This TED Talk features documentary filmmaker Nan Fu Wang recorded live at TED 2019.

My name is Nan Fu. In Chinese, Nan means men, and Fu means pillar. My family had hoped for a boy who would grow up to be the pillar of the family. And when I

turned out to be a girl, they named me Nanfu anyway. I was born in 1985, six years before China

announced its one-child policy. Right after I was born, the local officials came

and ordered my mom to be sterilized. My grandpa stood up to the officials because he wanted a

grandson to carry on the family name. Eventually, my parents were allowed to have a second child,

but they had to wait for five years and pay a substantial fine.

Growing up, my brother and I was surrounded by children from one-child families.

I remember feeling a sense of shame

because I had a younger brother.

I felt like our family did something wrong

for having two children.

At the time, I didn't question

where this sense of shame and guilt came from.

A year and a half ago, I had my own first child. It was the best thing ever happened in my life.

Becoming the mother gave me a totally new perspective on my own childhood,

and they brought back my memories of early life in China.

For the past three decades, everyone in my family

had to apply for permission from the government to have a child.

And I wondered what it was like for people who lived under the one-child policy.

So I decided to make a documentary about it.

One of the people I interviewed was the midwife who delivered all of the babies born in my village,

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