Boo hasn't asked me. Yet. I don't look forward to it. I've thought about my answer, "I don't know. But I know I love you. Forever." But now I wonder.
Oh yes, there is what God intended. Then what happened in the Garden - that Eve will bear her children in pain. Then the quick descent - the twisting and distorting of what was meant to be: The bond of mother and child, reflecting the bond of the Father and the Son. Rent apart. A friend of mine said she felt like an alien was growing in her body. I've seen and heard other moms cry as their bodies decieved them - bloated, dysfunctional, their lovely legs growing purple webs.
Did she love her son? my son? Did she look into his eyes? Did she hold him at her side? Was she resentful knowing that keeping him would be too difficult to bear? She gave him to me - unknown me. Was she willing? anguished? relieved? She didn't name him. Why not? Was it too hard? Did she try not to care? Did she, in fact, not care?
Is it possible that a woman can grow a baby inside of her, see his shriveled little face and red clenched hands and not love him? If she were indifferent, did that brittle indifference get birthed from an anguished bitter heart, choked out by human weeds but still rooted in Eden?
Do I need to change my answer?
11 comments:
I agonize over my answer to this question too. When A and E were born, there was such a huge,fierce love. However, as you wrote, was there already some resentment or guarding of my son's birthmom's heart--knowing what the end result would be? I also don't know which one is easier for me to handle either. Such a hard question when so many of the answers are missing.
Jen (Gotcha)
The conversation we had tonight:
Me: Do you think your birthmom loved you?
C: She made a bad decision.
Me: Do you think she loved you?
C: Yes...until she had to leave me.
He said it with confidence. And the innocence of not being able to imagine that someone wouldn't love him. These days he thinks pretty highly of himself. =) I'm sure this is something that will be with him forever, with differing guesses each time.
I've missed your blog...I've been away.
Powerful words and emotions. Lots to think about on this Mother's Day!
Have a wonderfully beautiful one and enjoy the feeling of being 100% MOM because you are!
Very hard stuff. Impossible to know. I wonder constantly how we'll handle it with our kids and what to say. Good post!
I have always thought that I would answer yes to this question with the girls. I think this because in China they easily could have been aborted or killed after birth. So somewhere in this tragic event of abandoning your child the birthmother had to choose to love them enough to hope that someone would adopt them rather than let them perish. Also with no information to prove otherwise the answer has to be yes there was love for the emotional stress would be greater for the girls. We will never know because we have no way of knowing who their birthparents are so no one can tell them otherwise. It is such a tough thing to deal with though. No answer will ever be 100% right or wrong.
But in this I am sure, you are his mother and your love for him is absolute. So that is the best thing about Mother's Day.
Julie, good points - esp about killing them. I think for your situation, your answer is absolutely right. For me, I think I'm coming to realize that it is "yes," for more complicated reasons than I had thought about previously.
All I have to offer was said by Julie. She loved him enough to keep him alive. To care enough for her body to support a pregnancy. To deliver him into the hands of people who would take care of him.
If it means anything, the love I had for Jacob when he was first born was feral, innate, raw. Nothing like what it is now. I'm wondering if J's mom felt that. I could have given Jacob up at birth, if needed or forced. I could not have given him up weeks afterwards, I would have rather died.
This may be the hardest question an adoptive parent must face. But nothing compared to what our children go through as they ponder the answer. I'm glad you wrote about it here.
Hugs, hope all is well in your world.
I've read your post and the comments over and over again today. Probably 25 times. My son has not asked this yet, either. He's 3 and is just beginning to understand the concept of adoption. Birthmother is not yet something he grasps. But, one day he will. And what do I say? I love him...God how I love him. But my love is not the question...
I believe the chances that these children were loved by their birth mothers far outweigh the likelihood that they were not. Julie stated the main, basic reasons for this.
Not all of these babies were "abandoned" by their mothers. Rather, they were surrendered, an act of protection, for the sake of giving their child a future and a hope.
When I was on the missionfield, I once accompanied a young lady when she signed papers to give up her newborn for adoption. It nearly tore her heart out. But she did it for the sake of her baby.
Post a Comment