Coming to terms with being abandoned at birth

Ms Grace Lee, 39, was abandoned at birth. Her mother gave birth to her at KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital but left without her baby, while her biological father was never in the picture.

Ms Lee –  who later learnt her birth mother had an affair with a married man – has never met her biological parents. She was later adopted by a teacher and her engineer husband.

The wounds of abandonment ran deep, and it was not until she met an unwed mother who gave her child up for adoption that she was able to come to terms with her birth circumstances and adoption.

On Oct 12, Ms Lee is launching a book she wrote about her life titled Abandoned At Birth, Living With Hope.

She said it took only one person whose story she heard to change her own life and turn it around, and hopes her story can similarly bring hope to others with difficult childhoods.

She also hopes to change the stereotype that abandoned children and orphans do not do well in life, given that they started off with the short end of the stick.

In 1986, about two years after she was born, The Straits Times ran a story about how the then Ministry of Community Development, now known as the Ministry of Social and Family Development, was looking for her birth mother. But her birth mother did not respond.

Ms Lee spent the first five years of her life at the Wilkie Road Children’s Home, where she was often bullied by an older boy, before she was adopted. Her adoptive mother gave birth to a boy shortly after she was adopted.

“My adoptive parents were loving to me, but I felt they were faking it,” said Ms Lee, who works in the Career and Attachment Office at NTU.

“I felt my biological mum threw me away like garbage, so how could my adoptive parents love me? I felt unworthy, and I was always afraid they may return me to the home.”

She said her adoptive parents gave her a good life and cared for her deeply, but did not tell her the truth about her birth and always brushed aside her questions on the issue.

She always suspected she was adopted. For example, when she was in primary school, her pastor asked her if she knew she was an abandoned child.

She struggled with finding her origins and identity. She said: “I had struggled with thoughts of suicide as I couldn’t find the meaning of my existence. And I felt maybe I should not have been born.”

Her adoptive parents came clean only after Ms Lee, who was then in secondary school, found her original birth certificate with her birth mother’s name and other details and showed it to them.

The discovery made her even more defiant towards her adoptive parents. Among other ways, she rebelled by not paying attention to her studies.

Her wake-up call came after she heard from a motivational speaker when she was a student at the Institute of Technical Education.

The woman, who had had a child out of wedlock, shared her story and said she regretted giving her child up for adoption. 

This led Ms Lee to the realisation that her birth mother may have had her own trials, resulting in her abandonment.

She chose to let go of her pain and anger, and to embrace her adoptive parents.

She also strove to do well academically after realising that she had wasted a decade of her life being angry and resentful, and neglecting her studies.

Ms Lee later obtained a first-class honours degree in hospitality management from the Manchester Metropolitan University.

She worked in hotels in Dubai and Switzerland, and rose to become department head in a hotel before she left the hotel industry.

Ms Lee, who is now giving NTU students career and skills training, said: “I went from being a student scoring Fs to being a top student.

“I realised that my circumstances do not need to define me.”

Ms Lee will be sharing her story during her book launch at the Book Bar in Duxton Road on Oct 12 at 10.30am. Her book will be sold at bookstores such as Popular and Kinokuniya at $21.90 before GST.

Ahead of the book launch, Ms Lee has also started a fund-raiser for the Singapore Children’s Society, aiming to raise $10,000 to support the charity’s work.