Quantum, bless your soul for responding to my question. I was afraid after I posted it that our birth/firstmom sisters would avoid it like the plague.
I'm still trying to gather my own thoughts about this question. It has some pretty heavy implications in terms of reincarnation and life goals.
One of the things that I think I've gained from surrendering my child to adoption is that as an adult I've been able to reach people who are really hurting inside. I have more empathy, more compassion for my fellow human beings. It's kinda strange, but no matter where I go in life, it seems that adoptees who are in emotional pain or distress seem to find me. Sometimes it's almost eerie. When I moved up here to the Sierra mountains, I thought that wouldn't happen anymore. After all, I live in a tiny hamlet that boasts maybe 700 or 800 people in all. But within the first few years of living here in the mountains, I had five adoptees reach out to me...none of them even knew I was a birthmother when they first met me. I like to think that I've helped them...at least I hope I have.
I know I've learned how to unconditionally love my friends and relatives. I think a lot of that is directly related to my son's adoption.
The relinquishment has made me strong as hell, I think, in terms of not giving into other people anymore. I trust my own instincts now, rather than other people's opinions. I am no longer afraid of standing up for myself or for my loved ones.
I treasure my nephews and nieces in a way that I don't think would have happened if I hadn't given their cousin up for adoption.
I never was able to have more children... I have learned how we can never foretell our own futures. Those promises that the social workers made back in those years were "pie in the sky" in terms of what would happen in my life. I've learned that sometimes we only have one chance...
I've learned that, sometimes, some type of spiritual bond occurs between mother and child...one that doesn't ever die.
I've learned that I need to listen to my own gut-level instincts, not to the voices of other people who think they know best.
I've learned that, yes, teenagers do know what love is all about. I've learned that sometimes love never dies...
