At 83, Johan Nilsen said he's lived a full life. But the man who was adopted as a boy still has one wish — to see his original birth certificate.

"I want the truth," he said. "I don't want any lies, I don't want any stories, I don't want any 'well, it could have been.' I want the truth."

Agnes, Johan's wife, understands her husband's quest.

"I'd really like to be able to see him have that knowledge because it's something that he's always wanted. A lot of people say 'I just wouldn't worry about it...well, a person that is adopted, I think in the back of their minds, they probably always would want to know.

"I'd really like to see him have that knowledge before he passes on."

Due to Mississippi law, however, his previous attempts have been fruitless. Without his birth parents' permission, who are likely deceased, Johan has been told he can't access the information he so desperately wants.

He was born in Gulfport, originally named 'Harold'

Few details are known about the circumstances surrounding Johan's birth. Born on Dec. 12, 1935, at King Daughter's Hospital in Gulfport, he weighed just 2 pounds, 6 ounces. His birth mother, Johan believes, was told her baby died during childbirth.

At some point, he was taken from the coast hospital to the Mississippi Children's Home in Jackson. He was given the name "Harold." Then, when he was 7 months old, he went to live with Dorthy Mae Nilsen and Johan Nilsen, a married couple in their late 40s, stationed in Pascagoula with the U.S. Coast Guard. The couple renamed the baby "Johan."

"I had to fight for everything I got," Johan said. "They gave me a home, they gave me a chance."

Johan had a tough time growing up. He found out the Nilsens weren't his birth parents when he was 7 years old, around the same time he was formally adopted by the couple. One day, a little boy who lived in the neighborhood called him a "bastard," saying, "you don't know who your mom and dad are."

"The third time I knocked him out, he realized he had a glass jaw," Johan said.

"It was hard," he said. "When I started school, my first name is Johan and the kids started calling me Joanne. By the time I finished the third grade, I had taught all the males in that school to watch their mouth."

Once, in high school, Johan got a 17-hour detention slip. He used the time to do other people's homework for .50 cents a page. Shortly after, he was transferred to the local Catholic high school.

Then, in 1958, he slipped out of school to smoke a cigarette. An Army recruiter caught his eye.

So, "I went over and joined the Army," he said. While in the Army, Johan finished his GED. After three years, he left the Army and began working as postal worker. That's when he met Agnes. She was working in a bakery and Johan would stop in every day to buy doughnuts.

The couple eventually married, had two children and two grandchildren. They'll be married 55 years this month.

"I've got a lot to be proud of and a lot to laugh at," he said. "I have no real complaints...I'm just dear, old, lovable Johan."

Own legal requests about adoption go nowhere

The couple lived on the Mississippi coast, in Pascagoula, until Katrina hit in 2005. They moved to Missoula, Montana, to be closer to their daughter.

While they love life in Montana, Johan's health is declining, Agnes said, and he's in and out of the hospital. He has Type 2 diabetes, congestive heart issues and has had two pacemakers. He's currently implanted with a defibrillator.

"His pill bag looks like a small suitcase, he's just in bad shape," she said. "The VA doctors, about all they tell us is 'just take the medicine and we'll do the best we can.'"

Her husband's current health has been a large reason why she also has pushed so hard for the original birth certificate.

Johan wants answers.

"I deserve that, in fact, I demand it," Johan said. "I'd like to know the actual truth. I may go to my grave the next day but I'd like it to be done honestly."

Arin Adkins, Canopy Services general counsel, said without his birth parents giving the approval, Johan's adoption records cannot be unsealed.

"Canopy follows the Mississippi adoption statute and, according to the law, cannot release identifying information without biological parents' consent unless a chancellor orders the release of information for good cause shown."

Agnes sees it differently. Johan's mother, she said, did not sign the adoption decree. Instead, the director of the children's home did. Agnes argues that if Johan's mother thought he died during childbirth, she couldn't have expressed her desire for the adoption to be open or closed — because she wouldn't have known it happened.

"I haven't been able to get anything from that children's home to tell me any different," she said. "I have butted my head trying to get information but it's just like a stone wall. It just seems to me that an 83-year-old record, all the parents by now are deceased and you can't get a judge to simply open the record...I don't understand a record being that old and a person can't get a hold of it."

In 2018, the couple wrote to Hinds County Judge Patricia Wise asking to obtain "the forms for filing a Pro Se Court Document in your Court, the purpose for which is to obtain a Court Order, for Necessary, and Unnecessary Documents from The Canopy Children’s Solutions Home in Jackson, Mississippi."

They filed the request themselves, they wrote, because "we have not been able to obtain a pro bono attorney in Mississippi, and are not financially able to pay the hourly fees which attorneys charge for their services."

They were denied.

Then, in February, the couple filed a petition in Jackson County Chancery Court, "with reason being To obtain a Court Order to The Canopy Children’s Services, (past name, Mississippi Children’s Home) to open, and unseal, all Adoption Records which were filed 83 years ago."

Instead, they were sent a copy of the adoption decree, a document they already had.

Trying to piece together family history

Without his original birth certificate, Agnes has tried to help Johan learn more about his birth family over the years. In 2013, the couple's daughter ordered him a DNA kit. The results linked Johan to distant cousins in Texas. Through bits of information, the couple pieced together connections they believe to be Johan's birth family.

His birth mother, Agnes said, married when she was 15. Her husband, Johan's birth father, was a medic in France with the U.S. Army during WW II. He was wounded at some point, Agnes said, and had a metal plate in his head. He also suffered from tuberculosis. He was in and out of VA hospitals in South Carolina, where the couple previously lived, and Mississippi.

The couple had five children before Johan's birth, all of them boys. Each of the five boys are believed to have been born in South Carolina.

According to Agnes' research, Johan's birth mother died in 1940, at age 29. Her five sons were raised by her mother until her death in 1955. After their grandmother's death, Johan's five brothers went to live with extended family members.

Agnes believes Johan's birth mother, grandmother and at least three siblings are buried in Greenwood Cemetery in Gulfport.

Whatever his family's history is, Johan said he just wants to know where he came from.

"I would like to know the unvarnished truth, don't color it," he said. "If, at this point in time, if I can't stand up and take what is told to me, what is true, then I'm in poor shape."

Correction: The spelling of Johan Nilsen's name has been corrected since this story was first published.

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