A Thousand Acre Heart-Part Four

There is so much angst involved in adoption and I think just as much in a reunion. If affects everyone involved in a different way. I worried a lot about the wonderful woman who raised Jeff as her son. As a parent myself I couldn’t help but put myself in her position and that caused me a lot of stress. I was happy for me but sad for her. I also worried about his sister Natalie. Natalie is Jeff’s younger sister. She came along four years after her big brother. What a blessing to a family that had had problems conceiving and adopted and then four years later were blessed with a pregnancy and special baby girl. I have two brothers and I think the relationship between a brother and sister can be so full of love but also fiercely protective so I worried about how Natalie would react to not only finding out that her brother was adopted but also to finding out that he was going to meet a whole other family and two little sisters. Jeff has always spoken so highly of Natalie and though we have never met I feel that she is a part of us and I adore her. Proving herself to be such a remarkable young lady Natalie sent me a very sweet message this morning and agreed that I could share it.

6:51am

Natalie Matthews

Hey michelle! I just read your blog. I just wanted to tell you it is absolutely beautiful. Its also very courageous of you to share. I want to thank you for blessing me and my family with jeff. Hes the best brother I could have dreamed of. I can’t imagine what life would have been like for me without him..he has taught me the meaning of kindness,positivity,friendship and so much more which are all priceless and will forever be a part of my heart. I also cant imagine the heartache you must have felt… I know you know everything happens for a reason, jeff has been lucky enough to experience love from not just one but two families and I thank you for that. I have a huge amount of admiration and respect for you, and just felt the need to tell you. i hope this brightens your day because you deserve it. You’re a great person michelle, i look forward to meeting you in april. Xo

_____________________________________________________________

To continue somewhat how I left off my Dad’s death was obviously a huge blow to my family and one thing right after the other for me. A lot of that time seems like a blur to me. I can only describe the feeling as numb. The days seemed so long and I longed for bedtime but couldn’t sleep. When we were planning the funeral we really pulled together as a family. I remember silly stuff like picking out the casket and my oldest brother Mike wanted the most expensive one. He wanted to send Dad out like Elvis. The reason this struck me as funny is because Mike is the frugal one in the family. We all put different values on different things and for some reason that was very important to him. We did not buy the $17, 000 casket…sorry Dad! Funerals are an odd business. I think people should spend their money in life and not so much on death. It is pretty damn expensive to die. It seems to me that focusing on the funeral was the only thing that really kept us together. I was overwhelmed at the funeral. We had an open casket and my Dad was wearing his signature grin. It looked like he was playing a silly prank and he was going to open his eyes and say “just joking” because he looked so lifelike (at least to me) I remember putting a rose on his chest and trying to hold his hand. It was cold and hard. Not at all like holding your father’s hand should feel. I remember a lot of people were there. I saw a lot of friends there. They had all those little side rooms open and full of people. Seeing my baby’s father there near broke me. We had always remained friends and I needed him there that day. I know the songs they played were that Old Rugged Cross and Amazing Grace. My dad loved those. His family was very musical and though my Dad didn’t play any instruments he liked to sing. What else can you say about a funeral? You get to see a lot of special people at the same place that say wonderful things about your deceased loved one and then when it is over and everyone goes back to their  everyday lives there is this huge void. It’s ironic the memories that are triggered during this process that you don’t normally think about. It was a sunny August day so the burial was immediately following the funeral at Pine Grove Cemetery in Stewiacke where my Dad grew up. The family stands in a line and people walk through to pay their respects and a relative of my Dad stops to talk. She mistakes my friend Cheryl for me. I know Cheryl tried to correct her but the lady wasn’t catching on. She raved about my Dad and how she hadn’t seen me (but it wasn’t me) for years and how beautiful I was (but it wasn’t me). It was a little thing but I remember feeling upset by it. I think in that moment I wanted be recognized as his daughter because I was proud to be that and I wanted to hear all the glowing things she had to say.

When the burial was over a lot of people came to our house to mingle. My brothers and I just disappeared. I just went to my room. I was done with niceties. Till this day I apologize for leaving my Mom to deal with all those people. If it was up to me I would have told them all to get out. Maybe my Mom got some solace out of their company but I just had an overwhelming need to be alone. Then when I was alone I was numb. If you recall I had started dating a guy the day before my Dad died. You would think that it wouldn’t have worked out but it did for over four years. I was talking to a friend today and she said she thought we were fantastic together and we were for quite some time. I was thinking back to some of the times we shared and those first couple of years must have been hard for him. I had migraines. I had them before dad died and they just got progressively worse. The doctor misdiagnosed me with depression and gave me these pills that made me so messed up that I had a hard time putting my socks on for school in the morning. My Grampy Miller, my Moms Dad was a godsend. My Mom didn’t drive and he drove in several times a week from Noel ( about forty minutes from our house) and he took me to all of my appointments in the city (another forty minutes away). They finally got the migraines under control and not long after  I went through this spell where I just wanted to sleep constantly. I couldn’t get enough sleep. That was probably the depression kicking in but the doctor suggested I might have Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and recommended that I get lots of rest. Ironic. How I ever kept a boyfriend through this I will never know but writing this I feel like I owe him a HUGE amount of thanks.

Shortly after Dad passed away my Mom called me downstairs and this lady from the church was there and wanted to have a talk with me. The first thing she said to me was something about god. Well I wasn’t happy with that. I told her that I had given up a baby and then GOD took my Dad away and I didn’t want to talk about GOD! I said to her “How can you talk to me about God. I am sixteen. I didn’t even get a chance to say goodbye. What kind of God would do that to me” There my problems with God were born. My poor Mom. 32 years old and dealing with three  grieving teenagers and her own pain. Thank God she had her family. They are the most amazing people and they are all very close. In the fall my Grampy sat everyone down for a very polite and direct conversation about how he was dying of cancer. I was in disbelief , he seemed perfectly healthy to me. I didn’t really believe it was true. The events all seemed to happen really quickly. His last days in the hospital were rough. I got to see this man who symbolized strength to me, who served in two wars, who got up at the break of dawn everyday no matter what,reduced to skin on bones and he couldn’t communicate. For three days he was in and out and he rambled. Very rarely did you pick out anything coherent. I assume it was the drugs they gave him to keep him comfortable. I wanted to be there every waking moment. As much for me as him. I was going to say goodbye properly. I was sitting right beside his bed, I didn’t want to leave even to pee and the nurse cautioned us that we were not to show any emotion. Then after three days of rambling my grandfather grabbed my hand, looked me straight in the eye and said as plain as day “It won’t be long now!” I bolted from the room in tears. How could I not show emotion? My grandfather just told me he was going to die soon. My mom asked my boyfriend to take me home to get some rest and somewhere between the hospital  and my house Grampy passed away. It was really hard to see someone you love suffer and deteriorate. I think in seeing that my damaged relationship with God and faith was a bit restored. I felt that god gave me that opportunity to say goodbye but also showed me that sometimes the other way is best.

The strength and love of my Mom and her family is the only thing that got us all through that time. We were already grieving and now we were trying to cope with another huge loss. Grampy was laid to rest in November, as per his wishes had a very simple, private burial. The family gathered together at Grammies’ house for Christmas that year. It was a nice thing for us all to be together and share “remember when” stories and memories of Grampy and Dad. My Dad loved Christmas. He always had us up bright and early so it was a day we really felt his void. After the present opening was done we all retreated  to our own quiet room to be by ourselves. We were a family with a lot of love to share but we were facing a lot of sadness.

To be continued.

My Dad as a boy
Jerry David Watson

My Grampy Harry Miller

For my brothers. Live your life for today, not for someday. Love you xo

A Thousand Acre Heart-Part Three

I have some really amazing people in my life who have been wonderfully supportive and encouraging to me. In the last couple of days I have re-connected with some fantastic and inspirational people. Adoptees, Adoptive parents, families with adopted siblings and people who simply took the time to read and share their feelings and kindnesses with me. After I gave birth there were a select group of people whose mean spirit made me feel guilt and shame. I put up a wall around my “heart” and my secret and very few people were let in to that part of my life. My need to tell this story comes from a good place inside of my heart that hopes that maybe there is someone out there holding the weight of guilt and shame on their shoulders and she can see from my mistakes how ridiculously unnecessary that is.

Here is the dictionary meaning of shame:

the painful feeling arising from the consciousness of something dishonorable, improper, ridiculous, etc., done by oneself or another.

I think we can agree that I did a good thing, nothing dishonorable. The unprotected sex was definitely improper but that wouldn’t warrant years of shame. Holding onto years of shame was detrimental and unnecessary. If I can prevent one person from feeling that; it is a very good thing. That weight off my shoulders has been the most absolutely freeing. My whole life has been changed. Last night when I was writing about the death of my Dad I thought how sad it would be if it all ended now. I finally know who I am and I am happy and confident and proud. My Dad always told me “life is short” This is something he said all he time. He never saved for a rainy day, if he wanted something he got it, if he wanted to do it he did it. You can say that is irresponsible but he died at 39 years old. LIFE IS SHORT!!

I wondered a lot about what might have been. I pictured us all as a happy family. I thought of Dad spoiling Jeff rotten and buying him a race car. None of that was meant to be. I knew that taking myself back and placing me in those times of such emotion would be difficult. To be real and honest I have to be there in the moment. When I was writing about being in the hospital room after giving birth I was in that room and the pain was excruciatingly emotional. I bawled all the way through the process. This is not a bakery, I refuse to sugar coat any of it! For many years I wasn’t true to myself and this is my truth.

I did have one person send me a message that was mean spirited. It was suggested that this story should be about the parents that loved Jeffrey and raised them as their son. I was told that it wasn’t all about me. This is MY story. I cannot tell anyone else’s story, but I have earned the right to tell mine! I will of course talk about them later on in the story. I feel overwhelming love and admiration for them, but I cannot tell My story from their point of view. That being said, everyone is entitled to their opinion and I knew that opening myself up in an intimate and vulnerable way I would have to deal with that as it came. My daughter has a “theme song” and she plays it to remind herself that words can’t hurt her and nobody can bring her down. I will post it at the end of this blog. I admire my daughters, their strength and their capacity to love and put themselves out there without fear. They play Roller Derby. It has been such an empowering presence in their young lives. I try to teach them that nobody can make them feel inferior without their consent and it is something that I need to remind myself of frequently. Haley and I have this new thing that we do before bed where we gather up all the good things that happened to us during the day in our hand and put it to our heart and then we gather any of the bad things that happened  and we crumple them in our hand and then we throw them far away! I took that mean comment that made me have a little mini meltdown in my truck this morning and I threw it to Never-land. Being strong doesn’t mean you don’t feel things. I feel everything!! My husband said to me today that I was the brains of our operation and I disagreed, I am the heart. If my brain worked as much as my heart does we would be millionaires.

My heart wasn’t always this kind and pure. If you have ever heard the saying “misery loves company” it is very true. Hearts that are happy love, embrace, endure and encourage. I can show you everything I have learned but I cannot tell you what to see. You will interpret however your heart allows.

In English class they tell you that every story has a beginning, a middle and an end. I believe this is the beginning of my story!

Date: Thu, 4 Feb 2010 09:54:52 -0400
> From: JENNINCR@gov.ns.ca
> To: michd@live.ca
> Subject: Fwd: File#35674
>
> Above is the receipt of the first correspondence I ever had with my son. Apparently it had been stuck in a spam filter for two weeks because his email was grapedrink (if you are from N.s. you may remember those delicious drinks that used to come with the milk delivery)

I know you are all anxious. It is really hard to condense 23 years! What a journey! I can give you a little glimpse and tell you this….everything I endured to get to the day that I was reunited with Jeff evaporated immediately when I met him. He has a beautiful spirit and though I was prepared for all sorts of scenarios I wasn’t prepared at all for the one that actually happened.

I will continue I promise……xo

A young shot of Jeff that was given to me by his Grampy!

A Thousand Acre Heart -Part Two

…and spring became the summer

It was a typical hot and humid Nova Scotia summer. Nobody was more thrilled then me that the school year was over. It was hard to go to school every day and feel like everyone was staring at you, either because they felt bad for me but didn’t know what to say or because they had lots to say but none of it was mature or worth listening too!

My Dad had had some recurring heart problems and I remember he was in the hospital after suffering an attack. My Dad had a great personality and people couldn’t help but being taken in by his charm, the nurses included, but even they were not impressed when he was having his visitors sneak him in KFC and Pizza.  My Dad had been diagnosed with Angina.  Angina is an indicator that your heart is not getting all the oxygen it needs to keep working at its optimal level. People who have angina are at an increased risk of having a heart attack. So in short my Dad should not have been eating Pizza and KFC. He did if I recall correctly make some changes after his stay in the hospital, at least for awhile. He owned an Auto Body shop beside our house but he wasn’t supposed to be working and he wasn’t allowed to drive his motorbike, which he loved to do in the nice weather. I can remember him pacing around the house just lost. He wasn’t used to not working and his number one hobby was being forbidden. As I said the changes were temporary but there were other more subtle changes as the hot summer forged ahead. He really was interested in what we were doing, wanted to spend lots of time with us and have long talks. I recall wanting a drive to a friend’s but he really wanted to spend time with me and offered to take me shopping. My dad was a unique shopper, so unlike my Mom and me, he didn’t look at price tags. If he liked something he bought it. He didn’t compare shop or look for sales. He also liked to carry lots of cash with him. This didn’t mean we had lots of money; it just meant there was very little in the bank and a lot in my Dads pocket! Well I lucked out that day I got a couple of new outfits and a 12 speed bike. I felt at the time that there was some guilt involved.  It was his way of saying, “I know you are hurting, I don’t know what to say to make it better so I am going to buy you stuff!” Regardless the sentiment was appreciated and I completely understood that he didn’t know what to say to me. My mom tried to talk to me often, I am not sure how much was ever said between us we just cried and hugged a lot. Sometimes there really are no words but knowing that someone cares enough to share in your pain and just be there is more than enough. My mom was my best friend. She married at fifteen years old and had three kids back to back. She never ever complained about her life or said it was hard. She always made motherhood look effortless. I always felt so bad because I knew she wanted more for me and she felt she failed but I know it was I that failed her. She talked to me about boys and sex. She tried to be involved and always told me to come to her if I needed anything. I am the one that shut her out. I met the guy that made me weak at the knees and I made a bad decision on a hot summer’s day in August and now one year later I was silently suffering the consequences.

We were planning a surprise party for my dad and his best friend because they were both turning 40 that year on September 4. The BIG 40!! I probably thought that was old and I am going to turn 40 on my next birthday. It was exciting to try to keep a secret from my Dad. He loved parties and he was such a big kid. He was always the first one up at Christmas; (five a.m. most years), and he LOVED presents.

It was late August and I had met a guy that summer that I was crazy about! He was a friend’s older brother and he was sweet and mature and I was very much absorbed in thoughts of him. It certainly gave me something else to focus on. I thought about him all of the time but I really didn’t have the guts to tell him. I guess I eventually took that 20 second leap of courage (if any of you have seen We bought a Zoo you know what I am talking about) It probably went something like this “Hey I just met you, and this is crazy, but here’s my number so call me maybe?” Of course it really didn’t go like that; Carly Rae has dibs on that one. Actually while I was typing that groan joke I recalled how it really went. We were hanging out at my friend’s house (as I mentioned “he” was her older brother) and she and her boyfriend wanted to take a drive to the beach so we tagged along. Ahhh the good ole days in Nova Scotia when you just decide to drive to the beach and you get in your car and drive to the beach!! It was after dark and I recall I had to pee all the way to Brule. For those of you who know the drive from Truro to Brule and know how I am when I have to pee you are probably thankful that you were not along for that ride. We got to the beach and I was able to pee in the dark in those stinky outhouses. So once I have peed I start to realize what a crazy romantic scene this is. Moonlit beach, warm summers night, it is a scene from a Bryan Adams music video!! Now I am panicked so I just run into the water and keep walking out nonchalantly as far as I can till I realize that I am a long way from shore and I don’t know which way is back to the shore and which way was further out into the water. I have a helpless sense of direction to begin with and you would think I would know from the direction of the moonlight but the sky was very dimly lit at that point. I just turned around in circles for a minute or so until I realized that the object of my adoring affection had come to find me. I can’t recall the exact details but we shared a very sweet first kiss under the very dimly lit summer sky at Brule Beach. I went home that night and for the first time in a long time I felt like a normal teenage girl.

Morning came as it always does bright and early. It was August 21, 1990. My dad had called me a couple of times to ask me to make coffee for him and the guys at the shop. I was already on the phone with my guy and was just having a hard time getting down the stairs to do it. I finally made it when I got another call to please hurry and bring the coffee out. All this time I am talking to my cute guy on our “kids” phone line upstairs and running back and forth to answer the house phone. My Dad’s shop was right beside our house so I put on some flip flops, grabbed the pot of coffee and went out the front door. There was an Ambulance in the yard. At first it didn’t occur to me to be alarmed because my Dad owned an Auto Body shop so it wasn’t unusual to see smashed cop cars etc in the yard. Then I realized there seemed to be some confusion and I feel like I am outside of my body staring at me with my feet glued to the ground holding a damn pot of coffee. My brothers are yelling at me to stay there as they jump in Mike’s car and follow the ambulance.  My uncle follows them in his car. By the time I realize that my Dad is in the ambulance and that my brothers told me to call my Mom at work it was just me and a new guy in the shop yard. I kept telling him he had to drive me to my Moms work and he kept saying they told him to stay there. At some point I made him realize that he was not going to lose his job and we had to get moving. My Mom worked at a corner store that was along the way to the hospital. It had a drive-thru attached and when I got there all she knew is that my brothers were following the ambulance to the hospital and she was to meet them there. The owner was at the store but didn’t know how to work the till so my Mom was expected to stay until his wife got there and she was on her way. I will never ever forget in my whole life how my Mom was trying to wait on customers not knowing what was happening to her husband. This one lady came in and she was as bright as the sunshine and she said to my mom “It is a beautiful day!” My mom struggled to hold back tears and I decided enough. I told her boss to wing it and we left.

At the hospital they took us to a private room, they explained that they had the best team working on my dad. It seemed like an eternity passed and for some reason we were separated. Maybe by choice I am not entirely sure. At some point a nurse told me that they had done everything they could. She kept looking at me with this really idiotic grin and I had no idea what she was trying to say to me but she was going to help me find my Mom and brothers so I followed her and she kept looking at me with that ridiculous smile. I hated her. I really really hated her. Have you ever felt like everything was moving in slow motion but so fast you couldn’t catch up! It was a beautiful sunny day, August 21, 1990 when they told me I was never going to see my Dad again.  My warm and wonderful mother was a widow with three teenaged kids at thirty two years old.

Life wasn’t fair or just and it wasn’t going to be OK for a very long time. 

To be continued…..

Thanks to my friend Amanda for this, I had to share
Legacy of an Adopted Child

Once there were two women who never knew each other..
One you do not remember, the other you call mother.
Two different lives, shaped to make Your one…
One became your guiding star, the other became your sun.
The first gave you life and the second taught you to live it.
The first gave you a need for love, and the second was there to give it.
One gave you a nationality, the other gave you a name.
One gave you a seed of talent, the other gave you an aim.
One gave you emotions, the other calmed your fears.
One saw your first sweet smile, the other dried your tears.
One gave you up … that’s all she could do.
The other prayed for a child and God led her straight to you.
And now you ask me, through your fears, 
the age old question unanswered throughout the years…
Heredity or environment .. Which are you the product of..
Neither, my darling .. neither..
just two different kinds of love.

A thousand acre heart

This is a story that I think I should tell because very few people know the whole thing and when it is told in bits and pieces I always feel that so much is left out. I will begin to tell it slowly and at my pace. I will try to tell it the best I remember it and it is not my intention to hurt anyone’s feelings.

“I always knew there was a piece of the puzzle missing, I never imagined what it was”

Jeffrey “Jam” Matthews

I got bored of cleaning out the 5000 useless emails in my hotmail so I decided to check in with some random and hopefully inspirational thoughts that will have us all seeing clearly once the rain is gone, and by rain I mean tears, yes I stole the first part from Van Morrison.

I have been sitting at my computer attending a GoToMeeting to see my first grandchild’s Ultrasound at 3D Miracles. I am in Edmonton, Alberta, the other family and friends are in Truro, Onslow, Tatamagouche and Pictou Counties in Nova Scotia. My grandbabes Mom is at 3D Miracles in Halifax, Nova Scotia. In itself this is amazing that technology can bring us together for this special time. We are able to chat and share our feelings. Right now we are on a 45 minute “Yoga Break” because baby is playing camera shy. I am not quite sure where in the family the shyness comes into play!

I am taking this time to reflect on the miracles that have changed my life and brought me to this day that I am so fortunate and incredibly grateful to be a part of.

In April my first grandchild is due to come into our world full of love. Almost twenty three years ago I gave birth to her father Jeremy at the Colchester Regional Hospital. I was sixteen years old, a child myself really. I was scared, confused and full of such conflicting emotions. I gave birth to a healthy eight pound, magnificent baby boy. He had dark hair and these eyes that looked at me with what I was certain was the hint of a smile.  The plan for lack of a better term was to give him the very best life possible and even at sixteen I was pretty certain that love alone could not provide that and my options were limited. I was a child, discussions were had, and choices were made and with a heavy heart I went along with some amount of certainty with what I was told were best. Anyone that has given birth to a child knows that something changes inside of you the very moment they come into this world. It is powerful and indescribable but even in tender teen hood I felt it. I felt a connection that time and miles and tears would never take away. I was giving my baby boy up for adoption. He was going to be raised by a couple that had longed for a baby and had more to give him then I possibly could. When I was finally alone in my hospital room I cannot even begin to tell you the emotions I experienced. In a very short time I had crossed that line between girlhood and womanhood and I was not ready for any of the hard choices or the heartache that would bring. My father came back to the hospital a short while later. The birth of his first grandchild had moved him immensely. He said we would do whatever needed to be done. He said he would go right out and buy a crib and diapers and whatever was needed he would help. When he left I was more confused than ever and my older brother came back to the hospital to talk to me. He would have been eighteen at the time. He was always a bit of an authority figure to me, he was smart and organized, and he wasn’t as lead by emotions as the rest of us. He talked to me that night with the soul and wisdom of someone much older than his eighteen years. He talked to me about the family that had been waiting for years to love my child. He talked about how I was too young to make grown up decisions and that he just wanted me to see my options from all angles. He is the only person throughout my whole pregnancy that really discussed options with me and talked to me like the decisions were in my hands but I needed to understand how my decisions were going to affect everyone involved. He didn’t know the couple that was going to adopt Jeremy. We all just knew about them, through lawyers. It still amazes me how he pleaded their case. He said he had seen the movie Kramer vs Kramer in Law class at school and it moved him. I have never seen the movie. I had a torturous night. I remember very little of it except for the feeling of a huge weight on my chest. In the morning I told my family that I hadn’t changed my mind, I was going to give Jeremy up for adoption and allow the family that was expecting him to love him and give him a wonderful life.

It’s not as easy as it sounds. You go home to return to your normal life and nothing is normal. Your friends want to talk about boys and clothes and everyday adolescent stuff but you are now a grown-up. They want to talk about broken hearts and you know that they have absolutely no idea what it feels like to be truly heartbroken.

The law says that a minimum of sixteen days needs to pass before you can legally be approached with respect to signing adoption papers. It felt like a year and a day all at the same time, which of course makes absolutely no sense but nothing would make sense for a very long time. On the sixteenth day when the lawyer called I was sick. I was the kind of sick when you call into work on inventory day…avoidance. I was also heartsick. If I had had the capacity to question I am sure everyone in my household was experiencing a type of loss as well. They were there for the growing belly, to feel the kicks and anticipate the birth and then at the part where you are expecting kisses and cuddles and late night feedings it was as if the universe had stalled and life as you knew it was paused. I am not sure how many more days passed but when my lawyer came to the house I tried another stall tactic and she understood quite clearly what was going on. She didn’t push me but explained that until I signed the papers that Jeremy was living in interim care. He was being well taken care of but the family that longed to hold him and love him could not take him home until I signed the papers. I must have signed the papers that day. I can’t imagine what my signature looked like. I was a mess inside. I wasn’t eating and my clothes were falling off me. I was a woman, making woman’s decisions in this childlike body.

Insert sex lecture here, sex is an adult decision made by people who are not ready to make adult decisions and lead adult lives. Of course I wouldn’t change any of it now, because to change one thing would change everything but if I could help one person to realize that as a teenager you are seeking affection, validation, acceptance and love. Sex will not give you any of those things. Sex will complicate.

At some point life went back to normal or at least I began to accept the new life. I accepted the mean comments at school from girls “How is your baby, oh never mind you gave him away!” One day in English class a girl named “Dawn” ( I won’t say her last name only for respect for her family’s privacy,),said to me “You are no better than me, I went through labor and delivery just like you!” The difference is she had an abortion that was performed at or after five months. So yes she did indeed go through labor and delivery but she did not give life to a child.  I don’t know her reasons and I don’t care, I remember how badly that hurt me and how I went into survival mode. I had to adamantly remind myself that I gave my baby the opportunity to have a wonderful life and nobody could ever take that away from me.

For years wherever I was I would see a dark haired boy and I would calculate the age in my head and wonder. I was fairly certain I would know right away if I ever came face to face with him but I never knew how I would react…..

To be continued