A name. A voice.
A way home.

01 / The beginning

I Always Knew

I don't remember a day when I didn't know I was adopted.

It wasn't a family secret hidden from me until I became an adult. My parents, Sam and Shirley Taylor, told me when I was very young. I appreciate that they never lied to me about it. There was never a shocking moment where someone blurted it out in anger or where I accidentally discovered papers hidden away in a drawer. Adoption was simply part of my story from the beginning.

Knowing it, however, and understanding it were two completely different things.

As a child, I didn't know what adoption truly meant. I only knew that somehow I had come into the Taylor family differently than my brother Dexter and my sister Stephanie. I knew Katrina and I had both been adopted into the family, but I didn't understand why. I didn't understand what happened before I became Jason Taylor.

I just knew there was another story before mine began.

One of the earliest things I remember hearing was my birth surname.

My adopted sister once told me that when I was little, the family would sometimes call me "Mann." They wanted me to remember my original last name, even if I couldn't understand why it mattered.

That always stayed with me.

Long before I ever held my original birth certificate...

Long before I ever saw my biological mother's name...

Long before I ever met my brothers and sisters...

The name Mann was already living somewhere inside me.

I couldn't explain it then, but looking back now, I believe that name became a thread connecting my past to my future. It was a small piece of my identity that somehow survived everything.

02 / The discovery

My Mother

My mother. I had never spoken my mother's name before. For forty-four years... She had been anonymous. Now she had a name. I said it out loud. Again. And again. And again.

I couldn't stop. My wife asked me, "What do you do now?"

I looked at her. "I don't know."

"I've never gotten this far." That night I couldn't sleep. Every time I closed my eyes... I heard my mother's name. Over and over. Almost like she was calling me. Some people may not believe that.

I do. Because less than forty-eight hours later... That name led me to my brother. And my life would never be the same again.

03 / The first phone call

Jason, You Found Us

In this passage, Jason reaches out to his cousin Rosalyn after finding a connection to his brother Andre.

I texted her. "Do you know Andre Mitchell?"

She replied, "Yes. Why?"

I told her everything. She said, "Jason, let me make a phone call."

About an hour later my phone rang. Rosalyn had Andre on the line. The first words I ever heard from my biological brother were words I'll never forget. "Jason! You found us!"

Not... "Who is this?"

Not... "Can you prove it?"

Not... "I don't believe you."

Instead... "You found us."

I broke down crying. So did he. We talked over each other. We laughed. We yelled. Neither one of us could believe this moment had finally arrived. Then Andre said something that changed everything.

"All your brothers and sisters are alive." I replied, "All five?"

He laughed. "No, little brother."

"There are eight of us." "You have seven brothers and sisters."

I had spent my entire life believing I was the sixth child. Instead... I had two younger siblings I never knew existed. My family was even bigger than I imagined.