{"id":12679,"date":"2017-11-24T15:34:56","date_gmt":"2017-11-24T20:34:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mdcthereporter.com\/?p=12679"},"modified":"2020-09-25T11:28:45","modified_gmt":"2020-09-25T15:28:45","slug":"im-not-related-family-blood-thats-okay","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mdcthereporter.com\/staging\/8357\/im-not-related-family-blood-thats-okay\/","title":{"rendered":"I\u2019m Not Related To My Family By Blood And That\u2019s Okay"},"content":{"rendered":"

I was born on June 8, 1999 in Magnitogorsk, Russia<\/span><\/a>. I was adopted on May 26, 2000 by a Cuban<\/span><\/a> couple. Before my adoption, I used to live in an orphanage in a small town near the Ural Mountains<\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Though not related by blood, I have spent most of my life surrounded by these people. I \u00a0never questioned whether they were my family or not; I simply was. When my parents decided to adopt, they contacted an agency that facilitated adoptions from other countries. By sheer chance, I was the first child they saw. After being enamored with me, they spent the next 10 months toiling to finalize the adoption.<\/span><\/p>\n

I always knew I was adopted. It was never a secret kept from me. When I was a child on my way to school, I asked my mom if I was ever \u201cin her belly.\u201d It didn\u2019t take her long to explain that I was not \u201cin her belly,\u201d but I was \u201cin another woman\u2019s belly.\u201d That woman couldn\u2019t take care of me, so she decided to care for me. Even as a child, I understood what she meant, even though she never used the word \u2018adoption\u2019 or the word \u2018abandoned.\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n

To me, being adopted doesn\u2019t mean being abandoned or lost. I may not look like my mom or my dad. I may do things differently than the rest of the family, but they have never told me that they were not my family.<\/span><\/p>\n

A lot of people have asked me about my \u201creal\u201d parents. Let\u2019s get this straight, my mom and dad are my real parents. They took care of me, bathed me and nurtured me. I\u2019m not going to degrade their parental status just because of some stupid DNA test. My \u201cbiological\u201d parents, however, are a different story.<\/span><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know a lot about them. I know that my biological mom was young and couldn\u2019t take care of me, so she decided to give me up for adoption before I was born. My biological dad was never in the picture. That\u2019s okay. I\u2019m not upset about it and I don\u2019t hate them for it. My mom always told me that it wasn\u2019t easy for my biological mom to give me up and to not be mad at her for it.<\/span><\/p>\n

I love being adopted. I love hearing the story of how my parents had to go through all this stuff just to get me. I\u2019m not ashamed that I\u2019m not \u00a0blood related to my family. The bonds of love are much stronger than that. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was born on June 8, 1999 in Magnitogorsk, Russia. I was adopted on May 26, 2000 by a Cuban couple. Before my adoption, I used to live in an orphanage in a small town near the Ural Mountains. Though not related by blood, I have spent most of my life surrounded by these people. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":478,"featured_media":9011,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[144,259,2177,2178],"class_list":{"0":"post-12679","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-forum","8":"tag-cuban","9":"tag-russia","10":"tag-adoption","11":"tag-adopted"},"yoast_head":"\nI\u2019m Not Related To My Family By Blood And That\u2019s Okay<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Jasmine Machado was born in Russia and adopted by a Cuban family. 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