Laura Underwood

Laura Underwood was born in Seoul in 1972 and adopted as an infant into the prominent Underwood family, whose missionary legacy in Korea dates back five generations to 1885. Raised by fluent Korean-speaking parents, she grew up immersed in a unique world while feeling like an outsider who didn’t look like the rest of her family. Though surrounded by Korean culture, she was excluded from the language and details of her own origins, instead raised on an adoption narrative shaped by faith and fate. For decades, she felt unanchored from her identity as a Korean adoptee.

In adulthood, Laura and her non-biological sister Sarah submitted their DNA to 23andMe in 2019, eventually leading Laura to discover and meet her biological sister in 2025. Finding detailed adoption records from Incheon helped her challenge the narratives she had inherited and reclaim a sense of agency. Through the Korean American Adoptee Adoptive Family Network (KAAN), she found community and solidarity, embracing the complexity of her story and the understanding that the story Laura has to tell today, is “not the same story that [she] was taught.”

Special thanks to the Thomas and Wonsook Foundation for their generous support in making this project possible. And to Joy Lieberthal Rho, founder of IAMAdoptee for her consultation and post-support services for this project.

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