I am officially one month away from the launch of my debut memoir, and if I am honest, I am as excited as I am terrified.

My story touches on ideas of family, love, identity, and separation. Putting all of those things together has the potential to make some people uncomfortable. So I am bracing myself, and my family for negativity (that I hope never appears).

When I first set my story to the page, I had one goal; to create a place in the world where my siblings and I could be together.

Now, it turns out that there is a real chance that my siblings and I will physically all be together for the first time at the book launch in Los Angeles. We’ll be able to do things, simple things, together. Cook breakfast. Bicker about whose turn it is to do the dishes. Take a family photo. Play guitar. Sing. Make fun of our big brother’s bed head over the breakfast table. Share blush. I almost don’t want to say too much about it because I am afraid that if I want it too much, I will jinx it.

But there is another opportunity within our story. There is an opportunity to raise awareness for the ways that siblings are separated from one another. As research is revealing the incredible strength of sibling bonds, records are also showing that many adults who were placed in foster care as children were separated from their siblings. In fact, more former foster children search later in life for their siblings than search for their biological parents.  There are ways to help children who are currently in this situation.

Donate to organizations like Camp To Belong, a summer camp whose sole reason for existence is providing a place for current foster children to spend time with their siblings. And by supporting the work of organizations like Kindred, a group that provides support to adoptees in the midst of search and reunion.

I look forward to sharing more of these organizations as I discover them myself.