Born Brigitte Sylvia Andler in 1960 in
Hamburg-Altona, Germany, she was the daughter of unmarried parents Ursula Andler and Emmanuel Ayim. Her father, a
Ghanaian medical student, wanted to have her raised by his childless sister, but German law made 'illegitimate' children a ward of the state and did not give rights to biological fathers. After a brief time in a children's home, Andler lived in a foster family called Opitz, who raised her with their biological children. She grew up in
Westphalia, where she later said that her childhood was unhappy. She considered her foster parents to be strict and spoke about how they used physical violence against her. This was one of the issues she explored in her later poetry. She later said that the family threw her out of the family home at the age of 19, which the Opitz family denied. She continued to keep in touch with them. That same year she graduated from Friedenschule, the Episcopal School in
Münster, and passed her
Abitur. She attended teacher training college in Münster, specialising in German language and Social Studies. Opitz attended the
University of Regensburg, majoring in Psychology and Education. During this period she travelled to
Israel,
Kenya and Ghana. She found her biological father, Emmanuel Ayim, then a professor of Medicine, and developed a relationship with him and his family. She used May Ayim as a pen name from 1992 to reflect this connection. ==Career==