After thinking it over I decided to remove the original post and replace it with the following…same idea and focus, just less specific conclusions. It is difficult to write about specific conclusions when I’m still so unsure myself what is the right thing to do. I’m still attempting to walk out “being a birthmom in an open adoption” in my own shoes…
Lyrics to BEAUTIFUL by Eminem
Lately I’ve been hard to reach
I’ve been too long on my own
Everybody has their private world
Where they can be alone
Are you calling me?
Are you trying to get through?
Are you reaching out for me?
I’m reaching out for you
I’m just so *** depressed
I just can’t seem to get out this slump
If I could just get over this hump
But I need something to pull me out this dump
I took my bruises, took my lumps
Fell down and I got right back up
But I need that spark to get psyched back up
And in order for me to pick the mic back up
I don’t know how or why or when
I ended up this position I’m in
I’m starting to feel dissin’ again
So I decided just to pick this pen
Up and try to make an attempt to vent
But I just can’t admit
Or come to grips with the fact that I may be done with rap
I need a new outlet
And I know some shit’s so hard to swallow
But I can’t just sit back and wallow
In my own sorrow but I know one fact
I’ll be one tough act to follow
One tough act to follow
I’ll be one tough act to follow
Here today, gone tomorrow
But you’d have to walk a thousand miles
In my shoes, just to see
What it’s like, to be me
I’ll be you, let’s trade shoes
Just to see what it’d be like
To feel your pain, you feel mine
Go inside each others’ minds
Just to see what we’d find
Look at shit through each others’ eyes
Don’t let ‘em say you ain’t beautiful
They can all get ***, just stay true to you
So don’t let ‘em say you ain’t beautiful
They can all get ***, just stay true to you
I think I’m starting to lose my sense of humor
Everything’s so tense and gloom
I almost feel like I gotta check
The temperature of the room
Just as soon as I walk in, it’s like all eyes on me
And so I try to avoid any eye contact
‘Cause if I do that then it opens the door
For conversation, like I want that
I’m not looking for extra attention
I just wanna be just like you
Blend in with the rest of the room
Maybe just point me to the closest restroom
I don’t need no *** man servant
Trying to follow me around and wipe my ass
Laugh at every single joke I crack
And half of ‘em ain’t even funny like
Ha! Marshall you’re so funny man
You should be a comedian, *** damn!”
Unfortunately I am
I just hide behind the tears of a clown
So why don’t you all sit down
Listen to the tale I’m about to tell
Hell, we don’t gotta trade our shoes
And you ain’t gotta walk no thousand miles
In my shoes, just to see
What it’s like, to be me
I’ll be you, let’s trade shoes
Just to see what it’d be like
To feel your pain, you feel mine
Go inside each others minds
Just to see what we’d find
Look at shit through each others eyes
Don’t let ‘em say you ain’t beautiful
They can all get ***, just stay true to you
So don’t let ‘em say you ain’t beautiful
They can all get ***, just stay true to you
Lately I’ve been hard to reach
I’ve been too long on my own
Everybody has their private world
Where they can be alone
Are you calling me?
Are you trying to get through?
Are you reaching out for me?
I’m reaching out for you
The lyrics of this song really spoke to me…spoke to where I am today as a birthmother in an open adoption…
Struggling with so many conflicting feelings, wanting to be like moms who would have never even considered adoption as an option and struggle to be the best parent they can be everyday, wanting others to understand why I feel the way I do about being a birthmom and what it feels like to be a birthmom in an open adoption, not knowing what to do about or with all the pain and regret. Sometimes not wanting to talk about it anymore. Feeling as if I have to behave a certain way to protect others from your pain. Acting out a role to spare others the uncomfortable feelings. Watching relationships unravel when I can’t seem to stay in character as the “happy, accepting, nurturing” birthmom, being unable to keep my pain in check when spending extended time with my “birth”daughter. Wanting the pain to end. Considering my options to minimize the pain. Wanting to do the right thing. Finding often that I’m clueless about what the right thing is for everyone involved, not having the will or strength “to do the right thing” consistently.
Even after almost 19 years in this open adoption, I have so many unanswered questions and feel as if I’m floundering in the dark. Sometimes I want to just run away from it all. Focusing on the pain and the regret has taken it’s toll, but to do anything else…to tell myself that “I made the right choice” or that “it was acceptable and right for me to relinquish my parental rights because it was in the best interest of my child or that what I did was an act of love”, to just let go of the regret and accept what has occurred…I can’t seem to walk out a path of acceptance and peace as a birthmom. Is it possible? How does one do so? To try to force it or to fake it (which I haven’t been able to manage to do in the last seven years) has become impossible at worst and an intense dichotomy at best. To do so…to be present and squash my “crazy, conflicting feelings” is more comfortable for others, but I find that to do so I have to enter into a state of detachment, numbness, and a state of suspension where I am physically, but not emotionally present. Kinda like a zombie or the invisible “woman”.
Yet this state could not and cannot continue as it has for many years…facing the constant inner turmoil on a monthly basis…which was part of my motivation to move out-of-state; an attempt to distance myself from the pain somewhat and to figure out what to do to end this cycle of pain and emotional anguish.
Can I change the way I feel about and the perspective I hold on what I have done? I’m attempting to find a way to participate in this open adoption in a manner that doesn’t force me to live a lie, but also doesn’t enclose me in a prison of (or encase me in a shell of potentially explosive) pain and anger. How? What do I do?
I still do not have the answers and so I find myself in limbo…having an inkling that there could possibly be SOMETHING BEAUTIFUL just beneath the surface of this mess my life has become. On the other hand facing that I separated myself from my child and believing that in doing so I obliterated the process of parenting her which would have/could have made me into a stronger, wiser, more valuable, loving, and insightful woman today than the one I’ve become, facing the endless losses of the decision to relinquish… It is this particular thought process alone that is a significant source of my regret and pain. Somehow I must reconcile these two beliefs…holding on to the hope that somehow, somewhere I can come out a better person despite the choices I made to separate myself from my daughter, that I can somehow be all I was meant to be. Is it still possible or how much is possible? That is one of the many questions I must answer.
If I could only figure out how to release it…the pain, the reget, the decision…to my change myself and my life to be what I desire it to be. I keep thinking of the phoenix bird and hope that I will be able to find a way to resurrect the better parts of myself and extinguish much of the anger and pain. To find a way to resurrect a relationship with Sri that will allow both of us to love and trust one another and at the same time acknowledge (not deny) each other’s truth of what has happened between us and how that act-the relinquishment and adoption-has impacted who we are today together and apart.
All I can say for now is thank God for all the other birthmoms blogging…reading about someone else walking a similar path is what has kept me somewhat sane when I thought it was just me thinking the thoughts and feeling the way I did/do and wondering if I was losing it.
Thank-you to all birthmoms who are courageous enough to share the truth of relinquishment and the ongoing walk towards a loving connection with the child(ren) we have relinquished.
