"The Strings of Life"

I stumbled onto the writing of Dabeshim a couple of days ago.  One of his poems caught me from the very first stanza.  I again am amazed at how the words of someone adopted can be so meaningful to me as a mother of adoption loss.  Below is the poem, interspersed with my own rambling thoughts brought to mind as I read the words. 

There once was a day

The winds were cold, darkness creped as far

As the inside, It had its say

We did as others wished

Serving them on a golden dish.

We knew no other way.

Like marionettes we lived,

Upon the Strings of Life.

Giving no thought at all.

The Florence Crittenton building was a big, old brick building. Dark. Cold. Always. Not the temperature, it was the atmosphere in that building…

I did only as they wished. As society expected of me. I made sure to let them all know that I wasn’t “one of those girls”. I really was a good girl, not a crack-whore. I really did love my baby, I really only wanted the best for him ~ It wasn’t at all that I didn’t want to be a mom, it wasn’t that I wanted to have a life full of fun instead of responsibility. I proved that I really did love my baby, loved him even more than I loved myself. I served my son up to the adoption industry on a golden dish…

What a good marionette I was, right in line being the good birthmother without any further convincing necessary. I already knew that there was no way I would raise a child in the way I was living. I knew that the only way I would be able to raise my child would be to move out of the house, and that would have been impossible on my own. I gave no thought towards the future, only to finishing what I had started by becoming pregnant while unmarried and young. No thought was given to what it would actually be like to give birth to my child, much less live without him. No thought was given to the fact that I couldn’t really ensure that my child would have a better life. No thought was given to what an adoptees life was like, how their life was affected by adoption. I was just following along with what was expected of me, like a marionette I lived…

I returned to school that fall unable to really be myself. I was sure that any classmates who knew of my pregnancy thought of me as either the classic whore or as a heartless person who gave her child away. I never breathed a word of my son to anyone afterwards, losing the freedom to be myself. Always fearful that someone would find out the truth. In addition, without even realizing it, my heart was locked up tight in order to not fully feel the loss of my son. How heavy was the weight of that prison I imposed on myself…

For our own freedom, our own call.

Now after so many years

I awoke to see that the power to live is

In you and in me.

We could be

Light as the air

With the wind through your hair

Free to move, here and there.

There and here, everywhere.

Now that we are no longer tied to the loom.

We can go from room to room.

We are Free at last,

no more strings of life to hold us down,

making us like clowns

In the moment of reading the first emails telling me that my son was looking for me, I awoke. I awoke from 30 years of denial and felt the power, the freedom, of living in my truth. I felt as light as air ~ the weight of that self-imposed prison was lifted. Once I had the chance to bask in the joy and treasure this new life that now included my first born son, I wanted to share the news with everyone. Christopher himself told me that I could go stand on the sandhills of Nebraska and yell the news out to the world. I was no longer tied to the loom that was labeled birthmother. The loom of shame. Shame that wasn’t mine to take on, but that I willingly accepted from the judgment of our society. The loom of despair and grief from the loss of my son ~ loss that I wasn’t even allowed to speak of. Loss that nobody in society sees, much less understands to have any empathy for. (Except for the others who live with the loss of adoption that is)

In talking to the search angel who matched our profiles, I felt as though I had beaten the system. Even though deep down I knew it wasn't true, the remnants of former beliefs were still there. I had believed the social worker when she told me it would be against the law to ever look for my son. Taking on that lie, it tied me further to the loom of adoption loss. Now here I was, being told by an angel named Kim that my son had been searching for me for a while, was very excited and waiting to finally hear from me. Just as I had been tied to the loom of adoption, so had he. In the finding, we were both freed from the looms, we were free to go from the room of secrecy into the room of truth.

The past is the in the past

None of that matter anymore

Yesterday is out the door

Let’s make the most of now

Since time doesn’t last

We made our own many mistakes

Sacrificed the best of ourselves at the stake

Yet we are free now to move every which way

To say what we want to say

no more strings of life to tie us down

making us look just  like clowns

Yes ~ the past is in the past. I can’t get back those lost years with Christopher. I made my mistakes. Many mistakes were made in the years after I lost Christopher to adoption. My biggest wish is that I had been strong enough to live my truth, instead of hiding from it.  For I wasn't really hiding from it.  It was always there, just under the surface, just out of reach of my conscious being.  I not only sacrificed my son, I sacrificed my authentic self. Being silent after the loss of my son to adoption only allowed the myths to continue. Being silent gave the impression that losing my son to adoption was ok. Being silent kept the tremendous loss and grief hidden. Did another mother go on to choose adoption because she saw that my life did seem to go on as before after losing my son to adoption? I will never know. But I do feel that I fed the adoption industry with my silence. The strings tying me down are gone, I am free now to speak of my experience. I am free to speak of the child, now a grown man, forever lost to adoption. There are no self or society imposed strings keeping me silent now. I speak out of the truth of adoption loss on my life. I speak out not because it can change anything for us ~ but maybe I can change something for another mother, for the children of that mother. I speak out now to help another living with the loss of adoption to free themselves from their own loom, to no longer be a marionette of the adoption industry.

We are as light as the air

With the wind through your hair

We have no more cares

That will hold us and keep us,

From ourselves,

like marionettes up on the shelves.

Oh you must believe me!

Oh can you see me?

Can you hear this song I sing?

It brings me here to you!

The strings of life have all disappeared

The strife we lived, sheared and blown away

We are free now to move every which way

To say what we want to say

no more strings of life to tie us down

lifting us high above the ground

We are free now to just be. The strings of adoption no longer control us as though we are only marionettes. I am his mother, he is my son. I love Christopher no less than the children I raised. The strings of adoption could take away my legal rights, but could never take away my love for him.

Oh come with me

And Fly! You will see

The music is playing, the choir is saying

We are Light as the air

The wind through your hair

Free to move, here and there.

There and here, everywhere.

With no more ties

Gone are The Strings of Life.

………………………………

© 2012 Dabeshim

Thank you for sharing these beautiful, yet haunting, words Dabeshim. Thank you for allowing me to ramble on and write of how the words touched my heart.

"The Strings of Life" by Dabeshim at http://anunrequitedlife.wordpress.com/2012/02/22/the-strings-of-life/ 

Last Will and Testament of an Adopted Person

Watch this.  It's a powerful video.

Thanks Peach for posting this.  

Last Will and Testament of an Adopted Person

A Light Through The Darkness of Adoption Loss

Artwork from Ordinary Courage

I know I've been quiet lately.  I have been focusing on the good in my life, making brighter my "light from within".

I am so thankful for everyone and everything that has helped me find that light after being lost in the dark of adoption loss for so very, very long. 

The one who has made the biggest difference in my life at this stage is Christopher's mom.  I cannot put into words how much brighter my world became by meeting and being fully accepted by her. 

Lately in adopto-land there has been much written about adoptive parents keeping the natural mothers and families away from their children (infants to adults).  If they could only know, if only some would care, what a difference they could make in the loss and grief felt by those who lose loved-ones in adoption. 

A mother of adoption loss has no idea what life is actually going to be like without her child.  It should be expected that the moms are going to have a hard time, that she's going to be grieving.  That grief should not scare away the adoptive parents. 

I would hope that it would have them instead showing some compassion.  

I would hope that it would have the adoptive parents wanting to help ease the moms heart and mind.  Instead, I see so many cases where the adoptive family turns their back on the mother turning the blame back onto that mother.  They tell themselves and others that the mother wasn't "going on with her life" or some such crap.  They excuse away the true reasons they are uncomfortable in the face of the grief. 

By turning away from the mother (and father, siblings, extended family), they are only adding to the grief and loss.  Nothing will take away the grief, but many things will certainly add to it!  A letter, a note, some photos and/or videos, promised visits can go so far in helping a mother cope with the grief and loss of a child to adoption.  Keeping communication open will help her find acceptance and help her see that her child has loving parents who only want the best for the child.

One of my on-line friends has been shut out of her child's life.  The adoptive parents have pulled far away from the open adoption that was promised.  Leaving a mother, father, and sibling heart-broken.  Yes, the adoptive familiy would have to face the grief of this left-behind family ~ but in facing the grief they could relieve a lot of it too.  I just can't imagine being the kind of person who couldn't open my heart to help another out of their grief.  A small act by the adoptive family could have an enormous effect on the family left behind.  How can they deny that?  I will never understand. 

Not only is an adoptive family hurting the natural family left behind, they are hurting the very child they claim to love. 

The denial of adoptive parents does not take away the importance of or the need of those adopted to know their first chapter.  It only builds upon the loss and makes it even greater. 

If you have adopted or are planning on adopting and 

won't understand and honor the place of the 

natural family in your child's life ~ then please don't adopt. 

It's pretty simple really.  I don't understand what is so hard about it.  A child doesn't just appear out of nowhere.  A child is born to a mother, created by that mother and a father.  The story behind the conception and/or birth doesn't matter ~ the story doesn't change the simple fact that a child is born to two people and their families (past, present, and future). 

A child being given up for adoption and adopted by another family doesn't take away their first, biological, natural family ~ it only adds more family. 

If you have or are planning on adopting and you can't accept the fact that your child has another family, then you aren't offering your child unconditional love.  You are putting conditions on their very existence. 

As adoptive parents, you have the ability to make the choice for adoption either bearable or something that breaks a person.  

I am so very happy and thankful that Christopher got a mother and father who adopted out of love.  They never denied their daughter and son their beginnings.  They never denied my relationship with our son.  I was accepted into open arms and with a loving heart.  By openly accepting me as a part of their son's life, they have showed me love.  Love that allowed the light within me to grow stronger. 

The light of their love and acceptance of me shines brightly 

through the darkness of the loss of my son to adoption.  

I wish all mothers of adoption loss could know that love and acceptance. 

I wish that all adoptive parents would act out of love and not fear.  

For their own sake, for the natural families and for their adopted loved ones. 

I Need To Decide ~ Am I Going To Chicago?

Click here to learn more about the demonstration!

I really, REALLY want to go.  I have been excited about it ever since I learned that the demonstration was going to be in Chicago this year. 

Some of  the friends I have met in adopto-land have become a huge part of my life through the healing I have found with them.  I think it would be so amazing to meet them "in real life". 


What's holding me back?  I hate to admit that one of the big things is explaining to my hubby that I want to go on a road trip to meet a bunch of people I only know through cyber-space.  Another thing is that although I think this could be a huge healing step, I also have that fear of the "Fessler Effect" as Suz calls it.  Being in the midst of so many people who get it? Who get me because of the adoption loss?  *sigh*  That thought is as amazing as it is frightening for me. 

But.  I really, REALLY want to go!  I just need the final push to make that decision. 

So...

Who's going?

When are you arriving?

How long are you staying?

Adoption Loss & Grief. It's Forever.

I have been enjoying a wonderful few weeks adoption-wise.  Long enough to have me off guard, totally surprised by the slap back into the reality of living with adoption loss.

I suppose it probably started the other day when I first learned of that new show on TLC.  I didn't watch it, I could barely read about it on fb and in blog-land.

This morning as I was washing my hair, I had a sudden remembered snippet of a dream during the night.  A hug, that felt so real.  A hug that included a whisper in my ear "I love you"...  Three precious words I have yet to hear from the son I couldn't raise.

I feel that there was a lot more to the dream, but the hug and whisper are all I remember.

I can't wait till that dream comes true...

In the mean time, I find myself lost in thought and sadness today.

Even though.  Even though things are going well in my reunion.  Even though I am so blessed in my life in so many ways.

That's just the reality of living with the loss of a child to adoption.  No matter how long you have lived with the loss ~ it never goes away.  No matter if you are reunited or if your relationship with your lost son/daughter is going well.  The loss is there.  The grief is tremendous.  The hole in my heart is still there.  

I wish that the mothers considering adoption on that damned show could feel in their hearts what my heart feels 33 years later.  I wish that the mothers considering adoption on that damned show could feel in their hearts what some of my adopted friends feel in their hearts (even the ones who did get a great adoptive family!).  Why is it that only the joy of the adopters is taken into consideration in adoption?  Why isn't the life-long loss and grief acknowledged, much less understood? 

Danielle wrote a post a while ago about the life long grief that comes from losing a child to adoption.  It's a fabulous post, as usual, you should go read it in full if you can.  Here is just a part of what she says that rings so true for me today:

I will always live with this. It is a huge part of who I am.  It always will be. 

I will always be a “birthmother”. I cannot take back anything that happened to me almost a decade ago. A thought that both comforts me and renders me feeling so helpless that I wish I could crawl into bed and sleep forever. I cannot undo the pain that still sears through my heart. I will never be able to erase the memories or the feelings associated with those memories. I will always have moments where I feel the debilitating sense of grief that comes associated with adoption loss, and I will have moments where I feel like it’s going to be okay.

I will always carry this with me, until the day I die.

No matter how many words I eloquently splay onto this screen, no matter how many posts I publish to the internet, no matter how many times I see a therapist, or how many pills I am prescribed to take to help with the anxiety. It will always linger. It will always be color on the inner walls of my soul. Always....

...Because I know that this will be a part of me as long as I walk this earth, I’ve more readily accepted that I need to navigate through the muddier paths of this journey so I can use my voice to join the multiple others who have been traumatized, or isolated as a result of adoption. I need to speak so women, many women know that adoption isn’t always a miracle and that there are many hidden aspects, crucial ones that could impact your life in so many incredible ways, not always positive.  Because I know that this is who I am, I understand me a little more.

Adoption has been written, etched into my DNA. Maybe it wasn’t willingly, but it’s there. And it’s shaped a good part of the woman I am. I won’t change any of that, not because I don’t want to, but because I simply can’t undo it. What’s done is done; I am a birthmother.

I will always live with that.

I'm not the only one with this life-long effect of adoption on my mind.  Today Rebecca (an adoptee and adoptive mother) author of  "Love Is Not A Pie" also wrote about this subject.  She writes:

In pre-adoption counseling, mothers who are considering placing a child for adoption are sometimes told that they will "get over it" and move on. Not so surprisingly, many mothers who relinquish find that moving on is not a simple matter. The following posts are not easy to read, but they are an important part of the adoption story.

Those Hands
Grief Remains
Missing Him
Pretender
The Scars of Motherhood

If you didn't click on the above links to read the blog posts, you missed another great link.  The post "Those Hands" was inspired by this post by a natural mom "coming out of the adoption closet".  It is heart wrenching, it needs to be read by all. 

So if you are one of the people who enjoyed watching that show on TLC, if you are someone who promotes and advocates for adoption, please take the time to go read some of the links above.  At least acknowledge the deep loss that occurs in adoption. 


If a mother in your life is facing an unexpected pregnancy and considering adoption, please have her read this post.  Please make sure that she makes a fully informed decision for or against adoption.  Don't let her fall for the false beliefs that encompass adoption in our society.  Don't let her make a decision based on fear or lack of confidence in her ability to be a wonderful mother no matter if she is young, or single, or poor, or whatever. 


Adoption loss is forever.  Even if it's an open adoption, it's still the loss of motherhood.  Forever.  For the mother, for the infant, for the entire natural family. 


My heart aches for my son.  My heart aches to know my grandchildren.  My heart aches to know my son's wife, the mother of the grandchildren I also lost to adoption.  I don't wish this heart ache on anyone...

Happy Mother's Day!

For the first time since becoming a mother, I can say that I had a great Mother's Day!

Much has been going on in my life, much I want to share with all of you, yet I haven't been able to bring myself to write about it all.

The last visit we had from Christopher seems to have broken the silence.  I have realized that I am reading much more into that silence than what was really there.  As usual...

I was going to be over in Christopher's neck of the woods last weekend, but he was busy so we couldn't make a visit work. 

So.  I got brave.  Writing the message was easy.  Finding the courage to hit the "reply" button was hard ~ my finger hovered over the mouse for several minutes.  Christopher's mom lives just minutes away from where I was going to be.  She replied that it was going to be a busy weekend ~ but she would make it work as she wanted to meet me too! 

I was surprisingly not nervous as the day arrived.  I was just so excited to meet her.  She had an event to attend in the morning/lunchtime, so I went shopping in a quaint old-town area of the city while waiting for her phone call.  When she called to say she would be able to meet in 20 minutes, the nerves kicked in! 

We met at a TCBY at 2:15.  All nerves were gone the minute I saw her and she walked towards me with open arms.  Our hug seemed to last forever.  I felt as though I was channeling all the love that those arms had shown Christopher over the years ~ all the love that I was unable to show to him, but she was able to.  All the worries that I had while driving there were for nothing.  She was completely open, honest, and loving with me.  We talked for hours.  About Christopher of course, but also about both of our families growing up, our other children and grandchildren, so much more.  She gave me a beautiful gift and card for Mother's Day, with a loving note.  I had gotten her a necklace that symbolized the bond I have always felt with her ~ even while I didn't know her.  I always felt a bond with her, that we were brought together through the love of a child.  I think the necklace found me actually, it is a perfect symbol of that bond.  I got one for each of us, wore it that day and almost every day since.  I knew that we had been talking for a long time, we both seemed to try to wrap things up at the same time.  I was so surprised to see that it was 6:05 when I got into my car.  Almost four hours had passed!  Driving away from meeting her, I felt such complete peace, love, and happiness.

I texted Christopher afterwards and told him that his mom was wonderful.  We had a few texts back and forth, he was very relieved that it went so well. He said that he was more nervous than both of us had been! 


Just three days later was Christopher's birthday.  Due to the anticipation of meeting his mom the birthday blues hadn't kicked in as they have every year since he was born.  It was so wonderful to be able to talk to him on his birthday.  The birthday blues did kick in a bit that day, along with some decompressing from meeting his mom.  But overall it was a wonderful day, the feeling of peace was back the next day when I received a lovely thank you card and note from his mom. 

I don't know what I ever did to deserve all the blessings I have had in my life.  Getting to know Christopher's mom, her loving acceptance of me into their lives, is more than I ever thought possible. 

This is the first year since Christopher's birth that I have not fallen into a funk for the weeks before and after. 

This is the first Mother's Day since Christopher's birth that I have truly been happy to celebrate being a mother on this day.  I had a fabulous day that included playing in the sun and dirt (finally getting some flowers planted) with three of my granddaughters help, then dinner with all three of my (raised) kids, the grandkids and my mother and father-in-law.  My daughter even cleaned up the mess from dinner.  To top off the day, Christopher sent me a "happy mother's day" message ~ the first one since being reunited!  Once everyone was gone, I sat outside and just breathed it all in. 

I am one very thankful and lucky mom! 

Continuing to Find Myself

I think the first crack in the fog of adoption loss happened for me when I was pregnant with my youngest son.  My husband had been begging for a third child, I didn't want another one.  He works in construction, very long hours 6 and sometimes 7 days a week during the summer.  Days would go by without the kids (and sometimes myself) seeing him ~ he would leave before we were awake and come home after we were asleep for the night.  I was a married single mother and used that excuse for why I didn't want another child.  I once had the thought enter my head that I didn't want another child, I wanted the one I wasn't able to raise.  As quickly as that thought entered my head, I shooed it away and swiftly forgot about it (or so I thought...).  Thankfully he had started wearing me down and I finally was considering having another child, because I found out the hard way that antibiotics don't play well with birth control!

Even though I didn't consciously acknowledge my missing son's effect on my life, my brain and my body knew of it.  It was shortly after my youngest son was born that I began to put on a lot of weight.  I can look back now and easily see what I was doing, but I had no clue at the time.  I was trying to fill the hole in my heart with food.  That worked for a few years (in the process gaining almost 100 pounds). 

After that I began trying to fill that hole with "things".  I spent money we didn't have on things we didn't really need.  It was financial problems that I was no longer able to hide from my husband that cracked open the door of denial for me.  What the hell was wrong with me?  I was a grown adult, why couldn't I get control of my life?  What was I doing to myself, my husband, our marriage, our kids and our future?  Everything always came back to the loss of Christopher.  I finally handed over our financial matters to my husband and started doing some soul work.  It would still be a couple more years though before I finally was strong and brave enough to say enough is enough.  I knew that I needed to find someone to talk to, to finally deal with the loss of my son to adoption and to deal with the effects of that loss, as well as the denial of that loss, on every aspect of my life.  After that I was going to start the search for him. 

As you may know, we were reunited by a search angel just three days before the date I had set to find a therapist and make an appointment with him/her.  I truly believe that God had his hand on my plans, because if I had found a therapist, chances are pretty high that it would have been someone who believed in the sunshine and rainbows and would have easily been able to put me right back into that closet of denial. 

In the last 3+ years after that search angel changed my life, I have become a different person.  I got rid of the false beliefs, I have come to have a sense of acceptance over the loss of Christopher and an acceptance of myself.  I got rid of the financial issues and no longer feel the need to buy things "just because".  I have un-cluttered my house (mostly!), it's now a house of calm vs a house of chaos visually. 

I however still carry the extra weight.  Towards the end of March I decided that it was time to quit hiding under it.  I decided that I was going to see if I could make some drastic changes in April ~ and I did!  I knew that I wouldn't be able to just cut back in a couple of things, it had to be a huge jump into eating healthy.  It had to be all or nothing.  I quit eating/drinking "white" stuff ~ sugar, flour (which includes bread and pasta), dairy.  I even gave up alcohol for the month!  (And I love my margaritas, or a glass of wine sometimes after dinner)  I was only going to eat and drink real foods.  Lean meats, veggies (LOTS of them!), and some fruit.  I am proud to say that with only three days left in the month I have been very successful.   Despite the birthday and anniversary parties, 1st Communion celebrations, snacks at school every day, I have only had a few bites of cake and cookies, no breads, just a couple of bites of pasta.  Oddly, it wasn't the sweets that were in danger of being quickly consumed by me ~ it was the breads and chips that about did me in several times.  I did have a couple of chips a few times, just enough to get a small fix of salty and crunchy.  I had NO Pepsi ~ not a single drink!!  (and if you knew me, you would know how impossible that thought was!) I am going to continue eating only "real" food, but I am going to try adding back a little bit of dairy (cheese please) and some whole grains now and then.  I feel so much better, my skin is clearer, as are my sinuses.  I don't know what foods were causing those problems, so I will add foods slowly to avoid those issues again.

As of this morning, I am down exactly 19 pounds!  Without starving.  I ate whenever I was hungry ~ it just had to be real food.  I think a big part of the loss has just been the mind set.  I now realize that I was holding onto the weight as a way to continue hiding from myself ~ from my true self that is.  I think Christopher's silence was also a big part of me getting to this point.  I had to face some things that I still hadn't faced, until I was forced to with his silence.   I had to look deeper inside myself, I became stronger in the loss of him. 

This may sound corny/new-agey to you, but I also found help not just in my own mindset, but it was as if the universe was also helping me along.  It seemed that everywhere I looked, everywhere I read, I was seeing messages to help me along my way, helping me to be strong.  I will share those messages of inspiration with you soon!

Oh ~ and by the way ~ even though I still hadn't heard from Christopher, he texted my daughter last weekend to tell her that he was going to be fairly close-by again, and came to join us for dinner Wednesday night!  I don't need to tell you that it was a fabulous evening ~ about four hours with all my children together again.  Heaven!  Yesterday I suffered from an emotional hangover that always hits after a visit, but today I'm just thankful and feeling blessed that things are still coming together, even when they sometimes feel as though they are coming apart!

Family Preservation

I have written about this before, but after the controversy at Circle of Moms and the controversy going on in a forum I belong to, I wanted to write about it again. This post however is mostly written out of emotions.  If you want a post to really learn from, go read my first post on this topic:  Family Preservation, Not Anti-Adoption

I am not anti-adoption, despite what some may say.  When some people throw out the "anti-adoption" label, it's like saying that the person hates puppies and everything nice in the world.  It's often hate filled.  It almost always comes from somebody who really needs to learn about the other side of adoption.

It hurts when people refuse to see that adoption happens only after great tragedy.  No matter how wonderful the adoption story is for the adoptive family, that joy is built on life-long grief that is unimaginable by anyone who isn't living it. 

I honestly do not understand how people don't see the terrible wrongs in infant adoption. 

I honestly don't understand how a woman could watch a new mother crying over losing her child, yet think it's "the right thing". 

I will never understand a prospective parent being angry that a mother and child are able to stay together.  Yes ~ I understand that their hopes of finally being a parent themselves are dashed.  But to be angry at a mother for deciding to parent her baby ~ the baby that she has nurtured in her womb for nine months?  The baby that she has been agonizing over for the last several months?  The baby that she loves more than life itself?  Is their grief so deep that they no longer have any compassion?  Could that prospective mother and/or father really feel good about taking the baby from the mother if she wasn't 100% sure that she did not want to raise the baby herself? 

I will never understand how a woman can read or hear the words of grief and loss from a mother who lost a child to adoption, yet tear her apart for daring to speak against the beauty of adoption or write her off as "just another "bitter" birthmom". 

I will never understand how a woman can tell a mother of adoption loss that "adoption is different now", thereby erasing the validity of her grief and loss. 

Again, adoption is built on loss ~ tremendous loss for both the mother and the child.  Even if it truly is the choice of the mother, it's still a tremendous loss. 

I live the life as a mother without her child due to adoption loss.  And I WAS one of those mothers who was 100% sure.  Yet, I still wish this life on NOBODY. 

I am so very lucky to be reunited with my son, I am so blessed to know that he did get great parents, he had a wonderful childhood and has a wonderful life.  Yet, I still wish this life on NOBODY.

I was somehow able to "just get on with my life", just like the so-called counselor told me to do.  I met and fell in love with my husband when Christopher was just about 8 months old.  32 years later we are still together.  We raised three wonderful kids, who have given us 7 beautiful grandchildren (with another one due in August!).  I have a job I love, we live in a house we built ourselves.  Life is great.  Yet, I still wish this life on NOBODY.  The grief and loss is there under the surface of every great thing in my life.  

I do not have the life I do because I didn't have the "burden" of being a teen mom.  I have what I do DESPITE the loss of my son to adoption.  DESPITE the effects that adoption has had on every single aspect of my life. 

I advocate for keeping a family together if at all possible ~ family preservation.  Family should be sacred.  Family preservation should be the goal of everyone.  The tearing apart of a family should be something to avoid at all costs.  How sad that is not the case when it comes to newborn infant adoption in this country...

So call me anti- adoption if you want.  I know and live the truth of adoption loss.  If I can save one mother from knowing the gaping hole in her heart and soul from losing a child to adoption, then your name calling is worth it to me. 

My Thoughts on the "Circle of Moms"

I'm sure you all know about the "Circle of Moms" blog contest by now.  It is a sad statement about the purpose of that website.   It isn't for all moms.  It's for moms they deem worthy of being on the website.  This excludes anyone who speaks anything other than the fabulous rainbows and sunshine of adoption.

I managed to get a pdf printed of the contest page just seconds before it was taken down.  So I was still able to go read some of the blogs listed to see what the big deal was.  Why some were "offended".  The only things I read that I felt were not supportive were the blogs where the bloggers and the comments to the bloggers were bashing those they deemed "anti adoption" or "adoption haters".  The blogs that had the worst bashing of people were on blogs that praise the institution of adoption. 

Here are the Top 25 blogs, their number of votes, and place in the triad as of taking the contest down:

1.  The Declassified Adoptee ~ 360 ~ adult adoptee
2.  Musings of the Lame ~ 301~ natural mother
3.  The R House ~ 265~ adoptive mother
4.  Dreaming Big Dreams ~ 244 ~ adoptive mother
5.  Adoption Talk ~ 213 ~ adoptive mother
6.  Neither Here Nor There ~ 207 ~ adult adoptee
7.  Ordinary Miracles & The Crazy 9 ~ 198~ adoptive mother
8.  The Sky Is Laughing ~ 195 ~ adoptive mother
9.  Finding My Way To My Little Starfish ~ 182 ~ adoptive mother
10.  Marvelous Love ~ 170 ~ adoptive mother
11. iAdoptee ~ 160 ~ adult adoptee
12.  To Tell The Truth - Please Stand Up ~ 157 ~ foster care alumni
13.  Ethiopian Ties ~ 151 ~ adoptive mom
14.  Traded Dreams ~ 130 ~ adoptive mom
15.  Marty's Musings ~ 113 ~ adoptive mom
16.  Costain Party of Six ~ 113 ~ adoptive mom
17.  Write Mind Open Heart ~ 113 ~ adoptive mom
18.  Welcome to my Brain ~ 104 ~ adoptive mom (and adoptee/natural mom?  seems like I read that before on her blog?
19.  Rage Against the Minivan ~ 102 ~ adoptive mom
20.  Last Mom ~ 99 ~ older-child adoptive mom
21.  Ni Hao Y'all ~ 97 ~ adoptive mom
22.  The Road Less Traveled ~ 96 ~ adoptive mom
23.  I Will Pull This Blog Over! ~ 96 ~ adoptive mom
24.  the5parkers ~ 83 ~ foster care adoption
25.  On Our Hearts ~ my pdf cut off right after the title of the blog!


Not in the Top 25, but their posts regarding this should be read:

Adoption Truth ~ Cassi was the one removed from the contest ~ the beginning of the end...  I have never thought of Cassi's blog as being offensive.  Not even her post after finding out she had been removed from the contest.

Production, Not Reproduction ~ adoptive mom, I think she took herself off the list in protest after Cassi's removal?  I think there were others who removed themselves from the list also.  If you know of any, please feel free to add them in the comments. 

One Option Means No Choice

Since some people felt offended by what others were writing, causing this fiasco, I thought I would add some of the things I found offensive.  Funny how most of those offensive things I read last night and this morning are gone.  Hmmm...

What was it that offended me?  People who were name-calling and bashing those who spoke out of the negative aspects of adoption.  Calling us "haters" and such.  Although now I have no proof since most of them have been deleted.  Oh well.  I guess if anything positive came out of this mess it's that someone realized that they were going a little bit too far hating on those they were calling haters...  

Shoot. Sounds like some people need to un-bunch their lovely unders and take a deep breath. 

  From a dad who reads all the adoption blobs and loves them I was planning on setting my alarm everyday to vote for you! If you had one more day you could have beat the haters who came in number two! Keep it up!

There were a few blatant lies posted though.  This one I found particularly offensive: (directly copied ~ misspelling is theirs)

Be glad that you were not one of the targets. The antiadootion groups set out to personally attack blogs that had positive adoption messages or just didn't focus on the hard stuff exclusively. They flooded the blogs with negative comments and threatening emails. Be glad that you were not put under attack.

Really?  I didn't see anyone in the top 25 personally attack any blogs nor bloggers themselves.  I didn't see any blogs flooded with negative comments, nor hear of anyone receiving threatening emails.  Maybe this did happen, but I didn't see any proof of it.


As I was going through the blogs just now, I was only offended (strongly) by one thing I read:

Not sure what happened, but it's so incredibly sad that we as an adoption community can't come together and truly embrace the reality that adoption is a loving response to a tragic reality.

Excuse me? adoption is a loving response to a tragic reality? Is she calling an unplanned pregnancy a tragic reality?  Maybe I'm wrong and the tragic reality is that a mother and her child were separated.  But then where does the loving response come in?  Nope.  I still think she was being very offensive.  I don't know the percentage, but the majority of children born in the world come from unplanned pregnancies.  Two of the children I was lucky to raise were not planned.  Are they tragic realities??  I think not. 


I could see someone being offended by things said on one adoptive mother and one adult adoptee blog.  If they were looking to be offended...

Here are some of the good things that came out of this fiasco:

No, I am not "anti-adoption."  No, I do not think children are better off left in orphanages, foster care, in abusive homes, in homes that cannot care for them, or homes where they are not wanted.  Absolutely not.  I do not even begin to believe that I offer the only perspective on adoption; my goal is to offer a different one.  Not one that fixes all of the world's or adoption's problems but one that gives people something different to think about, than perhaps what usually comes to mind, when they think of adoption.

 However, you summed up what we all should be coming together on: the children. The love and care of a child is most important. Adoption, when broken down to it's simplest form, involves so many emotions and issues. I believe that anyone involved in adoption should have access to ALL views to make well informed decisions; further, the understanding that comes from differences perspectives is priceless.

The Circle of Moms Top Adoption Blog contest is ending in a typical case of “a few bad apples ruin the batch.” I just got the following message. I am sad that we couldn’t agree and include everyone. Makes my heart hurt.

 Apparently the fault lie more with COM for their refusal to allow certain participants when they could have simply ignored the naysayers and let people vote as designed – totally ridiculous.

 Cassi is being censored because of WHO SHE IS as much as for what she says. Cassi relinquished her child for adoption.  She writes about coercion in adoption consent.  So do I.  She writes about adoption reform.  So do I.  She writes about open records.  So do I.  She writes about how adoption has affected her now-adult child.  I also write about how adoption has affected my not-yet-adult children.  SO why is Cassi censored, and I am not (or at least not yet!)?  Because adoptive parent speech is the only privileged speech in the adoption triad.  Because I sometimes post photos of my cute adopted kids. And isn't that a shame, that my status privileges my speech, while Cassi's status enforces silence?

...when I was accused of being "anti-adoption," the short-hand equivalent of not writing about adoption in "a supportive, positive way:"

 The point I'm trying to make here is that adoption is way more complicated than simply saving the orphans from the hellish orphanage. There is domestic adoption. There is international adoption. There is black market, illegal adoption. There is human trafficking that ends in adoption. There is corruption. There are lies. There are falsified documents. There is profit generation. There is abuse of power and children. There is entitlement. There is desperation. To ignore or turn your back on the realities that the adoption industry cultivates is a misguided act because it is all--good and bad--interconnected.

 The whole situation is so ridiculous.  Adoption is hard.  It's complicated.  The blog they pulled, Adoption Truth, reflects that from the author's perspective.  Just as my blog reflects how hard and complicated adoption is from my perspective.  Some adoption stories may be all rainbows and unicorns, but I think those situations are pretty rare (and often fabricated or exaggerated).

 I'm even more offended now that they wouldn't allow this blog in there...a blog that reflects this person's reality, and quite frankly, a point of view that adoptive parents need to consider as they are raising their children who weren't born to them. The thing that really gets me, though, is that they banned this blog for being bitter, yet so much of their other stuff that they freely publish really is anti-family and promotes a lacks morals.

 BUT this post is important because it calls out the very, very important reasons we need to continue to break the stereotypes surrounding adoption.

Ironically- I think all members of the triad felt welcome and supported UNTIL they disqualified Cassi. (although I suspect there was a contingent of "Sunshine and Roses" bloggers who complained about Cassi's blog in the first place) They don't have to agree but Cassi had the right to be on that list- if they didn't like it they didn't have to read or vote. Circle of Moms should had left it alone. It was when they didn't that the problem started.

Letting Go

From this quote at the very beginning of the blog post on Metta Drum, I was intrigued...

We only become what we are by the radical and deep-seated refusal of that which others have made of us.

Jean-Paul Sartre

The following is my rambling brain trying to talk my way through the meaning of Daniel's post (which is in the brown all-caps text) in regards to my life.   This post is just a rambling mess, as are my thoughts...

Lately I've been exploring this idea of transformation as letting go. Letting go of what I no longer resonate with, and nurturing the deeper "me" underneath all that, instead of trying to patch myself up in an attempt to become something new and improved. 

I did let go of that confused, scared, all-alone-in-the-world 15 year old girl who had to give her son up for adoption.

Now I want to let go the wanting more.  I know that there IS no more to be had.  In order to have the more that my heart and soul search for, I would have had to raised my son. In order to have more, my son would also want to have more.

I want to let go of the hurt.  Is there a way to heal the hurts of losing a child to adoption?  Not to just accept it, but to heal it?

I feel that I am a new and improved version of myself ~ having come out of the adoption closet, out of the denial, I've gotten rid of the false beliefs.  But is there more than that?  Can I get to the deeper “me” underneath all of that?

Scraping the layers of paint and dirt off of the mirror, so to speak.

I think we lose sight of who we are when we find ourselves identifying with the paint and the dirt. We think all those layers of "stuff" define us, and then we feel defective. So we try to become less of this, and more of that.

In this way, we continually create a distorted, unsatisfying sense of Self.

You won't find any long-term solutions in the less of this, more of that approach. Instead, consider the idea that the You you've been searching for is already present within you, just waiting for conscious connection. Let go of the idea that you need fixing, because deep down, you aren't really broken. 

Am I really not broken?  I'm Christopher's mother ~ I gave birth to him.  Yet I didn't raise him.  Yet my heart and soul feel him as my son.  Yet...  It's an endless circle.

The truth of the matter is that I gave birth to a son who is not in my life as my soul yearns for him to be.  Is the conscious connection that needs to be made just the "knowing" that I am indeed a mother to my firstborn child?  That I'm not just a "birthmother"  (God, I HATE that word!)  I think I have scraped some of the layers off ~ I no longer look at myself as a "birthmother", I now know that I was always much more than the egg donor and incubator I believed I was.

Is it that the me I've been searching for is already present in me ~ just the knowledge and belief that I am and was always his mother, despite signing those damn papers?

Is the idea that  I need Christopher to truly be a part of my life in order to be "fixed" a false idea?  In writing out all of my pondering here, the answer to that is yes.  In the creating and giving birth to him I am his mother.  No, not in the way that I wish with all of my heart that I could have been, but signing a piece of paper didn't unbirth him from me.  It didn't take away my motherhood, it took away my parenthood.

You've only taken on layers of concepts, habits and dogmas that aren't serving you, and certain basic needs have gone unmet for awhile.

So begin to strip away those layers that you've built up over the course of your lifetime and discover the truth of who you are.

While I know I am so much more than a mother who lost her son to adoption, it is the biggest part of me.  Isn’t it?  I feel that it is.  It effects everything I do, everything I think, everything I am…

For example: Instead of trying to be less argumentative and more understanding of the viewpoints of others, simply let go of the need to always be right, the need to win. Underneath that, you may discover a fear that you aren't being heard, a fear of being invisible and unimportant. This fear may reveal the need for a very specific type of self-love — and once you understand where nurturing and healing are needed, you can begin your work of letting go at the source.

In being less argumentative and more understanding of the viewpoints of others in adoption, should I let go of the need to speak out of the truth of adoption loss for the mothers and adoptees?  To me it doesn’t feel like a need to always be right, it feels as though it’s a truth that needs to be told and understood.

I DO fear that I’m not being heard.  I do have the fear of being invisible and unimportant.  It’s not really a fear though...  I feel that it’s just the truth.  As far as being a mother of adoption loss, we are not listened to.  The loss that I live with every minute of every day is unimportant to anyone who believes or needs to believe in the institution of adoption.  The rainbows and sunshine of adoption are so prevalent, so deeply engrained in everything/everyone.  Except those who live with the loss of adoption.

I will admit that I do have a fear of being invisible and unimportant ~ To Christopher.  So what does that fear reveal?  What kind of self-love is even possible to overcome that?  Where do I let in the nurturing and healing for that?  What is the source of that?  How do I begin the work of letting go at the source if the source is the very soul of me, of my motherhood?

That's just one example, but it illustrates the process of letting go of the outermost layers of "stuff" and revealing the deeper issues underneath, where you can discover your root needs and begin to nurture them. This is where true healing and transformation take place. This is where your higher Self is waiting to emerge.

My root needs...  to have my son in my life.  Which he is.  Kinda.  I know where he is.  I know of his life.  And I am so very thankful for that.

The problem there is that my heart, soul, and every cell of my body feels for him as a son.  No differently than the sons I raised.  I didn't raise Christopher though...  so our relationship is...  less than?  Less than I want it to be, less than I need it to be.  Maybe that's what I have to finally accept?  That it will never, can never be, what I want/need it to be? To be completely honest with myself, right now I don't even know if what we have now is a relationship at all...

This will not be a comfortable process. You may stir up some scary, negative stuff. You may experience some very unpleasant awakenings that shake you to your core. But on the other side of this discomfort and this work, enlightenment and healing are possible. 

I have never really grieved the loss of my son.  I live with the grief, but I haven't experienced the grief.  I'm scared to allow myself to face it.  That deep, dark hole of despair.  As I referred to in another post, I'm scared of facing it because I'm scared that I won't be able to come out of it.  I fear that it's going to envelope me completely instead of just chewing me up and spitting me out. 

It won't be easy, no. But it will be worth it.

Begin the process of letting go of what you are not, and uncovering your neglected/abandoned needs. Nurture and clarify your true Self in this way. The process of transformation is really a process of discovery and refinement of who you truly are.

Today, you are not asked to change in order to become a better version of yourself. You are free to simply let go of what isn’t You. Free to let go of what isn’t magnificent and beautiful. Free to delight in the nakedness of You. The beauty and excellence of You. The fullness of You. 

Let go of what isn't me...  Let go of what isn't magnificent and beautiful...  Writing and contemplating on this entire post, I come up with two things that I need to let go of. 

The grief and loss that are trapped inside of me, unable to be expressed. 

The expectations of having "more" with Christopher. 

What if in finally allowing myself to acknowledge, feel, and express the deeply buried grief I sink into the despair, never to find my way out of the depths?
How do I let go of Christopher?  Again?  This silence is killing me.  Because I am wanting more.  So, do I just accept that there is nothing more to have, walk away and hope that one day he will again come into my life?  Do I just let go and let God?  Just as before when I went back to my life before I gave birth and gave away my first born son?  Shall I now just try to go back to my life before reading those emails on January 16th 3 years ago?  Walking away from my son again?  Is it walking away if he doesn't want me to be a part of his life? 

I thought that working through this post of Daniel's, it could help me work through some of my confusion.  I'm still confused...  Do I write Christopher a letter asking him what he wants out of this relationship?  Do I force a visit on him to discuss it in person?  Do I just go into silence as he has? 

Do I walk away from all things adoption?  The forum, the blogs...   In order to try to get back to life before reunion, I would have to.  To accept my life without keeping that adoption wound open, I would have to.  Or not?  Even if I don't keep picking at that scab, will it ever heal? 

Is Your Unmarried Daughter Pregnant?

To the person who searched google for "what to do when you find out that your unmarried daughter is pregnant":

Support her.  Love her. 

My daughter became pregnant at 17.  Yes, I was crushed.  Yes, I was angry.  I had talked to her openly about using protection when she became sexually active.  I believed that she would come to me and tell me it was time.  Yes, I had to learn to have new dreams for her future.  The future was pretty much the same, just harder as she was going to be a mother while finishing school, going to college.  

One thing I was certain of?  That my daughter, who I loved more than life itself, would NEVER know the pain of losing a child to adoption.

My parents played a huge role in my "choice" to give my child up for adoption.  They didn't tell me that I had to, they also didn't tell me that I didn't have to.  My parents fought all the time.  My parents had never (that I could remember) told me they loved me.   I lived in an ugly, hateful home.  I refused to raise my child in that house of hate.  I wanted him to be raised in a loving home with a mother AND a father to love him.   After losing my son to adoption, I was never able to have a true loving relationship with either my mother or my father.  Yes, I love them because they are my parents.  But the loss of my son is there between us.  My mother passed away before I came to terms with my loss.  I have come to love my father, the death of my mother changed him.  He now tells me he loves me, I can tell him I love him.  But I can't reconcile the father of my childhood with the father of my adulthood.  Meaning that I keep the dad of now completely separate from the father of years past.  I don't know if that makes any sense...  I can love the father he has become, I can't love the father he was....

Here is a heartbreaking letter from another mother of adoption loss.  Her mother DID tell her that she had to give her child up for adoption.  If you want to see what may become of your relationship with your daughter if you push her towards adoption, go read this post.  It's heart wrenching.  It's honest.  It tells so well the pain caused from losing a child to adoption. 

To My Mother

Now go read another post by Danielle.  This should speak to you as the grandmother to the child your daughter is carrying. 

Grandparents

"Letter From An Adoptee"

If you are a mother considering adoption,

please watch this video. 

 

"finding a young mother who is considering adoption"

If you are the person who found my blog by google-ing "finding a young mother who is considering adoption", I hope you stayed/will stay to read a little.  Look over on the right side of this blog, go down a little bit.  You will find my blog list.  When you are done here, go do some reading on those blogs also.  Learn about adoption from the other sides.  The ones who live with the loss of adoption ~ the mothers (and fathers) and the ones adopted. 


I don't know why you are looking for a young mom who is considering adoption.  Do you think that young mom = bad mom?  Do you think that you will be "saving" a baby?  Do you simply want to be a mom?  Infant adoption isn't all you think it is.  It isn't at all what it's supposed to be.

Adoption should be about providing a home for a baby/child who doesn't have a family to go home to.  The infants that are taken for adoption usually have mothers and fathers who actually do want to raise their children.  However, for one reason or five these parents have been made to feel that they aren't good enough.  They have been convinced that if they truly love this infant, they will want to offer a better life than they have. 


The parents-to-be may have gone to simply seek advice after they unexpectedly found themselves to be pregnant.  They didn't go in with the thought or expectation of giving the child up for adoption.  They were simply looking for advice, wanting to have someone to talk to about this life-changing event in their lives.  They were in need of help finding resources and services to help them with medical care, maybe for some parenting lessons and advice.


Unfortunately, most crisis pregnancy center and adoption agency employees, social workers, high school/college nurses and counselors, as well as many doctors and nurses are not trained to give parenting help or advice.  Most of them have instead gone through a program called "Infant Adoption Awareness Training".

This "training" was created with one goal ~ to increase the number of parents who will "choose" to give their newborn infants up for adoption.  This "training" is coercion at it's best.  If you do not believe that coercion still exists today, you are wrong.  Millions of dollars have been spent in research to "convince" mothers that adoption is the "right choice".   You can learn about this training yourself.  You can make your own decision as to if coercion is still used today.  Here is a great article on this training.  Don't skip the comments to this post, you can see more proof of the coercion that abounds.


If you think that by adopting an infant, you are saving one from abortion ~ you are wrong.  Most mothers who choose adoption never even considered abortion.  Abortion is the choice to not be pregnant.  Adoption is the choice to not be a parent.  The two have nothing to do with each other.


If you think that young moms are unable to be great mothers, you are wrong. 


If you believe that raising an adopted child is the same as raising one who was born to you, you are wrong.


If you think that I am a "bitter birthmom" who regrets her past, you are wrong.


If you think that adoption is only about the sunshine and rainbows, you are wrong.


I hope you are still reading.

Please go on to read some more here.

Please go read the post I talked about above: Adoption Truth: Coercion Not Choice, if you haven't already.

Please go to my blog list over there to the right and learn some more from other mothers of adoption loss, some adoptive mothers, and some adult adoptees.

You owe it not only to yourself ~ if you do go on to adopt you also owe it to your child and their other mother and father. 

Is your unmarried/young daughter pregnant?

Then I have some reading for you!  Danielle at "Another Version of Mother" writes a fabulous post for the Open Adoption Roundtable #35 regarding Grandparents.  Do yourself, your daughter, and your grandchild a favor and go read this blog post.  Then read it again. 

Open Adoption Roundtable #35: Grandparents

 

Honesty In Reunion. Yet Not Completely Honest...

Is it ever going to be possible to truly live an authentic life?  From the very first moment of my reunion with Christopher, I vowed to only be honest with him.  No matter what he may want or need to know.

But I'm NOT being completely honest.  By omission.  It's in the unsaid and unwritten that the lies come in. 

I was looking at my own facebook page and saw a couple of things on there from some of my "adoption related" friends and groups.  Is he a fb "stalker" like I am with him?  Does he check out the new friends I make there?   Does he go look at the movies/groups/links that I "like" there?  If he does, what does he think about my emerging voice in things adoption related?  Going beyond facebook, has he found this blog?  Does he think that I've become a "bitter birthmother"?  Is this a part of why he has been so silent?

I wish that I didn't worry about what he would think if he found my on-line presence in the adoption world.  It is not because I am saying anything untruthful that makes me worry.  It's because I am speaking out about how adoption has effected my life.  I'm speaking with complete honesty here on my blog, in my comments out and about in blog-land.  I don't want him to really know that truth.  I don't want him to know how deep the hurt goes for me.  I don't ever want him to think that he, himself, has hurt me so deeply.  Because is wasn't "him" that hurt me, it was the loss of him.  It was my own "choosing" of adoption that has hurt me.  I don't want him taking my pain and loss onto himself.

So I continue to lie to him.  About my thoughts & feelings on adoption loss anyways.  By omission.  While he does know the summary of  how adoption has effected me, I hope to never let him know the true depth of it. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In the re-reading of this, I'm really uncomfortable with it.  I started this post days ago.  I have come back to it at least 5 times.  Hoping to see why it has been bothering me so...

It wouldn't even help to have someone to talk to, because I can't even put what I'm feeling\thinking into words!

                            Am I again making a choice about his life leaving him without a say in it? 

                                 Deciding what he can and cannot handle knowing?

              Am I using that as an excuse for something else? 

                            As a way to continue to hide my feelings?? 

Or is it simply to avoid confrontation? 

Is it because I don't want to be the one to kick Christopher out of the adoption fog?  Because it was so much easier in there, while I was in there. 

*sigh* 

I guess this is just something I'm going to have to ponder on for a while.  I hope I can figure out why this has brought back the tornadoes of thoughts that won't settle... 

Yet another thing they don't tell you when you are considering adoption.  The self-doubts.  The questions.  The confusion about it all ~ even 33 years later. 

I wish that it was possible for expectant mothers considering adoption to live inside my brain for just one day...

Living In The Sacred Moment

I was reading about a reunion recently.  The mother was hesitant to tell her raised kids about their oldest brother,  given up for adoption.

 The first thoughts to enter were judgmental ones.  Then I remembered.

I went back to those days in mid-January three years ago.  I also was hesitant for a while.  But not because I didn't want to tell them, not because I was afraid (although I was).  I was hesitant to share him.  I finally had Christopher in my life, after almost 30 years.  It is hard to put in words those feelings that overwhelmed my life so suddenly. 

The only thing that comes near to describing it is that it was sacred.  I wanted, no ~ I needed ~ to live in the sacredness of us.  Just us.  For a little while.  Not out of avoidance of anything.  Simply out of love and amazement and needing to savor it all.

Beyond Words Designs

Mother and son, found. 

Sacred. 

That which should not have been torn asunder to begin with. 

Just thinking about those first days brings the feeling right back to me.  I needed those days to revel in the amazing turn my life was taking.  To adjust to this new life that included my firstborn son. 







I think sacred is just the right word.

This beautiful painting (and more) is available here on Etsy, from Beyond Words Designs.