I'm Not Proud of This ...

I'm really not. And I wonder if I'm going to get a lot of vitriol for voicing this. But my current blogging philosophy is that it's best to be completely honest about my feelings and experiences because trying to paint a pretty picture isn't going to help anyone.

I need to make something abundantly clear, first and foremost: I am NOT for one second referring to P and M in any part of this. They are, in my mind, what every adoptive couple should be in patience and attitude and love. None of what I have to say applies to them AT ALL. I love them more dearly than I can say and if anyone even so much as thinks anything unkind about them, I will beat that person up.

That said ...

Sometimes - rarely, really, but every now and then - I get irritated by the attitudes of some hopeful adoptive couples. There, I said it.

I don't get irritated by many of them, and as I said, it's something rare. I love adoption and I think it's heartbreaking how many wonderful couples can't have children the typical way. Heck, I've got two pages of links to adoptive couple blogs in the hopes that maybe I can play some small part in helping their birth moms find them.

I try to go through my link lists fairly regularly to make sure I don't have any bad or invalid links. For the most part, I like reading their blogs as well. It helps me to feel that I've made the right decision for my little Roo.

But every so often I'll read something in one or two of their blogs that just grates at me. There's no kind way to explain it - no way of putting it that will make me seem any less juvenile and petty and selfish.

It's something that I'm guilty of, myself, which makes me a hypocrite, and I am acutely aware of that. It's something that everyone is guilty of at some point in this adoption thing, and I certainly don't fault anyone for it. It's just sometimes I get sick of it.

Desperation.

I'm not going to pretend that I can even for a second imagine the agony of the seemingly interminable wait to be chosen. I've never been on that side of it, and I hope and pray that I never will. I feel I can relate a little to the insecurity, the doubt - why not me yet? What is it about me that has kept me from being picked? - because I am single with no love life to speak of, and although I'm probably going to get crap for saying this, I think there are certain similarities in being single and wanting to get married and in being approved and waiting to be chosen.

I'll duck for a moment to avoid the rotted fruit being tossed in my direction.

All done?

Good.

But therein lies some of my beef with why-haven't-we-been-picked-yet desperation. And let me state again, I know how cruel and insensitive this is going to sound, and I am not the least bit proud of myself. When I read that sort of thing on a blog, my knee-jerk reaction is, hey, folks, count your blessings. You've got each other. You're sealed to one another. You've got something, even if it's not exactly what you always planned. No, you don't have children, and maybe you never will. But you have each other, and you've been approved to adopt. You have been found worthy to be parents.

Birth moms never get that official seal of approval.

And birth moms rarely have birth fathers involved to be there with them, to share the burden and the pain. I don't have a good man by my side to say no, we don't have a baby, but we've got each other. In my case, I don't even have a father around for support.

As a single pregnant woman, there is nowhere you can go for validation - no one to tell you that they've looked into your finances and your emotional health and relationship skills and everything else and found you to be a perfectly acceptable mother. The attitude is so often the opposite - you were stupid enough to get into this mess. You can't even take control of your own life. What makes you think you could possibly be responsible for someone else's? No one will tell you that you will make an excellent mother and that any child would be lucky to be in your care.

I searched for that kind of validation during my pregnancy. I couldn't find a single soul who thought I should keep my baby. No one on earth, not even my own mother, thought I could be or do enough for my child. I was found lacking. Not only did my baby's father desert me, but those close to me, whom I loved and admired and respected, also felt I simply wasn't enough, nor could I ever be. Those who knew me best found me lacking.

Adoptive couples have relative strangers - adoption agencies, caseworkers - telling them they are wonderful people, that they've lived lives of example and responsibility, that they've made the very best choices and will be wonderful parents.

Birth mothers have people who know them through and through telling them their babies deserve better than to have them as a mom.

When I was pregnant, I remember hearing someone say that it wasn't fair that so many loving, wonderful couples couldn't have children. The person who said it went on to imply that, as a knocked-up skank, I owed such a couple a child - they deserved to be parents and I didn't. My attitude, once I'd gotten past my initial offense, was that no, it wasn't fair that these couples were childless. But you know what else wasn't fair? I was single. These couples had each other, at least. Whom did I have? No one. Just my baby. They had each other for eternity. I had no such guarantee. This might be the only child I ever had, my only chance at a family. Yeah, their lives were unfair. But you know what? Injustice abounds. And I don't owe anyone anything.

I was wrong about that last bit, of course. I owed Roo the best I could possibly give her, and once Heavenly Father made sure I knew that, and told me who her parents were supposed to be, I gave it to her.

My point is ... well, okay, I'm not sure I have one. I guess it would be to be grateful for what you've got, even if it's not what you thought you wanted. I've come to realize over the past few months that this time I have as a single adult is going to benefit me. I am going to enjoy it while it lasts. I am going to study and travel and organize my life so that when, God willing, the time comes that I do marry, and have children (or not - there are no guarantees) - I will be a better version of myself, better prepared to be a wife and mother. I want to be happy just as I am - single and childless and slightly chunky. I want to learn to be happy without a man. I want to be responsible for my own happiness, instead of waiting for someone to ride in on a white horse and do it for me.

I think that having that kind of attitude - that I'd be happy with, but I can be happy without - is going to make me more attractive to men, and I think that there are certain parallels in adoption.

A birth mom doesn't want to read that your life is miserable without children. She doesn't want to feel that your happiness hinges on a baby. The most appealing thing to a birth mother (in my opinion, anyway) is a couple who wants a baby very badly, but who are making the most of life without one because they know that it will happen when it's meant to happen, if it's meant to happen at all.

And now I'd like to apologize for being immature and petty and selfish and whiny and rude and inconsiderate. It's a bit of a departure for me (don't laugh) and it's not something I plan on revisiting. I just needed to get it out, and if you've made it this far, then God bless you, little buddy. Because this was quite a rant.