And your name is.......???????

There is a comedian I have been going to see for about 15 years now. His name is Flip and he is a hypnotist. Look him, see his show, and you'll understand my title. You won't regret seeing the show, if you do, well you're just not a funny person.

Growing up I would ask "How did I get the name Wendy?"
I knew of two other Wendy's, one younger then me and one older. In my adult life I have met one who is older then me. We've all said, there just are not that many Wendy's.

If I asked my mom she would without fail say "Ask your father."
When I would ask my dad he would reply either that he didn't know, ask your mother, or Peter Pan.

To date, I have not seen the movie nor read the Peter Pan book but I am getting closer to renting Hook. I believe that has something to do with Peter Pan.
I don't recall my brothers asking where they got their names from, I'm not sure if they know or don't really care. It's always been of interest to me.

Am I the only one who wonders where my name came from?

On my parents last visit I decided to ask again. We were in the car headed to dinner, meeting my inlays about an hour away. We had time to kill and we were trapped for the hour in the car, so I went ahead and asked.

"What made you guys name me Wendy" I asked without looking back.
Mom "Well, your father always wanted a daughter........" I let her finish the story of why they had to adopt a girl. In the past I would have said why they adopted me, I'm an adult now and fully aware that I just happened to be the girl available.
Finally she got to the question "I think it was the name of the mother of a nanny dad grew up with. Ar???" her nick name for my dad." Ya. What???"
He wasn't paying attention, or maybe he fell asleep.
We carried on the talk and never could figure out if they had named me after the mother of a nanny my father had, whom he liked very much. Or if my name was from some character from Peter Pan. As 41 I got a new answer though. I always find it interesting how a story can change, or the truth it might be finally comes out.

I have two birth certificates. My "Amended" birth certificate which would indicate that the parents I grew up with were my blood parents by anyone else who looks at the form. I also have my "OBC" which is my Original Birth Certificate.

My name on the amended copy is as I've always known it.
My name on the OBC is "Girl Moore".

The one thing I had so very much looked forward to was finding out what my birth name was, with hopes of why it was given to me.
Girl Moore.
Yup. I'm a girl.

I may never know what my first name was.
I will continue to have fun trying to find out the reasons for my now given name of Wendy. I'll ask until they are no longer here to ask.
The changes in answers are always amusing.
Not knowing my birth name, not as amusing.

A reason to live if just one more day

I can't think of a time when death was not a daily thought. Not a thought I would usually share publicly but what the hell, everyone else is opening up.

I wouldn't call my thoughts suicidal though they do range in thinking of how I could end my own life. It's not planning per say, just thoughts. I've spoken to a few people about it with mixed reaction. There is one person I know who understands that the thought of death, even at my own hands, brings some sort of comfort.

I've had plenty of bouts with depression where death doesn't cross my mind as an answer, but then neither does life. There have been times as well where death seemed the only rational way to deal with the pain, darkness and emptiness that nothing seems to remove but time.

For many years I was able to break free of my thoughts with a different though : I must first find my birth mother.

There was one point in time where that wish was not enough and I attempted to take my own life twice within a two week period.
I was 23 years old.
I was married though my now ex husband for the first attempt was in Korea.
I was lonely. I went out with a couple of girlfriends one evening for dancing and when I came home to my empty house I was once again alone and it felt as if the loneliness would never go away.

I grabbed my bottle of sleeping pills (I had not been sleeping well at all) and began taking them one by one. I pretended they were tick tacks. I wondered if I would go to hell.

As my dog sat by my side I got scared and called a friend who in turn called the MP's, When they arrived at my house they said they couldn't force me to go to the ER but really wanted me to. I didn't want to, but I also didn't want to die alone.
When my dog grabbed one of the MP's hats and began running around with it they began to laugh.
Laughter was not something I had heard in a very long time.
To the ER I went with a mandatory lock up for 3 days.

My husband came home after that for a mid tour leave.The first thing he asked me upon arriving at the house was "When is the last time you cleaned?" He had said I could go back to Korea with him. I wasn't sure which would be worse, going with him or staying home alone again. Again at a loss for where my life was going I decided to make one more failed attempt. After taking this time a full bottle of sleeping pills I sat in the bathroom alone while he watched TV and drank his beer.
And then, I changed my mind.

I was not able to stand up and found myself pulling myself across the linoleum floor to him. I could no longer raise my head and lay a rooms length from his recliner.
"I think I made a mistake. I took a bottle of pills and I think I changed my mind".
He got up and came over to me and picked me up. Instead of turning towards the kitchen to bring me to the car he took me to our bedroom and proceeded to rape me.
When he was finished he closed the door, leaving me in bed with my forever friend, a dachshund. I'm not sure what happened over the next three days but as you can see, I did finally wake.

I didn't have a dime to my name and as I dropped him off at the airport to head back to South Korea I left the airport with determination and hope rather then tears. I didn't know how I would do it but it was time to really be alone in my journey.

I found a job, I packed my bags and I moved with my dog into a gang filled area of the city. I was free from him as well as my depression, for the time.

In looking back there is not a moment I regret from my 23rd year. Each moment that happened had its place and brought me to the new roads I have no traveled.

Depression is still a very common part of my life. The world around me could be perfect and I know there will still be days that my only reason for getting out of bed is to feed the pets that have no ability to open a can of food.
There are also the days where I jump out of bed and forget to think about death. They come more often in the spring and summer then they do in the winter.
There is one thing I have learned and that is I can only say I'll try for one more day. I no longer try to set a goal as to what I am trying for. When I found out that my birth mother had died at 24 hers of age, and that she too had tried multiple times to take her own life, I knew then that in order to survive I had to remind myself that it's for me.
It's not for what I might find.
It's not for who I might hurt.
I can only make myself survive for myself.

The laughter stopped

Depression VS Sadness

Are they different??
I spent much of last night pondering, thinking, and crying.
On the evening of the death of Robin Williams I was crushed that he was gone, saddened by those who had negative things to say, and finally, saddened that I was not surprised.

For those who don't like to read ramblings then stop at the following line which in my mind may sum up what I'm about to type:
Depression comes from within, Sadness comes from that around us.


This blog, as is with the rest of my blogs, are based on my experience. I'm not a doctor, hell I didn't even finish high school, but experience I do have many.

As an adoptee I have always had some sort of emptiness inside. Yes, Always. Not having a base to your tree makes it difficult to balance. Pasting on pretend roots doesn't hold a person stable during rough times. The emptiness came from feeling alien to my surroundings and doing what I could to fit in.

My family, for the most part, was happy. Laughter was heard often and while we had rules we also had fun. I believe that our family was as average as any other. We hold our secrets and we also hold onto old family vacations.

I was at a shrink often. I'm not sure why I never felt the ability to open up in such a setting. One man would ask at the beginning of each and every visit "What are you thinking?" A few visits in my reply would remain the same "Of how to answer that question" and we would spend the next 50 minutes watching the shadow creep on his wall as the sun set. It was fall when I made my visits to him. He was one of the few who asked how I felt about being adopted. My reply was that I didn't feel anything about it, and it was never asked again.

I saw another who fell asleep during my visits, while I was speaking to her. She would wake up and offer off the wall advice. To say I took it personally would have been an under statement at the time. I told my mom "She falls asleep while I talk to her!" My mom didn't believe me at first but after a few visits with my same complaint she spoke to the woman who indeed had some sort of iron deficiency. She began taking a supplement and thanked my mom for letting her know and offered some fee sessions. I refused to go back.

While in high school I had a friend. She sat behind me in "sober homeroom" which was a small group of us who had stopped drinking, doing drugs, needed support first thing in the morning. I enjoyed the group, especially when we got to ditch the first class or two to head out as a group for breakfast.
This girl was a pretty redhead. Orange really. She was graduating that year and had a nanny job lined up for the summer. I believe she was an A student thug I can't say for sure, but I do know she got into the school she wanted and would be headed off to start her new life in the Fall. She wore Keds and I used to playfully joke with her that her Keds didn't hold up like Converse would, she always had a hole in the toe of her shoe.
She killed herself. She "had it all" and she killed herself.
A victim to depression placed on meds that helped her to jump from the cliff of life to the eternity of death.
Dead.

For all of my teen years I knew that suicide would always be an option, I always had a reason not to. I needed to survive, I needed to get out on my own, I needed to find my birth mother.
I did not want to die before meeting my birth mother at least just once.

I made it through my teen years and moved at the age of 18. The road to my own survival was not a smooth one and allowed for many hints to happen that could cause others to hold their head in shame. I have no shame over what I had to do to survive the moments.

Married at a courthouse I moved with my now ex husband to Texas. My depression was at bay for a while. Without (at this time anyway) going into details, the desire to find my birth mother no longer healed any weight over my desire to leave this life.
I attempted to take my life twice. The first failed attempt left me feeling like a complete scum of the earth as the medical team shoving coal down my gut looked at me like I was almost too worthless to help. They didn't look sad at me, they looked annoyed.
My second failed attempt brought about some life changes, including but not limited to leaving my first husband.

My path of independence continued and I met my forever husband. It was the year we were planning our wedding as well as looking for a home. Upon seeing several homes I began to cry and not understand how I could hurt so much when everything was going so well. I wanted to die and I could not locate a reason for wanting this. I was placed on Zoloft and it evened me back out. I could breath again.

In order to cut on length (I know, too late) I want to skip forward to now. I was put on meds nearly 20 years ago. I have used those meds three times, each for a period of a year. The last time was 3 years ago. They made me numb and I finally had to stop taking them.

What is depression for me?
Well, let me tell you about sadness first.
I can look at the news, the news including the passing of Robin Williams and I can cry. I can say how I hurt for him and his family. I hurt for struggle he must have gone through.
I watch the conflict of different countries and I hurt for the people in the conflicted areas. I hurt for the other people not in the areas who are making their own political calls on judgement.
I see the stories online of animals being abused and I hurt, I hurt for them and I hurt because it feels like I can not do anything for each pet.

Hurt, also called sadness is not the same as depression.
I wake up depressed on days that have no hurt in them.
The world around me and within my own home can be close to perfect and yet it pains me to get out of bed.
Depression hurts physically. For me it can be similar to that "butterfly" feeling but multiplied by hundreds and so making it painful.
Depression episodes come on with no warning and I can never tell how deep the dark pit will get, or how long it might last for. It lifts in the same way, without warning.

But why don't depressed people reach out for help?
For me it's a simple answer : Because I'm depressed.
I don't want to wake up, I don't want to face the darkness of my own mind, I don't want to speak of the emptiness that feels like it has been filled by cement inside.
Words during depression elude me in that a simple call for help doesn't make sense in my darkened mind.
Dark.
Depression is dark and asking me to see the light while in the midst of it is simply silly.
I hate depression.

My post is really pretty simple and while I could delete the above I won't because for some reason I was supposed to type what was typed.
In keeping it simple:
Depression, Self Pity, Sadness and Self Loathing are not the same. Each is very different.
Please, just don't judge.

Silence in the storm

As we drove in the rain last night I made a confession to my husband.

"Sometimes it's really hard to be good." 

He asked me what I meant.

That was possibly one of his newest regrets.

I find there are times where my heart breaks and my mind gets speedy. It sometimes even feels like my heart gets dark, or slows down with sadness.

These are the times where I want to smoke, drink, be wild and let it all out.

I don't have an escape that makes me feel like it's all been vented. 

I don't often cry. I'm an extreme person on the inside but on the outside I think I am fairly even.

Black and white.

Good and bad.

Right and wrong.

My soul leads me to do the worst of things and my brain hold me in the role that I am currently playing.

I hope the pay off is a love for self though, and that's the reason why I stick to it I suppose.

Though some days I want to be just like her, wild and loved in all the wrong ways, but I want to be remembered.

to follow a scent........

And as I look back I can see how I fell into the arms of dreams and wishes that were to never come true.

The pain of not knowing

of searching for the scent that would never be right.

To seek that embrace that warms the soul and lets you know that there is at least one person in this world who truly understands, who knows, who shares the pain with you.

For that someone who shares your soul.

Reaching out blindly for a fleeting glimpse of that love

of that knowing touch.

Reaching for anyone who can offer a chance at that one feeling

A true embrace so filled with love that you feel like you might suffocate.

Instead only to continue to float through the days wishing to grasp the clouds that are too far out of reach.

For just one chance to feel the embrace and lose myself in your scent,

rather then wander my days and nights alone pretending to understand that love.

The week of sadness = The week of hope

I had searched for 14 years before finding out my first mothers name.

I did as I was advised by sending in requests to the courts, and paying the fees to do so.

When the Internet came out I joined the groups suggested and searched different places for anyone who might be looking for me.

It was disappointing every time I looked, and found that there wasn't a soul who wanted to find me in return. 

Hurt leads to a lot of thoughts, a lot of theories, and a lot of questions.

Maybe she wasn't looking for me because she was told not to.

Was it possible that she didn't know how to search for me?

Dear lord maybe she didn't want to know me at all.

Was she a street person or in a mental ward? 

Was she strung out with a house full of other children?

The truth just never occurred to me. It was never even a thought.

I had my "non identifying information" so I knew a few things.

I knew she had been married, but my birth father was not. This was the first sign of why I had been given up to begin with, an affair. 

I knew her age, and as the years went on I knew that she too was getting older and that my time would at some point run out. 

I just never imagined that her time was already gone.

I knew that conventional methods of searching were not working for me. I had joined so many registries, forums, and had mailed or emailed so many groups trying to get my answers......

I decided to start listing items for sale on Ebay. This was my way of helping to contribute financially though I did also have a  job at the time.

I was selling purses that I had embellished with dachshunds made of fabric, rhinestones and vintage buttons. I did some with poodles as well, they were actually rather cute for someone who likes to be noticed.

I also tried my hand at painting. I only did one painting, and it was a purple dachshund flying through the air. She had a rhinestone collar. She was cute, to me anyway, as well as the buyer.

In the description of each item for sale I added a tad about being adopted and searching for birth family.

The painting was sold and the woman who bought it sent me an email informing me that she had purchased it for her daughter who was not yet a teen. Her daughter was adopted and when she became of age, this woman, her adoptive mother, would help her search.

This was my first personal experience with an adoptive parent who seemed to understand the need of knowing ones origins.

This painting also caught the eye of someone else. She sent me an email and informed me that she had sent my information to a gal in Ohio who does searches. This gal would go to vital stats and search for my birth name, if I was interested. All I had to do was call her and pay a small fee for meters and gas.

At first I thought it was a hoax. I spoke to my husband Shannon about it and made the call. She told me the fee, and I mailed the check. She told me when she would be going to vital stats, and I waited. We spoke a couple of times and emailed often. She explained that my search could take some time. The year 1972 at Columbus vital stats is not in order by date. Several years for Ohio are missing names, parts of the year, or are out of order like 1972 which makes an already tedious search even more so.

It actually didn't take long at all. 

I'm not going to go into the story of that call since I believe I have already touched on it.

What will I say?

Now, 7 years later, 7 years after finding out my first mothers name, and then about her death......as my husband and I have grown into different beliefs over time, I can say this was not by chance, it was not a coincidence.

I found out my first mothers name on July 13th and 14th. This was two days as my searcher checked for maiden as well as married and had to verify that she had the right birth.

On July 15th I found out that Dottye Robertson Moore had died in a car accident on July 17th, 1973.

You can not tell me that someone was not guiding this whole thing.

It is too much in our eyes to call it a coincidence that the first phone call to my sister was on the day before the anniversary of our mothers death.

July 17th is a sad day of coarse. For me however it is the 15th that takes me back to the sadness, broken dreams, and lost hope. While Dottye died on the 17th, my heart broke on the 15th and so I find this day a bit harder to escape in my mind, a bit more difficult to move through.

Shannon and I are able to look back over the 15 plus year we have been together, over the past 7 years of knowing this and that about my birth family, and we can laugh. There is so much frustration involved almost daily as I continue to try and track down leads. However, we have met some of the most amazing people along the way and are impressed with how much we have found out, how much we have been able to accomplish so far.

As we head into what is a roller coaster  ride of a week, we brace ourselves for what may or may not come. We have added this year the lost of a very beloved pet named Nugget, and that pain is still very fresh as well. Nugget. He was 9 and a half when we got him, meaning we had him before we got any of my answers.

Nugget. His name was actually supposed to be Nougat, you know the part of a Snickers candy bar? We spelled it wrong and Nugget stuck. We had to laugh when we found out that Dottye got pregnant with me while in Las Vegas.........and that we often called Nugget "Our Golden Nugget."

It all happens for a reason, sometimes it is hard to reason while the emotions are so strong. This year I will trust my heart, listen to my gut, and look back hopefully with happiness over what I have found, rather then the pain of those who have said hurtful things along the way, and rather then looking at the work still to be done.

Hopefully.

Still have a heart full of hope, and with that I am pretty confident that I will remain a ok :0)

Our boy Nugget......how could you not love that angel face? We miss him daily, and know he is always with us in spirit.

Pick your team

Most who know me well enough know that I am a huge Cleveland Browns fan. No, I'm not an idiot, I know that a winning team is a lot of fun. There's just something about being raised in Cleveland that makes you see what being a sports fan is really all about. It's die hard, it's enjoying that you are surrounded by others who are rooting for the team, even when the can't find a way to win. The fact that you bark in the stands and they're known as the Dawgs sure does help!

Growing up we get to pick our team but I feel like in mine it was low scale. We are in the home that we are in and make the best of it no matter how good or how bad it might seem at the time. Truth is when it seems bad, you're a kid, so you're stuck anyway. So we might be forced to seek out a good team while in school or at camps. I usually, when picking my friends, sought out those who were quit or picked on, sometimes out casts. It felt good being with them and it felt good knowing that they enjoyed being with me.

As an adult we really get to pick a team. Out on our own learning life as we live it rather then by what others are telling us life is about. I made a few bad picks early on. However, those bad picks actually made me a better team member. I learned to not latch on so much and to carry the ball on my own from time to time.

Today I really get to pick my team, in a sense like an assistant coach. Players are put before me and I can pick to play them or play with them. I'm happy to say often I chose to play with them. Every now and then my mind allows me to imagine what it would be like, to feel like, to play them.

The Browns, they're under dogs but their fans continue to show up to tailgate and party, going home hoarse from yelling after each and every game. The rain, the lake effect snow, the wind chill does not keep these fans at bay. They simply layer up with more coats and continue to rally around what they believe in. A loser team that just might find a way to win and to pay back to their fans all of the years of dashed hope.

My team? My team does the same. When my pass gets  intercepted or I get knocked down to the ground because of a play that was not up to par, my team rallies around me.We work together to make the plays pan out as they should on paper. I do however have a few players within my team who needed to be benched. I can't kick them off of the team, that's not my job, that job belongs to the coach. If the coach decides to remove them then so be it. But for now he decided that they are still members of my team, and so they just sit on the bench.

I'm not asking for cheer leaders. Not yet anyway. Once we make the big play that no one saw coming, once we get that final TD that we've been dreaming about, once we say the team has played to the top and can't get any higher, then I'll ask for cheerleaders.

For now I'll just stick with my team, even the ones who would prefer to deter from the main goal, even the ones who have issues with their jock straps being too tight. I hope for them that they can learn to adjust to the plays that are being called, and rally on to help finish this game.

Got to love those who support what so often feels like a team who can get so close to making the playoffs, or even the super bowl, and they never throw in the towel or say a mean word. Those are the best players of all!

I don't have news coverage of my team in action, oh no wait, yes I do. Click the link below to see a little bit of how team work can lead to good things.

Small in numbers but big in heart!

Looooooooong hair

You know growing up I always wanted to try a hair cut that didn't have bangs. My mom would never let me saying that my face was way too long to go without bangs.

I think she was right.

There's a story many of my friends know, but I'll go ahead and repeat it here.

I had a little friend named Lisa. When we hung out, we usually got into trouble. We were grammar school age. 

My mom took us to the indoor tennis courts with her one afternoon. We sat at the table and ate the free cookies, for a little while.

Soon we ended up in the locker room, then into a bathroom stall. What could be more fun then playing with Barbi in the toilet?? Yes, we were very goofy girls.

As we were playing in the stall I told Lisa "Barbi was made after my birth mom". Maybe I said real mom, I'm not sure. I stopped using "real" mom pretty soon after I saw the look on my mothers face, so I am not sure if this was before that look, or after.

This Barbi was like any other Barbi. Blond and thin, her hair went down past her butt. When I told Lisa this story, I do recall that I believed it to be true. I had imagined, at least when I was a child, that my first mother was as pretty as a Barbi, with long flowing hair that she could do up in so many ways.

As soon as the words came out of my mouth my mother called me out of the stall. We opened the stall door and there she stood, my mom.

She told me that I couldn't tell such stories, that it wasn't true.

I don't recall feeling like the story I had told had been a lie. I really believed it.

What I do recall is wondering, how did she know it wasn't true?

Below is one of my favorite photos of Dottye. We don't have a lot of photos. You know back then was the time of film so I am sure they didn't take as many as we snap today. And she died when she was 24 years old, a short life with far too few photos left behind.

I was sitting at my desk thinking of my upcoming trip to Las Vegas and I wondered what she looked like for the short period that she lived there. Was she happy when she got there? Did she gussy herself up or go casual? I imagine she gussied herself up, she liked to be noticed after all.

This photo is back in Ohio, not long before she died. It shows a side of her that many of the other photos don't show, it's one of the few where I think I can actually see a moment of true happiness, of just being silly.

At the mental ward .................

Karen has many memories of Dottye as well as the stories from her Aunt Ruby. I can't recall if I heard the story as well......it's in my memory as if it were told to me by Ruby.

Ruby and Dottye were teens. As Ruby would tell it, Dottye was the one who snuck out and caused so much trouble, but it was Ruby who always got into trouble even though she was as good as gold.

Dottye wouldn't get up for school, or was it church. They were teens living at home. Ruby figured out that Dottye had taken a bottle of pills in an attempt to end her life. Ruby made her get up, they walked around the room for hours until the pills finally wore off. Dottye refused to be with anyone except for Ruby, or so the story goes.

I can't help but to wonder, was this before or after she lost two children to adoption. Was it in between the two? 

Karen can remember waking one night to find Dottye slumped out of her chair down stairs. There were pills all over the place on the floor and Karen screamed and ran to the neighbors. Dottye was taken from home and treated. What was she treated for? How did they treat her? How long was she gone, that time?

Ruby told us "Dottye called me from Las Vegas crying hysterically with a gun in her mouth. She wanted to kill herself. I talked her out of it and then she came to stay with me." Yes, that was the time in Vegas where she got pregnant with me. Was the gun in her mouth before or after she got pregnant. It would seem that it was after.

I look at her photos and there are only a couple where I can see happiness. The others, there is something in her eyes. I hate to say it as I see it but to me it looks like a sadness as close to death as you can get while still being alive.

Where did this sadness start? Was she born with it? Was it given to her by genes or did it begin when she left her first home for the orphanage? What happened to send her to the orphanage? Why couldn't she find peace?

My video says she died as she was finally finding happiness. I don't actually believe that, it just seemed like a good way to end the video. I actually think, or my gut says she was as unhappy as ever. Not more, not less, just the same stagnant way of living. Trying to find something to fix her pain while avoiding where the pain came from.

I know where my pain comes from and I swear I am doing my best to fix it. The barriers I run into are maybe a part of my own stubbornness and strong will. I can't see moving on past the pain until I complete my search. I don't know how to move past needing the answers of where I came from.

There are days where I can relate to her without even knowing the answers. There are days where I carry her pain though I know she never asked me to. 

There are so many days where I wish I could scream at the top of my lungs, but I've done it before and it didn't help much.

You would think that with all of the road blocks I have had to move over 21 years I might throw in the towel. The truth is, I can't. I've lived more years searching then not, and I just don't know how to "let it go." Fact is, I really don't even know how to take a break for more then a day or so.

There's something or someone out there, I just have to figure out the way to get to them. I know I have a lot of tools I just am having a hard time figuring out which one to use.

It's not a great moment right now. 

I wonder, did her mood change as often, as fast, and without warning like mine does?

Nah, I don't need to wonder, I'm sure it did.