[MTL]

WHAT A GREAT STORY! It's the beginning for you and your bdaughter, and how wonderful that you shared this with us. Gives us all hope, let's us know how you're doing, and offers us a chance to smile. Congratulations.
Love, MT

[L@@king2]

yes, nice story, Mrs. Hoot! Hope you get what you want!!

Thanks for responding!

[janiej]

Wow Mrs. Hoot....I want to chime in with my congrats on your wonderful story !
Take it slow and easy....and let us know how it's going if you want to. We just LOVE details...and happy stories

[kakuehl]

Mrs. Hoot, I know that amazing feeling of registering on adoption.com and immediately! finding my birth son! He unfortunately was no longer active here and his contact info was not up to date, but I had his name and located him the same night! I hope your first f2f is soon, but like the rest, I encourage you to go slowly.

[Jannyroo]

Originally Posted by Lis6191

I became very engrossed in Jackie’s thread regarding reunion & shed tears for many of you. Someone mentioned that you were all talking about struggles with bsons . . . well, I am here to tell you that I am a bdaughter & my bmom has had it pretty bad. So, if you don’t mind the confession of an adoptee, it may help me to tell my story & it may help some of you understand why reunions can be so tough on us.

** Long Post Warning **

My bmom contacted me 8 years ago (yes, I said 8 . . . it was March 1997) & I’m not sure I can say we are in reunion yet. We write letters & have met for coffee once. She lives less than an hour away, so geography is not the cause of the “distance.” To put it plain & simple, I’m scared. Scared to death. Scared of everything. Not to mention confused, angry, carrying tremendous guilt & for most of my life in denial.

The fear, confusion, & anger are all understandable as long as they can be admitted. The problem is rooted in denial because you can't make someone admit what they are denying. The guilt was very hard for me to see & was a very recent realization.

So, let me go back 33 years & tell you that at 3.5 weeks old I was adopted into a wonderful family. The perfect family. A big Italian family, very close knit, & I was never, ever treated “different.” I have wonderful loving parents, sibs, aunts, uncles, & loads of cousins. It was never a secret that I was adopted, but wasn’t discussed. My parents will rationalize that they didn’t want to make me feel different; that in every sense I was theirs & part of this family; & they truly felt love would conquer all. The down side to this was my feelings were never validated. The most common answers to my questions: 1) We don’t know anything about them, honey, we just know they were too young to keep you. And 2) It doesn’t matter, because we love you. Yes, you read that correctly, “It doesn’t matter.” I recently came to the realization that denial for me came at a young age when I was told my feelings didn’t matter.

As a result of never talking about it, I have struggled with the words to express my feelings. And apparently no matter what words I use I’m still not understood . . . by anyone. Friends, family, hubby . . . all got tired of hearing it at some point, & again I reverted into denial – what I’ve now come to call solitary confinement. So, I ran. I’m the master of compulsions. And all this time, keeping my bmom at arms length, not too close, but not letting go of her either. You talk about waiting for that next letter, there have been some years when my bmom has only gotten 1 letter all year.

So, let me share with you what I’ve learned about myself & point out the biggest oxymoron that I think many of us adoptees stuggle with:

We go our whole life not wanting to be seen as “different,” or treated “differently” . . . yet, when trying to explain how you feel (the void, the confusion) you have to make everyone finally look at you differently. Does this make sense? This is scary for us. Chances are, the adoptee doesn’t have many (if any) people in their life that truly understand them. So, when we want someone to understand, we have to beat it into them that we are different. And as much as we want the validation from everyone around us (and for me, I seem to want validation from everyone), you begin to wonder if you will remain “accepted” as a member of this family once you’ve convinced everyone to look at you differently. I hope I’m explaining this well enough because this thought process is the basis (I believe) for the feelings of having to choose.

When we say we feel like we have to choose, it does not necessarily mean that someone told us to make a choice. I have felt like I have had to choose, & that could be partially because of the lack of acceptance from my parents. But I think part of that is my own fear of finally convincing everyone that I am different &, therefore, not being accepted any longer as the same person they’ve always known. I don’t want to be a stranger in my own family. I just need validation of my feelings & acknowledgment of my bmom. Again, it comes down to fear. I am afraid of losing what I have.
Lastly, I suspect that all adoptees struggle with some amount of guilt. I believe the theories that shame results from the knowledge of being “given up.” And I can say that I have worked very hard to prove myself & build my self-esteem, always wondering what part of me was “defective.” But my guilt was compounded greatly by what others have said to me. Probably the most damaging is the comment that my parents make, “We just wish we were all you needed.” (crying while they are saying it) – I internalized this comment, feeling how can I be so ungrateful for what I have? And how can I possibly want more? Some of the comments I’ve tried to cope with:
“But you have such wonderful parents.”
“You don’t even know her.”
“I don’t want to be around when you talk to your parents.”
“Aren’t you over that yet?”
All of this adding to my guilt, that I am hurting others, that I am ungrateful, that I am unable to explain why, & I’m unable to move on.

I’ll share with all of you what I haven’t been able to share with my bmom, & that is I need her, I want her in my life, & I have always wanted to find her & be near her. Do you know how scary that is? To need someone? To be dependent on yet another person -- all of whom can hurt me. . . . the fear keeps us from getting too close.

I'm confessing all of this because I feel guilty. I know what I’ve put my bmom through & I feel terrible. I had a long road to travel just to sort out my feelings. . . & I’m still not sure what comes next. I hope this helps some of you understand the “distance” you sense with your bson or bdaughter.

Having read this, I may just well be able to come out of the shock of my son nearly dying 5 nights ago and no-one telling me. I was about to give up on him, my mind is like mangled treacle. I feel nothing. The shock of 8 months of brutal emotions has been a lot. I will bear in mind what you say, but I have reached the end of my limits - yes, I have limits. I know us bmoms are supposed to hold out to the end of time, but believe me, I've had my own hangups/emotional pain to cope with over the 28 years my life went on hold when my son was adopted at 6 months. I've had the equivalent of being isolated emotionally since that moment when no-one in my family would help me keep this scrap of wonderful life. He could well be feeling how you express yourself. I will try to heal my mind and hang on to what you have said. No words can express how bad I am feeling at the moment, but your words have given a little spark of hope....

[kakuehl]

Sometimes it seems to me that people who feel like they've been betrayed and deserted sometimes test every relationship over and over again, to see if they're going to be deserted again. They push the loved one to the breaking point and then say, "See, I knew you didn't really love me." I doubt that it's a conscious decision on their part. I've seen the same scenerio played out in more than one situation, and I suspect it may happen for adoptees as well.

That said, you definitely have to set limits and protect yourself. Ann Landers once said that people can't walk all over you unless you lie down in front of them and let them. Loving unconditionally unfortunately does open you up to the possibility of being hurt by the loved one. If we don't risk love however, we also can't experience it.

I'm not making much sense, so I'm going to bed! My thoughts are with you.

[MrsHoot]

Thank you all - appreciate the kind words and good thoughts. I'm really trying to take things at her pace and not mine (and not my families, either!) BD has to be ready for a f2f and right now she isn't even ready to talk on the phone so I'm not holding my breath. I've extended an open invitation to her and am content in knowing that one day she will take me up on it. Until then I'm happy just to be in contact with her!

Jannyroo - my heart goes out to you, all I can offer you are {{{big hugs}}} I hope you are taking some time to heal yourself - PM/email me if there is anything I can do!

Cheri

[vbigelow]

I am so grateful for this post Lis; it helps me to put things into perspective. I have a 30 year old adult adoptee friend who has been talking about searching. He grew up in a great family with parents who adore him and gave him every advantage they could. He has two brothers who were also adopted. He has the blessing and even encouragement of his a-mom to search and he speaks of it often, but has reservations about it that he can't quite put into words. I keep wanting to encourage him because I know the pain being on the other side and waiting for the contact that promises to end the suffering. However, I don't want to go too far and turn him off to the whole idea. What you've described resonates with the patchwork of feelings he's shared with me. I am going to share your post with him and see what he says. If he'll allow it, I'll post his response (anonymously).
On a personal note, I have been in reunion with my b-son for 16 years now. It has been a challenge. I think both families saw this as a chance to expand, as someone posted on this thread...to exist like inlaws. That might have worked except for three things: 1) My son's adoption was coerced by my parents and my agency; I have a hard time on an emotional level accepting someone else as his mother (Intellectually, I do understand); 2)My b-son's need to know me was so great and had been so frustrated all his life by closed adoption that his need to be with me during those first years post reunion took precedence over everything else in his life. He tried to be sensitive to everyone's feelings, but ultimately did what he needed to do for himself. Unfortunately, my need was also strong and I didn't do a good job of setting boundaries; 3) Both the a-mom and I had gone on to have other children (four bio children in the a-family and three in the b-family) . His b-dad has five. My b-son loves his a-siblings deeply and feels connected by a common history. However, he sees himself in his b-siblings; has many common characteristics, interests and, now friends. I would say that he's closer in many ways to his b-siblings than to his a-siblings. This has resulted in some issues... Despite that, I can't believe any of us would undo the reunion. My son's a-family most certainly loved him as they did their bio children. However, I think they and he were always acutely aware of the fact that he was and is different from them in appearance, characteristics, talents, etc. Searching for someone who was like him seemed natural and he always articulated his need to find me. However, having done so, even with the challenges we faced, did not cause him to lose acceptance in his family or to make him feel like a stranger there.

[adopted1967]

I haven't been here in several months because I've been trying to forget I was ever adopted. Yeah, right. Like that is possible. Happened to stumble upon this thread and saw that step2 had referenced something my birthmother (nightowl) had written and then step2 referenced my reply to my birthmom. My bmom had written here she doesn't know what she would do if I didn't want her in my life. It's been exactly 2 years since she first found me and we haven't had any real contact for the past 6 months. It makes me sad to see that something that started out so wonderful went so wrong. She did in fact email me on Christmas and then the following week sent a reply back to my email and signed hers love, Mary. This after 1 1/2 years of signing love, Mom. It broke my heart. I guess I will never know where all the feelings went. It will remain one of lifes great mysteries! Anyway, I hope all are well here.
Megan

[kakuehl]

Originally Posted by adopted1967

I haven't been here in several months because I've been trying to forget I was ever adopted. Yeah, right. Like that is possible. Happened to stumble upon this thread and saw that step2 had referenced something my birthmother (nightowl) had written and then step2 referenced my reply to my birthmom. My bmom had written here she doesn't know what she would do if I didn't want her in my life. It's been exactly 2 years since she first found me and we haven't had any real contact for the past 6 months. It makes me sad to see that something that started out so wonderful went so wrong. She did in fact email me on Christmas and then the following week sent a reply back to my email and signed hers love, Mary. This after 1 1/2 years of signing love, Mom. It broke my heart. I guess I will never know where all the feelings went. It will remain one of lifes great mysteries! Anyway, I hope all are well here.

Originally Posted by adopted1967

Megan

Often it seems there's a honeymoon period in reunions. Then comes the real work of building a relationship. It's not easy. Both bmom and bdaughter or son have to take an honest look at what they hoped to find and the kind of relationship they dreamed of. Bparents have to honestly mourn the fact that they are not the parent who raised the child. You can't go back. The "child" we find is an adult. I recently asked my bson how he would describe our relationship. He responded "healthy." (He calls me Kathy, not Mom BTW) As I have frequently said on these forums (and said to D's adad) D and I reunited at a kairos moment. (Kairos means God's time - the right time.) D was at a very comfortable place in his life which helped.

Many bmoms wait impatiently for their children to reach 18. Unfortunately, their children are just entering adulthood and may not yet be ready for a longterm relationship. Many reunions seem to need "time-outs" on one side or the other until the relationship is worked out. I guess what I'm trying to say, Adopted1967 (and others) is don't give up!

[MTL]

You know, I don't know a thing here except what you have written, and I feel a sense of both sadness and what do we do next? Can you reach out to yourself in the forum here, as you would like to have your birthmom reach out to you? Maybe give it a chance to say what's on your mind and what you're really wanting accomplished from your point-of-view?
It couldn't hurt anyone of us to listen to you.
Love and many bear hugs, MT

[adopted1967]

I do wonder what is next. Are we just to forget about each other? Are my pictures put away and she is back to saying she only has 1 daughter instead of 2? We don't email, we don't call, and we don't visit so how are we ever going to work something out? We live 2000 miles away so it won't be easy to get together but I am willing and my bmom says it is impossible. In my opinion if there is a will there is a way. I have read about the honeymoon period and then the distancing thing but what if the time out lasts forever?

[kakuehl]

Adopted1967 - you can't make her do anything, but you can choose what you want. If you want to have a relationship with her, e-mail her, snail mail her, let her know what's going on in your life, even if she doesn't respond. Let her know you continue to think about her and want her in your life. Take it one day at a time.

[Yarrow1]

I can relate to scarey part about needing your Bmom, because the idea of needing anyone can be quite a freakish notion to adjust to! But it's true, we do need others. That doesn't mean we throw our independence out the window, just that we can't learn/be/do everything by ourselves. We're not meant to. I laugh at myself, thinkin at one point in my life how I was SO Miss "I can DO it mySELF thank yu very much"! about everything and everyone. I had to teach myself and let others teach me how to need others and still stand in my own skin. Still workin that. Probably always will. I'm glad you are involved in your life!