Angelica Panganiban gets real about being adopted: 'Para akong nawalan ng identity'

Angelica Panganiban-Homan recently gave an intimate look at how she handled the discovery that she was adopted. 

While sitting atop a picnic table in her one-hectare farm in Tanauan, Batangas, the actress, 39, spoke with Karen Davila for the latter's YouTube channel about multiple topics, including the time when she found out about her adoption. 

It was January 2010, and she hadn't spoken to her adoptive mother Annabelle, who passed away in 2024, for a month following a fight. Panganiban-Homan recalled she was in Dressing Room 9 of the ABS-CBN building, talking to her nephew, who was begging her to make peace with her mother. 

"Alam mo ba na hindi ka naman tunay na anak ni Ebela?" asked her nephew, referring to Panganiban-Homan's mother. 

"Para 'kong biglang nawalan ng identity...Bigla. Ganu'n pala siya. Hindi pala siyang pampelikula na 'pag nalaman mong ampon ka, magwawala ka," Panganiban-Homan said. 

She kept everything inside and still didn't speak to her mother until Feb. 15, when she couldn't recover from a crying scene she was taping. Fainting from over-fatigue, she was rushed to the hospital, where she woke the next day to find her adoptive mother by her bedside. 

After getting discharged, the actress went to her mother's house where the whole story came out. 

Every Christmas when she was growing up, there were people who would visit Panganiban-Homan's house and take photos with her. 

"Inis na inis ako...Pasko na nga lang ako hindi nagiging artista...tapos pupunta ng bahay para magpa-picture," she said. "Mga [biological] tito't tita ko pala na akala ko mga kapitbahay lang namin sila from Tondo."

She told the story of how her biological parents met, as told to her by her father, whom she tracked down on Facebook. 

Her mother ran away from home in Manila and went to Olongapo, where she found work as a cleaning lady in the US Navy's base in Subic. That was how she met Panganiban-Homan's father, who was then in the US Navy. 

From when he left Subic in early 1986 until 2010, he believed Panganiban-Homan and her mother had died in a car accident, which he learned from a letter the actress' mother sent him. She did this, Panganiban-Homan said, because she wanted to end the relationship as she met someone else. 

"Noong nahanap ko [ang father ko] sa Facebook, para daw siyang binuhusan ng malamig na tubig," Panganiban-Homan said. 

The actress learned from her mother's family that her mom passed away in 2007. 

"Hindi ko maintindihan 'yung pakiramdam. Bigla akong nanginig tapos naiyak ako. Bakit ako umiiyak, hindi ko naman siya kilala. Hindi ko naman siya mahal. Dapat galit ako sa kanya," Panganiban-Homan said. 

After discovering her true parentage, the actress felt thankful and ashamed of her earlier behavior. 

"Ang yabang ko kasi noon na breadwinner ako, eh. Parang okay lang na away-awayin ko sila, nakakapag-provide naman ako, eh. And then n'ung nalaman kong adopted ako, parang bigla akong walang mukhang maiharap. Ako pala 'yung may utang na loob," she said. 

"Sila pala, hindi nila 'ko kadugo pero inalagaan ako, pinag-aral ako, minahal ako na parang kanila. For 25 years, ni hindi ako nag-doubt na ampon ako kahit iba 'yung itsura ko sa kanila. Naniwala ako na 'wag lang daw ako maglaro sa ilalim ng araw nang matagal," the actress added.

Panganiban-Homan first opened up about her adoption to "King of Talk" Boy Abunda in 2010. “Hindi ko po siya kilala pero mahal ko po siya,” she said of her late biological mother at the time.