MILWAUKEE —A Milwaukee-area man who was adopted from an orphanage in Romania when he was 5 years old found some answers this summer in a journey that, for him, proved you can go home again.
John Gauthier, 32, grew up outside Milwaukee, but he always wondered about his birth family and the life he missed.
When he left for Romania in July, he went back to the land where he was born.
“I’ve been waiting for so long I just couldn’t wait any longer,” John Gauthier said.
Like thousands of other Romanian children, John Gauthier spent time in an orphanage. He was saved when a couple from the town of Lisbon saw their plight televised on 20/20.
They traveled to Romania in 1991 to adopt John and another boy and brought them to Wisconsin.
But John was always curious about home.
“It was something I knew was going to come along with time,” John’s father, David Gauthier, said.
Sensing his son’s curiosity, two years ago, David Gauthier gave John a letter.
“I open it, and it’s all in Romanian. I don’t know what it says. I remember that night I translated just the first sentence on the top of the letter and it said, ‘My dear son,'” John Gauthier said.
The letter said: “My dear son, when you read these lines that I am writing you right now, you will be an adult and maybe you are going to ask yourself, who are you? Where do you come from? Please do not judge me because I let you go. I just wanted you to have a better life than mine.”
The letter let John know who his mother was. With her name, through Facebook, he quickly discovered he had siblings in Romania.
“I just needed to go over there and see them,” John Gauthier said.
So this summer, he did.
He met his older brother, and for the first time, two younger sisters.
“They changed me in just seeing the beauty in everyone, just even more than what I saw before,” John Gauthier said.
He set foot in the village where he was born, Ramnicu Valcea, and met extended family he didn’t know he had.
“I thought about how much I could’ve experienced with my siblings, but I’ll take what I can get now. I’m just thankful for that,” he said.
Before he left, he went with his siblings to their mother’s grave. There, he showed them the letter that led him to them.
“The whole trip made me complete. The whole journey made me complete. I felt like I found my voice. I found myself and meeting them changed me forever,” John Gauthier said.
He hopes to travel to Romania again, and his father, David Gauthier, plans to take his other son, David, to Romania soon, so he can have the same kind of experience and discover his roots.
The Promise I Kept 