At the ripe age of four years old, I found myself sitting on my dad’s lap in a small courtroom in South Korea, completely unaware how much my life was about to change. All I knew was that Oscar – a curious and unaware eighteen month-old – was now my little brother. As I grew older, I began to understand the weight of what our family had taken on. Bringing Oscar home meant reshaping the rhythm of our family, learning new routines, and redefining what “normal” felt like. Even at four, I felt the shift, the way every day suddenly had a new layer of responsibility and unpredictability.

As we grew, the challenges grew with us. Oscar’s trauma responses and deep attachment struggles tested our household in ways none of us were fully prepared for. Sometimes it felt like every day required us to reinvent our dynamic, to renegotiate what patience, love, and understanding looked like. But despite the chaos － maybe even because of it – we learned to adapt together. Now, at fifteen years old, I can look back and see how those hard moments shaped us into something stronger and more connected than we might have been otherwise. Our story isn’t perfect, but it’s ours, and every difficult step has helped us grow into the family we are today.