March 26, 2009
· Filed under Adoption, Friends, Roommates
I’ve always had pictures of my son around. While I lived with my parents they were in my room and everyonce in awhile I’d put them around the rest of the house. Eventually my parents got used to it and now they have their first grandchild on display just as proudly as their other grandchild.
When I got my own place the pictures became more prominant. I have a sequence of pictures of us baking his 5th birthday cake together than hung in my kitchen. I have an ever changing array of pictures on my desk. And after our last visit I framed a picture he drew and that also sits on my desk.
Now I live with roommates. When we moved in I put my cake baking pictures in our new kitchen. I put the ever changing array of photos and the hand drawn picture on my desk in the computer room. But now, I’m thinking of taking them all down and moving them to my bedroom.
I have never wanted to keep my birth mom status a secret, but I also don’t want it to be the first or only think people know about me. When I lived alone this wasn’t an issue. Only people I was comfortable with came to my apartment. They already knew me. If they didn’t already know about my son I knew that I was comfortable with them perhaps asking questions and knew I’d be able to answer them honestly without discomfort.
Now I have no control over who enters my home. I enter the room and find out that strangers already know I’m a birth mom. They’ve already associated their own preconcieved notions about birth mothers with me before they’ve even met me. Because they don’t know me they decide to not ask me any questions. They wait. Then when I leave the room or when they next see my roommate with me they ask her. And so my story, my business is being told and re-told and I don’t even know whats being said.
I’m very protective of my story. I don’t want it told wrong. Maybe it’s because its all I have. At first it didn’t really bother me I figured my roommate could tell it properly but due to recent events I’m not so sure she can.
But then right as I’m on the verge of bringing all my photos to my room I feel ashamed. I feel like I’m hiding and thats something I never want to do.
I don’t know what I’ll end up doing but I do know that I can’t wait until I live alone again. I can’t wait to once again control who comes in my space.
March 24, 2009
· Filed under Plan B
I’ve read a lot of blogs recently about Plan B. Seems a lot of people are angry, disgusted, dismayed, (fill in the negative adjective here) that it will soon be available without a prescription to those who are *only* 17. I for one am happy and here’s why:
Late one Saturday night, or early one Sunday morning depending on how you want to look at it, I had sex. We used a condom. It broke. My boyfriend was able to sleep I spent the night tossing and turning and finally around 5 am I found a phone book and began calling clinics to listen to their voice mail trying to find one that said they’d be open on a Sunday.
I could have waited until Monday but having already had one unplanned pregnancy I was convinced that I needed that pill as soon as possible. Unfortunately not a single clinic that I could find was open on a Sunday. At 8am I called my best friend in tears. My best friend doesn’t usually wake up until at leat 11 on the weekends and I NEVER call her before noon. So she knew it was important for me to call that early. She went with me to the Emergency Room. Where because I was not an Emergency I waited for about 5 hours. I had to have a pelvic and a pregnancy test and then wait for another 4 hours. Finally they told me I was not yet pregnant but that this hospital did not carry Plan B.
I’d chosen this hospital because it was the Military Medical Center I’d been going to since my father had been stationed in this area. I sobbed for a few minutes and then the doctor got me a prescription for birth control pills. By taking a larger dose of the pill I could get the same protection from pregnancy as with Plan B.
Luckily it worked and I did not get pregnant. If I had I know that I would have had an abortion.
It makes no sense to me that those who are against abortion are also against Plan B. Plan B is not the abortion pill. Plan B does not cause abortion. Plan B protects against Pregnancy.
If this happened today I could go to any pharmacy and get Plan B and I for one am thrilled that 17 year olds will also have that same privlige.
March 19, 2009
· Filed under dating
So instead of sitting around waiting for a cross between Taye Diggs and Keith Olbermann to knock on my door I signed up for an online dating site.
And now I want to slap myself.
Oh and for the record I told the truth on the “do you have kids questions” so that will limit my responses.
March 18, 2009
· Filed under Adoption, Race, venting
Today I saw a blog about a couple who are in the adoption process. They recently discovered they cannot afford a white baby but are “ok” with Black or Mixed (they said AA but I prefer the term Black so thats what I’m going to use on my blog).
The blog writer expressed anger at a system that prices Black babies differently than White. And yet is still going forward with the agency. Still paying them to provide a baby. Still tacitly approving their practices.
Why can’t PAPs understand that by funding these agencies they are condoning these practices. Why can’t they understand that until they stop funding these agencies NOTHING will change.
Or maybe they do understand. Maybe they just don’t care.
And while I”m venting I also want to point out that being “ok” with a Black or mixed baby because you can’t afford a White one made me throw up a little in my mouth. Perhaps it was poor word choice but seriously?
Oh and for all those PAPs who decide that mixed is the way to go because a Black child would have a harder time adjusting to their location. Guess what! Mixed children are going to have the same problems. Being partially Black is being Black plus another race it’s not being “less” Black.
And as a side note I’m mixed the Critic is full Black and I’m darker than him so if you’re hoping for a mixed baby for a lighter skin tone you may not get your wish.
March 13, 2009
· Filed under venting
My glasses just broke! Prior to losing my wonderful health coverage I got a new pair of glasses. I splurged and bought the ones with the bling. Because really who doesn’t like to sparkle. Today I took them off to clean the lenses and SNAP right in the middle. GeishaGirl, my roommate, and her Boyfriend were on the receiving end of my initial rant as I blindly rummaged through my bathroom draw for a pair of contact.
I dont wear contacts anymore and thought I”d thrown them all out but thank god I hadn’t. I have one pair of contacts and they are currently being worn. I have one pair of broken glasses. I have no money, a very part time job, and no health insurance of any kind.
And just for the record they are FENDI they aren’t supposed to break!
March 11, 2009
· Filed under Adoption, Grad School
A couple months ago I began to really educate myself on adoptee rights. At the same time I began pondering possible research questions for my most recent grad school project. So while staring at the claim that give in adult adoptees back the access to their birth certificates would increase abortion and decrease adoption I wondered why there wasn’t any research to refute this B.S. Soon after I decided to fix that.
So tonight I presented my research proposal which is based on two fabulous (if i do say so myself) research questions: Hο 1: Would opening adoption records, specifically original birth certificates, decrease the likelihood of women relinquishing their parental rights through domestic infant adoption? and Hο 2: Do open adoption records, specifically original birth certificates, increase abortion rates?
(Side note: why did I have to improvise to type out my null hypothesis? They supply the option of the numerals 1-3 in super script but not a zero in subscript. )
Earlier in the quarter I was disappointed to figure out that there was no way to make my study publishable at least not in the time constraints I had to meet for the class project. Well tonight I was informed I may not even be able to complete it for the class project.
Apparently the questions I’ve concocted to address Hο 1 have the remotest chance of being triggering which means in order to ethically ask them I have to supply counseling…just in case. Since this is obviously a class project and not a funded study I have no way to pay for counseling to be available. Not to mention there aren’t really any counselors that are competent in working with birth/first parents.
I suggested that since it will be an online survey that I create a thread at a.com under birth parent support and that anyone triggered could discuss it there and work through it with the help of other birth/first parents. No go. And this from a prof whose specialty is online counseling.
I gave in and suggest I only do Hο 2 since it only deal with examining date that has already been compiled and would not run the risk of me triggering anyone. This also did not please the professor. Oh and did I mention he’d like me to re-visit the possibility of making it publishable. I only have 12 weeks from today to complete it! yeah right.
So here I am mourning the buzz that is almost all worn off and contemplating a reserach project I thought I had in the bag. Spring break technically started 3 hours and 24 minutes ago. Maybe I’ll go to bed and not think about it until next quarter starts…
March 9, 2009
· Filed under Adoption, Friends, Grad School, Pets, Roommates, Unemployment, family
I like to think I have a pretty firm handle on my adoption grief. But sometimes it rears its head in unexpected ways.
I got my first pet in December. Yes at the age of 25 I had never before had a pet. When my friends and I moved into a our current house there was a stray cat on the cul-de-sac. A neighbor began feeding her and put out a cat bed and heated blanket. We later found out that the neighbor could not take her in because of severe allergies and so she was looking for someone take this stray.
In December we had our first rediculous snow store of the season and my roommates brought the cat inside. Each of them already has a cat and I suggested the new cat be taken to the vet so as not to pass any illness to their cats. Well after a few days I was talked into becoming the owner of this cat.
I didn’t particularly want a cat. I wanted a dog, or an exotic bird. But I started to fall for this cat. My roommates had taken to calling her Oreo because she’s black and white I re-named her Cookie because I find the term Oreo offensive. I took her to the vet and bought all sorts of cat supplies. I let her sleep in my bed.
And then about 2 weeks into my new pet ownership I got a text while I was at the movies. Apparently Cookie had used the carpet instead of the litter box and my roommate had put her outside. I was beside myself through the whole movie. Worried about cookie, angry that I hadn’t even been consulted, and confused by my very strong reaction.
Turns out two of my adoption fears were triggered in that episode. 1- I had failed as a mother and now I was failing as a pet owner 2-I had no control over the situation.
The control piece came into play recently as well. I’ve been in a funk for a few weeks now, feeling stuck in my life. Its not that my life is awful. I just felt stuck. I think I’ve figure out that while I’m glad I’m in grad school it means that I need to stay put until June 2010. I dont like not having the option of moving. Even more so since my very part time job isn’t even enough to support myself I can’t go away for a weekend or even go out at night with my friends. I feel powerless in my life.
I was never a controling person. I’ve always been a laid back go with the flow type of girl. But apparently not anymore. Of course I can’t prove it’s adoption related. It could just be me changing as I age. But the more I think about it the more I keep coming back to adoption.
Oh and btw my roommate and I are on speaking terms again. Cookie doesn’t really like to be inside but I make her stay in when the weather is bad but I have to keep her in line of sight at all times to make sure she doesn’t pee on the carpet.
March 5, 2009
· Filed under family
Thank you everyone for your kind words and thoughts. The funeral went as well as a funeral can go and I am not back in the land of rain. The only positive I can think of is that although I left the sun behind I can now access the internet on a real computer instead of trying to read blogs on my phone.
Yes I am that addicted that I actually sat in my great grandmother’s house (well I guess it’s my aunts house now) and read your blogs via my phone. I now have tons of homework to work on but instead I’m going to try to remember all the comments I wanted to make while I was away…I know I jotted them down somewhere…
