Meet my bestie, "Grief."

A teenage friend of mine recently lost her second daughter at just two weeks old. Such a loss can be catastrophic for a young woman, I know. Wounds too fresh should not be touched, so I waited a little bit to gather my thoughts and inspiration... and I finally mustered up enough peace and will to write her. In addition to my tears, this is what poured out...

The pain won't stop.

But you'll get better at living with it.
For now, I hope you'will get in touch with that grief.

That pain will be the one thing that will remind you you're still alive,

that you've survived your overwhelming loss.

At this point, I know the emptiness in your gut feels like it's growing.

You may think that its black hole will soon swallow you entirely,

or perhaps that it already has.

That darkness may be your actual womb missing your baby;
a feeling usually replaced when a new mother gets to hold her baby in her arms,
but you and I aren't so lucky.

The best definition of 'forgiveness' I ever heard is "giving up the hope that the past could be any different."

In our culture, forgiveness is usually something we're expected to give others, when they do us wrong.
But in times of loss like these, who do we blame?
Who has done us wrong?
Yes, "God" seems vindictive, if at all existent.
No one else took her from you, so we all too often end up blaming ourselves.
It's not a valid blame, but still THAT is where the forgiveness MUST be given.

You MUST find a way to eventually forgive [yourself].
"...to give up the hope that the past could have been any different."
In the mean time, feel into the Grief. Get to know it like it's your new best friend, because...well, she is: Grief will be the closest friend at your side for years to come. You'll get to know how to tell her to shut up when you're too busy, and you'll let her spill her guts when you have the time to really listen. Don't ignore her, or she'll blow up at you when you least expect it... but never let Grief become more important than your life. She'll be the best friend you'll want to share secrets with, and listen to sad songs with. No one will understand you like she does (especially not the men in your life, and that's okay.)

So, from my old best friend to your new best friend... I'm so sorry for your loss.

I Love you: a Post-Valentine's Day poem

I LOVE YOU.
No really, you. Yes you.
I love you. I love you just as much today as I did yesterday...
and perhaps even a little more.
I love you without condition:
my love is a simple, humble gratitude for your presence in this Universe, on this plane of consciousness where we have met.
I love you,
because I know I have loved you before,
and will love you again.
I love you because my prophets have taught me to love you this way.
I don't have to like you to love you (but I like you anyway),
nor do I have to see you, tell you, kiss you, or touch you to love you; I only have to know of your existence.
Will you meet me here?
Will you knock down your walls, your defensive ways of skepticism and mistrust to meet me in this holy place?
If you don't, I will love you the same.
I will continue to love you until the day I die, until the day you cease to exist as you, or the day we cease to exist as us, at which time I will love you infinitely more.

without a Sun

I lost my Sun.

The center of my Soul-ar system.

You call it birth, I call it supernova. Bright lights, pain, explosive emotions.

And when it was all said and done, only blackness at my core.

Everything a mother's life revolves around, now gone.

No centrifugal force to keep my shit together,

inevitably everything fell apart, before crushing back in on the dense darkness.

Some say the Sun didn't disappear, but was transported through a wormhole to a different corner of the Universe, part of a new solar system. Some days I can barely feel its warmth radiating from so far away, but I cannot see its Light. It must be so far away that it will take years until I see it again.

So, my Son, how many light-years are you away from me?

I don't know what you look like.

Little Man,

I've been strong about this.

Even last night at my adoption-awareness support group, I showed them the thank you card that finally came in the mail for the birthday presents.

But I didn't want her handwriting. When I pick up an envelope out of my mailbox from Littleton, CO, there's only one thing I want to be in it: a photo.

One little photo of your face.

Is that too much to ask for?

I haven't gotten a new photo since Christmas, and then it was just a mass-mailed family shot posed in some department store studio. Your face was about one square centimeter, but it meant the world to me. I could see it changing, which isn't hard to notice when I only get one. That is, when I get one.

Augh, am I being petty? Should I be eternally grateful? 

I have no idea. I never have.

Today I found myself wandering a store trying so desperately to efficiently choose a birthday gift for my son, who turns 4 on Saturday. It has been six months since I've heard from his adopting parents and two years since I've seen him. It's hard enough to look at toys without fighting back daydreams of my son playing with them, but there I was, erratically picking up toy after toy, this time trying to see him play with it. Would he love it? Would he even like it? Rather, would he like it for more than twenty minutes? I pick up two tool sets based on a past photo I've seen of him playing in a construction hard hat, pretending to use a screwdriver. It's the one that warms my heart so much because his birthfather and I were home renovation contractors when we got pregnant... he was pretending to be like his father and he didn't even know it. Then I abruptly threw the two play tool sets back onto the shelf because I feared that his adoptive parents may read into it and think I'm encouraging him to be more like us, and walked away. I find more cool, boyish toys and pick them up only to turn them over and think maybe they're too advanced for his age, and then again he is advanced for his age. But that thought only spirals me down memory lane to the last day I saw him, just after his second birthday, when he wowed me with his ability to speak in full sentences already, and then my eyes filled with tears and I'd snap back to the present moment where I was trying not to lose it in front of the store clerk grudgingly restocking the shelves. I try to sniffle silently, and blink away the warm saline clouding my vision of the innumerable choices stacked along the aisle, and pick up the first toy I touched just to seem like I had a clue as to what I was doing in that store.

My stomach growled so I decided to take a break and walk over to the candy aisle to peruse the chocolate, hoping its natural concoction of endorphins would alleviate some of my emotion. It wasn't even a minute later when I was disgusted by the amount of toxic, neon-colored junk they call "candy" and sulked back over to the matchbox cars and puzzles, glancing one more time at the cute play tool belt before realizing, even if his parents didn't read into it like I feared, I was making the decision based on a year-old photo of him. What if he's grown out of "fixing" and "building" things? Was it just a phase that has already passed? How many other phases or interests has he developed and lost? I have no idea what he likes to do: I never have. So how am I supposed to shop for his special day when I'm clueless as to what's special to him? I emigrate from the toys to the children's books, and settle on two. Again, deciding on a Mickey Mouse adventure book based on a photo they sent last summer of Ryder absolutely ecstatic about getting Mickey's autograph at Disney World.

These little pieces of evidence of his life are more than precious to me, but still entirely impossible to survive on. Our "open" adoption was meant to be more than the occasional photo: it was promised to be inclusive, and I am far from "included" in his life. So as I wrap up and ambiguously label his gifts "From: Anne," my heart breaks that I cannot tell him these books are from his Mama and that I would do anything to be able to give them directly to him. One more birthday comes and goes and I know less and less about my son: less about what he loves, about what he wants, or does, or feels. If I had to decipher his life based on the photographed evidence that is rarely bestowed on my inbox, I would deduce that my son is never fed, read to, or even held; and I know that's not true. It would just be nice to see it.

maternal instincts

I can kid myself that I'm not as maternal as I used to be.

Or that I'm not as stricken with the maternal urges as I used to be.

Really, I just think I've become better at controlling them, but they're still there.

When my housemates' infant (I live cooperatively now with a family with children) cries, I no longer crave to take him from the rocker and sing lullabies to him. I do, however, have intense heartaching urges when they ignore him. One day I couldn't stand to wait longer than 60 seconds of his waking cries--that had become desperate screams--before I retrieved him from their bedroom because they were "busy" outside in the gardens. I had him quieted down to whimpers by the time they came inside the open door and mumbled something like, "Oh, thanks, we couldn't hear him." Their 30 month old I also feel compelled to care for, especially since her little brother was born and they have started to neglect her development. She, at a critical time of toddlerhood, has become a whiney shadow in their distracted midst. There are days when I feel ripped at my seams because there's only so much I can do with/for her. I read an average of a book per day with her (this morning I read three). I find myself compulsively reinforcing her tremendous speech development or intervening in her behavior (second nature to me as I'm a behavioral therapist) and even interpose when she wanders out the open front door and down the sidewalk when her father falls asleep on the couch. Although she does get to tag along to a ton of educational public events with her parents, at home she is encouraged to be completely independent, even when the parents are available.

Impressive, right? No, she's only two--this is the time to be constantly interacting: independence (that which doesn't develop naturally during the "terrible twos") should be encouraged later. I can only imagine how loquacious she'd be if they actually talked to her around the dinner table. They obviously did great with her, because she's brilliant and so very advanced for 30 months, but she's starting to tantrum because they ignore her unless she's repeatedly whining or screaming requests.

I digress.

I guess my point is [at the risk of sounding full of myself]

I think I'd be a great mother.

I even think I would have been a great mother at 21.

Why did my own amazing mother, then, think I wouldn't have been?

She never said I wouldn't have been a good mother, she implied I couldn't have been.

She explicitly expressed that she felt she would have been obligated to raise the child.

Not be a grandmother to my son, but "to be a mother again."

She has no idea how much it hurt me to say that.

And I can't bring myself to tell her.

alone on Valentine's

Alone.

A lone woman in this bed tonight.

It used to make me cry: to not feel him next to me.

I couldn't sleep without his wall of warm muscles

prostrated to my right.

I returned to him night after night,

even after he kicked me to the curb.

Knowing there was nothing I could do,

I returned anyway just to feel him

there in those last few moments as we drifted off.

When I woke up, he was gone.

And in my awakening, I realized he was never there.

I couldn't fill the void in my heart with him.

Nor was I a strong enough vessel to contain his love.

He began to fill me, and I cracked.

He poured into me, and I broke.

Now empty.

Hardening in the Sun of the Eternal Love.

Curing.

Healing.

I have found solidarity in solitude.

Tonight I lay wrapped in blankets of grace, trust, independence.

This bed is barely big enough to hold my new extensive heart.

No valley among mountainous pillows could hold this radiating chakra,

this bursting dan tien.

The chasms in my life are filled with overflowing waters,

sacred uncoiling kundalini,

pulsing qi force giving life back to my

sole soul.

So this is what happiness is.

With a fadeless smile under these sleepy eyes,

I drift off with no one next to me and EVERY ONE of you within me.

Happy Valentine's Day,

Open up, Let's all fall in Love with one another.

so call me paranoid

Ryder,

The closer we get to the holidays, the more likely I am to start an email to your parents, wording gently that I will be in Virginia over Christmas and would like to see you all. And then I get nervous and delete the email. Today I deleted it and then re-wrote it, only to delete it again.

The sooner I tell them I'll be in town, the longer they'll have to make excuses to not see me. I know this is ridiculous. I know it is. So call me paranoid. But I will do anything to make it more likely to be able to see you, and try not to do anything that makes it less likely to see you. Could I send them a random card in the mail? Should I reach out to your grandparents?

I found myself telling someone a couple weeks ago, "I don't know if I could survive another year without seeing him." Wow, what an admission. I'm stronger than that, aren't I? I mean, physically survive, sure, but sadly. Meakly. I want so badly to see your smile, to hear your laughter. More admittedly, I want you to see me. Maybe if you see me just once a year, you're less likely to forget me.

                                                             "...less likely to forget me..." 

I guess... yeah, that is one of my greatest fears.

I need to sit with that. Be present to it.

I'm in public, but the tears still well up.

Mama Anne

To Ryder, from the frozen forest floor of Flagstaff

My Little Man, Ryder,

As I lay flat in a tent trying to muster inner warmth so I can fall asleep among the Ponderosa Pines in Flagstaff, AZ, I think of you. I feel slightly closer to you. I am. Not only do I have that many less worldly worries (about dating, or grades, or paychecks) because I'm mostly consumed by thoughts of "Will I survive the night?" but I am also physically closer to you. I am about one-third of the way from San Diego to Denver, and a few minutes ago I honestly considered packing up all the camping equipment, getting in my car, and flooring it to Colorado.

I know, it was so unlikely, and irresponsible to even consider it. But I wanted it. I pondered, "Could I afford the gas? Could I drive that far without falling asleep?" The first two answers were a resounding yes. I would afford it, and lord knows I would be so excited about seeing you, I would stay awake until I got to Denver. But then what? Your 'Mom' and 'Dad' would probably shit a brick if I showed up on their porch. They would probably not even let me spend the day with you without supervision. And what about you? You're a brilliant 3-and-a-half right now. You would have questions--questions that would need to be answered-- about this strange woman who loves you so much; questions that you didn't have 17 months ago, when I last held you in my arms. And your 'big sister'? She would know. Has she been told otherwise? Does she know she's not allowed to talk to you about your other mom? That she's not to mention me? What do they tell her? These questions--questions that need to be answered--buzz around in my head as I lay frozen, pulling the sweater and mummy bag tighter around my face. I feel like I can't breathe. I open the mummy bag a little more, even though the cold air is shocking to my sinuses, throat and lungs. But it's not the mummy bag that is restricting my oxygen. I'm at 6900 feet elevation! God, it's cold. I think about how warm the heater in the car would be, driving through the night to see you. I think about how warm my heart would be, how fast my heart would beat, to have you back in my arms. And yet, writing this is the first time I have not cried when admitting these things in writing. The tears may be hesitant to fall, for perhaps they would freeze half-way down my cheek. Perhaps I'm healing. Perhaps your 'Dad' and 'Mom' would see that, and trust me more. I have to know... how far am I from where you sleep tonight?? I type your address into my map application on my cell phone: 686.1 miles. It would take me 11 hours and 53 minutes. Simple math tells me that's about 20 gallons of fuel. I just filled up. If I drove quickly, could be at your door by the time your 'big Sis' leaves for school.

But what about my responsibilities? School on Monday, and the friend who's counting on me for a ride back to San Diego on Sunday. I couldn't possibly drive all the way to Denver for just one day. I'd want to stay with you for... haha, that's a silly thought. There's no time limit I can put on that. I'd want to stay with you for... days? a week? Of course not. I'd want to stay. (Period.) I honestly would leave everything behind temporarily to just stay. I'd find a job in Denver, if I believed your 'parents' would open their hearts enough to let me really be a part of your life. I know it will be confusing for you to hear that I'm your Mama Anne (again), but I'd stick by you while you cried, and wait for you to overcome the confusion and fear; and be ready to love you and take care of you as much as they'd allow... but I think your 'Mom' would see one furrow of your brow and whisk you away from me if you showed the slightest fear or confusion as to having "two mothers."

The excuses that float to the tip of my fingers aren't because I don't want to go to Colorado; they are because I don't want to lose you again. I have to stay patient. I have to stay away. To give these precious years of your new life to them, and not be selfish and butt in.

But still, as a lay frozen against the solid ground in the middle of nowhere, Arizona, I fall asleep holding onto the warm thoughts that I'm that much closer to you.

these words

Certain things are brewing inside of me tonight. I have visions of yelling at my mother the things I want to say to her, that I don't have the guts to say outloud, the things I would rather not think and instead just squirm around under the covers and bite my fingernails. I want to forget them, to sleep on them. When I wake tomorrow I'll remember why I was so upset, but these words won't be churning, it will be a deeper, silent, bottled emotion that will become harder and harder to express, until one day, I won't be able to express them at all.

That's why I'm writing them down

I own these words:

How could you have let me give away my child? !?!?

Didn't you know how devastating that would be to me?

...To our famiy? ...To my life?!?

No, rather...
How could you have ENCOURAGED me to give away my child?

These words I SCREAM at her.

These words she will never hear.

a misunderstanding

There are occasionally (rarely if I can help it) days when I daydream about how life would have been had I kept my son; how different it would be. This is one of those days.

I've been in Virginia for nearly a month visiting family and friends whom I have not seen in a year. Within this year I've done a LOT of processing: crying, reading, crying, writing, crying, spilling. Most of this process is to come to terms with what has happened--what I cannot change. Then, out of the blue, this subject pops up in such a way that makes me realize how bizarre and unnatural it is, and I can't help but dream of how it could have, no, SHOULD have been.

Today I was texting a friend about meeting on Saturday in a nearby town for a day at the theme park. He suggested we plan to go back to my parents' home afterward to "meet the rugrat." "Whose rugrat?" I questioned. "Yours," he specified. My heart skipped a beat. I know I haven't seen him in four years, but he HAD to have known the outcome of my pregnancy. Did he really think that I've been an active mom for three whole years? Apparently, he did. So I clarified, and he was appalled. He apologized, and I brushed it off.

But it got me thinking what he must have believed I was doing these past few years if I were a single mom: sleepless nights, focusing on raising my family, studying child development and alternative early education, occasionally taking a course here and there to eventually finish my degree, attempting to be a part-time professional, moving across the country with the man who I entrusted to be the father of my child[ren], being devastated when the relationship didn't work out... oh wait... that IS what I've been doing these past three years. The only difference is that I don't have my son.

Life isn't much different than how it would have turned out had I kept him. Similar struggles, similar outcome. But instead of having my little bundle of joy--the reason to live through the struggles--I have no one. I don't have memories of his first steps or his first words, I don't have his unconditional love and admiration, nor do I have the brilliant beautiful boy (that everyone says he's turned out to be) to be proud of.

So what was the point?

on having other children

My Little Man,

I never was good at spending time by myself. For as long as I can remember, I was an extrovert, a care-giver, and I really didn't like being alone... ever. There are certain emotions people end up having to face when they spend time alone and I had always preferred to avoid those thoughts and feelings.

Well if there is anything that moving out has given me plenty of: it's time to myself.

And that has made me confront a lot of things: memories, feelings, dreams---and their corresponding fears.

The truth is: I'm getting to the point in my life that I want to have a child, but I'm terrified you'll resent me for that.

I only gave birth to you and made the choice to give you away just a little more than three years ago! I haven't accomplished anything else that my family wished I would before I had children (finishing my degree was one of the main "reasons" my mother encouraged adoption) and I'm single; but I realize all that is supererogatory in a way. Committed partnerships can be great, but not necessary for being a great mother. I'm now have much more sustained happiness and a healthy, focused solidarity alone than I ever had with a man.

I've thought about the possibility of foster care (specifically taking in a child with autism to guide them through reversal/recovery), but that may make matters worse--would I be setting myself up for emotional breakdowns every time the child would go back to his natural parent or be adopted by someone else? But then again it may be good for me....

I think, more than anything, I crave motherhood because I know what I'm missing.

...but then my thoughts return to you, and I think about the possibility of it hurting your feelings when I have other children with whom I DO get to spend all my time, and it breaks my heart.

I hope you will be able to forgive me.

Mama Anne

"Not So Simple Math" New York Times article on Open Adoption

To My Family,

This NY Times article was sent to me by a therapist I know, who is also a birthmother.

It took me a week to find the moment to be present and centered enough to read it, and I'm glad I waited because there's nothing that rocks my world more than to hear such private and unspoken emotions written SO EXACTLY and eloquently by someone else.

I send it to you because I now have the strength to ASK those I love the most to TRY to better understand. Please take the time to read it, I think it [could be] very insightful.

As always, with Love and Peace,

Anne

Open Adoption: Not So Simple Math
By AMY SEEK

Published: May 7, 2010

I WANTED my son to become the kind of person who appreciates the beauty of the world around him, so I smiled when, at 6, he asked to borrow my camera in case he saw “something beautiful.”

We were taking a walk in the woods outside Boston, and following behind him I was surprised by how much he moved like his father. We spent that afternoon showing each other icicles and hollow trees, breaking frozen patterns in the river ice, inching too close to the water to get a better view of the bridge above.

When we arrived home, Ben said that the reason he wanted to go for a walk was to spend time with me. It had been three months since I last saw him. I smiled sheepishly and stepped into the living room, where the woman who had adopted him six years earlier sat reading the newspaper.

I spent the evening chatting with her while avoiding direct interaction with Ben for fear I’d show too much affection, or too little. Open adoption is an awkward choreography; I am offered a place at the table, but I am not sure where to sit. I don’t know how to be any kind of mother, much less one who surrendered her child but is back to help build a Lego castle.

It is a far cry from the moment he was born, when my 23-year-old body seemed to know exactly what to do, when I suddenly and surprisingly wanted nothing more than to admire him nursing at my breast. When, after a drugless labor, my surging hormones helped me to forget that I was a college student, that I lived in Cincinnati, that I was passionate about architecture. During those days I was roused by the slightest sound of his lips smacking, innocent newborn desire that offered my deepest fulfillment.

In the months before I gave birth, when my boyfriend and I were just getting to know the couple we had chosen, I was able to comprehend the coming exchange only on the most theoretical of levels, but it seemed like gentle math: Girl with child she can’t keep plus woman who wants but can’t have child; balance the equation, and both parties become whole again.

During those months, my son’s mother, Holly, observed that birth mothers have to accomplish in one day the monumental task of letting go that most parents have 18 years to figure out. Days after his birth, when I struggled with letting go, Holly sat with me and cried — for the children she never got to have, for the fact the adoption would bring her joy while causing me pain, and out of fear that she had already grown to love a child I might not give her.

I decided to let her take him for a night, to see if I could handle it. She drove him to Dayton, Ohio, where she was staying with family, then called and asked: “Do you want him back? I’ll bring him right now.”

Meanwhile, the men in our lives stood by and hoped for the best. My boyfriend supported the adoption, and though we had broken up, he was there to help me through my pregnancy. We had met in architecture school, never suspecting that two years later we would be forever joined as birth parents, composing 111 questions to ask strangers about the most intimate details of their lives.

We had a list of qualities we wanted in a couple — basically ourselves, 10 years older. But when we met the couple we would choose, our list fell by the wayside, replaced by an overwhelming intuition that we could trust them.

I signed the papers on a hot August day in 2000, sitting at a large conference table with my sister, my son’s adoptive parents and agents from Catholic Social Services. I’d sat there several times before but hadn’t yet been able to say the words to relinquish all rights to my son. Each time I was left alone to think and, hours later, was sent home with him.

My ex was not there; the birth had made me a different person, and we couldn’t pretend that our losses would be the same. My sister had come from China, where she was teaching; she promised that if I kept him, she would move home and help. Her face was glazed in tears, but she stared intently at me as I prepared to sign the papers, as if to assure herself I knew what I was doing.

My pen rested at the intersection of two vastly different futures, and I struggled to see into the distance of each. It did not seem that a gesture as small as scribbling my name had the power to set me down one path while turning the other, its entire landscape, to dust. It was such a small gesture, but it was the first sketch of my life without a son.

One of the exercises I was given in adoption counseling was to envision the hours immediately after the adoption. What would I do after signing the papers? Pick up the towels that had been tossed in the corner when my water broke? Pack up the extra blankets I’d been given by the hospital workers who touched my shoulder and prayed aloud that I would find the courage to keep my son?

I had spent my entire life without a child, but I was newly born that night, too, and my old self disappeared. I could no longer imagine how a mother could give up a child and live. Adoption was not simple math; a new mother cannot know the value of the thing she subtracts. It is only through time — when my son turned 4, and I was 27; when he turned 6, and I was 29; when he turns 10 this year, and I am 33, and ready for children — that I begin to understand the magnitude of what I lost, and that it is growing.

The comfort is seeing my son with his family, whom I can no longer imagine him or myself without. He is an earnest child who seems to kick hard to keep his chin above water in the world, but his mother has a certain lack of sympathy that is good for him. When he wants to retreat into his own head, she pulls him back into the refuge of his family and makes him smile. I am ever astounded that I was able to see in her something that would still feel so right so many years later.

The greatest proof of her commitment to openness is that she talks about me when I’m not there. When my son was a baby, I was surprised that he always remembered me, even after long stretches when I couldn’t visit. When he was 7 and we were playing a computer game, he told me his password was “Cincinnati” because his mother had told him he was born there. I know that Holly represents me to my son in my absence and always encourages him to love me.

Holly jokes that with open adoption, at least you know what the birth mother is doing, that she’s busy at school and not conceiving a plot to steal her child back. It’s not so with closed adoptions; the birth mother is powerfully absent. But an open process forces an adoptive parent to confront the pain that adoption is built on. And openness for Holly does not mean merely letting the birth mother know about her child; it means cultivating a real love between birth parents and child. This requires exceptional commitment, which may be why some open adoptions become closed in the end.

I LOVE Holly for sharing such things with me, sentiments that show she is devoted to our relationship — and not because it is easy for her. And I have told her that a pivotal point in my grief was the moment I was able to say aloud that I wanted my son back, though I knew it was impossible — when I realized that his adoption had been both my greatest accomplishment and deepest regret.

And we continually redefine this relationship. I hide certain exchanges, like the time he was 4 and crawled into my arms and said, “Amy, pretend I’m your baby.”

I made sure no one was looking before I indulged his request, my entire body shuddering at the chance to hold him so close for the first time since birth. I suspect Holly knows about these moments, and when I visit she tries to help by sending me off with my son for walks in the woods, where we can freely explore my place in his life.

When I returned home to New York after my visit, I looked at the pictures Ben had taken with my camera: fragments of arms and legs, blurry close-ups of leaves caught in ice, too many spinning forest skies. Evidence to me that although he has his father’s distinctive gait, he shares my need to grasp and hold on to beautiful things, to document and to somehow preserve them forever — things he can’t possibly keep.

---

NYT

---
Amy Seek is a landscape architect who works on community food projects in New York City.

Letter to Ryder: Mothers' Days without him

Ryder,

I'd give my life right now if it meant that the last 24 hours of it could be with you, as mother and son.

The first Mothers' Day without you I happened to be in San Diego. I flew here to see friends on my way up to San Francisco for a job interview at a pre-school for children with autism. That morning your 'Mom' actually called to say Happy Mothers' Day, and to see how I was. I suppose because technically your firstfather and I were still living together (although honestly no longer in love with each other) I had a sense of stability; because I was traveling, I was distracted; and because she woke me up that morning with that thoughtful call, it started my day off right.

The second Mothers' day without you I was... actually in San Diego! My ex and I flew here to check out housing options because he had recently been ordered to take the surgical residency program in San Diego. So once again, the day went pretty smoothly because I was very happy in my relationship with a strong man to support me and we were traveling. But that day I didn't hear from your 'parents'. Around four o'clock Mountain time I finally called them and, well, you know the story from a previous letter: your 'Dad' answered and although I made it clear that I called to wish your 'Mom' a Happy Mothers' Day, he never handed the phone to her.

This year, my life fell apart. Again. I happen to be in San Diego, again, during this holiday; but this year I face the harsh pain these holidays entail for firstmoms like me. I have no longer have a strong man to wrap his arms around me when I cry because I miss you. I'm nearly three thousand miles away from my family and your birthfather, so the most they can do is wish me the best. I don't have you, or stability, or a place to call home. I've become a wanderer, alone and without my child. This year, I have not heard from you 'parents' at all.  I sent them a card a few days ago, but certainly not early enough that they realize the polite thing to do would be to send one back to me, maybe even with a few photos of your precious face. Actually I haven't heard from them in four months, when your 'Mom' quickly "texted" me three photos of you, without even the decency to say "hello." And before that it was a postcard with your family around Santa, one of those mass mailings they love to do.

I am appreciative of the photos, believe me, I live by them! I "hide" them in random places where I'm likely to "find" them often: as a bookmark in whatever I'm reading, in my planner, in a purse I don't use that often, etc. They sustain me. Your face is my "happy place" I return to for just a few seconds a day to clear my mind and feel like I've done something good in my life. I can NEVER get enough of your photos. [Which is why I got so upset over your adoptive grandparents saying they "lost" all the photos of our day together when you turned two.]

However, I will say there is one catastrophic downside to only getting to see new pictures of you every four to six months. It elaborates how much time I'm missing. It's hard to see and appreciate how a child grows when you see them every day. See them a couple times a year, however, and it's shocking. I still remember exactly how your toes looked at three days old. At this rate, by the tenth time I see you, your feet will be bigger than mine. It's startling to think of things in that way. It's like fast forwarding time. It's unnatural. I'm a fool for choosing this life.

So it's even harder to get photos only a couple times a year, especially these days when it takes less than ten seconds to pose, take, and send a photo to anyone of your choice. Sometimes I sit down and write an email to your 'Mom' to ask, "How often do you send photos of Ryder to your mother that you don't send to me???" And then hold down the top right key on my laptop and watch as the cursor slowly skips in a backwards direction deleting each letter, each word, until only the blank white box remains.

One of these days I will ask. One of these days I will remember that your healthy relationship with your natural mother is more important than they can conceive, and I will convince them that this healthy relationship begins with mutual trust and sharing of precious moments between your parents. All four of them.

So until I am blessed with an other snap shot of your handsome face, I will be waiting, dreaming of how much it's changed since the last time I saw it.

I miss you so much, my Love.

I really would give anything to spend this day with you.

Eternally,

Your Mama Anne

grief

A whole lot of nothing.

Emptiness.

So from where do the tears fall?

I lost the most beautiful thing that would ever happen to me.

I thought I would die of the grief.

I didn't.

I fell in love.

I had hopes and dreams of filling that emptiness with another child's laughter,

because I couldn't hear Ryder's.

I found a man who will make a great father.

I adored him. He discarded me.

I think I am going to die of this grief.

How much love can a person lose?

Birthmothers' Day

In the adoption awareness community, the Saturday before Mother's Day has become known as Birthmothers' Day.

It's a day to...

...I don't know

It's the day before one of the hardest days of the year for me. It's a day to grieve. A day to sit and wonder about how many more years it be until I hear my son say, "Happy Mothers' Day." Hell, it's a time to sit and wonder about how many more years until his adopting parents would even say that. Last year I called them to say 'Happy Mothers' Day' to his adoptive mother, and his adoptive father didn't even put her on the phone so I could say it directly to her. After a few minutes of small talk (that I thought was meant to fill the silence while he went to tell her to pick up the phone), I finally got the metamessage, wrapped up the conversation, and said goodbye.

I gave life to their son. Do they honestly think it would be inappropriate or unnecessary to extend best wishes on such a day? On one hand, no amount of gratitude expressed by them would be sufficient, so I understand why they don't call just to say, "Thank you for such a precious little boy!" [And he really is a precious little boy.] But society created holidays for a reason: to take at least ONE opportunity per year to show love for specific groups of people that make the world go 'round. Like Moms. After all, they would not have a son if I didn't exist in their life.

Is that too much to ask?

My greatest fear

One of my favorite inspirational quotes was one shared with me by my sister Natalie, written by Marianne Williamson:
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There's nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we're liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."

I couldn't agree more with her that it iscompletely terrifying to allow yourself to become the best you can be when you see others struggling to just BE. Time and time again I have sacrificed my career or put my education on hold for the men I love. I don't blame them, I blame myself for giving everything to them. For putting their happiness before my own. I was ignoring my own soul's beauty and ability to be great, because I believed in them and wanted them to be great.

By doing that, I hurt them. I hurt all of you. By not allowing myself to be the beautiful, passionate, out-going, insanely determined and independent woman I once was, I have hurt my community--and within it hundreds of children--by NOT being ready and available to help them. Economists say that an unearned dollar is a lost dollar: for every month longer I take to complete my degree and certifications, there is less opportunity to help others.

When I fell in love with a surgeon, I let my fear of our opposing philosophies [regarding health and healing] stand in the way of my interests in alternative medicine, specifically how it can reverse autism. I was terrified that my theories would conflict so greatly with his education that I was putting our relationship at risk by pursuing alternatives to his ingrained "Experimental-Based Medicine!" Recently I got over it and realized: by feeling the need to justify the physiological reasons for such "alternative" therapies to HIM, I was further educating myself on the subject. I never got the chance to share with him how much I've learned, but now I'm definitely more educated on the subject because of it.

IT SHOULDN'T HAVE TAKEN SUCH REASONS. My mistake was not pursuing what I wanted; it shouldn't have mattered what he thought. It doesn't matter. I don't think any less of him even though I believe most surgeries are unnecessary (that's not just a personal opinion, it's the result of my personal studies pertaining to survival rates of cardiac surgery patients and the skyrocketing rates of procedures like C-sections and hysterectomies/vasectomies)! So why did I worry he'd think less of me for believing in progressive therapies? Because it is my light, not my darkness, that most frightens me.
Then, as if God/Creator/Gaea/Universal Being (whatever you want to call Her) couldn't stand seeing my weak dependence and fear-driven life, She plucked the very focus of my Love. Now with no one in my arms, I HAVE to feel the emptiness inside of me. I HAVE to address it. I HAVE to fill it with my own strength and Love--for myself, my purpose, my reason to Be.

So that I can no longer serve just one man.

So that I will instead serve the World.

this is my hell.

My beautiful Ryder,

I don't write you nearly as often as I want to. Lately I've been shutting down emotionally about losing you, for fear that your parents are closing the adoption... but that's no excuse.

For months after I first moved to California, I felt deserted. In some way I think I relished in this emotion, because it made me feel closer to how adoptees feel. We share that. A sense of deserting. Except I made the mistake of deserting myself.

By losing you, I was supposed to give up all the parts of motherhood. I'm told I no longer "have" a son, so I am therefore no longer a "mother" to a boy. I was supposed to refocus. To buckle down and achieve all the things I was meant to, but no one told me those dreams would become insignificant to the dreams of motherhood.

So after losing you, I then lost my drive. I lost my foundation, my family, my trust in men. I lost all confidence and belief in myself. I then lost my sense of who I was: who I had been, and who I was to become. If fate makes me a mother, and yet I can not BE a mother because I have no child to care for, then would I ever get to be one? How could the beautiful Universe ever allow me the opportunity to be a mother again? I shoved that fate back in Destiny's face. And her punishment for me is this.

This.
This is my hell.

All thoughts, beliefs, wants, dreams, yearnings, intuitions, fears, and love boil within me as a brew of maternity.

I crave your touch—the affection of my child—and worry for your safety and health.

I dream—both night and day—of your smile, your laughter and favorites and interests.

I hear your distant voice, somehow carrying on the wind of the night's sky to me. I hear you tell me that you're confused and just "want to be like everyone else" without the complexities of parents, law, and distance. (Of course, you won't be able to verbalize this for sometime, but I still hear you explain it as I sleep.)

My hell is that I can't say back that I'm sorry and want you right back in my arms like you used to be. I can't watch your curiosity grow and revel in your young intellect.

I know you fall and skin your knees but I can't be there to wipe the dirt off and kiss your tear-streaked cheeks. I am merely a young girl in legal chains that have stricken me from reaching out to you too much, for fear of being locked even further out by your parents.

This is my hell.

This hole in my body that you used to fill has become a cell block. I am imprisoned to the confines of maternity and yet separated by bars of fire-forged fear from you. Furthermore I am supposed to be grateful for my imprisonment. My only, rare visitors expect to see nothing but smiles and tears of joy for my few moments with you, as if I had done something wrong that would necessitate such a loss, and thus should feel lucky mine wasn't permanent.

This is hell.

I am not the lucky one. Your new 'parents,' and big 'sister' are the fortunate ones. They are constantly blessed by your radiance. You smile upon them, and call them by the most sacred of names: mommy and daddy. The only thing that gets me through these dark days in my cold cell are the warming dreams of the possibility that you may one day remember that you are my son, and I may be a mother to you again.

My love, I want you to know that as much as this all hurts, it is not you who made my life such an empty, sad place: it was I.

Eternally,
Your Mama Anne

only blue skies

nostalgic. listening to the rain

and blessed, booming thunder

augmenting heart beats

shaking chests

days like these gives us reason to stay inside

sit. listen.

hear the thunder within our souls

reflect

raindrops splatter

mirroring my own

one or two on my fingers

millions fall outside

but it doesn't rain here

merely sounds put to music

only blue skies out my window

shards of cobalt peaking through palms

shining on my tear-filled stormy soul