This last Mother’s Day was the first time I’ve ever had a little guilt while calling my mom because as the conversation went on I started to wonder if my birth mom was wondering when I would finally make the call. I’ve never had that realization before, and this year has brought on so many new realizations pushing me closer to doing something and also struggling that I shouldn’t feel guilt about a process that is entirely forced upon me with absolutely no resources or guidance. That a closed adoption only benefits the birth parents and sends the adoptee on a lifelong path of never really knowing who they are. How even at 36 I will still be reminded there are facts about me that I will never be able to know unless I am ready to dive head first into a most likely traumatic and lengthy process of tracking down these answers. Is it really worth it to spend so much of the little time and energy I have on that so that when someone asks me how much I weighed at birth I can finally have a definitive answer?
This year has brought on some of the most complicated feelings I have felt to date over being adopted. It’s made my birth mom, who was somewhat of a fairytale to me my whole life, more and more tangible by the day. She’s become an out of focus image that’s slowly creeping its way into focus, the lines growing sharper with each new day and each new realization of both what could be and what could have been. She’s become more than an anecdote I can bring up at parties when the conversation needs some picking up. My whole life she’s been an afterthought, a unique fact, something I could put in my pocket like a dollar bill or tissue only to uncover months laster when I needed to wear that item again. Formerly when she wasn’t in sight, she didn’t exist. I’ve never had object permanence with her, only at random would she pop back up from under a blanket and remind me that she is a real person in my life.
It hits me at all the wrong times in the most unexpected ways. The same way it hits you that you’re you’ve forgotten to take the trash bins down the driveway or that it’s been awhile since you’ve seen that shirt. That feeling of “oh my god I need to get an oil change” coupled with “and holy shit I have got to find my birth mother.” It’s that same rush you get when suddenly there is a task before you that is imperative to get done or something dire might happen. But eventually you just let your car keep driving for a few more (hundred) miles and go about your day hoping that shirt will eventually turn up in your possession. It’s a task, an errand, a to-do saved for another time but hoping when you tick off this particular errand it’s still alive and well and happy to see you. She’s not my first thought in the morning or the worries that fuel my 3 mile runs, but she is the thought that flashes before my eyes when I’m stopped at a red light too long. It’s not that she’s not important or finally meeting her isn’t a priority, but it’s just a task that I’ve learned to live with because I am honestly too scared to deal with it at the moment (but don’t worry I finally did get an oil change a few weeks ago).
In the last 6 months I have grown more accustomed to the knowledge of her existence rather than her actual existence. These first 6 months of this year have been nothing like I expected or set out to be- I lost a job but then I ran a sub 2 hour half marathon, a goal I’ve had my whole life. I’ve been able to travel a lot more than expected but also have come down with both pink eye and norovirus just months apart. I’ve rearranged my living room one hundred thousand times and would like paint orange trim in my bathroom at some point. How am I supposed to fit a whole other person in the midst of these goals and failures, and that person being someone that could potentially change everything for the best and for the worst?
I like control. I am a Virgo. People can sniff that on me miles away. I need to be able to see 5 steps ahead of me and sudden change or information has historically never gone over well for me. Not being able to picture what can come of this is terrifying to me. I’ve been very open about my willingness to find my family on here and I feel like I am just edging everyone when I say I still haven’t sent any messages or have gotten any closer. And believe me I really want to, I just also really don’t want to.
I get it- when will I stop writing about my feelings on this and start doing something. The problem is doing something seems insurmountable at times. It’s been nice to find a friend in a similar situation- his finger also always floating over the “sent” button. We both talk about outsourcing our communication with our birth families to a trusted friend and we both talk a lot about never wanting to inconvenience anyone around us with any task due to trauma we have collected in our brains as adoptees. When I was last in New York we finally met up and spent the entire night laughing at the parts of our adoption we’ve never been able to laugh about because it’s too sad to other people, lamenting on when we should take the plunge and overall commenting on just how supremely abandoned we feel by the system. Here is a little bit of this great essay he wrote that I have revisited several times over the last month that I am begging everyone to also get their eyes on.
“What I’m saying is adopted people don’t talk. Not about being adopted, at least not in my limited experience. We’re perfectly comfortable stating the facts (“I was adopted as an infant, I know nothing about my birthparents”) but beyond that, our minds go blank. Our instinct for social camouflage kicks in. We know how to read a room, how to blend, how to give off that “We’re doing fine!” aura. Nothing to see here, I just don’t know where my face comes from. It’s taken 35 years for me to clock how bizarre this is.”
We both have the same fears, the same hesitations but also the same wants and desires. We both have the same shake in our voice that’s followed by a booming fit of laughter because there isn’t a person in sight of our conversation questioning why it’s taking so long for us to do anything. Being able to talk to him and another fellow adoptee here in LA has been the first time I’ve ever felt a sense of belonging to a group. As adopted kids we continually struggle with our identity, feeling like frauds saying out loud any part of our heritage but being adopted is it’s own group that I feel so firmly alive and apart of. I feel more connected to that than any part of my 23andme data or adopted parent’s family.
(Also after our cathartic meet up, we walked home only to be followed by these ads punctuating the street, truly the world can be a bully).
I wish I had more answers for everyone and I’ve already set aside one friend who is ready at a moment’s notice to reach out to the person who I think could help guide me closer to my birth family. It feels like I opened up a time bomb in December that ticks away but no one knows what it is ticking down to or what that explosion will look like. This year has been unique for me since it’s the first time I have really taken into consideration the feelings of my birth mom. How my million questions about her could be met by her million questions about me. How every holiday the guilt of what could have been hits deeper as both of our ages tick higher. Again I hate that I have this guilt because I didn’t ask for it. I know none of us are asked to be born but I surely did not ask to be given away with no information. The last thing I want is attention or to be an inconvenience and having to be like “hey life, can you please just…. tell me who I am through this entirely emotional and tedious process??” feels so out of character for me. I like to be left alone and not flung into the spotlight and I just want the information that is owed to me for simply existing.
Eventually things will be in motion and my world will be tailspinning as a result all the while my to-do list will be growing with linen closets to organize and weird car sounds to figure out. The list is already long and crossing off “find birth family” will probably be a relief, even if it’s just to feel my pen make a little scratch on a piece of paper. So stay tuned because those details dropped on me Christmas Eve have finally formed a person and as a result have propelled me closer and closer to finally reaching out (through my friend of course, I’m busy I have some orange trim to paint).
Love how your curiosities are expanding and that you are navigating them in the most Beth way possible! That is key. As always. No matter the path you end up taking. So glad you connected to someone navigating a similar experience.
And yes to orange trim in that bathroom!!
xx