Today my sons have a soccer game.

Today is the monthly meeting of the Ohio Birthparent Discussion Group.

Originally, I said I wasn’t going to go to the meeting. After some soul-searching and inner woe and discussions with a few trusted friends (adoption and non-adoption), I decided that I should go — to the meeting.

That sentence was hard to write. While I do not place my entire self-worth on my perceived parenting perfection, I still find it difficult to admit when I don’t place my children first. Even knowing that the healthiest and best moms among us have priorities and obligations and a true need to take care of themselves, I always have this deep pull to put my kids first. Above even taking care of myself. And I know that’s not healthy. That’s why I decided to go.

It wasn’t an easy decision. I love to watch my sons play (indoor right now) soccer. Our oldest son adores the sport. The pure joy that crosses his face when he scores a goal, blocks a goal or maneuvers a fantastic defensive move is something that makes my heart soar. Our younger son is new this season and is improving. When he looks to us after he misses a kick or just doesn’t know quite what to do, I know that my “thumbs up” and a positive reinforcement make a difference. I love watching them together; when our older son takes his brother’s hand to lead him out of the court, I am just so moved. I love being their mom. I want them to know that I am there for them. Always.

But I also need to take care of me.

Sometimes I miss bedtime because I go to the gym for yoga, zumba, hip hop cardio or to get a run in for the day. (Note: They don’t put themselves to bed. They do have a dad.) Sometimes I can’t play with them when they want to play Hungry Hungry Hippos because I have a conference call or an immediate deadline. Occasionally I get sick and have to sleep and let my body heal itself. This is no different; going to this birth parent meeting is part of my emotional healing process.

However, unlike the bedtimes missed for physical fitness or the games missed for career work or the sleep due to physical illness, allowing myself to prioritize my healing — for this issue in specific — is difficult for me. I don’t ever want the relinquishment of the Munchkin to make the boys feel like they are somehow less than — that the loss of their sister somehow makes them less important than the elephant in the room. They are so important to me; anyone who knows me understands that fact. So admitting that I need to skip a soccer game to participate in a once-a-month group is hard for me to do. They are important. I am important. I don’t want their sister’s placement to take away from their childhood. But I need to do things for me so that I can be the best mom I can be.

And ’round and ’round it goes.

Despite going and knowing that it was the right choice, I will fight guilt over the choice for days and weeks (and months? and years?) to come. This is just one example of a difficult choice I keep facing in the weird world of parenting post-placement. I don’t suppose they’ll ever end.

But I’ll be really glad when indoor soccer ends and t-ball begins. T-ball is on Thursdays. The decision won’t have to be made, and I’ll feel more at peace with allowing myself some me-time.

Difficult Choices is a post from The Chronicles of Munchkin Land. Want more Chronicles? Like our page on Facebook! If you have questions, please contact me or @ me on twitter.

I’m currently on a huge reading spree inspired by lack of technology last week while camping. I read four books last week and, while unable to keep quite the same pace here, I’m still reading, reading, reading. I’m currently five chapters into The Shack. A sentence near the end of the fourth chapter reached out and choked me.

It is so easy to get sucked into the if-only game, and playing it is a short and slippery slide into despair.

I nodded. Been there, done that. No desire to go back.

I struggle with my current place in my healing journey. Why? I am neither overly joyous nor deeply depressed about the things that have happened with regard to the Munchkin’s birth, placement and the continuous contact we have had over the years. Again, as I have talked about quite frequently as of late, I am in a place of peace.

Don’t misunderstand peace for joy or an overabundance of positive feelings. Peace is trickier than that, I believe. I cannot change what has happend; I accept that. I have little control over the future; I accept that. Right now, things are good; I accept that. Things in the past, in various situations, were not always good; I accept that. Things in the future may be good or they may be bad; I accept that. For me, peace is that acceptance, that acknowledgment that what will be, will be.

I don’t often play the what-if or the if-only game anymore. I don’t have time, quite frankly, to dwell on the past. I barely have time to live in the here and now, drowning as I am in ten days worth of camp laundry, the laundry that formed at home while I was gone and, you know, the making of meals and the bathing of children. And cake baking for no particular reason other than I like to do things with my kids. But there are other reasons that I don’t jump into questions like, “What if I had parented,” or, “What if I hadn’t gotten caught up with an unethical agency?”

It does no good.

True, if I had parented, my life would be vastly different. But I don’t like to entertain that train of thought. It does no good to begin to doubt that decision which, in essence, brings up a string of doubt regarding each and every subsequent decision I have made since the time I placed her in another family’s arms and walked out of the hospital. I try to be a confident (but humble) wife, mother, daughter, sister and friend. I can’t be confident if I am constantly thinking, “Well, if I would have done this or if I wouldn’t have done this, then this, that and the other thing may or may not be in my life.” The constant doubt brought about by the what-if game is a blow to my confidence and my ability to be the best that I can be in my various roles.

Furthermore, and more importantly, I just can’t change anything. My decisions are my decisions, whether they were pushed by other people or not. I signed papers. I walked out doors. I continued to keep my promise that I would always be available. I have parented other children. I have continued to live a life, however broken some pieces of that life remain.

I don’t have time and energy for the anger that others seem to want me to have anymore. I held onto that anger, clutching it as tightly as I could, far so very long. The only inkling of anger that remains is toward the unethical agency as they are still doing to other mothers what was done to me. And, still, even that anger is only fanned on occasion. I don’t think of them unless they show up in discussion or I’m writing a post of this nature. I can’t change it.

I won’t apologize for the way I feel about everything that has happened. I will continue to support adoptees, birth parents and adoptive parents interested in reform. I will continue to support adoptees in their fight for their original birth certificates. I will continue to offer help when asked, though I’ll admit that I don’t always have the answers. But I refuse to be poked and prodded for not feeling the same way as Birth Mom A or Adoptee B or Adoptive Parent C. I refuse to even acknowledge “what-if” questions anymore as I don’t feel that they are a healthy way to explore this journey that I have been making over the past six years. I refuse to be made to feel less because I have found a place of peace. I refuse to be told that, because of that peace, it means that I’m not a truly loving birth mother.

I refuse to let others ruin this place where I currently reside. Peace suits me well.

The If-Only Game is a post from The Chronicles of Munchkin Land. Want more Chronicles? Like our page on Facebook! If you have questions, please contact me or @ me on twitter.

If you remember the Me who started writing this blog, you may have noticed a lack of… put-em-up, throw-em-down, fisticuff-type writing over the past year and a half. Which is strange, really, when you think about it because some of that year and a half weren’t especially easy. I had angry moments, of course, but they always passed quickly. I’ve never quite been able to put my finger on it.

I’m just about to finish Kristin Chenoweth’s book, A Little Bit Wicked. I’m pages from the bright pink covered end. And while the book initially sent me to a place I didn’t particularly want to be, I have loved almost every page of the book. She appeals to the musical theater dork in me, the “too liberal” Christian in me and the short girl in me. (Though, to be fair, she’s shorter than me. And very blonde. Very.) I came across this quote just now and despite having only fourteen pages left to read, I had to put the book down and write. (That’s when you know it is a good book.)

She wrote:

Life requires peace. Peace requires balance. And balance requires a certain amount of get-over-yourself.

Can I get a big old Amen from someone? Anyone? Amen.

I don’t know what exactly changed within me or even when over the course of the past two years. I haven’t lost the urge to fight; I’m still as feisty as ever. Just as my loving, patient (very, very patient) Husband. I’ll fight when I know the time is right or the cause is particularly worthy. Perhaps my screening method for said causes has been beefed up. Or, perhaps, I just don’t have the same wealth of time.

And, really, I think that’s what it comes down to in the end. Parenting, itself, requires a certain amount of get-over-yourself. Earlier this week, my oldest son finally turned on me and said, “I don’t love you, mommy.” Fine. Whatever. I still love him. He was just ticked off because I took away his playroom privileges for the rest of the day. I know, right? Mother Dearest and all that jazz. Sue me, kid. I dare you. And, sure, it stung. (Though, to be fair, he said it a month and a half ago to his daddy first at which point in time I thought, “Oh, I’m so glad he didn’t say it to me, first!”) But I got over myself. Anger makes people say and do things they wouldn’t normally do, three and a half year old cheeky-faced boys included. I got over myself and he loves me today just fine even though I have declared it a no-TV Saturday. (I swear, I’m the meanest mother alive.)

So, maybe it’s the time and energy spent parenting that have helped me get over myself. Or the time spent throwing myself into the work that I do. Or perhaps it was finding something for myself, finding my way back to the stage. Or perhaps it was finding a group of friends with which to spend some time once a week. Or perhaps it was a combination of everything.

Or perhaps it is the fact that I am no longer just a birth mother. For the longest time, I let that title, that role, define who I was in life. I would have fought to the death against anyone who tried to strip me of that title or insinuated in some way or another that I am not important to my daughter (or her family). I don’t find that need anymore; I simply pass on arguments of such nature. (Mainly, I don’t have time to indulge stupidity.) But, really, in my core, I know who I am. I know who I am to her. I know who I am to my parented sons. I know who I am to my husband, to my parents and to my friends. I’m learning again who I might be on the stage. I think I’ve learned, exceptionally well and (too often) the hard way, that getting over myself makes all of the stuff in life far more enjoyable.

Someday*, though I don’t look forward to it, the Munchkin will tell me, as my oldest son just has, that she doesn’t love me. Or that I’m not important. Or that she doesn’t want me in her life. I know, at this point in my life with everything I have been through and learned from those experiences, I will be able to handle it. It won’t feel particularly lovely, of course. I won’t wish for her to say it to me repeatedly, though she might. But I have enough peace and balance and experience getting over myself to know that she will just be processing some emotion of her own. It will be less about me and more about her finding that peace and balance and get-over-myself-ed-ness on her end. And if she wants time and space, I’ll offer it with the knowledge that she does love me and I do matter.

I don’t know how I got here or what exact number of experiences lead me to this point. (Though, I’d assume that my therapist should be thanked. Thank you.) But I’m glad to be here. I write about it not really for the general public but so that the next time I feel my peace shaken to its core, I can come back here and remind myself to get over myself.

Because there will always be a next time.

[* = like in the previously mentioned teen years. No? Yes.]

Maybe That’s Where My Peace Came From is a post from The Chronicles of Munchkin Land. Want more Chronicles? Like our page on Facebook! If you have questions, please contact me or @ me on twitter.

I’m finding it hard to read blogs by “new” birth mothers. Not “new” blogs by “old” birth mothers. But blogs written by mothers who have recently relinquished their children. And it’s not their fault. It’s totally, 100% my emotional issue.

It’s my absolute inability to step outside of my own healing right now. Selfish as that sounds, I don’t have the energy to help someone find their own path right now. I don’t know where that drive and that passion have gone to… but I simply don’t possess it right now. Even on various forums, I can’t bring myself to read through an entire post of an expectant mother considering relinquishment or a new birth mother describing her experience. Something in me just stops comprehending. There’s a mental block. Maybe it’s my brain’s way of reminding me that I need to be focusing on my own healing right and physically shutting me down so I don’t slip up and regress.

I don’t know.

What I do know is that I feel like a heel because I haven’t been replying to posts and questions and thoughtful pieces. And I wish that I could. Perhaps I will again someday. But right now, as I’ve finally started to see light at the end of this tunnel that has been a mish-mosh of postpartum depression and adoption grief and loss, I just don’t want to step back into the darkness. Right now, I don’t want to be forced to remember the bad things. I don’t want to dwell on the negative. I don’t want to read someone’s story and be angered and saddened by the fact that the adoption industry is still acting unethically.

I just want to breathe for awhile longer as I make my way out of this tunnel. I’m getting there, slowly.

It’s Not Your Fault I’m Ignoring You is a post from The Chronicles of Munchkin Land. Want more Chronicles? Like our page on Facebook! If you have questions, please contact me or @ me on twitter.