Treating birth families like, well, FAMILY

I was doing some really quick blog and discussion board catch up this morning.  I was interested to read a couple of comments that were posted on a discussion board I follow.

One question posed by a mother of an adopted child was "What pictures should I send to my daughter's birth mother?" (Wondering if they should only be of the child or should they include their family too.)

There were a few responses at the time I read the board, but the best in my mind was one mother who said, and I paraphrase, "I send any picture that I would send anyone else in our family."

Profound in its simplicity as far as I was concerned.

A second question posted, asked again by a mother of an adopted child, dealt with whether or not their family should tell their child's birth mother that they are not comfortable meeting her boyfriend (of about 6 months) at their next visit.  (The birth mother kindly asked in advance, giving the parents the opportunity to say no.)

Another mother replied (a blogging mom that I actually follow) that they don't tell their daughter's birth mother who she can or cannot bring to a visit.  Just like they do not tell other family members who they can or cannot bring to family get togethers.  Their daughter's birth mother knows that they expect she would only bring someone who is safe to be around their daughter.  But past that, they are open to allowing her bring her current boyfriend, a girl friend or any other member of her family with her.

Again, a wise statement in my book.

The common theme in both of these responses, by two different mommas.

We treat our child's birth family the same way we treat our own family.

Love grows

Sitting in my living room last night I was reflective of what was going on around me.

I had printed 150 pictures from things we have done as a family since October.  Lots and lots of pictures of the boys playing together, being silly and celebrating the holidays.  I had also printed the pictures we've received of Brit over the past few months.

I was carefully looking through the stack so I could pick 8 photos to put in a collage frame.  I wanted to represent our entire family.  One picture of each child, including Brit. One picture of all the boys together and one photo of BF and me.

While I was doing that, BF was putting all the rest of the photos in an album.

And during that time, I realized how much our love has grown.  Not just the love between the two of us, but the love between all 7 of us.

I love BF's kids.  He loves mine.  We show all of the children affection and attention, irregardless of who has the biological connection. Honestly, there are many times that if you saw all of us interacting, you might not know who was born to who.

Brotherly love (the two 12 year olds)

While I love that BF and I are able to love each other's children, there is something even greater than that.  It is the love that the boys have for each other.

The first words out of my boys mouths when I pick them up after work each day is "Does BF have the boys tonight?"  And if I say no, that it is a mom day for them, they moan and are visibly disappointed.  (I usually follow it up with "What am I? Chopped liver?!?!)

Two of our boys are the exact same age.  The other two are one year apart.  And it is amazing how well they get along.  We are so lucky.  I know this is not normal.  I have blended a family before, not nearly as easily. But in this case, our boys actually enjoy the time they get to spend together. They consider each other brothers.

But back to my reflections about familial love...

Just because my boys love BF, it does not in any way change their love for their father.  They still think their dad walks on water. They are crazy about him.

Pals - our two youngest

The boys don't call BF dad.  They call him by his name.  They know that he cares for them.  But they also know who their dad is.

We have never had to define it.  Is is understood.  They are allowed to love BF without having split loyalty to their father.  BF does not try to be their dad.  He clearly understand that role belongs to their father.  But he can love them the same, no title required.  No 'competition' for first place.

There is plenty of love to go around for all of us.  We didn't have to divide what love we had prior to meeting each other, instead we just grew more.  

Before adoption changed my life, I would not have reflected much on something as natural as this.

My sisters and mom

Prior to relinquishment, I knew that I love easily.  I come by it naturally.  Within my immediate family of sisters and parents ,we bring people into the fold all the time.  Family is not defined by blood.  There is always someone in our lives who we are loving as if they are one of our family.  And as far as we are concerned, they are.

Since relinquishment, I am learning that not all families operate like this.  Apparently there is a sense of clan that some families have the does not allow others in very easily.  I have also learned that when it comes to children, some adults find claiming ownership very important.  Establishing the child as one of their clan, and  ONLY their clan is important.

Me, my  (former step) daughter and her mom.  Still family in spite of divorce.

That was all new to me.  I had no idea that was such an issue to so many people.

Since relinquishment, I have also learned that there are ALOT of families who are like mine.  They grow their love based on the people who enter their lives.

I now have a new appreciation for those kinds of people.  The kind of people who believe that there can never be too much love.  And that the love well has no bottom.  You can keep dipping in as many times as you wish.

Through all of the heartache adoption has caused me, it has also made me appreciate things so much more than I used to.  And I now recognize and appreciate those who let their love grow and love without boundaries.

Buddies

Yes, I will eat your pizza in front of your friends at school!

Driving the golf cart together - heaven help us

Checking out chicks at the mall

J does come around when there are presents.

PS - There is no picture of my oldest son with any of the other boys.  It is amazing how once a child turns 18, he is no longer nearly as interested in staying home to play with his little brothers. :)

Here is just a Christmas picture of him for good measure!













PPS - Here are pictures of the children with each of their biological parents, in case you wondered who was born to who.  Personally, I think it is hard to tell when we are all together.

Dear Brit, I'm sorry.

Dearest Brit,

It is the holiday season again. Thanksgiving just past, Christmas looming around the corner and Halloween is a not-so-distant memory.  It is a great time of year to be a kid.

Last year at this time, I was pretty much a mess.  I haven't gone back to look at my posts from that time, but I know for a fact that tears were my mainstay.  I missed you so much and wanted you with us so badly.

I must say, not much of that has changed.  I cry less (just because I think my tear supply is permanently diminished).  But the the longing for you is the same.

While it might seem silly, Halloween was hard this year.  There were a few reasons why, but one at the top of the list was because we didn't get to see you all dressed up.  We had all the boys, in costume and together.  But you were missing.

I know your parents took you out and you had a blast.  They told us about it about a month later when we got our monthly update about you.  But for weeks preceding, your (birth)father and I talked about what we thought you might be dressed up as and how you would like walking around getting candy. And the night of Halloween we sure thought about you and wondered how it was going.

This weekend when we were celebrating Thanksgiving, I found that while I have so much to be thankful for, my thoughts always come right back to you and how I wish you were here with us.



Your brothers D and LanMan - your cousin A also at the table.
If you look closely your (birth)father is in the background.

 I wanted you to be making gingerbread houses with your brothers at Nana's house. 

LanMan with your cousin B

I wanted you to be running around with your cousin who is 2 weeks younger than you.  I wanted to hear the two of you talking to each other in that language that toddlers speak to each other while playing with toys. 


I wanted to hold you on my lap while you napped from shear exhaustion from all of the busyness of the day.

Instead of that, when we took pictures, you were missing.  You didn't get to sit at the table with us.  You weren't rolling around on the floor playing with your brothers.  We weren't passing you around from aunt to aunt, oogling over how positively adorable you are.

Me and all my sisters (your aunts) and my mom (your gma)

Thankfully our family doesn't pretend like you don't exist, just because you aren't here.  We all love you so much.  We talk about you and what your parents have told us you are doing now.  We look at your pictures.  We speculate about what it is like to hear your voice.  We talk about how very cute you are and how you look like us.  And of course, all of your aunts ask time and again when I think we might be able to see you.

I sure hope that my counselor is right when she says that the way things are right now is not necessarily how they will be forever.  I don't know if I can bear the thought of not having a relationship with you for much longer.  And you are only 20 months old!

I am glad you have great parents who adopted you.  I know they take very good care of you and that you are happy.  For that, I suppose I am thankful.

But I won't pretend that I don't want a do-over when it comes to choosing to let you be raised in a different family.  The problem is, there are no do-overs with adoption.  We chose that path for you and now we are all living the consequences.  Thankfully your consequences are unnoticeable right now.  You are young and happy.  We are the only ones visibly grieved by your loss.  I do know that this will not always be the case.  As time goes on, you will be the one who is conflicted and forced to deal with all of the issues that are inherent to those who are adopted.

I would guess that someday you are going to wonder how we felt about our decision to place you with another family. I hope that you know that just because we chose adoption when we did, it does not mean we ever stopped loving you or that we didn't think about you all day, every day.

We all miss you.  Every one of us.  Adoption has not just changed me, but it has changed all of us.  Your (birth) father, your brothers, your grandparents, our extended families and even our closest friends.  We miss you.  We wish you were here with us, part of the family you were born into.

But you are not with us.  You don't get to share in the family get-togethers.  And it is our own fault.  We did what we thought was best for you at the time.  Unfortunately we didn't realize the consequences of that decision.  We were wrong.  We could have and should have raised you.  But we can't fix it now. 

What we can do is be ready and available for the moment when we are allow a little access to you by your parents.  And we hope and pray that once you are capable of having a say in it, that you will want to have a relationship with us too.

Now to be clear.  This has little or nothing to do with your adoptive parents.  They are so good to you.  They love you and care for you just exactly how we wanted you to be loved by two married parents.  They are excellent parents as far as we can tell (and we believe it to be so).  All that I am saying is that I wish you would have stayed with us.  Even if it was hard.  Even if we weren't married and you had to be shuttled between two homes.  In hindsight, that is nothing compared to the complication we have created by choosing a completely different family to raise you.

Me and your (birth)father at Jessica's wedding

So please know my dear, sweet Brit, we have loved you every single day.  If we could, we would rewind and make alot of different decisions.  The greatest of those being never letting you go.  I am so sorry that this is your reality now and that we are the ones responsible for it.  We are going to do everything in our limited power to make this adoption story turn out the very best it can.  We want only the best for you.

I hope that we are so available to you that you never wonder about our love and commitment to you.  I hope that you are allowed time with our family so you can know first hand all of your family and how much we all love you.  If there is any way to make this adoption story happy for you, we will do whatever it takes.

We love you dear Brit.  More than can ever be put to words.

Love,

Your first mother

P.S.  On a single happy note, I got more Christmas gifts for you last night.  Your (birth)father and I have already been shopping for you for several weeks (he actually bought your first present without me around!).  We finally figured out what gift to get you this past weekend and last night I found exactly what we were looking for.  When I bought it, I immediately went over to his house and had to show it off.  We can't wait for you to get it.  Maybe we will even get to see you open it, maybe...

The community rallies

I have been completely out of the blog world for the past week. After the big Extreme Makeover Home Edition announcement last Thursday, my life has been on warp speed. I work during the day at my real job,then head to the build site for my second "job". I spent 14-16 hours per day at the build site on Saturday and Sunday. And as tired as I am, I can't wait to go back every day.

Here is a quick snippet that will tell you about the recipient, Carl Hall, and his family. It was done before his family was chosen as an Extreme Makeover project.

Former Wichita State Baseball Player Carl Hall adjusts to new life

I have spent the last week getting to know his parents, in-laws and especially his siblings (there are 12 kids!!!). Every person should have a family that rallies around them like the Hall family has done for Carl. It amazes me by the ways and numbers of people who are irrationally committed to helping him and his family.

It is unfortunate that often takes personal tragedy to realize how many people care for us. But fortunately, it is in moments of tragedy that we need others the most.

Now back to work for me! I have to get things done before I head back to the build site.