Fear: As a birth mother I have developed an intimate relationship with fear. It drove me to every decision I made when I found myself in an unplanned pregnancy. It drove me to the abortion clinic, it drove me to place my son for adoption, it drove me to all my self-destructive behavior and it drove me to walk away from my open adoption relationship for many years.
Fear keeps us stuck and uneducated. Fear keeps us from embracing love and forgiveness. Fear keeps us from being honest in our relationships, and it keeps us from being teachable.
All that keeps us closed to all members of the triad.
Is it safer if we stay in our own corner? Maybe. But is that better? Absolutely not.
Trying to understand each other’s fears is one of the greatest challenges we face when navigating open adoption. Trying to put the pieces together about why people are feeling the way that they do without bringing our own insecurity to the table. No one has mastered it yet, but we are trying.
We are craving more vulnerability in our education, we want honest and raw but sometimes fear blocks us from being able to step into the ring and do the same.
SO, in solidarity, today I wanted to share with you my fears. These are real and scary and honest.
I wanted to share 4 things I feared as I was trying to make the decision to place my son for adoption…and even that I have carried throughout my 12-year post placement relationship.
We are challenged daily, we are learning daily and we are healing daily.
The family won’t be who I thought and won’t honor their promises.
It is almost impossible to put into words what it is like to pick complete strangers from a well-designed book to raise your own child. I would love for you to just sit in that thought for a moment. Put yourself in the shoes of a pregnant mother, terrified, most likely alone and then asked to “just pick one” off a piece of paper. It really is the most ridiculous and unnatural thing. Is this for real? Is this really my life right now? I am supposed to pick a family from a book and trust that everything they say is what I can expect. I know they are putting their best face forward, I know they want to be picked, I know they are “competing” with so many other families. CAN I TRUST THIS PROCESS? Unfortunately, we were brought to adoption for our own sacred reasons and if I am going to walk this out choosing a family is part of it. I poured over 50 families. I read and cried and laughed and got angry and tried to imagine my unborn son in their family pictures, on their family adventures, being raised in their communities. I tried so hard to picture it. I knew that they had wanted an open adoption, I knew that they had done this before and that there were other relationships being developed. That gave me comfort, but nothing is a guarantee. I wasn’t prepared for the grief that came over me, I wasn’t expecting to want to walk away, I didn’t know that I could trust what they were telling me. It all becomes blurred lines when a baby is “exchanged”. Are they really in this or is it because they feel obligated to me. Are they trying to repay what was given or are we really connected as family like we have been told? When I chose Derek’s family I was inspired and at peace with my decision but that doesn’t mean that I am not scared every day that something, someday would change the relationship, shift the focus, pull us away from each other. So, every chance I get to show up and come to the table, I am all in.
My son will grow up to hate me.
How could a mother do that to her own child? How could a mother choose a stranger to become their mother? How could a mother walk away and call it love? Adoption is the only grief and trauma experienced where we are expected to be grateful. I think we can get over pretending that all of this is perfect. There is a REAL possibility that my son will grow to hate me. I know in my soul that the reason that we have the kind of relationship that we do is because of the way that his family talks about me, honors me and loves me. THERE is no way that he could be in a space that he is if they didn’t. I did PLENTY of things that would have sent most adoptive parents running for the hills…and maybe that is why I expect so much of others walking this. When she could have closed the door and pushed me out, SHE DID’NT. She said yes, they saved a space for me and because of that Derek and I can have a relationship that is beyond anything I could have imagined. BUT I know that we are 12 years in. I know that there are going to be many hard conversations in our future. There are going to be questions that could change the way he looks at me, the way he loves me, the way he wants to associate with me. I pray that through open adoption we are able to have the courage to come to the table, answer the questions AND process the answers together. I know that he is able to feel what he needs to feel and not worry about the feelings of his two mothers. I know that if he wants to see me, she doesn’t make him feel insecure about that. She embraces it and arranges it for him. I know that if he has questions she honors him with truth and love. I pray those seeds have taken root, that he won’t grow to hate me for the things that I have done. I know he will question my love for him…but maybe just maybe we can all love him enough to keep that hate and betrayal away. Has it “worked” out? Maybe. Does that make it right? Not necessarily.
I will never see my son again.
When I sat in the hospital, after termination of parental rights was signed and the nurses and the witnesses and the case worker had left, I was getting ready to leave the hospital. I was in the room with my parents and Derek was there, in his crib, sleeping. I had spent the last 3 days memorizing his face, crying over him, begging for forgiveness. I always wanted to be a mother. I wanted to have a husband and children. BUT this was not what I had planned. How can I walk away from my son? This about killed me. Let’s be honest here: We are promised lots of things but guaranteed nothing. That is what it means to terminate your rights. My fate was going to be in the hands of complete strangers. Would I ever have the chance to see my son again? I know that they had expressed their desire for that, but they didn’t owe me anything and legally they didn’t have to do anything. I spent the next hour staring at him. Trying to remember every little thing about his face. Every time I tried to step away from the crib, I couldn’t, I was pulled right back to him. Whispering to him “don’t forget about me”. I truly had to prepare myself that this may be the last time I ever have the chance to see my son…it felt like he had died. It felt like I had died.
I won’t be worthy of love. The shame of what I had done was so strong. The embarrassment I had brought to myself, my family, my friends. I wore my mistakes out in public for 9 months. It wasn’t easy to hide and then after birth my body changed, it had prepared for motherhood, everything it was designed to do and I hated it. I hated the way it stretched and laid loose. I hated the marks and the reminders that I had now given birth, I was a mother, but I was childless. It felt cruel. My body mocked me. I was young and beautiful, but my body gave away my deepest secret and deepest sadness. I was in limbo hell. I couldn’t go back to the life I had before, I was changed to the deepest parts of my soul. But I didn’t fit in with mothers. So, who was I and where do I go from here? How do I date and tell men that I had given birth, that I was a mother, that I was broken? How was anyone going to love me after that. I never thought I would get into a relationship where someone knew about what had happened. I thought it would be a secret I would take to my grave. But as I healed and as I started to forgive myself and after I started to learn more…I realized that I couldn’t hide that part of me. Derek was NOT a mistake, having unprotected sex and getting pregnant was the mistake. NOT MY SON. I couldn’t separate the two before. I didn’t want to hide him away, I wasn’t ashamed of him or who he was, it wasn’t ever HIM. It was always about me. I knew that if someone was going to truly love me and be a part of my life then that would have to include Derek. I didn’t have any idea at the time that it would be an intimate detail of every aspect of my life but I knew that the man that loved me would have to love all of me. History has proven that in the case of unwed mothers we have been pushed out, deemed an unworthy member of society, forced into hiding and secret. I am not hiding who I am, or what came from my mistakes. I am worthy of love and I am so deeply grateful for my husband. I know I am lucky to have a man stand with a birth mother so fiercely. To embrace our open adoption, to welcome him into our home, to allow our children to be a part of his life, to honor his family and to stand by this powerful work.
FEAR is everywhere in adoption. It is unavoidable. There are more unknowns in adoption than in any other unique family dynamic. It is terrifying, and we are all coming together, as strangers, and entrusting each other with an amazing life, a child that is wanted and loved by so many. This is about that child. This is about giving them courage and a voice and confidence to be who they are meant to be and love who they need to love.
I pray that we always allow ourselves to feel the fear BUT DO IT ANYWAY.
Lean in my dear friends. We are all scared. But our love can be greater than that.
