Aa Tiko' travels to a meet up of Guatemalan adoptees in Washington D.C., though he’s a little unsure of what he’ll find there. He talks to three different adoptees from two different continents about their lives, and how they manage to live in two worlds. While hesitant at first, Aa Tiko' begins to see himself as part of the larger adoptee community. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Aa Tiko' takes us on a journey through Guatemalan history — from the Spanish invasion to the rise of the banana industry and eventually the Guatemalan Civil War — to understand how indigenous communities have resisted oppression again and again. And we see Dolores not as translator but as storyteller, sharing her own family’s history and her hopes for Aa Tiko'. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A birth family reunion in 2022 helps Diego piece together more parts of his identity, but it also sparks new questions that he struggles to process — especially as he and Laurie grapple with what it means to take a baby from one culture and raise him in another. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It’s 2022, and Diego has a mission: to reclaim his Guatemalan citizenship. But on the ground in Guatemala City, he finds that his identity as an adoptee is still complicated, even 23 years later. Diego asks his birth mother if he can meet his birth father, Cristobal — but it’s unclear if that will actually happen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We hear from a family whose adoption was in-progress when the Guatemalan government shut everything down. A few years after his fateful diagnosis, Diego is a surly teenager. The family’s figuring out a way forward. Laurie takes Diego back to Guatemala, where he learns about the meanings behind his birth names — Xicay and Petzey. Diego asks Isabel more questions about his birth father, Cristobal. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When Diego turns 12, he’s diagnosed with a life-threatening illness, and his entire world turns inside out. The family goes into survival mode. Sick and angry Diego acts out — and Laurie and Dan struggle with how to parent him. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The international adoption racket is surging — and it’s gotten way out of control. All over the world, ugly stories begin to surface: of stolen children, shady adoption lawyers, and birth mothers pressured to give up their children. So in 2008, under increasing pressure from human rights activists, the Guatemalan government shuts the whole thing down. And on a trip to Guatemala, Diego’s curiosity is sparked by seeing a photograph of his birth father for the first time. Learn more about...

Adoption has become a booming industry — the price is soaring, and Guatemala has become a top exporter of babies for adoption, second only to China. But when making families becomes secondary to making money, the cost to Guatemalan birth mothers is incalculable — and babies are treated more like products than people. Meanwhile, on a trip back to his birth village, six-year-old Diego receives tragic news — and Laurie and her husband Dan face a tough decision. Learn more about your ad...

Laurie takes three-year-old Diego back to Guatemala for the first time since his adoption. While Diego bonds with his birth mother Isabel, Laurie starts talking with birth mothers all over the country. Many are young, live in poverty, or are survivors of the Guatemalan civil war.  Despite how much adoption costs for families in the U.S., Laurie begins to realize how little birth mothers receive in exchange. Meanwhile, Diego is growing up as an indigenous Mayan kid in St. Paul, Minnesota —...

It’s 1999, and reporter Laurie Stern wants to adopt a child with her husband. At the time, international adoption seems pretty straightforward — Laurie wants a baby, and there are babies who need parents. But once she arrives in Guatemala City to meet a five-month old boy named Diego, she realizes that nothing about adopting a baby from Guatemala is that simple. 23 years later, Diego’s an adult, and he has questions of his own. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Defining Diego is the story of one Guatemalan adoptee and his mother, a reporter who documented their journey from his earliest steps, as they try to understand how international adoption boomed and busted — and what it all means for families like theirs, with feet in two worlds. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Families are complex, and so are the ways they come together. TJ Raphael, host of BioHacked, speaks with the host of our upcoming season — All Relative: Defining Diego, coming to this feed on October 3rd. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Once called “the miracle on the beach,” Synanon began in the 1960s as an experimental rehab facility in Santa Monica, California with a radical claim: It could cure heroin addiction. Before long, it would make an even bolder claim: It could cure any of your problems. All you had to do was move in. What started in a house on the beach, soon spread to compounds across the country. The man who made the miracle happen, Charles E. Dederich, aka “Chuck,” would be the one to destroy it all, along...

Publicly, the government once called UFOs a “waste of time”, but new evidence and uncovered documents prove that the U.S. government is, and for decades has been, very interested in the UFO phenomenon. Who are these people coming forward with these government secrets? Fringe Network: Alien State is part of The Binge, a new podcast channel from Sony Music Entertainment. The Binge: All Episodes, All at Once. Out Now. From Somethin' Else and Sony Music Entertainment. Learn more about...

The baby business has used shame and secrecy as tools for decades. But a new generation of parents are removing stigma by leaning into a model that centers love, science, and determination. How can the lessons of the past shape the way forward for the fertility industry? Have feedback about the show? Email us at [email protected]. Follow our host on Twitter @TJRaphael.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

From Facebook groups to Tinder-like apps, a new generation of parents are using unregulated tech to form families outside the baby business. Get to know the women and couples seeking out sperm online – and the donors stepping up to the plate to help them. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Fertility industry experts have a warning for donor conceived activists: new rules in the baby business could have some big, unintended consequences. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Donor conceived activists want lasting change, but they'll have to go big with their plans to overhaul the baby business. They've organized and strategized — and now, they're ready to take on the multi-billion dollar industry that created them. Even if it is an uphill battle. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices