Abandoment Healing through my son

Separation anxiety is real. My son is in a phase where even walking into the next room unsettles him. He reaches for me, with wide eyes and a cry that hits me. I feel it in my body—my breath shortens, my belly tightens. It’s more than a parenting moment. It’s something deeper, older.

He needs to know that I’m here for him.
That I don’t disappear.
That when I leave, I always come back.

I was 3.5 years old when I was separated from my birth parents in Korea.
To this day, I don’t know if they gave me up or if we were separated through systemic corruption in the Korean adoption system. I may never know the truth. But I do know this: we were separated.

That separation lives in my body.
I thought it was healed through the love and care from my family, friends, and husband.
But when my son cries in fear that I won’t return, something inside me responds in a way I can’t always explain.

I find myself jumping up quickly, meeting his needs before he even cries.
My husband reminds me gently, “He’s okay. He needs to learn we can’t always respond right away.”
And while I understand, my body often tells a different story.

It took me a few days to realize why this was so hard.
I wasn’t just reacting as a mother.
I was reacting as the child I used to be.

The one who didn’t understand why she was being taken away.
The one who didn’t get to say goodbye.
The one who silently learned that people you love might not come back.

Now, when I tell my son, “Mommy’s leaving, but I always come back,”
I’m not only speaking to him.
I’m also speaking to little Sun Mee.
The part of me that still remembers.

I started small—playing peekaboo, stepping into the kitchen and returning with a smile, saying gently, “I’m back. Here I am.”
Little moments, repeated often, teaching both of us that returning is possible.

Over time, I extended the space.
Now, when my husband takes him while I stepped away for a longer stretch, and when I come back, I always greet him with,
“Mommy’s back. I love you.”

These moments are rituals of reassurance.
They are healing in action.
They are a promise I’m keeping—not just for him, but for the part of me that once never got to say goodbye.

I am not just mothering a child.
I am mothering a nervous system—his, and mine.

And I love doing that.
There’s something sacred in these moments of stillness, especially when we’re breastfeeding.
The quiet connection, the slowing down, the warmth of his small body resting into mine.
The way he looks up and into my eyes with such depth and deep connection.

In those moments, I don’t need words.
We breathe and find safety together.

And something ancient in me exhales.

This is what healing looks like now.
Not in my mind, but in my body.

And as I return to him, again and again, I am learning how to return to myself.