My two moms...

Someday, I plan on having an adoption blog. Here are a couple that (while I'm not at all ready to be a parent) I enjoy reading: Bicycle Baskets (a family at my old church who shared their adoption story with me); Love is Waiting (my friends aaron and heather who are in the process of adoption); Grow in my Heart (a random I came across on the web); and What I Want You to Know: Being a Birthmom (the specific entry that made me write this post).

For now, while this has nothing to do with my quarter-life crisis, it's something I thought was worth sharing:

Last Saturday was my birthday. It was a crazy weekend full of working, playing, celebrating and more working. My family and friends were wonderfully attentive and loving, throwing me celebration after celebration. It was really great and made me feel special. While each celebration meant a lot to me, I still felt very alone on my birthday. You see, for those of you who didn’t know, I’m adopted and each year, my birthday is hard, bittersweet and I rarely look forward to it.

Of the few people in my life who I’ve shared that my birthday isn’t just cake, candles and presents, most have never really understood why. I’ve heard many different reactions to this like, “You’re adopted, shouldn’t you feel twice as loved on your birthday?” “You’re so lucky, you have a great family, aren’t you happy with that?” “I bet your birthparents are thinking of you, isn’t that sweet?” Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate these peoples' grasps to understand where I’m coming from, but the reality is they don’t. And for a long time, these types of comments made me feel selfish for being sad on this day. Shouldn’t I be glad someone picked me at all? Shouldn’t I be incredibly thankful that I got my family; they are pretty amazing? Shouldn’t I be overjoyed that I wasn’t aborted and that I got the chance to even have a birthday? Feeling sad on this day felt selfish and wrong and it just ate away at me. Sure, I am thankful, I’m lucky; I’m spoiled rotten and know it. But on April 16th, each and every year, I spend my day not thinking about the woman I’m becoming but thinking about another woman, my birthmother.

I have the greatest mom (the mom that raised me, she's who I will always call "Mom"). Not kidding, my mother has given everything to her five children: education, opportunity, love, support, you name it. She is my guide, mentor, teacher, and best friend. I wouldn’t replace her for anything. But the fact is, there is another woman who I’m connected to as well and while I cannot remember her face, her smell or touch, I feel her because she is part of me. Each year, on my birthday, I know she thinks about me; a truly surreal feeling. This is a day that I miss her terribly and the bond we never got to create.

I have a love/hate relationship with St. Patrick’s Day. I love green; it’s my favorite color. I love the spring that is always in the air. I love skipping work to drink all day and celebrate a ridiculous holiday with friends. But what I hate is that all day, people discuss their heritage. Not just the proud Irish, but everyone seems to take time on that day to talk and brag about where they come from. While this takes place, I usually sit and observe silently because I have nothing real to contribute. I know nothing about me.

My mom and dad gave me a single sheet of paper when I was in high school that had some basic info on my birth parents. It included height, weight, eye color, religion, age, occupation and basic ethnicity. My history on one, old piece of paper. It's nice to know the information on it, to see a tiny piece of what went into me, but I don’t know why I’m musical, loud, why my eyes are almost black and why, when my mother was 5’2” and my father 5’8” I turned out to be 5’9”. I don’t know why I struggle with reading. I don’t know why I love to sing but never in front of people. And I don't know why I hate peanut butter and chocolate. I know that many of my traits were picked up from my current family but there are things that I know didn’t come from them. I doubt I ever will and that’s not an easy thing to live with.

I’ve thought about looking for her. I started the process once but then convinced myself that she abandoned me once, why would I want her to do it again? I’ve never been one of those, “you’re not my real mom” kids, and never sought to find my birthmother as an escape. I was too smart for that and my parents were great ones, even in our hard moments, so there was no real reason to. I’ve never really wanted to get in touch with my birthmother. I’m not sure why. I think because it’d be hard. It’d open a door that might be hard to close. It would be hurtful, for all three parties of the triad. Hurtful for her to be reunited with someone she never got to be a mom to. Hurtful to my parents to share and be reminded that at one point, I wasn’t theirs. And hurtful to me to just be faced with the stories and questions about the life that might have been.

I have several friends that have adopted or are in the process of adoption. It excites me that they’ve chosen this path because it is a hard one. The patience required for the process, before the baby even comes, it’s so much more than nine months. The stress and anxiety of choosing a child out of the thousands in need of families. The challenge of having a child who is nothing like you. The difficult realization of knowing they’ll forever be connected to another. But, the joy of giving a child a life is one that makes it all worth it. I can’t wait to adopt and I know it’s going to be challenging, but it’s the right thing for me to do. I want to pass on the love and grace that has been shown to me by my birthmother and by my parents and family who together have given me the best life possible. It’s not only my duty but my privilege.

All this to say, to friends and parents of adopted children and adults: birthdays are hard and can be sad. Don’t challenge it, just listen, celebrate and understand that having two moms isn’t easy and it shouldn’t be. A book my best friend gave me, Twenty Things Adopted Kids Wished Their Adoptive Parents Knew, reads, "Not only does the day mark the beginning of the adopted person’s life, it also reminds the adoptee of what she has lost" (Eldridge). "Adoption is only made possible through loss, and birthdays can bring forward many adoption related issues for adopted people. An adoptee is not being ungrateful for the life provided by her adoptive family by asking these questions, it is just her way of dealing with the emotions only an adoptee can experience."

My two moms are both in me, one of them I talk to almost every day and forget that we look nothing alike. The other one has a face I’ve never seen…except maybe, once in a while, looking back at me in the mirror.