Writing My Wrongs

Kudos to ThirdMom

"Life is my college.  May I graduate well, and earn some honors!  ~Louisa May Alcott

Amazing how you can talk to a therapist, talk to your friends, read books and think for hours on a problem for one person to say the words you need to hear.

Award goes to the Margie.

Margie is right. Not that I would ever expect her to be wrong but something in this sentence made sense to me. Made it right for me.

"You deserve to see your daughter achieve what you sacrificed so much for her to achieve"

I am not by any means expecting it to be easy but I am now convinced I do have a right to watch my daughters graduation. I paid dearly for that to happen. Her adoptive parents may have paid the tuition. I paid for it with my life. My marriage has paid for it, my subsequent children have paid for it. I should at least see something GOOD come out of the 22 years of pain I have lived with.

So yeah, the plan is to watch it. Probably sometime in the weeks following the event. I will see what they post on-line. I might even consider purchasing the video. I don't know. I have not gotten that far in my thought process. I just know I am going to - at some point in some way. I am pondering inviting a friend over to be around just in case. I have a history of well, crumbling, with this level of pain. I have to make sure the boys aren't home and that I can at least phone a friend or use a lifeline. I am actually afraid (cue what I call The Fessler Effect) Even as I write this from the confines of my corporate cubicle, I am choking up and sobbing and tears stream down my face. I try to hide them with my long hair which is sorely in need of cut and color.

Yes, these types of events are THAT painful. For any adoptee who DOES want their mother there is wondering why she just doesn't jump at the chance or has to be sedated to attend, think of me. I cannot even watch it alone in my living room.  The idea of the live event, presence of the parents who replaced me, memories of all I lost, thoughts of the college-stick I was beat with by the agency, I dont think I could function at all.  If I had been invited I would want my daughter to be proud of me, happy I was there, and I am afraid I would be a messed bundle of psychosis. Please be gentle with your mothers who attend or dont attend your graduations. It is a wonderful day for you and your adoptive parents. It may be agony for your mother. You are essentially asking her to slit open her heart, let it bleed in the presence of strangers and smile while she is bleeding.

For the record, I would never consider going. I joked about it like all mothers joke but I would not.  If she wanted me there, she would have asked.  She would have shared some bit of it with me, some story, some exciting news. She has not written me in almost a year.  I believe (perhaps erroneously) this lack of contact is rooted in anger and I have visions of her flipping out on me if I showed up at her day. To avoid that I would have to hide or go in costume.

I will NOT hide in some dark corner and wear dark shades and act as if I have done something wrong. That is far too triggering to being sent away to a cold dark former convent to have your child alone surrounded by strangers. Strangers who cared nothing about you but saw the dollar signs on your stomach. Too triggering to days gone by when you had given birth to a child that no one acknowledged. Far too triggering to being told that "THAT never happened and we would never discuss THAT". The THAT in question was my first born child.

I don't hide anymore.

And if I do, it is for MY benefit and for no one else's.

Finally, to those of you that wrote me privately on the gift, thank you for your kind words and support. I am really quite comfortable with what I sent. I have received confirmation that it was received by her school on Monday a.m. I don't know if she has it yet and honestly, I don't expect any communication surrounding it. Truthfully, the kind wonderful words of encouragement and support I received from Margie, Joyce, Spangie, Jane, Mary, and others hit the emotional spot. Thank you for your kind thoughts.

Not Jupiter but Kool-Aid Drops

"All the bullshit that he's been taught- all society's brainwashing. You have to let go of all that to get to the other side. Most people aren't willing to do that." - Jim Morrison

I have been intermittently obsessed with my daughters graduation. I got through Mothers Day. Now I must get through her birthday (this Friday) and then her graduation (next weekend).

Yeah, May is a tough month.

Since I discovered it will be streamed on line and videos and audio and slide shows will be shown as well, I am well, pondering. Maybe ruminating (which is also known as "thinking too much") is a better word.

It was honestly easier not knowing those things were available to me. It was easier knowing I could never know or see that. Painful, yes, but easier.

Now I am faced with the decision to watch or not to watch. Even more difficult (though I would NEVER do it) was learning that tickets are not required. Attendance at the live event is first come first serve. Could ANYONE go? Like anyone who lived less than an hour away?

Moms like me like to joke about showing up at those events, lurking in some dark corner, repelling off of rooftops, using night-vision goggles to watch our children in their natural state much like you might watch animals on the Sahara plain. Lovely what adoption forces us into, eh? Creatures of the night skulking around to catch a glimpse of our very own child. Thank you adoption.

It is all a joke - kind of. It said with laughter to cover the actual tears that are there, for if we don't laugh about it we will cry.

Graduation is on Sunday. Even if I don't watch it live (they are streaming it, I think), I could catch it later.

Do I want to?

Part of me does, yes, absolutely

Part of me trembles at the thought and thinks it is best to avoid.

I decide to avoid and then the Gemini other twin inside me kicks me in the head and says "what are you freaking crazy?"

Which part of me is the avoidant part and which part of me is able to manage these things?

Is the 40 yo mom in me the part that wants to watch and is the 17 yo girl, the one who was told she had no right to these things, the one who is afraid? Am I still afraid I am violating some ones stupid rule by wanting to love my daughter? Am I afraid someone is going to yell at me and tell me I gave up the right to watch my daughters graduation - even in the privacy of my own home? Am I feeling as though I am infringing on the adoptive parents "exclusive right" to our daughters graduation since they paid for tuition.

(Side story, my daughter once wrote me some things about her parents and what they did or did not do. She ended it by stating "but they paid for my education". Um, yeah, SO FREAKING WHAT?? Isn't that what a parent is supposed to do? What they signed up for? Dude, that is one of the many sticks I was beat with, your college education. Whoopdee -freaking-do that they did what the agency told me only THEY could do.

I hate when adoptees think that when their adoptive parents do NORMAL PARENTING THINGS they are some great amazing things that they are forever indebted to them for. Um, thats what they signed up for no? If even a "dog can give birth" as one adoptive parent told me recently, ANYONE CAN PARENT. Maybe not well, but anyone can parent. GRRR.)

Stupid, I know but the fear is there. The way the agency and society makes us feel like criminals for loving our children, for caring about them, for not "getting over it".

Why do I feel like it would be "wrong" for me to watch her graduation? Who is it wrong for?

Am I still drinking the adoption kool-aid?

The Gift

“The greatest gift is a portion of thyself.” - Ralph Waldo Emerson

I mailed my daughters gift. I cannot really tell you what it is (least I cannot publish it...email me if you want the back story...its a bit of a tear jerker).

Due to the nature of the gift, the writing sample/story that went with it and the people I wrote about, I cannot post here. But its done. Its over.  I hope she accepts it with the spirit in which it was intended and sent.

It wasn't fancy or huge or expensive but there is a tremendous amount of love and emotion in it. Again, I hope she sees that. (I really wish I could share here! Do write me if you are interested!)

I was mildly freaking this a.m. (as in shaking, dizzy, lost, disoriented) as I prepared it and drove to the post office. I mailed it priority overnight with delivery confirmation.  She should get it this week.

I don't expect a response or a thank you or anything. I have learned.

I feel okay with sending it. She will either love it and cry or hate it and be more angry at me.  Whatever. I had to be true to me and my feelings and who I am and the type of mother I am. Her desire to not be loved does not stop my desire to love her.

But yeah, its done.

Oh My

In checking my daughters college calendar (to make sure I mail her stuff before she leaves the residence halls), I discovered they have a section of their site dedicated to graduation.

I clicked on over and then discovered they had their 2007 commencement ONLINE - video and audio.

I might be able to remotely (even after the fact) see her graduate after all.

I wonder if they will post the 2008 commencement too?

A Questionable Existence

“Man is the only animal for whom his own existence is a problem which he has to solve” - Erich Fromm

I wonder what it means.

Why is my son so obsessed with the idea that he would not have existed if I had been allowed to keep his sister?

He asks this quite frequently. Lately at least four times a month. This means to me he is thinking about it alot.

I wonder if it is some typical developmental milestone or is it some affect of being collateral damage to his sisters adoption.

Is he feeling I love her more?

Is he feeling neglected? Do I talk too much about her?

Is he wishing she was here but has no way to express that?

Does he feel like he doesn’t exist because she does?

Does he question his role as the first born in our family but not the first born to me?

Does he feel any envy or animosity towards his absent sister?

Does he simply just miss her and want to know her? Is that why she appears in all his school projects?

Or is it, again, just general developmental stuff?

Mr. Gunther was my third grade teacher. As the smartest student in the class (I was labeled "gifted" in the 3rd grade), I often finished my work early and was left with hours to kill and nothing to do. Mr. Gunther would send me to the Principals office and I provided clerical backup and assistance to the school receptionist, Mrs Kmetzo. I was an 8 year old receptionist.

"Good morning, Franklin School, how may I direct your call?"

Yes, I really did and said those things.

In between answering the phones for Mrs. Kmetzo, I sat behind her and pretended to sort papers. Most often I found myself staring out the window musing over the jungle gym and the kids out at recess.

A common thought, a pervasive, intrusive, disturbing thought for me during that time and at that age was:

"Where do I go when I die?"

I was obsessed for my entire third grade year with my own mortality. Growing up a conservative Catholic, I was taught (but never believed) heaven and pearly gates and St. Peter welcoming me and all that magical religious stuff.

I never believed it.

I could accept that my body would die and turn to dust but where did I go? Me? My voice? My personality? My spirit?

Yeah, I was an intense kid (not much has changed in that regard).

I was reminded of that phase in my life when I recently began pondering my sons obsession with his own existence in relation to his absent sister.

Of course it is possible he might not have existed. However, it is also possible he may have but his father would have been my daughters father. It is also possible he could have been born to his father and another woman.

We simply cannot know.

But for some reason, something is bugging my son and he has a need to know. Clearly, my answer of "we cannot know for sure, Nikolas" is not comforting him.

I don’t know what to say or how to help him.

And I don’t like that feeling.

I also despise that my son has to even ponder these things. They surely don’t tell surrendering mothers that our future children will also be traumatized by the loss of their siblings to adoption.

I wish I could make it easier for him.