For 24 years, Nguyen Thi Hong Gam lived with the pain of a decision she believed she had been forced to make. In 1998, she gave her newborn daughter to a French family, convinced it was the only way the baby could receive life-saving medical care. She spent the next two decades wondering whether her child was alive, hoping the adoption had given her the chances she could not provide. On March 14, 1998, Hong and her husband Tran Minh Thuan welcomed a baby girl at Tu Du Hospital in Saigon.
They named her Nguyen Thi Hong Gam, after her mother. Giving the child her own name was a quiet act of devotion, a way for the mother to leave part of herself with a daughter she feared she might not be able to keep. The happiness was short-lived. Soon after her birth, doctors discovered the infant had a lung condition.
Treatment was urgent, but the family was already drowning in debt. With no resources to cover the medical costs, Hong faced an impossible choice. Neighbors and relatives pointed to families in similar situations who had placed their children with French adoptive parents. They told her the baby would receive proper treatment and grow up with opportunities Hong could not offer.
She eventually agreed. Only three months after giving birth, Hong completed the adoption procedures. Her daughter left Vietnam and began a new life in France, where she was raised by a couple Hong knew only by name: Claude Al Filippi and Colette Dusky Dominique. She had been told they were teachers in France.
The adoptive parents kept in touch. Every Christmas, they sent letters and photographs to Vietnam, along with a small amount of money. The letters described how the little girl was growing up, and Hong studied every picture. Her daughter looked healthy and happy, and that was enough to convince her that despite the pain, she had made the right decision.
Hong and her husband wrote back, having their Vietnamese messages translated into French before sending them. For years, those letters were the only bridge between the two families, separated by thousands of miles. In 2013, another letter arrived. The girl, Gump, was 15.
Her adoptive parents wrote that she had grown into a confident and energetic young woman with a love of theater, film, drama, painting, and music. She was also an excellent student, and they promised to support her education. A photograph of the teenager was enclosed. Hong could look at her daughter’s face again.
She did not know it would be the last time. After that letter, contact suddenly stopped. The letters Hong and her husband sent to France went unanswered. Then the family moved, leaving their old address behind.
Ten years passed in silence. Hong continued searching for any possible connection to her daughter. Whenever she heard of Vietnamese women returning from France to look for their families, she tried to reach them, but with little education and almost no information, she had no clear way to begin the search. Then the COVID-19 pandemic brought another painful loss.
Hong’s husband, Tran Minh Thuan, died at 59. His death forced Hong to confront her own age. She became afraid she might leave the world without ever discovering what had happened to her daughter. When someone asked whether she feared her daughter might be angry with her, Hong broke down.
“What parent doesn’t love their child? She’s my own flesh and blood. I only want to know that Gump and her family are safe. If I knew my daughter was doing well, I would cry from happiness.
Her father has passed away, and I want to tell her. ”
Her youngest son, Tran Gia Huy, saw how much the uncertainty was hurting his mother and decided to help. “We posted her story on social media, hoping someone might recognize Gump or know something about the French family who had adopted her,” he said. Hong left a message for the daughter she had not seen since infancy: “Please forgive your mother.
I have done so much wrong to you. I only want to know that you are safe. ”
Huy said he acted because he could see his mother was still heartbroken over not knowing anything about his sister. “I posted her story on social media to help find her.
I only hope that one day, somehow, my mother will be able to meet her again. ”
The story quickly attracted attention. People began sharing the post and looking through the information Hong had kept from the adoption documents. Then someone noticed something unexpected.
The French couple who had adopted Gump might not have been ordinary teachers. The names on the old documents appeared to lead to a well-known French writer and filmmaker. Hanh Nguyen My Ly, one of the people helping with the search, examined the names in the old adoption documents and found a possible match: Philippe Claudel and his wife Dominique. Comparing photographs and details from the documents, the information appeared to line up.
The confirmation followed: the man who had adopted Gump was indeed Philippe Claudel, a prominent French novelist and filmmaker. For Hong, the discovery was difficult to take in. She had always believed her daughter was growing up with two teachers in France. Now she learned that Gump had been raised by a leading figure in French literature.
A journalist eventually helped Hong contact Claudel directly. He confirmed that he and Dominique had adopted Gump in 1998. According to Claudel, they had continued sending letters and photographs to Vietnam until 2013. They wanted Hong to know how her daughter was growing up and hoped Gump would remain connected to her Vietnamese roots.
The reason the letters stopped was simpler than Hong had feared. Claudel explained that the family’s letters were returned in 2014 because Hong’s old address was no longer valid. The area where she had lived had been redeveloped, and the family had moved. His own address, however, had remained unchanged.
Neither side had deliberately ended contact. They had simply lost touch. Claudel also told Hong that he and Dominique had brought Gump back to Vietnam twice while she was growing up, giving her a chance to see the country where she was born. But Gump was now an adult, and Claudel believed the decision to reconnect with her biological family had to be hers.
He told Hong that Gump had grown into a beautiful, independent young woman and was doing well. He offered to give Gump her biological mother’s address and phone number, leaving the choice of whether to make contact entirely in her daughter’s hands. For Hong, that news was enough to bring tears. She still did not know whether Gump would call or whether they would meet, but after 24 years, she finally knew her daughter was alive, safe, and living a good life.
“From the bottom of my heart, I am grateful to the couple who raised my daughter and helped her become the person she is today. I hope that one day I can meet her again. I am getting older, and my heart is not good. I may leave this world without knowing how my daughter is doing, but today, I’m already incredibly happy.
Thank you to everyone in the community who helped me find my daughter. ”
For the first time in years, Hong no longer had to wonder what had become of the little girl she gave away in 1998. She had found the answer she had been searching for all along.