Angela Tucker is the CEO of the Adoptee Mentoring Society, cultural commentator, podcast host, inspiring speaker, the author of “You Should Be Grateful:” Stories of Race, Identity and Transracial Adoption and is the subject of the documentary Closure, chronicling the search for her biological family.  

HER FAMILY

Angela was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee and raised in Bellingham Washington after being adopted from foster care. Her early prognosis was dire, the doctors stated that Angela had Spastic Quadriplegia and would likely never walk. She was deemed a ‘failure to thrive.’ This diagnosis is what attracted her adoptive parents to her. They specialized in adopting children with medical needs, ultimately adopting seven children, fostering many and hosting foreign exchange students as well. Throughout her life she encountered many barriers, but went on to surprise the doctors by playing basketball and running track through college. Her profound hearing loss was mitigated with hearing aids when she was just five years old, which she proudly wears as a fashion accessory.

HER CAREER

While studying Psychology at Seattle Pacific University, Angela began blogging where she publicly processed her emotions around growing up in a closed adoption. In 2013, at the age of 26, Angela found her biological parents and asked that it be filmed, simply as home video footage for her own private use. However, her husband, Bryan Tucker, saw a need to publicize the remarkable story and (with Angela’s permission), turned what would be home video footage into his first documentary film, leading him to a career as a filmmaker. CLOSURE made the film festival circuit and then premiered on Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime. In 2015, Angela created The Adopted Life Episodes, a groundbreaking video project that features interviews with teen and pre-teen transracial adoptees to bring awareness and education to the public about complex issues such as racial identity formation, searching for and having open relationships with birth/biological families, and, in some cases, having little to no information about one’s biological families. In 2020, during the pandemic, Angela debuted The Adoptee Next Door podcast, which takes the listener beyond the sparkly fairy tale of adoption, inviting adoptees from all backgrounds to share their rarely heard perspectives and shift societal perceptions about adoption. In 2022 Angela founded the Adoptee Mentoring Society which supports adoptees to develop agency over their complex and sometimes traumatic personal stories. Between 2011 and 2020, Angela served as a domestic infant adoption caseworker at a large, private adoption agency and created the Post-Adoption department at a large foster care agency in Seattle, Washington. She has also worked to support students with disabilities to ensure equal access in higher education.

HOW SHE INSPIRES

“I’ve made the decision to publicly share my complex story, with all of its vulnerabilities in the hopes that it will encourage other adoptees to find their own voices. Adoption is a necessary solution to an unfortunate need and the journey often begins at the intersection of grief and loss for birth parents and great joy for adoptive parents. We adoptees are wedged between that pain and joy without, historically speaking, much of a road map for expression. I’d like to change our collective opportunity for more honest expression about the experience.” There is something temptingly tidy about the idea of adoption: a family with extra love and resources meets a child in need of both. The reality is adoption involves a profound loss for biological parents and a great gain for adoptive parents and pitted right in the middle are the adoptees. Adoption is highly complex, with implications for all concerned that endure for decades. Angela offers nuanced, ethical, and accessible content for the adoption community.