Connections Through Technology

These days everyone is focused on unplugging, disconnecting from these chains we have with technology. Well, I have done just the opposite. YUP, I am as connected as ever, but it is for a very worthwhile cause.

Something that I do not share on Adaptive Amputees is that after my adoption I stayed in contact with my biological family. I was given up because of my deformities at birth. I had club foot and many other issues going on internally. I was dying, and therefore the best thing my parents could do for me was send me to a country that could care for my medical needs. Can you imagine what that must have been like for my mother and father? I was their first born. I was born very sick. I would not live if I stayed there. How selfless of them. How utterly amazing. And my adoptive parents…how amazing are they? They took this broken baby and helped heal her. Then, they selflessly shared me with my biological parents. They chose to tell me my true story and let me stay in contact with my biological family.

Flora and Lev (my Russian parents) had 2 more kiddos, both healthy, both boys. I had brothers! Kathy and Danny (my American parents) adopted another little girl. I had a sister! I took Russian lessons as a kid to ensure I kept up with my ability to speak to my Russian family.

We talked on landlines at first. This was difficult because my Russian was fading and my parents knew no English. My brothers were learning English and that helped quite a bit. Then we got email! We felt so advanced! I was able to ask all sorts of questions and my brothers would email me back.

Then this fancy app called Skype came out! Wow, this makes me feel old haha. I was able to see my family face to face for the first time in my life! I could show them that I was truly healthy. That I could walk and live a “normal” life. This was huge! I could see they were okay and they could see I was okay.

Then…nothing. No phone calls answered. No emails responded to. Nothing. I couldn’t get ahold of them. I had lost all communication with them. It has been 5 years of silence. This part of my life that was a huge driving force for me just vanished. I was pushed to do so much of what I do because of them. When I told them I was going to be an engineer when I grow up my father said, in English “Gala, I’m proud of you”. My nickname as a baby was Gala. My name was Angaylina (Russian for Angelina). I told my brothers about the sports I played, I told my mother about the garden I planted. I wanted to do everything as best I could to show them I was okay. That they had made the right decision and that I was not upset with their decision.

About 6 months ago, a lady commented on one of my Adaptive Amputees posts asking if I was Angelina, from Russia. I have shared publicly on this platform that I am originally from Russia so I figured she had read that somewhere. I confirmed that the name behind Adaptive Amputees is, in fact, Angelina and that I was originally from Russia. Her next comment was only 2 words. I’m Tina.

Holy Shit!!

Tina, from Russia, played a massive role in getting me out of the country and to my new home with my new family here in the United States. She even came and visited a few years after my adoption. She was a close friend of both my biological and current parents.

I cried when I read those 2 words. It felt so good to hear from Russia. I began speaking with her asking about her family and our other Russian friends. She asked how Flora and Lev and my brothers were. I told her I had no idea. I told her how upset I was that I could not get ahold of them.

Within a few weeks she told me she had contacted them and given them my number to call. I kept my phone at full charge and google translate ready. One afternoon at work my phone rang with a very long, very familiar number. I answered with tears in my eyes, “halo, mama papa?”

I am now talking with my family once again. They have cell phones, smart phones! so we are texting and sending selfies like crazy. My little brothers are not so little anymore. They are 25 and 20. They have facial hair and deep voices. They look like my twins! My mother and father are healthy and still working. They are all happy and healthy.

I am so thankful for technology. I am thankful for social media. I am even thankful for selfies.