The Tough Stuff

Parenting is never easy.  But adoption brings a special layer of complexity and pain to the process.  Tonight, Fiona called.  She and Jane told me that they had spent time with a social worker today whose job is to find birth families and facilitate if appropriate, re-connections between them and the child.  Fiona wants to find Mama J. her father, and a cousin. I am familiar with the process.  In our state it is called a Family Find Social Worker and it is how we first connected with Dee.

Mama J. is actually in contact with Jane.  Jane has been having phone calls with her for a bit now and is working toward a re-connection between Fiona and her birth mom. Mama J. also has another child that she is raising, a little girl who I believe is right around Lissa's age.

It turned out that Fiona all ready knows that part of the story.  Her brother Dee  told her at some point in a phone call.  I am not totally surprised by that. Dee is very angry about this.  Fi is also, though part of her also thinks that another little sister would be nice.

There are so many hard feelings for her to deal with.  She is angry with Mama J for not taking care of them, for "not fighting for us," and in her eyes letting the family unit be destroyed.  She said she remembers Mama J doing drugs and she and her sister Krystal telling her to stop because they knew something bad would happen to them all. Yet she still wants to see her first mom, to know her again and have some kind of relationship with her.  Tough stuff.

I am proud of my daughter for being brave enough to face the complexity of this.  I had to find some of that bravery myself and talk with Rob about it all tonight.  I didn't want him finding out back handedly about things so we sat in the kitchen and I told him what Fiona and Jane are doing, and what I knew about his first mom.

His eyes filled with tears that were not shed when I told him he had another sister, a little girl about the same age as Lissa.  I explained about some of Fiona's feelings and how his brother Dee felt.  I told him it was compicated and he would probably feel lots of different things as he sorted it out.  I said that if he wants to know Mama J in any manner, he needed to know that I am okay with that and will not be upset or hurt or angry at all.  I said that he may want to talk with his sister more about this as time goes on, or even Jane because she has a rare  ability to see through the complex stuff. I said I'd talk about it anytime he wants in any way he wants--face to face, email, by letter, whatever made him comfortable.

I do not hate my children's first mothers.  I do hate the pain that they are feeling tonight.