Today I had coffee with Sweetpea (umm... not her real name) who is Rupi's birth mum.
It was good.
There is a wholesomeness about her relationship with us and with Rupi. It's simple and pure. There seems to be very little clutter about it and I love it and her. As we get to know each other more and more she is opening up like a flower and asking for things. In a way that is really non-threatening to me. Things that she needs, like texts from me when Rupi does something for the first time. Simple. Do-able and wholesome. And I have longed for her to say what she needs because we would do anything for her.
I have struggled with adoption, I think you have to be made of stone not to. But mostly it's with the extended birth families and what I sense from them. Nothing bad at all, I just sense their desperation in a way. A perfectly natural and understandable desperation and grief. It has made me very uncomfortable and I have struggled with my "right" to be Rupi's mom around them. They are such wonderful people and would die if they knew this was how I had felt... but I have. I wish I wasn't so sensitive to others emotions but I am and God made me that way. It's almost always a good thing, but not so much in this case.
There is nothing in that desperation in our relationship with Sweetpea. There's grief for sure but because she chose this way and chose life for Rupi and chose us, the desperation is not there. I guess for the rest of the family, this was chosen for them and that's why it's so hard.
She is such an amazing young girl and is all of 16 years old. The choice she made was the hard one, only a handful make that choice each year while 17,000 choose to abort. Hers was the path filled with criticism and pointing of fingers. Her friends deserted her. She was a 14 year old alone socially. Hers was the hard path.
I thank God for her. She gave Rupi life and in doing, gave us new life (and hope and joy and laughter) As a person who's love language is gifts, I am overwhelmed at the gift Sweetpea gave us.
She is pretty special and it's all good.
She is pretty special and it's all good.
3 comments:
Sammy-
Anytime you post about your adoption journey I am amazed at how many similar feelings I have. Thank you for your honesty, it means more to me then you will ever know!
Hi, Gail told me about your blog today. I'm glad I stopped by and I'm looking forward to looking around a bit more this evening.
We adopted our son internationally and we were able to meet his birth mother and I so appreciated hearing the things you said here. Our situations are a bit different, but I have felt many of these same feelings. Thank you for sharing!
...And I love the name Rueben! :)
Beautiful to read - it's so lovely you can have that relationship with Rueben's birth mother.
We work with youth and I always love to hear of the positiveness that comes out of choosing to adopt, even though it can be such a hard decision.
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