Ravensong Hey there!
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I know that by sharing our experience, strength, and hope with other birth/first mothers, we help each other in the healing process.
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I think that's the key right there. If other people pick something up along the way in what we say then that is a good, good thing, but we must -IMO - be saying it for ourselves first.
It's like with Bill and Bob. They were helping each other deal with a powerful illness that had them both it in its grip. Later, AA/NA would come to be respected so much so that the courts of the land would recognize it as a positive force. But that's not why Bill and Bob did what they did.
That's how I see it. Yes, we may change the way people view birthmotherhood (though if you'll pardon me my dear dear friend - I won't wait with baited breath for that to happen), but that's not why I share.
AA/NA takes a lot of flack from the uneducated. From those in armchairs who either wouldn't know addiction if it came up and bit them in the rear, or those who've suffered beneath it and have nothing but hate left in them.
The members just keep going. When they're called the ugly names, they simply smile and shrug and say, "My name's Paul, it's tween y'all." They don't bow and scrape to what others have decided they are. And they must be doing something right, buddy. They've got how many members now? I know it's in the tens of millions.
They accept their past actions, atone for them with themselves, their loved ones and their God. They understand that there will always be those outside looking in with hard hearts and closed minds. They acknowledge that and continue on. Otherwise, the hard hearts and closed minds win.
I hope that made sense. Guess I'm just coming to feel that I can't fight prejudice by yelling at it and/or trying to reason with it. I can't reason with hate. I can only do my very best not to give in to it.
Thanks for this thread! It's great!!
BelleinBlue Hey Belle!
There was this famous man back in the 60's during the heydey of the Civil Rights movement.........uhmmm....I actually looked for this thing that he said on the net so I could quote him by name with the actual quote but I couldn't find it. I remember it well though because my mom taught it to me as she felt it was important. I hope you can bear with me because I feel that this applies to those in the unique position of being adoptee/birthparents.
Apparently the man said (loosely quoted) that the only way the line between White America and Black America would ever be erased was when all White Americans and all Black Americans married and had children. He said he believed that only when all of our children were mixed-race would we make peace with each other because our love for our children would overcome our distrust and hatred.
Whether or not that man was right I cannot say. I am from the most racially segregated city in the United States and have my druthers about people's ability to see past color. It would be a good thing though.
But to my point.....whenever I think about you and the other few adoptee/birthparents I've met in here, I think of that quote.
IMO - you are all living in a strange country where you are neither black nor white but a combination of each. Not fitting in on either side yet part of both. Coming at arguments with an understanding beyond those of us on "separates sides of the road" as it were. You guys are like the proverbial 8 Mile; a deviding line between one faction and another. Yet the road that forces both to meet in the middle.
How does a person get adoptees and birthparents to see our commonalities beneath the shadow of adoption? How does a person get people to live in peace with that? I imagine it is eternally frustrating to truly "be" both sides of an argument yet because you are both sides, both sides argue with you about how wrong you are!!!
I can't think of anyone treading a more challenging path. I believe you tread it well, Belle, with dignity and compassion. You really do!
