Mariette Williams packs a suitcase in her bedroom in Boca Raton, Florida, for her upcoming trip to Haiti to see her birth mother for the first time in 30 years. She was adopted as a toddler and taken to Canada in 1986. #

Williams kisses her two-year-old son Jaden before putting him down for a nap at their home in Boca Raton, Florida. Mariette is an English teacher at a private school, lives a middle-class American life in a suburb that couldn’t be more different from Haiti. #

Sandra Knopf, Williams’s adopted mother, holds snapshots of her two adopted Haitian daughters, Mariette and Patricia Williams, in her home in Armstrong, Canada. Sandra and Albert Knopf, at the time empty-nesters in their 40s with three grown sons, adopted the two girls in October 1986, at a time when adoption in Haiti was barely regulated. #

Williams arrives in her birth country, at the Toussaint Louverture International Airport in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. “Outside of my wedding and the birth of my children,” she said to the Associated Press, “this is probably one of the biggest days of my life.” #

Williams cries as she waits to see her birth mother and other family members in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. She was surprised, and a little annoyed, that her Haitian relatives weren’t at the airport. “I'm not sure I like Haitian time,” she said. #

After a half-hour drive, she arrived at the guest house where she had booked rooms for her family for the week. An SUV pulled up to the residence and her mother and two sisters climbed out. “You're so little!” Williams exclaims, wrapping her arms around her mother for their first embrace in 30 years. #

Williams shows pictures of herself, made when she was living at a Haitian orphanage, with her family members. She thought that she was adopted because her parents were too poor to take care of her. But through social media she found a sister and learned that her parents had not consented to the adoption. #

Williams, center in white, watches as her mother Colas Etienne, from right, niece Tamaica, and sister Aliette, look at images of Williams’s children and husband, in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. She learned that her mother had 10 children, seven of them still alive, and earned money from selling vegetables. #

Williams, left, does her best to communicate with her brother Guilot Etienne and her nephew Pierre Marken, as their mother Colas Etienne listens, outside the family home in Deron, a neighborhood on the outskirts of Pestel, Haiti. Williams never learned to speak Creole. #

Williams, wearing a yellow scarf, poses for a group photo with her newfound relatives outside their home. When she was taken from her family, she was “infected with parasites, had runny eyes and seemed weak from malnutrition,” according to the Associated Press. #

Williams was given this passport photo of her biological father as a gift. Etienne told her daughter that Berlisse had three children by other women, but that she raised them all. “My father was a rolling stone, apparently,” Williams said. #

Commuters are transported in a tap-tap, near the home of her biological mother. At first, Williams was shocked by the conditions of her family's life. “My initial reaction was, holy crap, I have to get out of here,” she said to the Associated Press. “It's not like I haven't seen poverty in Haiti before, but it was so personal. It's my mom.” #

Etoine Louisdieu, Mariette Williams’s paternal uncle, poses for a portrait with his machete in his garden in Deron, a neighborhood on the outskirts of Pestel, Haiti. His garden, where he grows bananas, cabbage, yams, and black beans, is located next to the home of William's birth mother. #

Williams takes a selfie in Deron. “Every single day for my entire life I have always thought of my mom,” she said. “When I wake up now I have a face to put to the name.” #