On other forums I have often typed about my dreams and hopes surrounding each birthday. I don't think I have ever really typed of the feelings, the confusion, and how they actually went down.
Then again, I don't read my own posts so maybe I have.
Sorry if I repeat, you do have the right to click away to your next site.
I'm not sure at what age Birthday parties are that we actually remember them. I can look at photos and think or I remember that party, and then I can look at some and have no idea how old I was. I'll just start with the first on that I remember.
I believe I was in about the first grade, somewhere around that time.
There were probably around 12 other children at my party that day. It was at my house. I don't remember food but I know that there was cake and my oldest brother put on a magic show. The photo shows the audience looking rather bored, but I'm sure he put on a good show, or at the very least tried to. He was no magician, he was just my big brother.
The feelings? I was excited that it was my birthday. As the kids got there I was excited to see my gifts. I couldn't wait to open them and see what I got! I didn't yet mind opening gifts in front of people. Maybe at that age you just love everything that you get?
It was around the first grade where I started going to bed sad when it was all over. I could not pin point what I was sad about and thought it had something to do with enjoying being the center of attention, and then the let down once I no longer was.
It's hard for a first grader to understand what is going on inside, and I was already starting to feel like a selfish person.
Imagine, the night before your birthday or the morning of, how excited you are. Now imagine that you've been told that you are special, that your birth was special because you were wanted. In my case my parents had two sons. My mom had several miscarriages, all of which were boys. She threw in the towel and told dad "You don't have a girl in you!" but then special baby me came along and they went and picked me.
That worked I guess until the first grade.
Maybe I sense it before then, but again, words and feelings are hard to grasp at such a young age. When it's a pain that you can't see, for reasons you are not sure of, how to you verbalize them? I sometimes run into this issue even at 38.
I'd put on the show of happiness, after all this party was for me. To not smile and play happy would be not only showing disrespect, but it would also show that I was ungrateful and we didn't want anyone to know how ungrateful I was.
I would ask my mom around the date of my birth to tell me again about getting me. She'd tell the story of how she had knitted me my blanket (pink and white and yes I still have it) and they knew I was their baby when the nurse walked down the hall with me in the blanket.
At what age did it occur to me? They didn't pick me, if they had, they would have known me without the blanket.
It was the first year of junior high that I had my one and only sleep over party. Actually, as I look in my minds photographs, it may have been the year before junior high. I guess that the years of birth dates didn't feel the need to remain in my brain!
I was so excited to be having people sleep over. It was one of the only birthday parties that my dad was home for. He always had a convention or someplace to be on my birthday. Possibly, we may have had it before or after the actual date. Regardless, it seemed cool that he "wanted" to be home. It was not until years later that I figured out my mother must have demanded it.
What did I think of that party? As I looked at the girls hanging out and talking in little groups, I realized they were not there because I was special, they were there because their other friends were there. Maybe I was cool for having had a date of birth and arranging the group of invites, but it really didn't matter that I was there. That was what I decided I knew on that birth date.
The story of my adoption changed as I got older.I went from being picked to "We waited a long time for you. We had other adoptions lined up, but then they had boys."
Also " you were premature, we were in line for a different baby but you came first, and you were a girl."
So now I felt like I not only was supposed to be grateful for being or not actually being picked, but also for being a girl. Ya, the being a girl part wasn't working so well. Dresses, high fashion and make up like a good lady were not happening. Not just at my own hand, my parents were involved in my lack of style but we'll save that for another day, maybe.
My 15th birthday was miserable for everyone in my family, I made sure of that. I was acting out, running away, and saying horrible things to my parents. There was a final straw and they went ahead and gave me what I asked for, they got me into a foster home. My first night there I was blown away as I slept on a cot, in the attic hall. They gave me away, I knew it would happen. See, I was horrible after all.
I was only there a couple of weeks before I got busted or not busted for smoking pot. We didn't smoke it, but we were heard in a mall bathroom getting ready to roll a joint. I got arrested, I had no idea who should pick me up and the cops finally tracked down my foster parents.
I went to see a drug counselor who decided I needed to go to rehab.
I was set to go to rehab, June 1st, the day before my birthday.
Well, no way. I had a friend pick me up as I turned on the shower at the foster home and jumped out of the window. I used the key that I still had to my parents house, entered and took my birthday gifts. My mom had said "We will celebrate your birthday when you get home from rehab." No mam, the celebration will be ON my birthday. I opened my gifts in the back of a car and have no idea what happened to them. A few pairs of jams and a new skateboard.
After spending several days in a friends attic, which got to above 100 degrees so I would strip down to my panties, with no water or food because she didn't want o be caught for having me up there, I called a friend and asked if I could come take a shower at her house. I promised not to stay, I just needed out of the attic and a shower.
To my surprise the cops picked me up along the way, and off to rehab I went.
My 16th birthday was also spent in rehab. See, after 9 months of "sobriety" my parents still didn't like my behavior and sent me back. I finally convinced the staff that I had indeed been sober, but they decided to keep me for 4 months to deal with my "issues."
And no, being adopted didn't come up.
I did get a puppy when I got out of rehab a month after my birthday. It was good vs evil really. I had begged for a long time for a puppy. Besides the desire to feel normal and know why I was adopted, a puppy was the only thing that I wanted.
What was bitter about it was when I heard my mom telling people why she finally went ahead and gave the ok for me to have one.
She would say "I needed her to know true unconditional love."
On my 16th birthday, or the month after, I learned that only a dog could love me unconditionally. I wondered why but never asked because in my heart I knew all along.
I was damaged goods. I wasn't wanted by my birth mother and my parents only took me because I was what was available. I knew in my heart that I had two mothers who knew some horrible about me. I could not pin point what about me it was that was so horrible.................but it must be something.
I spent the next two birthdays doing the smile and eat cake routine. Went to bed knowing full well that I was lucky to have a cake, lucky to have gifts, and ungrateful for not actually feeling lucky. On my 18th birthday I decided to make my own fate. I called my mother at work and announced with shock and glee "My birth mother called me! She called and said Happy Birthday, I've never stopped thinking of you!". It was a lie, I knew this. I am not sure what I was looking for but I imagine I thought my mom would hand over everything that she knew thinking that my birth mother had made contact.
She didn't.
She assured me that there was no way that my birth mother had called me. She told me that it was probably my ex's sister calling and pulling a prank on me. When I told her that this was not one of his sisters, it was for sure my birth mother, she told me then it must have been one of his friends.
There was no way that my birth mother called me.
I hung up the phone and could only wonder why my mom knew that it was not my birth mother.
I met Shannon just before my 23rd birthday. He got me cupcakes and for some reason it is one of the few birthdays where I didn't feel alone, ungrateful or sad. Maybe it was the excitement of starting my new life. It could have to do with my willingness of being totally open and honest with him from day one.
He knows my exact feelings at the exact time that they are going on, he is as prepared as he can be for my birthdays. There was only one year where he made a near fatal mistake.
He surprised me for my 30th birthday with a trip to New Orleans. I had never been there and was not happy at all about going.
Why?
What if my birth mother finally decided to call me on my birthday? I wouldn't be there to answer.
I thought that birthdays, birth dates, birth - day would get better after finding my first mother Dottye. I tried so hard to smile and enjoy. I still can't though.
I still don't have all of my answers and I am aware that some of them will never be answered.
I still hurt for the baby that sat alone waiting for someone to want me for 5 days.
And some birthdays, I allow myself to cry knowing that she never once got to hold me, touch me, or in the end get to wrap her arms around me.
For myself, I just will always feel like I needed that so much.
And I always, without a doubt, hoped that it would happen on my Birthday.The photo below was my 17th birthday.Prom, engaged, only a year until I would find my freedom, I thought. Click here for more photos.
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