The post the other day about my broken humerus was a preamble of sorts.
I wanted to talk about my arm, but you need to know the situation first.

***

It’s almost Mother’s Day, I am PMSing, it’s raining, I just turned 40, and my arm is still busted. Oh, and it really bothered me to figure out that the quantity of time that I have spent with my own son in practically the first 21 years of his life has still resulted in less that a weeks time. As in we can count the hours. I can list them and it includes time he has been sleeping on my couch, but I won’t because it’s pretty depressing. Yet, I know I have it good. I am lucky. Always have been in adoption…as if adoption can make me able to be considered “lucky”….. I know enough to give thanks. Still, I need chocolate.

Anyway, so in that frame of mind, I was laying in be the other night and thinking. My arm.. pain..rustle..can’t get comfortable..adoption.. pain..ruffle can’t get comfortable… arm.. adoption… pain….
Many times, losing a child to adoption has been likened to amputation. In fact, in searching for an example to quote, I even found the conservative adoption.com who says:

For some birth parents, sorrow over the actual physical separation may be expressed in tangible sensations of loss. Your arms may ache to hold your baby, or you may think you hear the baby crying. For birth mothers especially, the absence of the baby, after months of carrying and caring for the child, may seem like amputation. You may have a gnawing, empty feeling in the pit of your stomach that seems like it will never go away.

Of course, that was written by Brenda Romanchik and she knows… she knows…

Ah, I diverse, but it is true, it really is. I can count the odd parallels. We all know I love my parallels. Read once for my broken arm, once for adoption, twice for both.

******

Neither one, for me, is completely debilitating. I deal. I can function. It’s not ideal, but whatever.

They both still bother me constantly. Neither is far from my mind. They twinge. I know always, that something is not quite right.

Sometimes instinct, or sheer habit of movement, tries to make a connection, yet it abruptly fails. My arm reaches, sudden movement, sudden pain. My heart feels, my soul remembers, the dull ache.

Somehow, I “own” then. Both fit with the descriptive adjective of my name. Still searching or another definition of the name Claudia, but always it comes up “lame”; and lame I am.
Lamed by adoption. Lamed by my non function, no fusing arm.
My relationships unfused.
My bones refuse to mend back to one, staying jagged and rough. My motherhood, the relationship with my son, still too new, unreal, unhealed. Non fused.
Will either one ever be?

To plain sight, I seem OK. Camouflaged. You cannot see the wounds. Hidden.
I can’t, I say. I can’t move like that. I can’t laugh like that.
“Why? What happened?”
I’m wounded. See, here. Feel it. Broken inside.

“How do you live like that?”
I don’t know I just do. What choice do I have now? I took a bad step once. I faltered, I fell. I lost my footing and came undone. Now, all I can do, is hobble along.

If I had what I had not, my fate would be different, my need validated.
The care of my arm, repair. Surgical steel, donor grafts, screws and pin, needle and stitches, better again.
My pregnancy honored, not feared and horrored. Fathers ands showers, bedding, diapers and gifts.
Timing and dollars, beyond my control. Leaps of fate and bad footing, unworthy I am of better things.

I cannot change either. I move along, thankful for what I have.
Not my right arm.
I found him young.
At least its’ not cancer.
He got a good deal.
It could be worse.
I can function.
It could be worse.
I’m used to it.
Sometimes I pretend it’s OK.
It’s kind of normal.
Uterus Humeus

I can’t tell which is which, above or below.

I was told that it would be OK by now. That it would heal soon. That it would be OK. They were taking good care of me. It was standard behavior. Standard operating procedure. They couldn’t have know it would be like this. It all made sense at the time. They don’t know what’s wrong. Something I did? Not that it’s my fault.

But I took that step. I did it. I fell.
I heard a voice in my head, it said, ” Careful, Claud. you’re gonna get hurt. You’re crazy”
And I shut myself up. Felt invincible.
Did it anyway.

The initial pain was fast and sharp. It took my breath away. And then, I thought for a hot minute, ten years, that I would get away with it. I was immune. And when I crumpled, I was prepared, it was gentle and slow.

But I was broken. Smashed inside. And it won’t heal. It hurts.

I feel lesser. Not whole. Disabled. Limited. My heart.bones.bone.soul.heart.bone.soul.

It’s hard to sleep at night. But it could be worse.
I’ll deal.