getting involved. Right. You know, and that just came from what I believe is like an innate human, like you have to stand up for someone in this situation, you know,
• 3:19
  So this happens. Also I guess what I'm trying to say is with that relationship you're about to get married to this person. And just because you now have this new information, it doesn't mean that the feelings, the positive feelings that you had the day before, you knew this, they don't just disappear. They don't. So this is where I think, this is where my ability to detach
• 3:43
  really came to play as a benefit for me. And also the pre-law understanding taught me how to be very objective with things. Because if you're gonna be successful in a case, you can't get emotionally involved. And my abandonment stuff, it made it easy for, I've always been able to detach if I need to for self-preservation, and that's exactly what I did. Did that fuel the move to LA?
• 4:10
  It absolutely did. Because what ended up happening was Boston is such a townie feeling and he came from such a big family, one of eight. So I remember being in the supermarket with one of my friends and seeing one of his relatives and they're just staring at me because he told a different story. Right. You know, he told a story that I decided to change my mind that I didn't want to get married last minute. Okay.
• 4:36
  I made this up. My closest friends were like, this is anyone who knows you and his family knows you very well and they very much love you. It's very transparent that there's no way you would do something like that. You know, that is not who you are and that is not how you show up in the world.
• 4:53
  Did he ever get punished for his behavior? So he ended up hiring Whitey Bulger's attorney group, which so Whitey Bulger is the biggest Irish mobster in Boston. OK. And so I don't think innocent people hire and shell out that kind of money that he really didn't even have. OK. You know, you're talking a half a million dollar retainer to secure that kind of.
• 5:16
  representation. And so what ended up happening, and this is what turned me away from pursuing law, was that what I saw, it's so politicized, the justice system. And I saw someone who was very respected in the legal system, his representation,
• 5:34
  And I saw the assistant DA they put in front of that, you know, to represent my sister's case. I'd never seen a head intern at the DA's office. I was not familiar with that person and they were so weak. I was a student and I could have represented her better, you know, because nobody's willing to jeopardize their future career as an attorney. Most people being assistant DA is a stepping stone. You're barely making any money. And it's just something you put on your resume.
• 6:01
  And what I saw firsthand experience, not like I read or heard about, was how if you have enough money, you will outsmart the justice system because of the politics that go into play. And I experienced it furthermore with a tactic that his defense used was trying to destroy my credibility. So there was another component where –
• 6:31
  I mean, this is where my, the context of the relationships that I had came to play because I had already been, been kind of versed in this like dark underbelly of like the boyfriend who was a Coke dealer, yeah, on the side, but like kind of more than just on the side amounts, you know, and involved with the mafia.
• 6:55
  I my ex-fiance, you know, he for most of our relationship worked for an investment firm and had a nine to five job, but was like down to earth, had bartended to put himself through college so I could connect because that's what I ended up doing as well. And.
• 7:14
  lo and behold, he has a past that was involved with drug dealing and attached with the Irish law. So I'm like, oh, okay. And when you meet other people that are in recovery and sober, and women especially, attractive women, you start to see that we all kind of do the same thing. We all fall into these same kind of spaces. So you get to LA, is it to pursue music?
• 7:40
  No. So LA was just my whole life, ever since I went away to college, and I started having friends of color and biracial, and I would pick their brains, what part of the US do you live? And when they talked about California, I was like,
• 7:55
  I just sound so magical. Like, I like it. And for me, the attachment to it was more associated around the social culture as a person of color. Okay. And being able to blend in and be treated, you know, not as other. Right. And that was the place out of all of them that really felt like it was like, okay, these are like my people.
• 8:15
  And I always wanted to live there, but my ex-fiance was very attached to being near his family. Right. You know? And so I was like, you're going. You have friends that live there. They said, come take a one-way ticket. You've been through so much. One of my friends, Simone, you were such good friends in college. And so I came out. Mm-hmm. And I never left. I took a one-way ticket.
• 8:40
  I stayed for, I was there for a month and that's when I just put down a deposit for an apartment. Okay. You know. What was the plan? So there was just no point. So the thing was working in the hospitality industry, I was like, it's not going to be hard to get a job. You know, but that's, that's, there's a part of me that's very like, you know, like, let's just do it. You know, let's just rip the bandaid off and like, let's do it. And I just did it, you know.
• 9:06
  And so I come back to Boston. I told my family, I'm moving to LA in a week. I put a deposit down, you know, because that, unfortunately, it was traumatic experiences that reconnected me back to my family. And so I don't want to discount, like, they were always going to be there for me, you know, despite everything. There is so much of my own trauma that really...
• 9:31
  also contributed to my isolation you know but at the time it didn't feel like that the time I felt I was the biggest victim in the world and this is one of those things that like true healing only will allow you to unravel to own your own my contribution okay
• 9:49
  To also really look at things accurately of what I believed the other people were, you know, their accountability was, but not realizing as human beings that there's just way more than that going on. Yeah. You know, it took a long time for me to really.
• 10:06
  really see that and embrace it. But lo and behold, you know, it's just like, oh gosh, it's Lily, you know. I mean, if I get, there's so many things I could tell you. There was a time I went home for Thanksgiving and I hadn't seen my family in five years and I got served.
• 10:24
  I got served with papers for what? So the Jamaican boyfriend who's super sweet, works at Children's Hospital. I just I was so emotionally repressed that I was so afraid to ever be vulnerable to ever share anything. And I didn't want to be in a relationship with him anymore. And instead of being a normal person and expressing it, I I pent it up. And and you know, when you get that like towards someone that you're just like, I just don't like you anymore.
• 10:53
  Well, I got that ick, but unlike a normal person, because I at that point I was I just turned 21 and that's when I first was introduced to cocaine. And I was bartending and I was like, you know, working at the hot spots and the north end of Boston thought I was all this.
• 11:12
  And I like kind of snapped one night and I ended up physically beating him. And I was blackout drunk. Okay. And that's when I learned apparently in his, you know, Jamaica mom. Yeah. Oh, she wanted to kill me, you know, but she had a very strong hold on him because he was more of like a beta male. Right. You know, I mean, we're young. We're kids, you know.
• 11:38
  and so she made him file a police report. He went to the hospital, they took pictures. I'm meanwhile blacked out this whole time not knowing. And I'm a tiny little Asian girl at that point. And you know, I'm 21, I probably weigh 110 pounds.
• 11:54
  And but that was this. It's crazy because people that know me now and have only known me sober would have a very hard time being able to. Putting those two. Yeah. Like this was you did this. So I mean, so I get served.
• 12:10
  in Pennsylvania. OK. And it happened in Boston. I go back to Boston. I had to, you know, follow up with the police there. And they were shocked. An Asian woman beats a Jamaican man, a black man.
• 12:26
  You know, and they were just kind of like, what? So it's like, it's not funny, but it's funny. It's just like, how is their humor? Like, it's just crazy. Like, but it shows you how insane addiction is.
• 12:41
  you know, to cause you to behave in ways you would never usually behave, you know. Before we continue, make sure that you join our community by clicking the link below. You will get to choose thumbnails before the episodes go live, pick our next destinations, even recommend guests. I really cannot wait for you to help me shape where this podcast goes.
• 13:03
  when you get to LA and you're still working in the scene are you still having alcohol cocaine yeah it was and so from that experience after that relationship the Jamaican and like being introduced he had nothing to do with drugs he was like you know
• 13:23
  When I was with Max's fiance, he actually didn't drink. He had ulcerative colitis and didn't drink. Okay. And he didn't do drugs. Right. You know, but I learned later that it's probably because he did a bunch of coke that he had ulcerative colitis. Right. So, and so I wasn't around. I would dabble in it here and there with some of my friends who also worked in the service industry. But it wasn't.
• 13:45
  you know I remember there was a few years where I just never did it okay you know and I think I realized that things had gone really far in that one relationship it just it I always I always had a strong moral compass and I wasn't so out there I didn't couldn't acknowledge that my behavior was like abnormal beyond that
• 14:06
  but la you get to a new city and i was fairly tame but not like it wasn't crazy like when i was in boston oh really because i imagine that la all the vices are out i think i learned enough of myself one of the reasons this is another i'm just gonna be completely transparent but
• 14:28
  my boyfriends I kind of dated to be my babysitters okay and that's a really common thing that people in addiction do okay you know they'll get in partnerships like for me I was I was raised Christian and so I was always kind of torn morally about like you know I don't if I don't have a boyfriend I don't be sleeping around and all this and it would just tether me down yeah and then they became you know my my
• 14:55
  my chauffeur to pick me up. But then when I'm stumbling out, you know, and it's crazy because I think a lot of times men want to feel wanted and needed. And so when you have a, yeah, you have a girlfriend that's always needs you and makes you feel like a man. Yeah. And that I actually found relationships much easier to get into when I wasn't sober. Okay.
• 15:22
  Because now I have more discernment and I'm more intentional and I see all these things. When do you realize that you need to work on sobriety? So that wasn't something that I came upon myself. It just it got so bad and it was after I had actually had a relationship with,
• 15:44
  Another relationship in LA and he was a Korean adoptee turned out he was adopted from the same agency as me And we just like boom we thought we're like we're in love and like literally skipping through the streets. It was crazy and Outwardly he seemed pretty like had his stuff together But I realized the longer we were together that I'm like what are you seeing this guy? there's
• 16:10
  He had his background was he was a Navy air traffic controller. OK. And then he had done some contracts abroad and was able to like own his own condo and stuff. And and I think also the fact that he was Asian, too, and adopted, it really was like, oh, my God. And he had grown up in Pennsylvania.
• 16:31
  Oh wow, so lots of connections. Yeah, and he was a complete sweetheart. He was head over heels for me, this poor guy. Like, he wanted to get married, and he was devastated when I did end the relationship. But I was still in my drinking, you know. Basically, I would bartend at my jobs. I had one in Malibu and Beverly Hills, and then I would just lay at the pool drinking two-buck chuck.
• 16:56
  very glamorous you know but I woke up one day because I was like what do you have in common with this man okay you have those things in common but he was like like no I don't want to and don't mean this in like a dirt in a demeaning way at all but he was like you're all American grew up in Pennsylvania like to play video games they go to the gym right right and
• 17:25
  Even though I wasn't sober, I realized that that still didn't align. And so I kind of like woke up from a daze. And after that, I think, and a lot of adoptees that I talk to, we share this often when it comes to relationships ending. It triggers loss and abandonment, even if I initiated it. We all have different experiences, but
• 17:53
  I have also been known to initiate things in self-preservation that still hurt me emotionally. Like I had ended relationships with people I really liked because I have very firm like moral and ethical boundaries. And so if I feel very strongly that what that person is asking of me isn't something that I feel comfortable doing, I'll end it regardless, you know.
• 18:16
  And so that happened, and that's when drinking became everything. It became, I don't want to even take a shower. I don't want to go to work. Like, at that point, I didn't really care for any of those jobs. I started getting very diva about work. I mean, some of the stories I could tell you, and it's just crazy because of the L.A. culture. The more diva you act, the more people kiss your butt. Ah!
• 18:42
  Like I walked out on a job at I think it's called Bartels on La Cienega. And they have a chain where you may have even taken your kids where they have those giant forks and stuff coming out of the food and like a birdcage. Just like these crazy things. Right. And celebrities take their kids there. And I was training to work. And I go on my lunch break next door to the dive bar, the Belmont, which is like a local restaurant.
• 19:05
  a local watering hole in L.A. in West Hollywood. And I just decided to start drinking and not go back. And I was like venting with them about like, oh, this place is like they don't know what they're doing. Like they're barely even training me. And so I just go back. So I get a call later like what happened? Like and I told them I was like, people don't know what they're doing at all. Like I've really got any training. And they're like, well, we'd really like you to work there still. Like, can you come back?
• 19:33
  Wild to me. So like LA, it's crazy. It's absolutely crazy. And I did for a hot minute and then I was like, no, I'm done. And I think part of it too is when you're, you know, there's something innately in your, in your side of you that knows that you're not on the path you're supposed to be on. And I was out living this whole working in the service industry and
• 19:56
  everything because it was just doing a job to pay the bills. And I'm very social and outgoing. But what I failed to see was that choosing to work in that industry allowed me to facilitate my life around my addiction. Right. I was working in environments where often I was allowed to drink, if not encouraged to drink.
• 20:17
  and then everybody goes out to drink after work, you know? And I didn't see that because I was so immersed in it. It just spent my life, yeah. And so it's when you stop working that you then think. So when I stop, so what happened with the drinking, it gets to a point where I'm drinking so much that my brain is telling me, you don't need to do anything. You just don't care anymore.
• 20:43
  Like that's a bad place to be because not caring about working turns into not really caring about taking care of myself, anything, don't really care about living, but I'm not gonna do anything dramatic. I'm just, alcohol is a slow burn, you know, and people don't wanna, it's hard for people, I think, to accept that because it's socially acceptable.
• 21:06
  But when people are abusing it, they're often trying to mask and escape a pain. And when you start abusing it enough and it starts to wear off its usefulness and you still keep doing it, it's a depressant. It is a depressant and it will eventually catch up with you where the fun and the partying isn't there anymore.
• 21:26
  You're alone drinking, and that's all you do because you really just care about drinking. It's not about socializing or anything. Was there a particular breaking point for you when you realized that actually I needed to address some of my earlier traumas? Definitely the...
• 21:44
  It's interesting because it took, my sobriety journey had some like detours. Yeah, so it started in 2015, and then I was out relapsed for an entire year, and there was nothing dramatic about it. It wasn't just like, ah, she went on a bender or whatever. Like it's, and I will say the first sobriety
• 22:09
  There were elements that shocked me that I was where I was. You know, I remember being in the detox and engaging with other people in there and thinking, how did I get here? Like, I was mostly an alcoholic and some coke, right? Right. But there were people coming off of meth and, like, just things I'd never been around. And it scared me. Yeah. It scared me. And...
• 22:30
  one of the things that happens when you're detoxing from drugs and alcohol is that your emotions are are so out of whack right so I actually broke down and cried in the first group meeting we had and I ran out of the building because I was just so overwhelmed with how did I get here right and and I was the type of alcoholic that
• 22:53
  It was I looked I spent so much time on putting myself together to look nice. I was like a Stepford wife. I was like an Asian Stepford wife and a beautiful little sun dress, you know, with her makeup perfectly done. So nobody could tell what was going on behind here. And that's I mean, and that's a lot of times you have very functioning alcoholics because
• 23:15
  It's so much effort to do it, but we'll do it to save face, to make everything look like it's fine. Did you confide in your family what you were going through? So it didn't happen where I came to them. What happened was my friends in LA, who really never met my family. One of them is a nurse, and she's Asian. It's interesting because a lot of Asian culture does not understand addiction.
• 23:39
  She's still, I wouldn't say she understands it to this day. She's like, oh, you just choose to not do. Why didn't you choose? But as a nurse, as a medical nurse, she saw that I was not doing well. At that point, I was literally having a tantrum because my friends told me, you need to take a shower. And I was just laying on the ground in my apartment, like naked, drinking.
• 24:01
  I mean just like a wild animal. Right. I mean I don't I can't now I look back at I'm like this is insane like you just were somewhere else. And they're like we need to call her family and I guess they're sitting in my window still talking about me right in front of me and I just like whatever you know some in my own world I'm still lucid and everything but.
• 24:23
  And so that's when, so then my mom came, and I had been single, but the boyfriend that I had, the one who was super sweet, I dated him for like two and a half years when I first got to LA. He always would come in, you know, he was very much, very much in love. And so he came back, and he knew my mom. He'd come home with me to Pennsylvania. He was the only person I brought back.
• 24:51
  And aside from my ex-fiancee in my entire life,
• 24:55
  And so he kind of like, cause he knew her and I didn't go long, but he also knew that I wasn't doing well. Sure. And my mother had a very hard time believing I was an alcoholic because I could, like I said, put myself together. Cause you didn't look what she thought an alcoholic could look like. Well, lo and behold, you know, we spent the day going to the botanical garden and I'm trying so hard to like, you know, I wanted to drink so much, but like my mom's there and I'm trying not to. And,
• 25:24
  I ended up breaking when we got back and I got blackout drunk. I drank an entire bottle of vodka, which was my norm. And then I was like playing the keyboard. So for some reason, it's strange, even though I never practiced, there is something locked inside of me musically that just comes out when I was drunk where I could play like really well on the piano, like just making stuff up. So but at the same time, I think.
• 25:53
  It was horrifying for my mother to see myself in this blackout state. Just like, you know, I don't even because I don't remember it. I can't really tell you everything. Yeah. And that's I think that's when she knew what. Yeah. There's also a lot of denial that goes on in my family.
• 26:11
  Emily I don't think we're alone in that I think when things get real and they're they're hard to swallow it's easier psychologically to pretend they don't exist yeah so I mean she can't deny that after seeing that so
• 26:28
  Like a cliche, I went to Betty Ford. My family doesn't know anything about addiction, but the research led them to find out, like, this is the best place. So, you know, and luckily I had some insurance that helped cover that and everything. But, you know, one of the biggest things I learned was...
• 26:51
  part of the difficulty of accepting I was where I was didn't leave me after getting sober there. I didn't realize I was still holding on to the belief that I kind of wasn't one of them, you know? And they always say this, you know, now that,
• 27:07
  We have to look at the similarities and not the differences, you know, when you start this journey to recovery. Because it's incredibly humbling for you to accept, like, I am an alcoholic. I have a problem. Because it's so easy to separate yourself intellectually and find these reasons that you're self-rationalizing why your situation is not just that, you know. And...
• 27:36
  Addiction does not discriminate. It doesn't discriminate socioeconomically, gender, sexuality, you name it. And there's a shame that's attached to it in our culture.
• 27:51
  And I think maybe it's gotten a little bit better, but that's the hard thing when you're getting sober is you have so many different levels of shame compounded upon each other, societal, personal, traumatic, and to unravel all that when you have an explosion of emotions that happen because you're not numbed out all of a sudden, it's a lot. Was it through sobriety that you then felt this need to pursue learning more about your past?
• 28:18
  Yeah, but it didn't happen until I really committed to my sobriety. And when I committed to my sobriety, and it's this sobriety, I just turned seven years sober, was amazing. Thank you. That's when I realized, number one thing I'm working on,
• 28:38
  is my relationship with my family, period. I was like, at this point, I didn't really have. I actually went and started practicing Buddhism when I got sober. And now I'm a ho-renge-kyo. So I practiced that for seven years. And it was a blessing because it's led me on my journey that I'm on now. But I didn't have that right away.
• 28:58
  But the second sobriety I did. And I also realized I was like, you have a God sized hole with abandonment and you have this family that's here that you choose not to be a part of. Right. Let's look at that. You know, let's start there. And once I started, I mean, it looked like this.
• 29:19
  I had to start with writing a letter once a week to my family to begin to really begin like communications. That's how distant we were. And then it was a phone call once a week, you know, and just doing that routine. Yeah. You know, and.
• 29:38
  And I started going to therapy for myself. And it didn't all click right away and everything kind of happened in its own time. But as my journey went on, I started to really understand how impactful understanding our early childhood relationships are with our family members to see how we're showing up in the world and our relationships with other people. Yeah.
• 29:59
  And I mean, even knowing that I still kept repeating some of the same patterns with people, it definitely takes a lot because you've got to unwind a whole lifetime of conditioning. Yeah. And that's where I also really consciously gave myself time to not be in relationships. Okay. So I've spent these last 10 years almost like really not in relationships.
• 30:27
  No, but that makes sense. Yeah. It's not that I did date here a little there, but to really heal, I needed to have that time for myself. Yeah. And when you decided to move back to Thailand, what was the motivation for?
• 30:43
  It was initially like, it was a combination of knowing that I can't wait any longer to look for my birth parents. Okay. And I was feeling very isolated and kind of unhappy at that point in LA. Because I realized when I looked at my life from the outside, I was working 80, 100 hours a week. I was pursuing what I love to do.
• 31:10
  but I still was you know working to pay the bills as well and I was fine with that I was like this is the choice you made to be an artist but the social fabric around me didn't make sense anymore okay it didn't make sense I found myself wanting to not spend as much time with people and became a very very small amount of people that I wanted to even make time for
• 31:37
  And I was like, this is no way to live. And I couldn't afford to do the things like and have a social life. Sure. While I was pursuing being an artist and the cost of living and everything, you know. And so when I started inquiring about
• 31:58
  citizenship and then i started looking at youtube there's so many youtubers about thailand and i just got i was like wow like what am i why didn't i i should be going here sooner you know um because it's gonna alleviate some of the financial pressure for me and open up things but more importantly i was like the culture
• 32:18
  it's beautiful the graciousness of the people the fact that you know I believe cultures that have a very strong spiritual practice in them there's a it's a different social values how do you go about finding your birth mother so right now
• 32:41
  We've, like, identified them. Okay. Yeah. I'm not going to go into specifically, but basically because of, like, laws in Thailand and stuff about how to, you know, privacy and things like that. I do have a friend who works for the Thai police and stuff. Yeah. And so I've already gone and got my birth certificate and sending all this information to get my Thai ID and stuff enough to prove I am who I say I am. Okay.
• 33:07
  It's a very small, pretty much law enforcement are the only people really allowed to look at these things. But at the same time, you still have to. I'm also having the support of the adoption agency with helping me go to the district office. These are the offices of the different provinces. Yep.
• 33:26
  and helped me with the paperwork and all of that, which has been incredible. Do you know the circumstances that your mom was experiencing? So I'm learning that the adoption agency knows a lot more than they let on. You know, I think in the Thai culture, what I'm noticing too is that there is, they take their time to get to know you too, you know, and in this particular,
• 33:53
  situation they have seen some adoptees who come to do this go crazy, as they say, because it's such an emotional journey that their response to it sometimes might be different than how they were showing up when they first meet them, I think. Have you visualized what...
• 34:12
  this could play out, you know, in the sense that you go through the process. Yeah, I think I've probably gone over so many times in my head before I was even ready to take the first steps to do this. And that's largely to do with the fact that I've gotten really active and connected in the adoption community.
• 34:31
  yeah so that's allowed me to really hear other people's stories of reunification sure but for many years I didn't think it was possible as an international adoptee that's another reason that it kind of fed that fear of not looking because why set up yourself I set up myself for failure yeah
• 34:50
  Um, but the more I kept, I kept hearing these reunion stories and they're hard, they're complex, they're, they're not happy ever, ever, you know, happy everly after kind of things. And so I wanted to make sure my sobriety was in a good place. Yep.
• 35:08
  And I was struggling in my recovery to really understand, like, why is it that I don't feel like I can connect emotionally when I want to? OK, it's that's where music kind of came into play for me, because I don't have to make any effort to express myself emotionally through music. It's just like I said to someone, I think I'm autistic. Like I can know he's like, no, you're artistic. You're you're a musician. But so, um,
• 35:37
  Yeah, and that always frustrated me and I was like I know this has to do with all my adoption stuff, you know, and I think not having that like
• 35:48
  like gut response to things that I wish I would when it came to more personal things like this also kept me, you know, delayed in doing the search. But I think doing it is going to help open things up, you know. But yeah, so it could play out a few ways where sometimes I don't want to see you
• 36:11
  it's too hard for them. At the time my father had left her and during that time in Thailand, it was very looked down upon, so her family disowned her. She was 21, never went to college and did not have a job. And she had actually had an abortion with me and it didn't take.
• 36:34
  So the adoption agency, I saw that in the records. I didn't learn about it till I was an adult, you know, really older in my 30s when I first looked at my records. But then speaking with a social worker who knows because they spent time working with my bio mom, we call them bio moms. She explained to me that after she gave birth, she changed her mind.
• 36:58
  And she tried to care for me because I saw in the records there were these first five months that weren't really accounted for until I show up at the orphanage. Right. So I made the assumption myself. I'm like, she must have tried to take care of me.
• 37:10
  And she did. She tried. But then when I looked at the records when I got back, it was like malnourished baby, you know, this, that, and the other. So she just couldn't afford to take care of me on her own. 21's young, you know, to be all by yourself doing that. And...
• 37:29
  And I can tell you, I think one of the reasons why I'm able to really have compassion, too, for her is that when I was 22 and I was just getting out of the relationship with the abusive Asian guy and going into the relationship with my ex-fiance, I ended up pregnant. Okay.
• 37:50
  I ended up pregnant and you know I wasn't I didn't have a relationship with my family I didn't tell my mother until years afterwards and because our relationship was so close I left one and went right into another there was no telling for sure whose it was yeah and so I had an abortion
• 38:09
  You know, and today as someone who understands a lot more of the repercussions of the decision like that, I wouldn't do it now. You wouldn't? No, I wouldn't do it now. Why? So and I've dealt so deeply in my faith. I've realized that...
• 38:31
  First of all, I had to mention that I believe all these experiences in our lives happen for a reason, even especially the really painful ones. And if
• 38:45
  If I, today, I really believe that life is a gift, and I'm proof of that, that I came, I'm still here even after an attempted abortion, and if I hadn't lived, how could I share that you, we as human beings are so resilient and capable of becoming so much more than we realize and beyond our circumstances?
• 39:11
  I wouldn't be living proof to show that. Right. You know, and so I'm also, who am I to choose who lives and dies? You know, and I think,
• 39:23
  I think the thing that people get tripped on these days, and psychologically, people know what they're doing with linguistics. I was an English major, so I'm very careful about my choice of words because they have incredible meaning. And in the spiritual world, what we speak, we speak into existence. And it's very important to be intentional and be aware of what you're saying because they...
• 39:50
  Like scientifically, things that we say never go away. They're still reverberating in the sound waves. Did you have to go through forgiveness of self?
• 40:02
  I think at the time, I didn't, it took me a little, I was delayed in really processing the whole thing. Because I was so young and I was so scared. And those are being, making decisions based out of fear are probably the worst place we can be in. You know, basing decisions out of fear and trying to do them all by yourself.
• 40:23
  And the only people coaching you are the people at the clinic who really believe they're looking out for your best interests because they see this young girl like, you know, this is going to we've been taught that this is going to ruin your life, you know. But here's the thing they don't talk about. Like I mentioned, my family will always show up for me, you know, even if I don't think they are and I'm afraid they won't, they will.
• 40:49
  And when I told my mom what I did, she was like, I wish she would talk to me. You know, I wish she would talk to me. And I think people need to know there is.
• 41:01
  support and there are women who raise kids on their own as well and then the very last option is giving someone up like someone did for me which did provide me with a better opportunity even though I'm you know I have very mixed feelings I don't advocate adoption as the first
• 41:24
  resource. You know, I definitely advocate for family preservation, but only in very extreme situations. And so, yeah, I think, you know,
• 41:38
  I just think that it's become there's been very little consciousness attached to making decisions about whether to terminate a pregnancy or not, because we've been indoctrinated to be so disassociated and use terminology that degrades human life into a specimen or something that's not a human yet. I think from a spiritual aspect,
• 42:08
  it's got way more weight than that. Than we give it. Yeah, than we give it. And I have a lot more to say about it, but...
• 42:19
  I will just say this. I feel, I do not, my opinion is actually probably the minority in the adoption community about abortion. There are so many people in pain that believe that they would have been better off aborted. Okay. And I hear them saying this all the time. Okay. And everyone, I am not discounting your emotions and your opinion around it because of the pain you've gone through, but...
• 42:45
  we wouldn't be here sharing our struggles to help illuminate the challenges of adoption for the next generation if we had been aborted. So there's a reason we're here. And we're here to help other people
• 42:59
  So hopefully there's more awareness surrounding adoption where internationally countries are now making it illegal to adopt trans nationally. Like China, a few others. I think from a human- Do you support that? I do support that. I think, I mean, it's becoming that global, it's clearly a humanitarian thing where you're realizing that this is not in the benefit of the child.
• 43:27
  When you came to Thailand on this particular trip, knowing that you were gonna make Thailand your home for right now, did you have this sense of homecoming? I did, I think it's a mixed bag because a part of me has had to navigate my own internalization of where I belong in this particular part of my journey. Because,
• 43:54
  It's like I've always wanted to be around... There's a comfortability to be around people that are like you. And I think that's why the culture coexists with me so easily. Because it's probably in my DNA. 100%. You know? But then...
• 44:10
  because I can't speak the language, it reminds me that I'm a foreigner. Right. You know, and it's how I choose to interpret this. Do I choose to allow myself to continue to be self-conscious about this? Or do I accept that? Hey, you have a unique circumstance. And when you tell people about it that are Thai, they have been overwhelmingly warm and welcoming.
• 44:35
  You know, so that's where it's really important and how we perceive the experiences that we're having right now in this moment. Or are we perceiving it through the fear and insecurities that we're holding on inside internally? Yeah. You know, and so it's a daily reprieve to remind myself that your experience was.
• 44:56
  is mixed. It's been well received with Thai people. It's expats who have had a trouble with knowing where to place me. Really? And I think psychologically as human beings, we're just so used to being able to place people in these little... Neatly. Yeah, neatly. And I don't fit there. Why don't you speak Thai?
• 45:13
  you know and then it'll be well how are you gonna learn tai like don't they expect you to speak it and i'm like you're you know you're like so insensitive or you're deliberately trying to like really tear me down here because i think anyone with like half an iota of emotional intelligence would realize like this could be a triggering thing to mention you know people are ridiculous yeah and so that's
• 45:38
  I've gotten so attuned to people with non-verbals and verbal things and tone and all that, where it's like, and I think this is why it's, you know, it strengthens my ability to be an artist, but it makes my day-to-day life as a human being walking around difficult, where I do choose to spend a lot of time by myself to protect my energy. Because there's so many people that are walking around hurt
• 46:08
  and they're taking it out on other people around them. And I just don't want to be in the cross fires. Just quickly, pursuing music in Thailand, coming from an LA perspective, is it harder to pursue your musical career here?
• 46:25
  I think it's too early to tell. Okay. But I've noticed I've already had people reach out to me on Instagram. Cool. You know, and I got invited and I went to an event that someone was performing at, an artist who asked to collab with me who is from New York City himself and actually did a collab with Neo when he was in the U.S.
• 46:46
  and I know it's more I guess it's yet to be revealed but I don't think so I think this day with social media and day with social media and then I have another producer out here who invited me to you know do a little freestyle snippet on his social media too and so
• 47:06
  I come here, it's interesting because the part of me has to like recalibrate because I'm coming from like, you know, the Harvard of music industry in Los Angeles and I'm coming here to Thailand just in general, learning to reframe how I'm experiencing everything because...
• 47:27
  things are just different. Right. I think it's important to not place value judgments based on where you're coming from and what you've experienced when you don't fully understand a culture yet. Yep. And I think that's going to be kind of how I'm choosing to experience my walk in the music industry as well here. You know, and I still work, I mean, I have everybody I still work with in LA anyway. Sure. So I've been setting up all my sessions and stuff. But I think...
• 47:55
  it's what I have learned just from like regular people that listen to music that are young and in college here is that they actually really listen to American lyrics. OK. They're not listening to Thai music. OK. I was told, oh, that's what did they cringe?
• 48:12
  and so I was like cringe but here I am really embracing reclaiming my identity as someone who is a Thai adoptee who was displaced and now coming back and before I left LA I had a filmmaker an Emmy-winning filmmaker asked me if I would do one of my songs in Thai for a documentary he just shot in Laos and
• 48:34
  And I said, absolutely, you know, and I can distribute music both in Thai and English. Here's the thing. Yes, I don't speak Thai yet, but the way we record music in the studio, I can, you know, we can put it together where I'm like recording it line by line or something. But for me, I don't care if like the younger culture thinks it's cringe. I think the context behind having...
• 48:58
  an artist, R&B, like strong R&B, like my vocal mentor in L.A. was Sister-in-law Shaka Khan and, you know, friends with everybody. Yes. And so it tells music tells a story. Soul tells a story. And I'm coming back home and I want to be able to share that part of my journey. And I have had
• 49:21
  uh been well received i think on social media and i think whatever the algorithm does i'm still like trying to navigate that you know that's been a fairly newer thing for me social media but i just believe being authentic um because that's how we connected
• 49:39
  And I was, wow, I'm like, my stuff is reaching the right people. Because this trying to understand how everything works, sometimes you do just have to give it over and trust that you sharing your story the way you want to share it is all you need to do.
• 49:54
  and not fuss over so many of the other things because I've gone in different directions. I've connected with a lot of the expat Thai influencers out here. I know quite a lot of them and we were in a group together, but I was making posts about Thailand that weren't really encapsulating my experience.
• 50:15
  they were mimicking what was already going on out there because I was concerned with trying to get views and numbers. And then I was told, well, then you can have more liberties with what you're doing. Right.
• 50:28
  But then it's like, well, that's like not even my brand. So, but, you know, it's like you just kind of throw things at the wall and try them and find people that are doing well in that area. And, you know, it's just a little experimentation. And I expect my experience in Thailand is probably going to be a little bit of that. Do you think that you will be living in Thailand for the foreseeable?
• 50:54
  I believe so. I mean, I really love it. I really love it here. And I'm investing. I'm investing time and I'm investing money in building a home music studio. So we better put it to work. We better put it to work. And I also took the time to do some research about some of the things going on socially in Thailand. Because I'll be frank, like, I know that there's some information
• 51:24
  I don't know if I was going to be able to have access to it while I'm living in Thailand or not. And so I just wanted to get the real scoop on what's going on. I already asked the adoption agency if there were volunteer opportunities because I love children. Like, I love children. Like, if that hadn't happened with my ex-fiance, I wanted three kids, you know.
• 51:45
  and they said, yeah, I can teach English. Amazing. So I think that would be really special to do. And I know a lot about, there is quite a lot of displaced children in Thailand. Okay. Yeah, there's a lot. And...
• 52:04
  Out of the other countries though, Thailand is the one that's really tried to keep the kids in the country. And I think that's really admirable. They really try to focus on self-preservation. And I wanna contribute
• 52:20
  more than a donation. This was my life for four years. So recently, my real estate agent is just so fascinated with the fact that I'm a Thai adoptee and I'm coming back here to live and get my Thai ID. And she was like...
• 52:37
  So what is your house number going to be? So in Thailand, everyone when they're born is assigned to a house number and it's usually that of your mother's. OK. And so I said, well, I was I am assigned to the orphanage. And there was just like.
• 52:52
  you could feel her heart just kind of like weep, you know, because Thailand family is so big, like so important. The idea of you being assigned because you don't have a home to an orphanage, it's like, it's a harder concept to get. And in the United States, adoption has been...
• 53:17
  so normalized right and i i would argue that disconnections and severs and families have been so normalized as well that people don't have what i believe is a healthy response to something like this yeah you know it's there's a desensitizing that's happened
• 53:39
  And I think that same desensitization is also playing into the discussion about, you know, abortion and things like that. And I don't know. There was a time where I would have been like, oh, you shouldn't talk about this. But I'm a product of someone who has...
• 54:00
  been attempted to abort, also had an abortion, but now is a surviving adoptee. So I'm not in a position to judge anyone. Sure. Let me make that very clear. You know, I do believe everyone has their right to have their choice. But my choice and why is what it is now. Yeah. You know?
• 54:19
  Cool, he's having a heart attack. So I will wrap up by saying that I really appreciate you sharing and sharing so openly so many things. That you have touched on so many things and your life has been an example, a positive example for so many people for different reasons.
• 54:42
  I hope that this conversation has given respect to your journey. You know, in many parts, we have shared where, unfortunately, society ascribes shame or other things to so many different elements. And to me, your story is deeply inspiring, like deeply, deeply inspiring. I hope that Thailand gives you everything that you came for, you know. Thank you.
• 55:09
  there's just so many different points that I find super relatable, even despite the fact that our beginnings are so different. And I think that life is hard, you know. Irrespective of the different details, I think that life is hard, and I think it's really inspiring to know that you still have such a positive mindset. No, really, because I think also sometimes in my own life,
• 55:35
  I get guilt from not feeling positive because I know that I need to train what I'm focusing on. And I need to see the things that can be seen rather than feel overwhelmed by things that essentially are frivolous at the end of the day. Yeah. I think, and it happened just yesterday, because I do maintain a really positive outlook
• 56:03
  I get patronized sometimes. And I want to be like, if you only knew. Yeah. You know, if you only knew what people walk through, yet they're still able to hold their head up high.
• 56:16
  You know, we create the we create the experience we're in. Yeah, we do. And we do have agency, you know, and people need to know that. Thank you. Is there anything that you wanted to share that we didn't? I think I covered a lot. Amazing. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me.