My last post had a comment that I thought needed to be answered.
I had said in my previous post:
"If my natural mother was willing to finally come to terms with the decisions she has made in her life…"
Anonymous said:
“Tell me how a mother, and she is your mother, has to come to terms with a decision that more than likely was pushed on her. So many adoptee's can't and don't understand that WE mothers didn't want to surrender our babies, there was no alternative, no help, anywhere.”
My natural mother had a secret for years. ME. Then 21 years later, after I was born, I forced that secret out. It wasn’t intentional and I never thought for one second that I was a secret from her family. I am still a secret at times. There are still times that she will not admit that she had a child when she was 17 years old.
My natural mother does need to come terms with the decisions that she has made. Whether that was her making the choice for giving me up or someone forcing her, she has to come to terms with that. I am not asking her to admit that it was “her” decision. I am saying that she needs to come to terms with the decisions.
For our relationship to be able to grow and not be held back over something that happened 41 years ago, she has to come to terms. Yes, she gave birth to me. Yes, she gave me away. Yes, we reunited and it flopped big time. Yes, we found each other again. She can’t allow the past to mold our relationship anymore.
So, Anonymous, you asked me to tell you how a mother comes to terms with a decision that more than likely was pushed on her. If my natural mother asked me this, I would say to her:
“Admit to yourself that you are not perfect. Admit to yourself that you gave birth to me and you gave me up. If you had to do it all over again, you probably would not make the same decision, but back then, when you were 17 years old, you didn’t know any better. You didn’t know that years later, that decision would affect your life. YOU CAN’T CHANGE WHAT HAPPENED. Admit to yourself that you make mistakes in your life or decisions in your life that you think you shouldn’t have made. Most of all, quit thinking that I was “that” child that you gave up. I am a person; not “that child” you gave away. You might not think of me as totally your daughter or that you have a right to be my mother and this thinking is what is allowing our relationship to not be able to be whole.
I don’t think how life could have been different if I wasn’t adopted. I don’t constantly think about adoption. I think about the present and the future and how I can make a difference in our relationship.
As long as you are constantly going over and over in your head about what happened, our relationship can’t grow. Come to terms with what happened and look to the future. Stop allowing the past to smother what the future holds.”
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4 comments:
Thanks for the insight. Are you basically saying that in order for birthmoms to have a relationship with their children they have to come to terms with their past choices. I think I can come to terms with the past, but not sure I can say that all is well and it's okay that everything happened the way it did. However, I hope I can accept that it is what it is and go on from there.
You sound focused and clear in your message. One thing that sticks out for me is you say she thinks she "shouldn't" have made the decision she made. The guilt of that may block her from accepting reality, that she did give birth and you are her grown daughter. I know blaming myself was a big block for me.
Unfortunately, some mothers NEVER get over relinquishing their child -- or come to terms with it. I hope your mother does. Your best point was that she should look at you/treat you as a person, not "that child," which sounds to me like she sees you as a symbol, a reminder, of loss and pain.
Keep at it -- setting high goals for your relationship. Best to you.
here's a thought, if she's "constantly going over and over in her head about what happened," it sounds to me like things don't make sense to her, that she's focused on this because she cannot understand what happened. She's trying to understand things. Trauma can make people "blank out" and forget parts of important events. "If I loved my baby so much, why did I give her away?" may be what's haunting her, and if she isn't hooked up with information sources that tell her what was done to mother back then to *ensure* that they surrendered their babies, it may not make sense to her at all. She may keep ruminating on it to try to figure it out.
Is she willing maybe to see a trauma counsellor? Or read a book such as "The Girls Who Went Away"?
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