Where do you start when you are ready to start your book. The one that you have heard more than a dozen people tell you to write.
Well, I think you should start by writing it. Whatever it is that comes out must be what they meant when they made their suggestion and gave their strong encouragement. They must have listened to the words flowing out of your mouth at a mile a minute and felt so inspired by what they heard that they desired to have it in words, to read again and again, or perhaps they noticed that you really have so many things to say that it would be best for you to put them down on paper.
It is the starting place that gets me at times. The theme. The where to begin in this long life of mine. Do I start with the beginning? I have tried. But somewhere on the journey it is so far from where I am in the present moment that I become tired of having to finish the story to catch up to where we are. Because so much has happened and it happens so fast that if I write about what was I may never write about what is.
Blogging. The best of the writing world. I don’t have to commit myself to a book, at least not yet, I don’t have to start anywhere or have a climax and ending. I can tell you about today. Tell you about 10 years ago. Tell you about anything.
After all it is your choice to read whatever I put out. So I will leave it up to you.
I want to write about my journey. I named this beautiful blogging atmosphere learning joy. I am a big fan of names, after naming about 20 different businesses..some that have come to fruition and some that are dreams, I realized I just like creating names. I like words and I am understand more the power of words. The power of positivity and creating.
I heard recently that you inherit in your genes your capacity for joy or sadness, up to 50% I think they said. And please don’t quote me on this one but look it up yourself, this is just what I heard.
Of course becoming a new believer lends to a new inheritance but I do still think science wins here.
We aren’t all as naturally joyful as others. We don’t all receive the same genetic information the predisposes us to step into joy and we don’t all receive the same life experiences that make it easier to walk in this joy.
My life experiences were hard, challenging. Not the sweet fairy tale childhood that some get, many do not.
As I write I make it my effort to make all my words positive, it is a challenge to accurately describe my past without negatives, but I know the vibrations of negative words affect us all, and I will spare you as much as possible from going down.
Perhaps, I have thought, this blog or book, should be about adoption. My journey into becoming a birth mother...What a hilarious term, at least in my mind. I say it to myself and think about its meaning.
First you should know that I am a mother to 3 children. The label, the title, I am honored with here is, Mom. Yet, I really am only “mom” to 2 of the 3. To the 3rd,(which is actually, surprising to most) the middle child, I am Brammi.
It took us a while to find this title. It was painful for me to let go of my Mother name and receive this new term for this new experience. I see that it is helpful and best and in all ways I try to be accommodating and help my psyche to comprehend why.
To my sweet little one, my middle one, my one and only beautiful daughter, I am Brammi. To those who know her, I am her birth mother. The mother that birthed the babe, for the sister whose heart longed for one of her own. Not that my daughter’s mother is truly my sister and not that I planned this baby for her…just the unfolding and the weaving together that the Spirit does in our lives.
This must be the thing I need to write about because there is much to say and sharing the story with audible words is sometimes like pulling teeth. I would rather not. Rather not go there, rather not bring it all up, rather not have some misunderstand me, or the impact that this had on my life and my heart.
In the beginning that was such a challenge. Telling someone and not having their understanding, so I would have to tell the whole story. The whole story of where I was, who I was, what happened, what God did for me, what God asked of me, and how he healed me. It is long and I long for others to know and understand, but I don’t desire to tell everyone of you face to face. Sometimes they cry and I don’t, sometimes I cry and they don’t. Sometimes there just isn’t time and so I will begin to now refer all these that ask in the future to come to this place where they can read for themselves this journey of motherhood.
I entered motherhood at a young age. I was 16 when I became pregnant with my first, beautiful son. I recall being a young girl and dreaming of having children, lots of them, from every nation.
I grew up with a mostly absentee biological father, a few bad boyfriends, and then an angry, abusive, addict step-father.
I know from most learning that the absence of a father greatly effects children. In girls their identity, their value, their hearts are never affirmed, cherished, loved, when the father is gone or full of hate.
The damage this does for a daughter is severe and plays out differently for each child. I didn’t know my worth growing up. I longed for attention from men, young and old.
I didn’t know as a young girl that I needed the love of a daddy, I didn’t know that God was my daddy, and I didn’t know the way God felt about me. I didn’t know protection.
I didn’t know my identity. I was hungry for love. Yearning for love and attention and acceptance from men. I see this when I look at young girls, and I know their pain and I understand the reason.
I endured sexual abuse as a child. I won’t go into any details but that this too was a drive for me to be sexually active at a young age.
So, at age 16 I became pregnant. I was 5 hours north of my hometown and was at a party with mutual friends. It didn’t seem odd, crazy, or bizarre to me that a 16 year old travelled 5 hours north of her home by herself and hung out with people she befriended from the computer or hardly knew, this was fairly normal activity for me since I was 15. As a grown woman I would be shocked to hear about this, but I must remember the story.
Intoxicated by a few different substances I went home with a man I met at the party. My friends didn’t care enough to tell me not to, I was to drunk and high on cocaine to know not to, and so I went.
I woke up the next morning feeling very afraid and uncomfortable and glad to leave as soon as I could.
As soon as I returned home my heavy, broken heart knew that the life I was leading was sad and far from God. I had been reaching for God and been feeling his hands of love pursue me since I was a girl. So with my tattered heart I again turned over my life to the my creator and began to let Him heal and woe me back to wholeness.
A month later I turned 17. I knew that something was different on my birthday. I felt awful, hormonal, sore breasts, etc. Not long after I learned I was pregnant.
Telling my mom was a hurdle I had to face and the challenges we had were painful. Since that was so long ago and she is not that person and I will not go into details.
In the end she came around and became my biggest supporter for raising my beautiful, half black, son.
I didn’t know his dad. I didn't know his dad’s last name, my friend’s who I had known up north were not my friends any longer since I became a parent, and they had no connection to his dad anyways. I couldn't find him on social media and I was deeply saddened that I would never be able to tell him who his father was.
I wonder if I should now name this blog a list of God’s miracles, because as I write I will be obliged to tell again and again of the miraculous hand of God lovingly moving in my life.
When my son was about 7 months ago I got a call from a good friend asking me about my son’s dad. She already knew the details and we had spent time together trying to find him on social media, to no avail without the last name being known. She asked me again about him because she said that our mutual friend was telling her how much my son looked like a guy he had known when he lived up north, this guy happened to have the same name. I thought that was interesting, and very funny since I knew this family too and they had never told me about this resemblance, but I didn’t think it could be real. Our mutual friend had a picture of the same named look alike to my son, so I made a plan to go to their house the next day. Full of emotions I went, and unsure if I would recognize him, I looked at the photo from an old work party my friend had. Turns out….same guy. What?
Let us look at the facts. I live in a small town, I went to a church of about 30 people, out of those 30 people one family had lived 5 hours away and then moved back. When they lived away they had a job and one of their co-workers was dating a man, that man happened to be the biological father to my son whom I couldn’t for the life of me find. Wow. God you are so good.
The phone conversation that happened the next day was awkward and my son and I met his other side of the family when he was 9 months old. Turns out God is so good that the man and his family, who could have been any creep or weirdo, happened to be fairly normal and from a sweet family who loved God.
Even still the man was a grown up child and he continually failed to call or communicate with us to keep in touch with my son. He never sent money when I asked him. Never helped out financially except maybe buying some presents that weren’t even age appropriate every now and then (this is a relationship in progress and He is trying). I didn’t want to file for child support because I didn’t want to deal with custody issues and I wasn’t at all into the idea of sharing my son with a complete stranger. I was never financially helped and physically supported in raising my son from the time I was 17, except from my mom as she was able.
Fast forward through a lot of really amazing and hard and wild stories of me moving to the east coast twice and then ending up in northern, CA when my son was 4. I moved here from Philly to attend college with one of my best friend single mama friends from my home-town, which was 9 hours south.
A few months into moving here my best-friend left to go back to our home-town and I was alone with my son in a town I had never been in without any friends or church community.
Trouble brewing.
I became pregnant about 7 months into living here. I was going to be growing marijuana with a business friend and was thrilled to finally be able to make enough money to get off welfare.
I trusted my friend who was going to set me up in business and it was going to be legal and safe and the only real problem was I didn’t know how to grow weed.
The friends I had acquired while living there were very interesting. I suppose I was at a low point in life and my friend choices showed that clearly. With my desire to learn how to grow, I aligned myself with
those that knew, those in the industry, those who could teach me. They don’t just teach you for nothing…so of course my choices were male. I was lonely, so so lonely. I was far from God in my heart and I sought
men to fill this gap. The men I choose were bad choices…but ones who could help me in my new business. After one traumatic situation with a man another came to my rescue only to traumatize me more than
the first. I didn’t intend to sleep with him but after smoking who knows what, and apparently ovulating, I became pregnant again.
So there I was. Fairly young single mama living in the country, trying to go to college, trying to build and set up a warehouse to grow hydroponic herb, dealing with horrible morning sickness, staph infections, and a crazy meth addicted ,seriously scary, baby daddy. It was sad. I was sad. I made an appointment at planned parenthood. I cancelled it. I had to drop out of school. It got worse and worse and eventually I had to call the cops and send him to jail. He had a previous warrant out for his arrest and had to be locked up for at least 3 months. This 3 month period gave me time to make a plan. The plan was get as far away as possible so he couldn’t find me. Again the plan was, God I am so sorry…I have made a mess of my life without you.
Suffering post traumatic stress and pregnancy I decided I needed community again. God most certainly came in. He brought me a friend, who almost didn’t come but felt compelled to, who told me about Portland and the community of believers there. It sounded like what I was looking for and needing so I took my beat up old pick up truck and my son and drove 8 or more hours north to visit and see if we could find a room to rent in communal christian housing. The way God orchestrated that weekend is amazing. It stretched me, made me uncomfortable, and forced me to call and connect with people I didn’t want to. In the end all of the events led me to a craft fair. That didn’t seem to be very useful but it was fun to look at the amazing portland arts. While walking around with a newly made friend I became acquainted with one of her friends she ran into. This new person happened to be the wife to a pastor whose church I had e-mailed about communal housing and rooms for rent. How random? They didn’t have church services during the weekend so I wouldn’t have been able to meet her unless God intervened. She was aware of my e-mail and glad to meet me. She walked around with my son and I the rest of the day and had dinner with us before we left to head back down to where we were living. I got to hear her story and she got to hear mine. Her spirit was sweet, gentle, safe and I was able to share without feeling condemned. I wasn’t planning an adoption, and I wasn’t phased by the fact that her and her husband couldn’t get pregnant and wanted to adopt. The word adoption did come up before this meeting. Two christian friends mentioned it to me and I hated it. Then I looked online at a christian adoption webpage and crying my eyes out knew I could never pick a family. Meeting this new person was good, but I wasn’t moved to the idea of adoption, it was to heart wrenching and awful to think about. I loved my baby. I loved my children. I am a passionate mama who has always wanted little ones and I wanted this baby…I just wanted different circumstances and a different situation. I knew that she was a she before I found out. I knew that she would be born right around my birthday. I knew that she would be so much like me. I loved her and I felt so much pain.
We ended up moving to Washington state. One of my best friends and her daughter had moved there from the east coast and I needed her companionship. Portland was a new city with new people and in my trauma I couldn’t handle talking to people. I was a homeless mess with my truck packed full of our belongings and nowhere to live in Washington. We found a room to rent but the man, an older teacher, was a total creep. Another door opened and we moved into a trans gendered queer socially active permaculture communal house that was passionate about natural child birth and supporting single mamas. I certainly learned a lot being there. I was getting pretty pregnant by this point and couldn’t get a job. I lived on off of welfare, $400 something a month…a little more than my rent. I cried all the time. I felt stuck. Hopeless. I remember believing that I ruined my life. I had no hope and I hated Washington. I knew I couldn’t do it. Time went on and I just knew I couldn’t. I processed with a house mate and my best friend and I cried.
I knew after my daughter was born she would need to go to daycare soon after and my son to school so that I could get a job to make enough money to support us. I hated that idea. I knew she wouldn’t have a dad, just like my son who had grown up without one. Just like I grew up without one. I knew that I was broken. I began to consider adoption, though timidly and with so many walls in my heart. I emailed the woman I met in Portland and asked her if I decided to go the route of adoption if she and her husband would be interested, based on her story. I opened the door of communication about adoption…I took the first step off solid ground into new unknown territory. She of course said yes and she put me in contact with a woman they copastored with who had both been adopted and had children that she had adopted in an open adoption. This was my first learning about open adoption. Open adoption…for those who don’t know is much like it sounds. Instead of it be closed, children know who their birth parents are. They know their story. In different adoptions it looks different, for many open adoptions there is contact between the two families. Pictures, visits, etc. This helped soften my heart to the idea, knowing that if I chose that path that I wouldn’t loose my darling love forever.
I met with the woman and heard her story and her words, wisdom, advice, encouragement, no pressure to any decision. That meeting helped. I got to see a beautiful, strong woman who had endured the pain of letting her children go to be raised by a more capable set of parents who could meet their needs. I saw that she didn’t break into a million pieces and die but that she healed, she grew, she recovered from her loss to get married and have children. She has relationship with her children who ere adopted and their parents. This all helped my heart and mind.
I remember at some point I knew adoption was the route. I didn’t tell the family, in case I changed my mind, but I started to let it become real in my mind. I remember telling my son…he had turned 5 during this. One of the hardest parts of this journey was my son. He was so in love with His sister. So in love with my belly, with the baby, with his baby sister. So proud, so protective, so sweet. I can’t even write this without crying. His pain in addition to my pain broke my heart. He hated it. Hated hearing my words trying to gently explain to his 5 year old mind and to help his heart understand what I was saying. How to prepare him for what was coming so he wouldn’t be in a state of shock when she was there and then gone. He understood, but he didn’t accept, he didn’t enjoy, and we both suffered.
Everyday suffering. I learned how painful questions from people were. Simple questions from strangers…When are you due? What are you having? and then the horrible questions and comments…Are you excited to be a big brother? My son would hide behind my back. He knew what was happening and he didn’t know how to answer them. Of course he was excited to be a big brother, if he had been allowed the opportunity to become one. They would tell me how great that I had a boy first and then a girl after and they would ask and say so many things that must be so common and normal to say and ask but in the situation they were all daggers to our hearts. Sweet sad little son of mine…he didn’t know what to say, he just felt the pain, and I felt the pain double. I was angry. Angry at my hurt. Angry at my life and the unfairness of it all. Angry that my children had to suffer. Angry at the questions. Oh I hurt and I burned with pain and I knew no escape. I tried only to ease it all for my son and to be what he needed as much as I could.
I started journaling. Crying out to God. I wanted to leave Washington so badly, I wanted to be near my family (though we were so different and distant and they were in no situation to help me at all) and near my friends. A door opened for me to work in Northern, CA and I, in faith, packed up my truck and son for a few weeks of work before we would return to birth a baby. I was probably 7 months pregnant at this point.
My mom watched Elisha for a handful of weeks while I worked on a mountain in Northern, CA. Full of an almost full grown baby I worked my butt off in the hot heat cooking in an outdoor kitchen for 20-30 people. I carried water from a sink some distance from the kitchen to cook with and climbed up and down large wood stumps to get in and out of the kitchen. There was no roof, it was hot. I slept in the back of my pick-up truck. I accepted as little help from the men as I could and had a hard shell...but even here there were such amazing people loving me and providing me with a safe retreat to continue to consider the weighty decision that lay ahead of me, adoption. At this point I wasn't communicating with the family that would adopt my daughter, I just couldn't talk and think. So I spent weeks alone on the mountain working and then staring into the trees and letting my Spirit rise up to God.
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