Come, Sleep With Me

Normally I start getting ready for bed by 10:30.  But not tonight, or many nights of the past weeks either.  It’s another late night of keeping busy before I finally drag myself upstairs.  I am so tired my head hurts.
 

I flick on the light and trudge my way to the bathroom sink.  I avoid looking in the mirror as I open the medicine cabinet for my toothbrush and toothpaste. 

I wash my face and catch a glimpse of my own reflection.   I wonder what my son thinks when he looks in the mirror.  What does he see?  What are his thoughts, feeling, or questions?  Does he ever ponder his brown eyes that are just like mine, or his lips like those of his original father’s?  Do any emotions come to the surface for him, as they do for me? 

 

I close the door behind me as I quietly enter the bedroom.  I slip my feet between the sheets and mountain of blankets and burrow in for another long night. 

 I fall back on the pillow, the blonde tresses land softly around my shoulders.   This is not a picture of peace or serenity as I feel the heavy weight of weariness.

Sleep doesn’t come with the stillness and silence of the night, my heart aches and my thought churn out more questions than I could ever keep up with.  What will it be like to see him face to face?  Will he even like me?  Will I meet up to his expectations?  Will I disappoint him?  Will he allow me to give him a big long hug, or will he rather I not invade his space and keep a distance?  Will we actually get to connect after his 18^th birthday, or will it be just more of the silent waiting game?  Will we send e-mail back and forth as we try to get to know one another?  How long will it really be until he is comfortable meeting face to face?  When will he ask the “but why” question?  What will I say?  Will it sound like lame and pathetic excuses to him?  Will I be able to temper my disdain for this unholy institution of adoption?  Will I find a way to deal with all this guilt ahead of time so it doesn’t hinder our relationship?  Is it really guilt? Or is it just a continuous reaching out there for acknowledgement of how painful it has been? 

I am thoroughly exhausted emotionally.  I lie there staring through the darkness at the ceiling; the tears start to well up.  Closing my eyes doesn’t make them go away and the tears start slipping from the corner of my eyes.  I have to turn my head to keep them from rolling into my ears. 

The tears don’t let up, so I roll onto my side facing the doorway.  Curling myself into a ball, I pull the covers up over my head.  It is dark and all I hear is my own breathing and sighs.

It isn’t just the endless questions that keep me awake, it is the pain.  I miss him.  I miss him terribly. 

Yes, I regret my decision.  I regret that we were separated all these years for no good reason.  But it’s about more than just regret.  Since coming out of denial in 2006, I think I’ve come to a place where I am able to acknowledge plainly the different pieces of the adoption.  I know that I made the best decision I could based on the information at that time.  It was never because I didn’t want him.  It was never because I didn’t love him.  I know now that it was faulty information.  It was a very very very  wrong choice  and a very unnecessary decision at that.

However, looking back and acknowledging it all does not change the fact that he is 17 years old and he is a complete stranger to me.  This is my son, and he is a stranger.  This is the pain and the heartache, that time and memories – both his and mine - have slipped through the hourglass of time.  It can never be gotten back; it cannot be relived to knit our lives into repair. 

It hurts.  I have found no words to describe it any differently.  So many nights I cry myself to sleep, holding it all so I don’t wake my husband sleeping beside me.

Does it match your idyllic picture of ‘beautiful’?  as a ‘win-win’?  Where is the love now in this so-called “loving choice”?  It’s dashed to pieces on the jagged realities of grief and tremendous loss, an incredibly senseless loss that is applauded by society and benefits an industry whose thirsty greed cannot be satiated.

Come, sleep with me

so you can see firsthand

the aftermath of adoption