Quote

I was adopted by two amazing people: a Salvadoran mother and a white father who were incredibly supportive of me and my work. I am eternally grateful for them.

My son, who is five, was adopted from Ethiopia. My daughter was adopted from Guatemala. Her parents died of typhoid and malaria. We got her from an orphanage. They are the lights of my life.

The journey into adoption started for my parents, as it does with so many families: my mother and father desperately wanted to have kids, but they couldn't.

I wanted to help women and their families.

Meanwhile I married and I adopted three kids who were all from one family and then later I was divorced.

I was a sickly baby, and after two sets of adoptive parents took me home, they returned me to the orphanage because of a serious respiratory infection. But as they say, the third time's a charm, because my mom and dad adopted me and took me into their home where I was raised in a family full of love.

Thank God I had all these family values or who knows where I'd be now.

My mother birthed three children and she adopted myself and another African-American son. My adoptive parents were Finnish. I grew up in a white picket neighborhood.

For my 11th birthday, I asked to be adopted.

My father was adopted. He grew up in the Italian household.