Honestly, really. I think I should get paid off for relinquishing Max to adoption. The happy fuzzy feelings from relinquishment and my adoption counseling has worn off. It’s been gone for years now. Instead, I think maybe getting at least some cash for the years of pain and suffering won’t do any good in getting back what I lost, but nothing ever will. At least, I could get some new…
This is hard. I hate it, but I’m coming clean. I hate that I am feel seen as some kind of super strong birthmother because I am suppose to be immune to this sort of thing in my head. Guess what..I’m human. I’m not perfect. In fact, I am probably just as messed up as everyone of us. I just hide it well. Periodically, people ask me how my reunion…
Maybe it was because I spent almost two hours on last Tuesday evening talking to a reporter about how my seemingly very progressive agency was using acceptable, but subtly coercive tactics to point me only relinquishment, and it weakened my inner stone wall. Maybe it is because it’s almost Mother’s Day as well and between having lost my own mother many years ago, plus being a mother who lost one…
Judgement. Choices. Lack of True Choice. Variations of this theme have been running through my head for a long time. To some the birth mother is a saintly figure. Wise. Sacrificing. Selfless. A builder of Families. A deliverer of dreams come true. Adoptive families want to thank her. Poor girl, she is just in a sad situation, but through her wisdom she can make the best of the situation and…
So at 3 o’clock every afternoon, I walk down Wall Street to go pick up the kids from school. Today, being Wednesday, Scarlett gets dropped off at 4:20ish after Brownies, so I was looking forward to some quiet walking time with Tristan. Tristan is in Kindergarten, so his teacher brings the kids for release up to the audorium. Each of the three kindergarden classes have their own door and as…
Bare with me becasue I think I am still trying to fiqure this out. After I wrote out last nights post, I was still thinking a bit about it all. Especially that conflicted feeling that I have…the thrill that Max and I do have this connection, yet coupled with the sadness that even for three seconds he felt out of place in his life. Now I have had internet “discussions”…
The fact is..there are ENOUGH moms who relinquished who are saying…hey, it didn’t work like that. And enough adoptees say the same thing. Human nature is different than the plan and the beliefs. They were built on faulty principles Not your fault, not mine..lets blame the adoption industry. They have known for some time, they have had the information at hand, and still they kept throwing this pipe dream at us all and selling us all down a river.
Even with all that you see here, all that I DID sign, all that I was told, I still felt that I had no choice. I did this because it was the only thing I could do. And I signed all, I agreed to all, I waived all because I was trying to be the best dern birthmother the agency had ever had. I wanted them to be so proud of me. I wanted acceptance and I knew that by being “strong”, by being determined, I would make them happy. I would prove my worth.
I will confess my initial desire was to remove this from the “most popular” front page line up. I don’t want to talk about this really. I don’t want to have to open myself up to be judged and have nasty comments said again, but then, I realized that my desire was out of shame and fear. Mostly shame; not shame that I had this abortion, but that the possible reactions I feared triggered possible shame.
I know that this is one of the reasons we have so many issues, legislative restrictions and lack of viable options when it comes to safe and legal abortion services in this country is because of that shame. Having an abortion is something we still speak of in hushed tones. Oh, granted, no one should be out celebrating and for the most part it is a private matter, so what other folks think about it shouldn’t matter, but even among friends, we whisper. So while, my gut says take this post down, I know I cannot. I owe it to the women who have gone before me who have died in back alleys and fought for our rights to have legal safe abortions and I owe it to the women who will come after me who will still need to have the right to have legal safe abortions if they so need to. I owe it to my daughter to know that we have to stand up and not be afraid to be counted even if others might be mean to us.
Caution: Brain spinning in circles, see below for details. Jumping of my marriage rant of the last post, Suz got it all down in her comment: how do i choose between what is my calling, what i am supposed to do and the person I am supposed to be and my husband who would prefer I fit into a neat little package? i want him by my side, proud of me,…
God, I feel mopey. I have figured out that naturally, like all things in life, I work on a cycle..so great happiness and highs are frequently followed by quiets lows, emotionally, socially, physical, energy wise. And I am not one to want to have all the highs, so I resist any temptation for medical use to make the lows more bearable, I just wad though them, knowing they will pass….
Yes, right now that is all this meeting is to him, but to me, oh so much more. I have had this conversation with him, in my head, hundreds of times. This almost feels like deja vu as I have planned it so much, thought it out, played his responses, planned my perfect wording. No, much more than just old friends we are. I had his baby and gave him away to adoption.
This is a bit that just spewed out in reply to to a thread on SoA regarding the use of the word “Lost” as to “my son was lost to adoption”. It is a really interesting thread..five pages currently if you need a bit of deep summer reading.Anyway..I think it can stand on it’s own here. It’s mostly to a new mom now who was commenting on how the word…
Picture this… It’s Friday afternoon and I get in my car ready for work. I have a new really cute denim jacket that I love, my hair is feeling alittle crazy, the sun is lamost shining, and I feel pretty good. So I go to make my 17 minute commute, and pop on Tom Petty’s Wildflowers..one of my favorite CDs and blast it. Now I adore Tom. Saw him live…
Yes, I “decided” to lose my child. Yes, I was “very sure”. Yes, technically, I had ‘other options’, but in my heart, in my head..there was no other option just this thing that I must do for us both. I believed what I was told. I wanted to believe it since at least believing it gave me some hope. Of abortion, of parenting..both were dark and cold as seen by me. My views were skewed. Our lives at stake. And I was in no position to make this life long decision. Yes, I needed to be protected from myself.