A Very Good Day Indeed

It seems that I always am writing about the turmoil of reunion and not sharing the wonderful parts. Today I get to write about a wonderful part. The short story is that my daughter is on her way home from a visit to her parents. Her relationship with her a-mom has always been a bit strained and has been more so since she found out that my daughter and I met and have a relationship. My daughter always said that she just needed time to come around so she would answer questions when asked but otherwise didn't bring it up. Last night her a-mom did bring it up. It was all positive. Her a-mom has come to terms with our relationship and understands that it is not and never was about her. She knows I am not a relacement for her but that I do have a place in my daughter's life. They resolved a whole lot of things but that is her story to tell.

The reason I'm so happy about all this is it resolves one big load of guilt I was carrying around and it resolves a lot for my daughter. One of the things I never wrote about when I talked about not searching for her and the hesitation about contact was how I felt about her parents. Initially there was a lot of fog induced'those are your real parents' crap. It hasn't been like that for a long time. What has made me feel guilty is that the more I heard about her parents the more I understood that her parents are a perfectly nice couple who wanted a child. They didn't know any more about adoption than I did and no one told them anything except here is YOUR baby. The more I heard the more I felt that I would really like these people. In a way I chose them (non-identifying information only naturally). Notice I have no trouble refering to them as her parents, thats what they are. They are the ones who sat up with her all night when she was sick, took her on vacations, and put up with her when she was a nasty teenager and the rest of it. They are the people who parented her. I respect them for that and, as I said, would probably like them if I ever met them. I hated feeling like I was comming between them and my daughter. I hated that she couldn't talk to her parents about a part of her life. I didn't like the idea that I caused them pain. I din't like the idea that it caused my daughter pain when she felt like she was less than honest with them. Her parents understand now and are OK. They still love her and she loves them They know that. I love my daughter and she loves me. We know that. No one has taken anything away from anyone else. I don't think that I will ever have any contact with them and that is OK too. If it is ever something they want, that is fine with me but it is not something I need to take away guilt. Their acceptace of the relationship between my daughter and I is healing. I know it is for my daughter too. It is a very good day.

So my daughter, her parents and I are lucky. We are all in one piece in spite of the lies. I was told that I was doing THE BEST THING FOR THE BABY. Her parents were told that the baby they adopted WILL BE JUST LIKE YOUR OWN. (I guess you aren't supposed to notice the 5" shorter and so not blue eyed blond part) My daughter was told that she should be GREATFUL. I don't know how you can fix adoption or if it is even possible. I do know that a good start is at least stop the lies. No the mother who relinquishes is NOT going to just forget and get on with her life once the hormones settle. (I am not kidding about this, I really was told that it was just hormones when I said anything about wanting to keep my baby. Let me tell you, those are powerful hormones since they have lasted 39 years.) Then they tell the child how lucky she is. (That should have been enough to keep her out of Vegas. If her luck is growing up feeling like an alien gambling should be avoided under all circumstances). So the resolution with her parents is wonderful. As a side effect it makes me more pissed off than ever about the LIE.