Birth Mom – The World As I See It

Adoption Thoughts- A Hard Year

June 21, 2016

I wanted to do another post in my adoption thoughts series because I haven’t done one in awhile. If you want to read any of my past posts in this series, you can click here to check them out. This post is going to be about how hard this year has been since I

July 7th will mean that eleven years has gone by since I placed my daughter for adoption. I can’t believe it has been that long since I had her. I have found myself thinking more and more about her this year, and I think that is because I had to put Alley Cat to sleep earlier this year.

I have always said that Alley was my replacement baby, and now that she is gone I can’t stop being taken back eleven years. There are some days that it seems like it all just happened a few days ago. I can still remember all the feelings and how I felt the moment I handed her off to her parents.

I feel like I just can’t wait for this year just to be over so that I won’t have to think about it anymore. Even as I type that, I know that just because her birthday passes it won’t just go away. I know that only time will make it not hurt as much, and I hate waiting for time to pass because it seems to take forever.

There isn’t anything that I want to say other than that I am struggling with everything this year. I just want to go to sleep and not wake up until the middle of July. I know that it won’t make it better or make it hurt less, but I hope that by getting the thoughts out of my head and written down will help me deal with it all. That is all I have to say, and I am hoping to have another post about adoption up on her birthday.

*I did write a post earlier this year about saying goodbye to Alley so if you want to check that out, you can click here to read that post.

Adoption Thoughts-Birth Father’s Rights

February 2, 2016

I haven’t written about adoption in a long time because I never had the time to sit down and write anything other than a book review. Since things have pretty much slowed down for me at work right now, I wanted just to write about one of the thoughts I have had for awhile because I keep hearing stories about it in the news.

It seems like every time I turn around I am hearing about mothers placing baby’s for adoption and not telling the fathers what they are doing. It makes me sad because then those of us who followed all the steps including having the birth father sign away their rights are looked at like we might have done the same thing.

When I placed my daughter, I had no option but to have him sign away his rights because he was in the military and had to for me to place. I do know that some girls I knew through a support group I attend had the fathers of their child sign the papers as well just so that they didn’t have to worry about something like this happening.

I have to wonder if the birth father was okay with it until his family decided that they weren’t. I could be wrong but at times, that is what it seems like when you see the stories. I am sure there are cases where the birth fathers honestly didn’t know, and I feel terrible for them because no one should have that done to them. In the end, though everyone ends up getting hurt most of the time the child truly suffers because they don’t understand what is going on.

In the end, though everyone ends up getting hurt most of the time the child truly experiences because they don’t understand what is going on. They have no idea why they are taken away from all they have known and being given to strangers. I am aware that we have no way of knowing how this will affect them later in life or things like that.

I just truly feel bad for everyone involved and I hope that people can figure out a way to stuff like this to not happen anymore. Those are just a few of the thoughts I have been having, and I am wondering what you think about it and if you have any ideas as to how it could be changed?

Hi My Name Is. . .

October 23, 2014

This week for the writers workshop I am going to write about number 2 : Hi, my name is ______ and I am a _______. There are so many ways that I could answer that question so I just put the first thing that came to my mind. I think this came to my mind the first because I have been really struggling with being a birth mom. I am sure the thing that triggered my feelings now has watched my nephew grow up over the past year. It has made me see first hand everything that I missed out on when it comes to my daughter. It has also made start to ask the what if type questions. I haven’t ever really asked myself those types of questions because I know it was the right choice and know that those questions never get you anywhere in the long run.

I feel like I always have to say that just because I am asking myself the what if’s that I don’t regret my choice. I know that I did the right thing for both of us but that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t still hurt from time to time. Just because I hurt doesn’t mean I regret my choice. I can’t help but wonder where I would be and what my life would be like had I made different choices.

I do now know without a doubt that I don’t want kids and I am 100% okay with that choice. People tell me I will change my mind when I meet the right person and I can honestly say that they are wrong. I know I don’t have the patience let alone the energy that it takes to raise kids. I am glad I know this before I had anymore kids because it isn’t fair to have kids and not be able to take care of them and be there for them.

I got a little bit off topic but that happens in my world. If you are new here and want to know about my story you can click here and check it out.

How would you answer this sentence?

Just a quick note: I was looking through my archives looking for another post and I saw that I had already done a post like this back in November of 2013 you can click here if you want to check out that post as well!

Adoption Thoughts-Judging

September 5, 2014

This week for adoption thoughts I am going to write about something that was said to me that made me sad for many reasons but I also wanted to see how other people would feel if this was said to them. A few weeks ago I had a friend who adopted her first child tell me that she felt like I judge her because of her parenting and that she bet I was glad that I didn’t place my daughter with her.

First off I don’t ever judge anyone and their parenting choices because they are doing what they know and just because my parenting choice was different than theirs doesn’t mean that mine was right and that their choices are wrong or vice versa. All I know about parenting is that the choice I made was right for me and my daughter other than that as long as you aren’t abusing your kids I don’t care the choices you make for your family.

Now on to when she said that she bet I was glad I didn’t place my daughter with her. I am glad I didn’t place my daughter with her because my daughter wasn’t meant for her or her family. She was meant to be where she is. If my daughter had been meant for her than that is where I would have placed her but she wasn’t. Like I said before I don’t judge anyone on their choices and if I had to go through it all again I know I would place my child where she was meant to be and it wouldn’t matter who those people were.

One thing that has always bothered me about mothers is how they are always judging each other. Being a mom is a hard job so instead of judging we should be helping each other. I have always said that I wouldn’t want to raise kids in today’s world so I know I would have any children but if I do change my mind I would want help from people who have done it before me. I always get sad when I mom’s attacking each other because of choices they make for their family. You may not agree with someone’s choices but that doesn’t make the wrong and that is no reason to judge them or bully them. This post went somewhere I didn’t think it would but I am going to leave it because it is true and something I think needs to be said.

Adoption Thoughts: Being Sad

August 21, 2014

This week for adoption thoughts I am going to talk about something that I have heard over and over that just doesn’t make any sense to me. If you have missed the past adoption thoughts post you can click here and read them. For today’s post I am first going to list a couple of definitions of words that I am going to be talking about in today’s post:

Sad

[sad] Spell Syllables

adjective, sadder, saddest.

affected by unhappiness or grief; sorrowful or mournful:

to feel sad because a close friend has moved away.

expressive of or characterized by sorrow:

sad looks; a sad song.

causing sorrow:

a sad disappointment; sad news.

(of color) somber, dark, or dull; drab.

deplorably bad; sorry:

a sad attempt.

Obsolete. firm or steadfast.

Source: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/sad?s=t

Regret

[ri-gret] Spell Syllables

verb (used with object), regretted, regretting.

to feel sorrow or remorse for (an act, fault, disappointment, etc.):

He no sooner spoke than he regretted it.

to think of with a sense of loss:

to regret one’s vanished youth.

noun

a sense of loss, disappointment, dissatisfaction, etc.

a feeling of sorrow or remorse for a fault, act, loss, disappointment,etc.

regrets, a polite, usually formal refusal of an invitation:

I sent her my regrets.

a note expressing regret at one’s inability to accept an invitation:

I have had four acceptances and one regret.

Source: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/regret?s=t

Now that you have read those 2 definitions let’s get onto why I am talking about them. I have had people say to me when I say I am sad about placing my daughter that “they know I made the right choice”. I know this is said out of love so it doesn’t make me mad in that sense that I am upset that they think I made the “right” choice. It upsets me just because I am sad about the situation doesn’t mean I regret my choice. You can be sad about something in your life and not regret the choice you made. I will never regret my choice because I know it was the right choice for me and for her. As you saw above them do have similar meanings but they aren’t the same thing.

I am sad about a few things from my past but I don’t regret anything I have gone through. I spent years regretting choices I made but I have come to realize that I am who I am today because of those choices. I just want people to know that just because someone is sad doesn’t mean that they think they made the wrong choice or the regret what got them to this point. It is okay to just be sad about things once in awhile. I guess this post was more for me than for other people but I wanted to share just another thing I deal with because I am a birth mom.

Adoption Thoughts: Things People Say

June 20, 2014

This week I am going to write another post in my adoption thoughts series. This post is going to be about my current thoughts on people telling me “I could never do what you did” and “You are so strong”. There are times when hearing these things don’t really bother me and I will just say thank you to them but then there are times like right now when hearing both of these things just get on my nerves.

When people say “I could never do what you did” it usually leaves me just staring at them because how do you really respond to something like that. Up until recently I haven’t really said things back to anyone but now I almost always say “unless you have been in the same situation you don’t know what you would be able to do”. I know people just say this because they don’t think they could do it but I didn’t think I could do it either until I was in the situation. I never thought that placing a baby for adoption was something I could handle but once I was pregnant with her I knew without a doubt that it was something that I had to do. I mean who grows up thinking that they are going to give birth to a child and then place that child for adoption.

Now when people tell me I am so strong this quote always pops into my head:

Being strong is always relative to the person. Like the quote says you won’t know what you can do or how strong you are until you have to face it and deal with whatever is happening to you.

I guess the whole thing for me is that I just did what I had to do in the situation that I found myself in. I know in parts of this post I sound harsh but this is how I feel some days and I don’t want to sugarcoat things or make is seem like these things don’t really bother me. I have spent many years not talking about how things make me feel and I don’t want to do that anymore. For the first time I want to be honest with others and even myself.

If there is anything about adoption that you would like me to talk about please let me know and I will work on it for you.