Adoption Unfiltered

Carmen Winant, The Fall of the Modern Empire, 2023. © Carmen Winant.

I first interviewed Leah in a Starbucks in South Carolina in 2010, leaning closely over our drinks—black tea for me, mocha latte for her—so that my recorder would catch our voices over the whir of the coffee grinder. Leah was a young, bubbly white woman who gesticulated with her hands while talking as if overflowing with enthusiasm.

Yet, two years earlier, when Leah found out she was pregnant, this optimism was out of reach. After her parents’ divorce . . .