"When he was eight years old, Markus Lidman realized he was different from the other children in Pitea, a town in northern Sweden. They had all inherited the same pale skin tone as their parents. He, on the other hand, was dark-skinned. I decided to ask them if they were really my parents, and they told me they had adopted me in Colombia in 1982. They sat with me and showed me a video of the orphanage, he recalls."
"Questions started popping up for my biological mother: Why did you abandon me? Wasn't I lovable enough? Did you have a drug addiction and couldn't take care of me?' he says via video call after finishing his shift as a waiter at a pub. He believes the lack of answers has affected him at different times. I panicked about women leaving me. I did everything to avoid it."
"All they say is her name, and I think it's made up. When I Google it, all that comes up is an inventor from the 1900s with a mustache, he explains. He asked for help in Facebook groups and that's where, a year and a half ago, he met Mikael Kjelleros. He's something of a celebrity among Swedish adoptees: he found his Colombian mother in 2024 and now helps others."
Markus Lidman was born Luis Alberto Sanchez in Cali and was adopted to Pitea, northern Sweden, in 1982. He realized he looked different at eight and learned his parents had adopted him after they showed a video from the orphanage and adoption papers indicating abandonment with no details. The lack of information created a persistent void that led to panic about abandonment, substance abuse, and a suicide attempt; he later married and had a daughter. He sought his biological mother using scant documents and online searches, sought help in Facebook groups, and connected with Mikael Kjelleros, who advised a MyHeritage DNA test, which failed.
Read at english.elpais.com
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