I will never forget meeting my half-sister and discovering that our way of walking and moving is so identical that in any video taken from behind, you literally cannot tell us apart (that sounds weird as I'm writing it out, but...you know what I mean). The sheer JOY of seeing myself reflected in another human being (even though we bear virtually no physical resemblance to each other) was indescribable. I'm biracial, and have only met my b-mom, who's white, and her relatives-and I clearly 100% take after my father's side of the family. But-- in one (and only one) photo of a first cousin, taken from a particular angle, I could actually see myself in someone else's face for the first time in my life. It literally took my breath away and made my spirit dance for WEEKS. "It is perhaps easier not to notice the presence of something one has always taken for granted."--exactly! And, perhaps, even harder to understand just how much unarticulated grief one experiences in its absence. Thanks so much for this beautifully written piece!
Wow. So much of what you talk about reminds me of the first time I impulsively bought a book I saw on a shelf in a bookstore, which also talks about these issues: “Being Adopted: The Lifelong Search for Self,” by
David M. Brodzinsky, Robin Marantz Henig, and Marshall D. Schecter. When my brother was searching for his birth family, I sent him a copy.
I always wanted to know who gave birth to me. When I was very young, I told people proudly my parents chose me, I grew inside another Mommy’s belly. Until my adoptive mother talked to me and it was good that I knew and understand that, but I needed to stop telling everybody I met.
That’s my first memory of the cognitive dissonance necessary to existing as a person who has nothing but a black hole in place of knowing who one is, who and where and what one comes from. I do remember relatives and friends and even strangers saying to my parents, “How can you take in a stranger’s child? You don’t know what you’re getting.” Also too many references to me not being a “blood relative.” As you know, the confusion and questions - both around and within me - never ended.
I wanted to find my birthmother, if for nothing else, to thank her for giving me life and let her know I was alive and had a good clean home, was loved. I had met enough birthmothers along the way that I understood they too suffer trauma from relinquishing their infant or child (not always willingly, not always having been given a choice). I didn’t really care about the sperm donor, that’s how I had been taught to think of him. What kind of man leaves a woman pregnant, alone, and worst of all, unmarried. That was a big deal back in the day.
Although we are not currently in communication, I treasure my experiences in searching, finding and spending years getting to know my birthmother and her family. My fears of being rejected were wrong. She wept with joy when I first called her and we talked a very long time. I told her I didn’t care about the birthfather. I had been pregnant, had three babies, so I knew darn well she hadn’t forgotten me. Who could? We talked and exchanged letters and photos. She visited me twice and then I visited her home, which she had always offered. This was a cross-country drive that took me a few days. Perhaps because I took my three small children with me.
The genetic mirroring is truly a fact. Very powerful. My children played with big tubs of her (then grown) children had played with and she insisted they call her Granny, a name she chose to be uniquely hers, as they already had two grandmothers. It was a trip which unsurprisingly became interrupted at my adoptive mother’s instruction. (No, not at all surprising.) I had a minor illness, though did not even need medical care. She used that as evidence that I was incapable of driving us home. She bought a round trip airline ticket and sent my husband out. Her plan was he would drive the two older children home and I would fly back with the baby.
My birthmother was driving me and the baby to the airport. She said she had to tell me something important. She said she knew the moment she saw me that the birthfather was not who she had always believed he was. I scrambled for a scrap of paper and a pen from my purse amongst the bags at my feet. She told me a name and story, different from what she had been saying thus far.
I never found any information at all about that name. It’s hard to know whether there’s simply no record of that man, a possibly undocumented immigrant, or whether she was worried I would change my mind and search for the first name she’d given me.
I still have a photo of us in my kitchen, the two of us laughing, smiling, arms around each other’s waists. It’s on my nightstand. And yes, I have photos of my adoptive parents.
I say if a parent can love more than one child, then why can’t a child love more than one parent? We see that often in stepfamilies, and in many other unique family constellations.
I’ll finish by saying Congrats on your marriage! And I can’t wait to read the rest of your essays.
Thank you, Tony. I'm from California, where private, closed adoption remains legal, along with sealed birth certificates. I may never know who my parents are or experience mirroring. It's a strange way to be.
I will never forget meeting my half-sister and discovering that our way of walking and moving is so identical that in any video taken from behind, you literally cannot tell us apart (that sounds weird as I'm writing it out, but...you know what I mean). The sheer JOY of seeing myself reflected in another human being (even though we bear virtually no physical resemblance to each other) was indescribable. I'm biracial, and have only met my b-mom, who's white, and her relatives-and I clearly 100% take after my father's side of the family. But-- in one (and only one) photo of a first cousin, taken from a particular angle, I could actually see myself in someone else's face for the first time in my life. It literally took my breath away and made my spirit dance for WEEKS. "It is perhaps easier not to notice the presence of something one has always taken for granted."--exactly! And, perhaps, even harder to understand just how much unarticulated grief one experiences in its absence. Thanks so much for this beautifully written piece!
Wow. So much of what you talk about reminds me of the first time I impulsively bought a book I saw on a shelf in a bookstore, which also talks about these issues: “Being Adopted: The Lifelong Search for Self,” by
David M. Brodzinsky, Robin Marantz Henig, and Marshall D. Schecter. When my brother was searching for his birth family, I sent him a copy.
I always wanted to know who gave birth to me. When I was very young, I told people proudly my parents chose me, I grew inside another Mommy’s belly. Until my adoptive mother talked to me and it was good that I knew and understand that, but I needed to stop telling everybody I met.
That’s my first memory of the cognitive dissonance necessary to existing as a person who has nothing but a black hole in place of knowing who one is, who and where and what one comes from. I do remember relatives and friends and even strangers saying to my parents, “How can you take in a stranger’s child? You don’t know what you’re getting.” Also too many references to me not being a “blood relative.” As you know, the confusion and questions - both around and within me - never ended.
I wanted to find my birthmother, if for nothing else, to thank her for giving me life and let her know I was alive and had a good clean home, was loved. I had met enough birthmothers along the way that I understood they too suffer trauma from relinquishing their infant or child (not always willingly, not always having been given a choice). I didn’t really care about the sperm donor, that’s how I had been taught to think of him. What kind of man leaves a woman pregnant, alone, and worst of all, unmarried. That was a big deal back in the day.
Although we are not currently in communication, I treasure my experiences in searching, finding and spending years getting to know my birthmother and her family. My fears of being rejected were wrong. She wept with joy when I first called her and we talked a very long time. I told her I didn’t care about the birthfather. I had been pregnant, had three babies, so I knew darn well she hadn’t forgotten me. Who could? We talked and exchanged letters and photos. She visited me twice and then I visited her home, which she had always offered. This was a cross-country drive that took me a few days. Perhaps because I took my three small children with me.
The genetic mirroring is truly a fact. Very powerful. My children played with big tubs of her (then grown) children had played with and she insisted they call her Granny, a name she chose to be uniquely hers, as they already had two grandmothers. It was a trip which unsurprisingly became interrupted at my adoptive mother’s instruction. (No, not at all surprising.) I had a minor illness, though did not even need medical care. She used that as evidence that I was incapable of driving us home. She bought a round trip airline ticket and sent my husband out. Her plan was he would drive the two older children home and I would fly back with the baby.
My birthmother was driving me and the baby to the airport. She said she had to tell me something important. She said she knew the moment she saw me that the birthfather was not who she had always believed he was. I scrambled for a scrap of paper and a pen from my purse amongst the bags at my feet. She told me a name and story, different from what she had been saying thus far.
I never found any information at all about that name. It’s hard to know whether there’s simply no record of that man, a possibly undocumented immigrant, or whether she was worried I would change my mind and search for the first name she’d given me.
I still have a photo of us in my kitchen, the two of us laughing, smiling, arms around each other’s waists. It’s on my nightstand. And yes, I have photos of my adoptive parents.
I say if a parent can love more than one child, then why can’t a child love more than one parent? We see that often in stepfamilies, and in many other unique family constellations.
I’ll finish by saying Congrats on your marriage! And I can’t wait to read the rest of your essays.
Toys.
“My children played with big tubs of ____ her (then grown) children had played with”
Thank you, Tony. I'm from California, where private, closed adoption remains legal, along with sealed birth certificates. I may never know who my parents are or experience mirroring. It's a strange way to be.