Lineage

When I was eight and living in England, I discovered a wonderful series of children's books written by Lucy M. Boston about children of a family living in an expansive old castle called Green Knowe, originally built at the time of the Conquest. I devoured these books, but remained enchanted above all by the very first one, The Children of Green Knowe. It chronicles one Christmas holiday, when a little boy of seven is shuffled off to his unknown Great-grandmother Oldknow, who lives in the castle. The boy, Tolly, is an only child, his mother dead; he has been living at boarding school, abandoned for all intents and purposes by his father, who has remarried and lives somewhere off in the Empire with the stepmother. Tolly knows little about his mother's family, and it is this lineage he discovers when he goes to visit Green Knowe.

I cannot tell you how many times I have read The Children of Green Knowe. But not once in the past 11 years, and not once since I faced all of my own adoption demons or really contemplated my losses. Wow. I have absolutely no idea how I read the book so many times as a child without sobbing uncontrollably. I have no memories at all of my own feelings as I read this book 100+ times. Which is very strange. I was talking to my husband about this, and his answer: "I am sure that you numbed yourself up. You were young. You had no hope then of finding your family. It was all a fantasy for you, so maybe you lived through Tolly?" Maybe.

'Come along in,' said Mr Boggis. 'I'll show you in. I'd like to see Mrs Oldknow's face when she sees you.'....
'So you've come back! she said, smiling, as he came forward, and he found himself leaning against her shoulder as if he knew her quite well.
'Why do you say "come back"?' he asked, not at all shy.
'I wondered whose face it would be of all the faces I knew, she said. 'They always come back. You are like another Toseland, your grandfather. What a good thing you have the right name, because I should always be calling you Tolly anyway. I used to call him Tolly.' 

Did I fantasize about going back, being recognized? I wish I could remember, but it's all blocked out.

I do remember walking through stately home after stately home with my parents, looking at portraits and the collections of likenesses and seeing how important bloodlines were, and feeling that I was a changeling. I could have been anyone, anything. Were these my people? Maybe. Maybe not. There was no way to know. I did lots of fantastic thinking, lots of pretending, lots of searching for likenesses, lots of dreaming about the heroics of Van Dyck's Cavaliers. Perhaps that's when I developed my interest in portraiture that's endured to this day. Interesting thought.

As a footnote: I was very pleasantly surprised to find myself related through C, albeit distantly, to another one of my favorite English children's authors, Edith Nesbit. It was an incredibly wonderful gift to find I share her bloodline. She is the inspiration for one of the chapters of my dissertation. ;-)

Now off to work to help some new individuals enter into the world and start their own journeys.

Irritations

I have been standing up for myself, which is new for me, but long overdue.

As I mentioned last month, I had a repeat of the radio-frequency ablation of my celiac plexus that went badly, and the fellow hadn't done his homework before the procedure. I went to see the attending, and coached by my brother and my friend Katie, I asked to speak to the attending alone, I explained why I thought it was bad form, and unsafe, that the fellow hadn't read my chart. Of course, the attending had all kinds of rebuttals, but I stood firm, and used my RN skills and experience to rebut right back. As a patient I just didn't feel safe having an MD not know my story, my risks, my reasons for the procedure. How could he answer questions that I posed if he was unprepared? If he needed to prep, he could do so outside the room, before entered to consent me. It was shoddy. End of story. I know I was a thorn in the side of the attending. I don't care. It's not my job to be easy. I am living with a giant medical mistake, and it sucks. Fuck them.

Then at work, I had a difficult assignment one night, including a patient with twins in preterm labor. She was in pain and had terrible edema (swelling) from the waist down. Her covering MD was the perinatologist, whom I like very much, but he was scrubbing into a case in the OR when I had time to call him to ask him to assess her and see if I could get an order for pain meds. He asked me to call the second MD on call, who was, horrors, the MD who had delivered Tobey and left amniotic sac inside me and who is rude and likes to torture RNs. I sighed, took vitals, lined everything up and braced myself. I called him on our intercom devices and asked if we could talk. He responded snidely, as usual, and asked me to call him on the triage phone. I decided that I would walk to triage, rather than risk him hanging up on me. So I walked to triage and stood there, while he talked to other RNs, and he ignored, ignored, ignored, ignored, ignored me. Five minuted later, I begged for an audience, and he said, "I told you to call me." I went on to talk about my patient, he asked for vitals, which I responded were normal, and he berated me about hypertension/hypotension, as if I don't know the difference, and I walked out. I couldn't stand the treatment anymore. I walked to my Charge RN, and told her that the MD was not engaging with me and had basically told me to fuck off. He came after me and told her that I (!) was acting inappropriately and that she should assign a new RN. At that point, I lost it. No more "nice" Kara. It was liberating! I know it probably wasn't the place or time, but at some point, people need to know that they cannot just stomp on people because they are tired or angry or have low blood sugar. If he was busy, all he had to say was, "Kara, I will come to the room in 10/20/30 minutes. Call me sooner if her condition deteriorates." Fine. That would have been GREAT. But no, the passive-aggressive shit was out of control, and I WAS NOT TAKING IT. And at some point, I WILL have it out with him, privately, about how he needs to come down off his holier-than-thou doctor perch because he made one hell of a huge mistake with ME as the patient. I showed him compassion by not suing his ass. So fucking show ME some compassion on the floor.

I have also been thinking a great deal about losses, sadness, and respect. My life has changed radically for the better having my first mother back in my life. The more we talk, the more I find that we have in common: we lived very similar lives into our twenties. The more I share with her, the more I find that I am able to let go of my past, the things I have been holding onto so tightly. When I tell her about things I thought I wanted so much, she says, "Why?" and all of a sudden, it's true: I have permission to open my hands and let the cares fly away. How is it that she can understand me so well without knowing me? If I have no bond with her? If, as my husband likes to describe the empiricists' worldview, the uterus is made of inert metal and the fetus develops independently of its mother, unaffected by anything? It's fucking absurd. Thanks, I needed a good laugh this morning.

Ah, yes, and the feeding. Yes, feeding is important. How we feed and nurture babies is extremely important. But the first nine months that the fetus develops within the uterus is also important (hence my previous comment about the uterus not being made of inert metal, and the influence of hormones, etc.). Yes, I am certain that the future of science with reveal all kinds of things about the effects of the intrauterine environment on fetal brain development. We don't know those effects  now, but to say they don't exist is ridiculous. I speak about skin-to-skin and protocols and the importance of mother and newborn bonding because that's my job at work. There is science behind such protocols, and the peanut gallery loves to pelt with peanuts because they say I don't know my science. In the postpartum units at work, and in most hospitals, RNs work closely with mothers and babies on feeding, and hold classes, to make sure that feeding is working well. Eye-to-eye contact is important for that formation of attachment between caregivers and babies. Propping up bottles and lack of body contact isn't good for forming attachment. No. Agreed. We need to continue to work with parents on that. My husband was terrible with that and I had to take him to task over and over. He has his own issues with his family, being German, and not knowing how to be intimate with children or anyone for that matter. We were talking about that this morning, and he said that he's horribly sad for missing out on that with our children, because he will never get that time back.

Then I think about my own case. My mother was very stressed out during her pregnancy. I was born. My mother left. I was in the NICU. I had no primary caretaker for 10 weeks. I was probably propped up with a bottle, or an RN fed me, attentively or distractedly--who knows? I was given phenobarbitol to shut me up to stop me from crying sometimes. I was in foster care. When my aparents came to meet me at the agency, I was brought in with a bottle that had a hole that was huge, and that I had to gulp from or drown on the formula. My amom said it made her want to cry. From the beginning, she said I didn't want to cuddle, unless I was exhausted. I was always pushing away, "wanting to explore the world." Was it that, or did I already react against close touch? Who knows? I did bond to my parents, and I love them unreservedly, but I am also hugely anxious and worry about people leaving me all the time. To this day. I think I am invisible. To this day. Some of my anxiety is probably genetic, but some of it is undoubtedly shaped by my early experiences of loss and not having a primary caregiver.  Because I have probably some of the best aparents anyone could have, and I got them at 10 weeks old, if anything is "fixable"--because a child who is adopted before six months should be "fixable"--why wasn't I "fixed"? As in "issue free," just fine, no problems? I was told I was adopted from the beginning, so everything was fine according to the empirical plan. I didn't find out about the Primal Wound until I was 40. It's not like Nancy Verrier screwed me up all my life, I bowed to a cult of authority, and I am blind to reality. This is what I have LIVED. It's my truth.

No. I feel that reuniting with my mother and my brother put me on a path that has led me out of a dark valley, and now I stand on a ridge, looking down. I knew I was lost and anxious and depressed and sad, but I had no idea I was in that valley, and how blind and depressed I was for all of those years. How much sadness I had repressed, or how much anger and how much self-hatred I had. I asked for help, but no one knew how to help me because no one believed it had anything to do with my adoption. Just like the empiricists STILL want to say it doesn't. It has meant the world to me to have C acknowledge me as a person. I think that has a great deal to do with my ability to stand up for myself in a way I have not been able to do so before.

Being adopted before six months didn't "fix" me. Finding my family didn't "fix" me. There is no "fixing" me. What's broken is broken, but I can move ahead with the help of people who care about me.

If some people are unaffected by adoption, that is their gift. More power to them.

Bricolage

I spent several hours yesterday trying to tidy up the house. At the best of times, this can be a rather slow process, as I easily become waylaid by interesting articles in the stacks of journals, periodicals, and book reviews lying around my room. I brewed a pot of coffee and gave myself permission to do a little intellectual arcade strolling for a while.


I deplored how sticky my mind feels as I read, like it's dragging through treacle, and remembered what my psychiatrist friend had asked me the weekend before. After talking about the Topamax, he'd said, "And do you feel that your thinking is..." "Stupid?" I blurted, finishing his sentence for him. "Slow was what I was thinking," he replied with a smile. Argh. I hate this drug, but I promised I would stick with it a little longer. I feel that I lose some of my mental acuity on it, but on the other hand, it dulls my anger and sadness and I haven't felt half as annoyed about half the people things that used to bother me, so that's a plus. Maybe taking the blue pill and never knowing the Matrix exists isn't such a bad thing.

So I wandered happily through reviews of exhibitions the Royal Academy and other venues in London and thought about documentary photography for the first time in years; decided that my new television obsession will have to be "The Hour" on BBC America, which apparently gives "Mad Men" a true run for its money; and delighted in Toni Bentley's delicious description of Violet Trefusis' mental state, imagined by today's standards, but wait for the punchline: "Today Violet would be on a Lexapro cocktail with an Abilify chaser, Ritalin with some Ativan on the side for particularly fiery outbursts, while attending daily meetings of Sex Addicts Anonymous after a few weeks of inpatient therapy with Dr. Drew at Almost-a-Celebrity Rehab. But instead of all this to rein in her emotional anarchy, she had the old-fashioned cure, a formidable mother." I was excited to see Sir Michael Holroyd's new biography of Vita Sackville-West and Violet Keppel, A Book of Secrets: Illegitimate Daughters, Absent Fathers, on several counts; Holroyd is a brilliant writer and biographer; his research is encyclopedic. His wit and compassion for his subjects, combined with the thorny issue of illegitimate daughters, only adds to his allure. Although Bloomsbury is well trammeled territory, I am confident in the hands of Sir Michael, and from the new point of view of the paternity and illegitimacy, there might be new things to learn. Curious.

From Bloomsbury to Bosch. I read a rich essay by Terry Castle on Outsider Art in The London Review of Books. In one segment, she wrote about her childhood fascination with Hieronymus Bosch's The Garden of Earthly Delights: "The weird punishments visited on the sinners in Hell were riveting enough, but even  freakier, possibly, were the pleasures to be found in Bosch's world--the surreal salamander bliss depicted in the eponymous Garden and beyond. Strangest of all: the fact that outlandish things were happening--all over the painting--but that nobody, even in hell, looked to be particularly tormented. Indeed, some of the little naked human figures seemed to display a near comical sangfroid, even as they were pecked by giant birds, hatched out of egg, had huge flowers inserted in their bottoms, or, in the case of one of my favourites, sported a monstrous blueberry instead of a head. What sort of person could have dreamed this up?"

My answer? Tongue in cheek, of course, but the same kind of person who insists that adoptees aren't allowed to define their own narratives. They paste smiles on our faces because that's the way they want to see us. If we say we feel otherwise, well, there's no "science" to prove that we can feel that way. Aren't there lots of happy adoptees who have blueberries for heads? And why do these experts/concerned individuals/Bigfoot hunters/alien debunkers feel free to tell us this is normal? Because, once again, they feel we aren't quite human. Mockery is such fun sport.

And yet we are human. We are individuals, each with our own stories, our own paths and journeys, we were all separated from our mothers. That is our truth. We aren't imaginary creatures, figments of an artist's wonderful, crazy thoughts, or members of a cult. We have lived what we lived, and we remember it. It's in our minds and bodies.

It had never occurred to me before, but Bosch's painting, with all of its serene smiling in the face of suffering, really is like one big adoptee nightmare. Well done, Bosch. Dogma is dogma is dogma.

Transitions

Last week I put on my Danskos and went back to work. As ever, it kicked my ass. There is so much to manage, and I was humbled. I was fortunate to have the support and mentoring of my beloved senior friend M for two days as I got my feet wet again.

It was fantastic to have M behind me, reminding me to draw up cord blood (the second time before it congealed), and to help me balance monitoring, to bounce off my clinical skills, and to help me get things done within a resonable amount of time. Even when working on my own with all my skills and faculties about me, I liken my job to riding a unicycle and juggling torches and balancing a chainsaw on a toothpick held in my teeth. Having M with me made returning to work much less of an anxiety fest because she'd see when the chainsaw was about to tip or one of the torches was about to catch the curtains on fire. She is an angel. 

I had two great patients and two wonderful deliveries. The first day my patient was teenager--with the father of the baby, their parents, and a great-grandmother--and it was heartwarming to see a baby so wanted and loved. Managing her emotions and needs was a little harder, as she was still a child herself, but it was a challenge I was up to. The second day I had a straightforward young couple with no complications. 

My third day back was more challenging, as I worked with a young couple suffering from the unexpected intrauterine demise of their first child. I sat with them, admitted them, cried with them, and started the woman's induction of labor. Then, and more painfully, I had to ask the parents to sign papers related to the disposition of their child's remains. Who thinks they will go in to Labor and Delivery to sign a Death Certificate? It's horrifically brutal, and probably the worst part of my job. I explained to them how I, or another nurse, would bathe their baby, take pictures, take footprints, and create a box of memories for them, as well, and how spending time with them is an honor for me. 

A few days later I was speaking to C about being back at work, and I told her that my charge RN had entrusted me with the couple with the fetal demise. I said that the charge RN had probably given me that assignment because I was newly returned and slow. She said no, the charge RN had given me that assignment because I am a kind person who is able to take care of a couple who needed special care. I felt so warm and validated; I think C really gets me. She's right. I am very good at the psycho-social stuff at work. 

So while work has been positive, health issues have not been great. I had a repeat of the radio-frequency ablation of the celiac plexus that resulted in more pain. I ended up in the ED at UCSF on Thursday night with intractable pain following the procedure, and at least the MDs could rule out an internal bleed. It seems that the resident nicked the wrong nerve and caused swelling elsewhere, so now I have pain in two places rather than just one. As two friends of mine put it, "It's you, Kara, so it couldn't be easy. You should have asked for the atypical side effects." I was also incredibly pissed off that the resident didn't seem to have read my chart before the procedure, because when he was asking questions of me, and when I asked questions of him, he was clueless about some very big facts 10 minutes before the procedure. I made an appointment with the attending later this week, and this shortcoming will be discussed. For. Certain. There is NEVER an excuse not to read a chart. I am curiously still Zen about it all; maybe the Topamax is keeping me on even keel, although I am irritated about the pain and wonder what the long-term plan is going to be. For now, I keep putting one foot in front of the other and avoiding known stressors. 

The kids are both enjoying school, and Tobey has taken to Kindergarten in a way I had never dreamed he would. His teacher had sent home a poem for him to memorize and recite in front of the class next week, and we'd half-heartedly begun to go over it. Callum had always been my poetry man, although Tobey had begun showing interest. He came home today waving a sticker, excitedly announcing that he'd already recited the poem and that he wants to sit and read more poetry with me. I had no idea that he'd learned it (he perfected it listening to the other children recite!). That Tobey is a dark horse, and an exciting dark horse he is. Clever one. 

Callum has his first crush and is coping with the knowledge that the girl is moving away at the end of this year; her family is military. We spent the weekend camping together with her family, and then last night, after we came home, he was bereft. He is busy coming up with elaborate plans to show this girl, for the next 10 months, how much she means to him. He told me that I will be busy taking the both of them to the Academy of Sciences, the DeYoung Museum, the Legion of Honor, and other dates. Could be fun for all of us. ;-)

Grounding

I have been living too much of my life by proxy this past year, wanting to build relationships with people I don't know and who don't really know me or have time for me, spending time on the Internet in fights that aren't worth my time, debating people whose arguments aren't worth the dirt on my shoe. I'm finished with that. It's been positive over this past month to step back and ground myself. To let people go, and see who comes back to me. It's been quite illuminating; I hold people to high standards, it's true, but that's okay. It's time to put myself first.

I was thinking about a post that Amanda made on her blog about coming to peace with oneself on one's adoption journey, and perhaps I'm closer to that place than I had thought.

I have been able just to be.

I spent a great long weekend with my aparents in Southern California the week before last, nerding out, swimming, playing with the kids, watching movies, and enjoying my father's birthday present. I gave him a lecture series on the Vikings. Yes, we are seriously that nerdy of a family. It made me realize how wonderful it is that I belong to my aparents; I wouldn't trade them for the world. They understand me like no one else, and it is what it is. They are my home, my support, my most constant source of unconditional love. And as much as adoption has left me with loss, they are its gain for me.

While I was visiting my aparents, I also spent a part of a day with my brother and his family, and for the first time, we could actually just be as well. I think we were all relieved and happy about that. It was also the first time we were together that I didn't cry. Maybe it was the drugs. Maybe it was having Callum with me. I don't know, I don't care. It made me wish that we could work on getting to know each other as people. Perhaps we can try.

Finding Meaning in Chaos

The past few days have been rough, but I always forget the hands of the gods, or angels, or of serendipity. Whatever you want to call it, things do change. I am blessed by a circle of amazing people who never stop giving me something to do, or love, or hope for. Well, sometimes just doing isn't enough. It's that I want to love. I feel that my capacity to love is dead, or that I am too alone, or that I will never have my love reciprocated. And then, just as I feel there is no hope, something changes. It's truly uncanny.

When I was in New York, Nalini was telling me how horribly sad she was that my nmother and brother have such incredible power to make me feel the worst possible despair. I agree that it seems wrong, counterintuitive, and terrible that two people can pull me down when hundreds more love me and pull me in an opposite direction. I was pondering this, and thought maybe this was because I am not in another relationship in which I feel anchored and safe in the same way, or perhaps in which I feel I know about the core of me, that part of me that I try so hard to take care of on my own but cannot support all by myself. I wish I could, but it's the kind of love you need in order to feel tied to humanity. You can't hold yourself in that way, you just can't. Well, maybe some people can, but I can't. Or maybe I could if I had this other connection. It's hard to put into words, precisely because it's preverbal, maybe beyond words.

Anyway, I'd been fighting upstream against this despair for over a week, even with the help of my aparents, when C called me. We had an amazing talk, and she supported me in such a way that I was all of a sudden back on my feet. It was unbelievable. I can't explain it, but she was able to offer a hand to help me stand up, dust off, and get on with things that no one else could. I spent the rest of the day wondering, again, why she could do this when no one else could. Again, I think it's because the lost child inside me WANTS her so very badly. She validated my pain and gladly listened. It meant everything, everything, everything to me. Certainly, I would love to get to the place where I could do this to myself; that is, help myself stand up. But my wounds and problems suffuse more parts of my life than I can count. For now, I will take the little victories and welcome my mother's helping hand.

Monday afternoon, I went on to see my artist friend, who is moving to Philadelphia. He cut and colored my hair one last time before his big move; as usual, he offered sage advice on everything in my life, and more excitingly, he invited me to participate in his next project wearing my art historian hat. I will write an "article" about a period room he is creating, and then situate that room, and him, within the history of art and masculinity. It's a creative essay more than an article, as his period room is going to be a creative critique; so I get to think about all of my fave Arts and Crafts homosocial circles, pull my books off my shelf, and write for fun! I love that my friend has given me a job and an outlet to take my mind off all the Sturm und Drang in my life, and I don't have to be orthodox art historical, either, which I would abhor. It's about being arch and witty and making connections and doing what I love. Now that I can do. I love you, emmett!

And on another front, my friend Greensunflower has been helping me, as well, getting me out of the house, feeding me, showing me solidarity in the cold, hard light of the crazy. I love being in the company of the best and brightest. So we're a little off our rockers? It means we're also great empaths.

One of these days, I will get there. One step at a time, I will find my way there. It's a group project. Don't cash in your bets quite yet. I have decided not to give up. The universe is pulling for me. I can feel it.

Walking the line

I have been mulling over the seeming impossibility of really talking about what it is to be adopted, and the feelings related to being adopted, with some people who are invested in the system to such a degree that they simply refuse to listen. Those who have read my blog over the past year are aware of "debates" about the primal wound, or ways in which adoptees are demeaned in "conversation" through various epithets I've mentioned: "bitter," "angry," "angsty," "ruined by a bad childhood." And of course, the parting shot: "MY adoptee won't grow up to be like YOU." The same tired arguments are rehearsed, over and over, in which adults (namely adult adoptees) are robbed of our agency by those who speak for adoptees they claim they know, or for their rights to be parents at all costs, or for "science."

I have been engaging in discussion with Daniel Ibn Zayd, an activist adoptee living in Beirut, about the difficulties and frustrations in trying to work within the existing framework of the hellagon and dominant culture, and he has agreed to let me post some of our conversations on my blog as food for thought. I would love to hear what other adoptees have experienced in terms of trying to be heard; what works, and what doesn't. How do we change things? How radical do we need to be?

For more information about Daniel, his projects, passions, and thoughts, visit his blog. Join the dialogue!

"This is because the native intellectual has thrown himself greedily upon Western culture. Like adopted children who only stop investigating the new family framework at the moment when a minimum nucleus of security crystallizes in their psyche, the native intellectual will try to make European culture his own." Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth

Kara: I have been thinking much about the quote from Fanon that you shared, and I think it resonates deeply with the problems that we encounter in online discussions with APs, first parents, other "advocates," and even with other adoptees. 

At the time of our adoptions, we are stripped of our histories, our identities, everything. In your case, also of your culture, your language, and your religion. So (most of) us cling to the structure/language we're given to make sense of our experiences. This is the ideology of the dominant society, controlled by the industry, and in which our APs and first families function (or are encouraged to function). This is the world of Positive Adoption Language, the "good" adoptee, etc. It is the place in which we will be secure if we do as we are told. We can make this our own, and use it, but if we challenge it, we lose our paternalistic "protection" and our Otherness is immediately called into question. We are labeled as being "out of line," "different," and "aberrant." The "Not Us." If we have our own needs and and wants, or if we assert our own rights as adopted individuals, these are seen as non-existent, precisely because we are defined as Other. At most we are granted the "right" to our OBCs, but even that is suspect to many.

For example, I recently engaged in a feminist discussion about adoption and the rights of our (supposedly closeted) mothers were again and again seen as trumping the rights of adult adoptee WOMEN. How could this be, unless we were Other, and thus outside the circumscribed limits of the society in question? 

Those adoptees who are feted and rewarded are precisely those who adapt and praise and use the language and social customs and terms and social codes provided by the dominant culture. In order not to be rejected by the "family of man," so to speak, they agree to play within the given rules. While I concede that some adoptees may certainly feel happy to live within the existing paradigm, the existence of these happy adoptees isn't a reason to sanctify the existence of a failed structure that actively harms other adoptees by pathologizing their experiences.

You have, elsewhere, suggested that it is impossible for us to engage in true, productive dialogue because with an offhand remark, those in power, those unwilling to admit the power they have, are able to denigrate our position. There is no level playing field. Such is the ploy of labeling adoptees in discussions. The end message is that we are outliers, and that "normal, decent" adoptees don't grow up to be like us. It isn't in their interest to talk to us as equals, and so they don't. There isn't room for it in the model we have.

There is no listening. It is intensely frustrating. What are your thoughts? Are we too bound up as commodities to have voices?

Daniel: You've summed up our condition to a T. This is endlessly upsetting to me. I see it even beyond our condition, for example, in the thesis papers my students are forced to write they must conform their way of thinking to the dominant norm. This is a game of controlling output. I see it like constantly being patted back into position, as if we were wind-up toys. As long as we head in the right direction, then all is well. But the more we persist in trying to get away from the norm, and here what you are saying is really astute, ***knowing all the time that our very movements (our words) do not have a potential for freedom*** because we are still "controlled", the more we are knocked back into place. With time, that reaction just becomes increasingly violent.

I think what I resent most is the fact that I was removed from one group and placed with another, and by virtue of being raised with them, cannot communicate with anyone but the latter group. As I assimilate more (assimilate is not the right word; integrate perhaps) I am more and more loath to engage with the latter group, but this is where my job is, this is where my family and friends are, this is the language of the Internet and all of my communication is stuck there. I don't want to live one more bourgeois moment of my existence, and this is killing me. Because to truly step down from my position would mean completely severing myself from the world I have known my whole life.

For Ramadan I am reading this really great book on the Imam Ali (pbuh), called Justice and Remembrance. I'm more and more into liberation theologies, these places where radical ideas intersect with reality on the street. When I first got here, I used to use Marxist terms with the guys in my neighborhood, and the were immediately tagged onto political parties--"only such and such a group talks like that". When I match these terms with relevant terms from the Qur'an, then something interesting starts to happen, and a discussion is opened.

I guess what I am saying is that if we spend all our time trying to "walk out of line" like a little wind-up toy, we are going to go crazy. We need to seek out those who are outside of our circumstance and this structure if you will, and engage in order to get ***their*** voice heard. In doing so, our voice will be lifted as well.

Noir

I have slid back into the pit. It's sad how this happens. Unexpected, slippery, mean. I forget sometimes how near I live to the precipice until I fall in, and then the battle starts over again. Depression is not a party game. I liken it to poison that spreads through my body and makes it difficult for me to breathe.

I went to New York last week with my friend Nalini, who was excited to share an adventure with me and to encourage me to take care of myself. What's not to enjoy? But somehow, I ended up sad to the last fiber of my body, tears pouring down my face, wanting to die, sitting in the center of Times Square just before midnight. It's amazing how being in the middle of people can make me feel like such a non-human.

I was reading Von's post over at Lost Daughters today, and was immediately struck by this sentence:
"Adoptees too may not always understand the triggers and as most of you can state from your own experience, they arrive unbidden, unexpectedly and unsurprisingly when we sometimes least expect it or are prepared for it."

I couldn't have said it better myself. I should have been enjoying myself, with a dear friend, and yet I was a complete mess. [I did manage to love The Book of Mormon, which cheered me up no end. Thanks, Trey and Matt. Now if only I could learn to do the following.]

What is going on with me? Rationally, I look at my life and I have done very well for myself--on the surface. But there is still that massive black hole called depression: yes, it has a genetic component, and yes, adoption is hellaciously involved in its exacerbations. Then another friend tells me that it's because I've educated myself within an inch of my life and carry those scars with me, too. You don't survive graduate school at Berkeley with its beatings and not have damage. Moreover, no one wants to hear me babble on about literature and art. Well, pretty much nobody. I could tease out a thousand reasons why things suck. And still it just hurts. Maybe it's the Topamax talking. It does cause suicidal thoughts in 1 in 500 people. That would be my luck.

So I have been curled up in the fetal position for about four days, wondering why I was ever born, wishing I hadn't been, and thinking it's all been a huge fucking cosmic mistake. The world would have been a better place without me: my mother would have been happier, I would have been happier not to bear the burden of eternal rejection, etc. Of course, my friends and family feel insulted when I speak this way, but there is no rationality in madness. It just is. I can fake things for a while, and then it all becomes too much of an act. It's hard work to pretend to be happy. And no, I don't want my cross in life to be bearing the burden of rejection. It fucking sucks. It doesn't make me a better person to "rise above" it. I am tired. Wake me up when there's a pill that helps make you impervious to rejection.

One more thing before I resume the fetal position: over at FMF, someone wrote in the comments that "on a [rejection] scale of one to ten I rate the experience of being given up for adoption a fifteen." I wholeheartedly concur.  

Scars

I have been marveling at the way I am healing, but also feeling more than a little frustration. Here is what my wrist looks like at six weeks out.

It's definitely still swollen. I cannot flex it worth a damn. I am fighting against the metal plate that's in there, but I am giving it all I have. The scar doesn't look bad. It just needs time. Both my primary care doctor and a friend who's a psychiatrist said to me, "Wow, it looks like you tried to kill yourself." All I could say was,"Not this time."

It's too neat a job for that, anyway. I think my surgeon would be offended to think his work was compared to a slice and dice. I don't think I'll tell him what they said. I don't want to hurt his feelings

So I got to thinking about scars and wounds and healing. And how you get over things, and how it takes time. How scars mean that you've been through something and emerged on the other side. They're a visual marker of past trauma on the body.

My friend just returned from Cambodia, and my scar made me think of him and his writing project on trauma, the legacy of the Vietnam War, and visual culture in Southeast Asia and its diaspora. We had a great heart-to-heart yesterday, and he told me about some amazing moments he had at a conference in which people were horrifically out of line. He now has the status and power to put them in their place. When a white woman declared that she IS the authority on Khmer masculinity, although she isn't fluent in Khmer, and hasn't done a lot of fieldwork, my friend stood up and said, "White woman, go home!" I hope she was well shamed. White people need to understand that political and cultural colonialism is over. Check your ego at the door, and think about your power. Yes, you have it. My friend and I had some very interesting talks about power and agendas and narratives, and he sympathized with what's been going on in adoptoland and the narrative controlling. Race is always, always, always the elephant in the room.

Then he and I were reminiscing about our younger years, and he said, "Remember when I said that I was eccentric? I was lying. I was crazy. You and I are both crazy. And you know why we're crazy? It's not our fault. It's THEM. The rest of the world makes us this way. With all their incessant bullshit and ignorance. Don't worry, darling. You're fine." It's true. All of his friends are batshit crazy. Never a dull moment. I am honored to be in such exalted company.

Back to painful tendon stretching and True Blood. And craziness. And maybe some Dumas, for some ideas on retribution. Just kidding. Sort of.

Disenchantment

I am excited about the upcoming Adoptee Rights protest in San Antonio, even though I am not going. I am sad that I will miss the excitement of being "normal" among my friends; not having to explain anything as we sit and talk over coffee and drinks and meals. As we cry and tell our stories and nod and know that we are not alone. My experience in Louisville last summer, especially as it was tied to my visit to my family's graves in Indiana, was both exquisitely painful and cathartic. I remember sitting in a bar and nursing drinks while tears ran silently down my face, wondering "Why, why, why?" I still don't know why. I will never know why, but I have slowly come to peace with some of the worst parts of it, and of course, I am on speaking terms with my mother and brother, which takes some of the sting out of it. At least I am a PERSON, not a ghost.

There is still so much to be done in terms of advocacy and activism. So many states, so little openness.

And then a few nights ago I nearly lost my mind when I read the results of the legislative session in Missouri that pretty much change nothing and get me no closer to my OBC. The people on the ground there encourage us to take the long view. It takes time to chip away at convention, they say. But it appears they are not vehement opponents of the CI system, as I believe they should be. NO ONE needs a third-party to conduct private business between adults. Moreover, adoptees are being used to fundraise pay for the changes. We have to fork out extraordinary amounts of money, $500 and up, to get our identifying information, provided that our "biological" families approve, or that we can prove that they are deceased. Oh, and if my brother had found out about me, and wanted to get identifying information about me, he couldn't under the law. It's only the parents and adoptees than can. It's so Byzantine and patriarchal and disgusting.

As far as the OBCs go, I would still need to petition the court with good reason, and have the permission of my mother. I don't think I'd need my father's permission, as he is not named on my OBC. It pisses me off that I need ANYONE's permission to get an official document as an adult. My children won't need my permission when they are adults. Sigh. As Joy said, if I had just been born a bastard, I could have my OBC. It was the ACT of my legitimization that made me a second-class citizen. I had more rights as a bastard than I do now.

The only good thing to come out of this law, as far as I can tell, is that adoptees don't have to get the notarized permission of their APs for non-identifying information or identifying information anymore.

So on the one hand, I feel like a total bitch, because what did I do? I didn't draft the law. I didn't do anything in terms of grassroots work except write to legislators back in the spring and complain about the law because I found it grossly unfair and Byzantine and patronizing.

Are "baby steps" towards good legislation better than nothing? Or have we now enshrined more bad precedents? I am curious to hear what you all think, if you have opinions.

Here is a link to the Missouri Adoptee Rights Movement Web site.

Please don't take my bitter words for anything, and if you can find a silver lining in all this muck, I would be all too happy to hear about it. I know it will supposedly be "better" for adoptees born after 2010, but seriously? How much better, and why give us older adoptees such a big middle finger?

My APs and I are a good match, and that had to happen in St. Louis. Other than that, I am horrified that I was born in Missouri. The conservative values enshrined in adoption laws there are so opposed to my own ideas of equality.

Humor

As I was driving back from Santa Cruz yesterday, I listened to Kirsty MacColl and fell in love with her all over, as I do when I haven't listened to her for a little while. Her voice is seductive, but above all, her lyrics are arch and make me laugh. I mourn her untimely death and the loss of a lifetime of songs like "Innocence."

I got home and watched her video for this again, and just had to post it. So '80's, so funny. So dedicated to trolls, horrible ex-boyfriends, rock collections, dumbass art historians, and all people lacking brains who think they have brains.

True Blue

Sometimes I fight seeing things. I get tunnel vision and get caught in my battles. It's capricious, to be certain, but I forget that I am surrounded by people who love me, who have loved me for years. People who do have histories with me, who want to be my family, who choose to be my family, even though they don't share my blood.

I have mentioned before that I have a very, very dear friend with whom I suffered graduate school. We met in 1993 and bonded as we found ourselves slung to the edges of our department. We had no money, no support, no anything really, except each other. He is worldly and brilliant. He saw things in me that I didn't. He picked me up when I hated myself and kept shaking off the dust that the scornful people kept heaping on me. He saw me through lots of horrible boyfriends. He improved my fashion sense a thousand fold. We went on adventures together in India and England. I nursed him through many illnesses before I was a nurse. We were inseparable, and in the department we were called "the twins."

He was my maid of honor at my wedding. He looked better in his silk suit that I did in my wedding dress, and that's the honest truth.

While "writing" our dissertations, we would skive off and see movies, go shopping, eat--do anything except what we were supposed to. I watched him climb the academic ladder, and he commiserated with me as I didn't move ahead. And he astutely told me why I didn't move ahead: it was because I didn't want to. I could have committed to it and pushed ahead and made my contacts and fought the good fight against my evil adviser. I just never liked the nasty circus that it was. I hated the bullshit and the teaching of eejits. He was right.

And in the fall of 2003, he moved away to take up his first big teaching post. I was pregnant with my first son, and I knew I would miss him like mad. How was I going to do this parenting thing without him? He had predicted way in advance--before the wedding, even--that my marriage was going to be rough, and he is nothing if not perceptive.

Time went by, we spoke on the phone frequently, but life gets in the way, and I missed him like hell. How could all those the years have gone by?

I know that he loves me, but somehow as an adoptee, I feel that when I am absent from someone's life, or when I don't talk to them, I disappear from their minds. Not that they disappear from mine--this is a one-way equation. It has to do with my perception of that initial loss of my mother, I think.

Anyway, my friend is now a powerful, successful, wonderful, sought-after professor at Santa Cruz. Brilliant and fantastic, and I knew he always would be. He is writing a book and has been away in Cambodia doing research. I was at his apartment, watering his plants and chilling out, as he offered it as a place for respite and repose. And walking around his place, I cried. I could see how much our lives have been entwined, and how much I matter to him. There's the Iznik tile I brought back from Istanbul for him; the Arts and Crafts tile I brought back from London. The matching scarves we bought years ago; the gorgeous photograph of him at my wedding! The postcards. The photos of my children next to those of his family. The incense burned in front of his Buddha that I know was burned to ask for my recovery after my surgery. I matter. I am not absent, I am not problematic, I am loved. Here is a person who knows me inside out, and who has loved me for going on 20 years.

I truly feel that sometimes I am living a ghost life, that I am touching no one. Moments such as those I had at my friend's, when I see proof of a bond, mean more to me than I can say.

My friend suffered greatly during the genocide, as I mentioned before, and he says that he chooses now to make his family out of his friends. He is loyal beyond loyal. He will never leave me, and if I need him, I know he will not fail me. He is fiercely protective. He hasn't liked to watch what I've been going through. To be honest, most of my friends haven't.

I think that if I had been born and raised knowing who I was, it would be easier to walk away from painful situations. It's the not knowing, and the hunger to know people like me, and then the loving of people who are like me that is so hard to turn away from.

What I can say, then, is that I am grateful--and not in an annoying, rainbow-farting way--to have my true-blue friends in my corner. Even when they shake their heads and roll their eyes and say, "I cannot for the life of me figure out why you do this," I know they love me and will stick with me and let me go back into the darkness that is my attempt to figure out who I am and how I fit into the world.

Thanks to all of my friends who are reading this, especially those who are not adoptees, who support me (or other adoptees) and allow me to pull away and test you. Thank you for not abandoning me; thank you for listening to my litanies of frustration; thank you for showing me in ways, large and small, that I matter to you.

I know I pull away. I know I am not always the easiest to get along with. But I am also loyal as hell, and I appreciate how loyal and loving you are, too. Sorry if I forget sometimes.

Awareness

I don't post as often about my afamily as I do about my nfamily, but that's because my relationship with my afamily is stable, good, run-of-the mill. Not too much drama, not that much excitement. My parents are great, and always have been. The spin of fortune's wheel was gentle to me on that count.

I am not saying that they're perfect, or that I was perfect. I know I was a pain in the ass and that there were bad times along with the good. But overall, we were an excellent fit. I have many adoptee friends who fit much less well with their afamilies in terms of interests, goals, personalities, and looks, and were ridiculed, marginalized, and treated badly--or worse. Some were abused, ostracized, or raped. Adoption is sold as a "win-win" situation, but it certainly isn't when the adopted child isn't welcomed, loved, and put first, just as any child should be in any family.

My extended afamily is equally warm and kind. I am not fabulously close with many of my relatives, but I love and appreciate my aunts, uncles, and cousins. I was never treated differently than any of the cousins who belong by blood; I am also not the only adoptee on either side. That said, adoption was not a subject that was ever really broached. There were times when it came up, but I never actually sat down with my other adopted cousins and asked them how they felt about it. Some of them are much older than I am; all of them lived very far away from me. My extended family is scattered across the Midwest and West, although usually we would gather in groups at least once a summer.

One particular segment of my dad's family settled in California long ago, and I have been getting to know them better over the past 20 or so years, since I moved out here. I really, really like them. When I was at my parents' last week, my cousin and his wife had us over for dinner, and I met up with my cousin's son and his wife, who are fantastic people. They played with my son, we had really interesting conversations about life and family, and when the topic turned to genealogy and family trees, I sat back, enjoyed the night sky, and took some deep breaths. Once again, it's my family, but it's not my family tree.

Then the unexpected happened. For the FIRST time EVER in a family situation, someone turned and asked me, quietly, how it was for me to sit and listen to topics like this. I almost cried with relief. After so many years of living this life, what I can do? It just is my life to be talked over. To have someone ask me how I felt in that situation? Surreal. And welcome.

It is amazing to have someone in my family now who is aware that adoption is not "as if born to." It can't be. It hurts me when people pretend that I am not different, although I also don't want to be told that I don't belong. While I love my family dearly, there are things about me that they just can't know about; things they can't tell me; things that will forever be a mystery. That sucks. Ambivalence sucks. Adoption is a complex, constantly changing, organic experience.

The more people we have to support us, listen to us, love us, share with us, and be aware of how things might affect us? The better.

Dreams, feelings, and memories

I saw my orthopedic surgeon yesterday for another post-surgical checkup. I am almost five weeks after surgery now, and he says I am doing great. I love this doc. He has amazing bedside manner; he is both smart and gentle, and he takes time to check in about my broken bone and the bigger picture (clotting, going back to work, etc.). I would crush on my doctor a little if it didn't feel weird.

He must be about my brother's age, and even looks a little like him. Same build, blond, blue eyes, charming. I can imagine that A, if he were in a specialty that dealt with patients face-to-face, would be as kind, warm, and solicitous.

Anyway, back to topic. I remember reading something in my non-identifying information back in 1997 that threw me for a loop.

As long as I've remembered, I have had this attraction to boys/men who are really tall (over 6'1 preferably), with dark hair and green eyes (although blue is also acceptable ;-). I always attributed this to a boy I knew from childhood and loved for most of my life. (I actually dreamed about him last night--we were saving the world together in an exciting, fantastic action sequence. The dream must have been inspired by seeing the new Harry Potter film last week.) He was the first in a pretty long series of men I sought out in real life who fit this "look." [Note to self: You might have had better luck if you went with men with good hearts rather than those who looked good. Luckily, Mark is both.]

It's a type: Clive Owen/Matthew Macfadyen/John Cusack, you get the picture. Oh yes, and Irish/English. And now Michael Fassbender isn't all that bad, either.

Mark finds me endearingly ridiculous, but on my desk I have an autographed photograph of Matthew Macfadyen that Nalini procured for me one birthday. She is the best. Try not to laugh at me. ;-)

It was just my thing.

So when I wrote off in 1997 for my non-identifying information and got my twelve pages of summary, imagine my surprise when I read that my grandfather was "about 6'2, black hair, green eyes." Argh. Had I subconsciously been looking for a man that matched some genetic imprint I had in my head? Was I a weirdo? And then when I found out that my grandfather indeed came from English/Irish/Scottish stock, what did that mean?

I remember seeing the first picture of my grandfather, taken when he was about 33. I was knocked for six, because he looked so much like a male version of me, except that I am very glad that I didn't get his nose and ears.

Maybe if I'd grown up around my grandfather, uncle, etc., I would still have chased after all the tall, dark-haired, green-eyed Irish boys in town. Maybe not. Was my "type" connected to my pull to try to find my way back to the family I was born into? Was it based on some unconscious memory of my tribe? Or are tall, dark Irish guys just what I like? Because growing up around Scandinavians sure didn't make me want Alexander Skarsgard. You can have him. And yes, this is a rhetorical question.

Which brings me circuitously to Verrier. I was visiting my parents this past week and picked up my copy of The Primal Wound to reread after two years. While I concede that the lack of footnotes and scant primary research on Verrier's part are definitely, definitely problematic, I don't see her hypotheses (based on what we truly *do* know about obstetrics) as being the catastrophic adoptee-prisons that the naysayers do. Then again, they haven't even read the book!

This is what the naysayers often argue, as Verrier knew they would:

"Adoption as Concept

The other trend in trying to understand and eliminate the problems connected with adoption is to view them as conceptual. According to this school of thought, the problems stem from the child being told about adoption, the idea of having two mothers, the reason for having been relinquished, and the feeling this brings up for him. In other words, it is the intellectual knowledge that he is adopted which confuses and disturbs the child. One gets the feeling that adoption is only a theory, and that if we don't say too much about it, it won't have too much effect."

Her counterargument to this makes me cry, because it is the same one that Joy, and Lulubelle, and Von, and Linda, and theadoptedones, and Amanda, and many others reiterate ad nauseam:

"All of this rhetoric ignores one simple but critical fact: The adoptee was there. The child actually experienced being left alone by the biological mother and being handed over to strangers. That he may have been only a few days or a few minutes old makes no difference. He shared a 40-week experience with a person with whom he probably bonded in utero, a person to whom he is biologically, genetically, historically, and perhaps even more importantly, psychologically, emotionally, and spiritually connected, and some people would like to believe that it is the telling of the experience that makes him feel so bad!"

If you don't like Verrier, fine. If you don't feel affected by adoption, fine. More power to you. But HOW DARE YOU sit there and tell those of us who are LIVING this that this is a fucking intellectual theory. It is PART of us. It is not something we made up, it is not a planted memory. It cannot be carved out of our souls like a corrupt thought. It is not a bad joke.

I am strong enough to believe in my own memories, my own soul, my own strength. I know what I feel, and I know who I am. It may be a "fun" argument for you, but it's my life. Thank goodness for my wonderful community of fellow adoptees, friends, and family.

Needs, Rights, and My OBC

I have been following some interesting debate over on FMF about whether people have a universal "need" to know who they are. My sense is that all people will eventually ask about the birds and the bees, but many won't care about their family trees, or whose blood runs in their veins. I care deeply. My aparents love genealogy. I was dragged to many cemeteries in my youth. Doing rubbings of headstones was an interesting diversion, even when it wasn't my ancestors.

Anyway, back at FMF I found myself agreeing with someone who said that people should have "a universal right to find out family history if one wants to." Seems reasonable to me. It's a "right" then, not a "need."

A "right" is something that is agreed upon by society a large, or the majority, or elected officials in a democracy representing that majority. A "need" is a personal want that might become a "right" but is not necessarily a "right," unless it is so agreed upon by the aforementioned majority.

I noticed in the discussions at FMF that "equality" was of course important, and certainly I would like to be considered equal under the law and don't feel so as I do not have access to my original birth certificate (OBC), as non-adopted individuals do. In some states in this fine country, some adoptees can access their OBCs if they are of a certain age, or if they are born between certain dates, etc. Adoption is a matter of states' rights, not federal jurisdiction, so there is great difference between states in how things are handled. Not that I think we'd have a great chance of getting our OBCs released to us if we could be heard in front of the current Supreme Court, but then again, I am a Poor Innocent Dismissed Diseased cynic with little faith in the conservative patriarchal system in place. I wouldn't bet much on the chances of trying to persuade Justices Alito or Scalia, who would have the Catholic Church and the adoption industry lobbyists yipping in their ears to preserve the "rights" of the poor closeted mothers being tormented by us uncouth adoptees with our separate-but-equal amended birth certificates. We'd be told that our place at the back of the bus is quite good enough, what is to be gained by all of this nonsense? Go home, children!

Separate is NOT equal. Did we not learn that? We CANNOT separate the emotional content from the rational part of of the argument, however much we dream we can, because we are human. The people men making decisions about this, about us, are human, too. They are prejudiced by THEIR emotions, however much they claim they are not. It's a farce. Humans do best by ourselves by being honest about our motivations and prejudices. And these people, by and large, are APs, or PAPs, or have friends who are APs or PAPs. Where does the power lie? With the APs and the industry. Not with us, and usually not with our natural families.

Sigh.

I have been thinking a great deal also about what Daniel Ibn Zayd has said about the impossibility of true discourse in adoption related to inequality of power. When adoptees are told to "play nice," and treat first parents or APs or PAPs respectfully so that we can all "get along," we are immediately hamstrung. There is no free give and take. When we make comments and are immediately labeled as "angry" or "angsty" or "poor innocent dismissed" or some other tasteless, demeaning pet name du jour, it's hardly the sign of well meaning, let's-get-on-with-it, reform-minded camaraderie. Because it's not about working together. It's a fucking war zone with Bigfoot and alien sightings and grenade launchings and petty dictatorships at every corner.

People cannot see past their noses; they rarely look at the big picture; they revel in offending others for sport; PAPs and APs speak of natural families and adoptees as if they're paper towels. Some natural mothers are downright rude to adoptees. It's disgusting. Why be polite? These people aren't polite. They're aggressive, self-centered people of the worst sort.

On the one hand, it reminds me of that great quote of Gandhi's, who when asked what he thought about Western civilization, replied, "I think it would be a good idea." On the other hand, it drives me to read Frantz Fanon and feel less like Gandhi. I am sick of being treated like an object, spoken for, infantilized; I am sick of watching children being taken from countries abroad and stripped of their cultures and worse. I don't want to be told to be grateful anymore. Why do people think they know what I feel? Why do they think it's their prerogative to *say* what they think I should feel?

Oh yes, the power thing.

And the cycle starts over, because there is no constellation or mosaic or triad or whatever silly thing it is called on Tuesdays. We're not even in it. Because it's not about us, the commodity.

And because we're nonentities, forever children, if we even can be considered children, we cannot have our OBCs. Our mother's rights come first, because she must be protected at all cost, even to that poor last woman in the closet.

Except that we *are* people, and we should have our OBCs, and my favorite people are organizing a protest to convince state legislators that we are people with both needs *and* rights. Please support the Adoptee Rights Coalition (donate!) and contact your state representatives. If you know and love an adoptee, please, please do this! We deserve our OBCs! Just like the real people we are.

Love to you all.  

Arrogant Bastard

No, I am not talking about myself. It's a really good ale. You should try it sometime, if you like beer at all. I think it's fabulous and have had it numerous times at local bars in my neck of the woods, and of course its name makes for great jokes in adoptoland. As it turns out, A took me to lunch at the brewery where Arrogant Bastard is made! You have to love his great taste.

Not to mention that I left the brewery with some marvelous swag, including a hoodie for the brewery's IPA (India Pale Ale) called Ruination (ah, another loaded name for us bastards) that reads appropriately across the front: "I'm very bitter and I like it." A found this one and brought it to me, knowing I'd love it. He is the best little brother EVAH.

So the visit was amazing. I feel a thousand times better, although I broke down several times being in super-danger-trigger zone. I don't think I ever quite convinced him that it wasn't that I was crying about him, it was the always right-under-the-skin losses that seeped through. Men are sweet in wanting to fix things, but adoption isn't a fixable item. I feel secure that he and I can move ahead, which is a HUGE step for me, and he was able to ask me, in return, for certain things that are reasonable to make his life easier. It felt great to have a real conversation about what the heck we're doing, what we both want, and know that we're in this for each other. I am relieved to be off high-alert adoptee mode because it's a fucking living nightmare, and when you love someone, you waste time being a freak when you're hypervigilant around them.

It's a learning process. Baby steps.

And then I learned that my nfamily has read my blog. I am aware it raised some eyebrows. I know that A learned some things from it that he respected and has used to change the way we interact, in a positive way. He wanted to explain about some of the times I felt abandoned, and why he wasn't able to be there for me. He was incredibly supportive about how I felt, and for that I am extremely happy, especially where it comes to coping with my depression. He wants to be one of the people I ask for help when I get into my dark place, which is both unexpected and scary for me. Wonderful because I think he could be of great help, frightening in that when I am depressed, I am at my most vulnerable.

We have agreed also, in the spirit of moving ahead with our relationship, that I will keep our conversations private. I understand that no one wants their dirty laundry aired on the Interwebs, and he fears being savaged by an angry bastard. Fair enough. We are a very scary bunch, we zombies adoptees.

Then as icing on the cake, I had a great talk with C today and discussed my anxiety/abandonment issues with her. I feel like my emotional system is near to a positive reset. I had been so scared to tell her how I was feeling, but all went absolutely well. We talked about the primal wound and my loss and anxiety and extended time in the NICU and guess what? She didn't tell me that my pain is "probably" is due to some other variable, like my amom being depressed, or the color of the nurses' uniforms, or the type of lightbulbs used! In my nonscientific nonstudy, that makes TWO of my mothers who believe in the PW. I  like it.

She and I talked about how we both have our dark, lonely prisons in which we suffer our losses and sadnesses, albeit different ones. She was encouraging and told me that she's sorry that I read her silence as abandonment; she cares for me. Wow. It meant the world to talk to her about my anxiety and have her accept me anyway. She called what happened to us "our story," which was very cool. It is ours.

Her advice to me for now was to try to "just be" for a while. To take walks and read books while my arm is healing. I am not very good at living in the moment, but for her, I will do it.

Actions

I know I do poorly when I sit back and wait. I fare better when I am able to take control and do something. This is true both of my physical and emotional well being.

I was thrilled (and scared) to have to start physical therapy this week. I was mortified to see just how far I will have to go to get back full range of motion and fine motor control of my left hand. I have lots of work and pain ahead. The therapist advised me to dive right in before my tendons get stiff and I lose the ability to bend my thumb altogether. Not a pleasant thought. So I have been tenacious: heating the arm, sweating, crying, and repeating the five pages of homework set by the therapist over and over. I will get there, if not in four weeks, then in six or eight weeks. I have faith in myself. This is something absolutely in my control. It's my body, my comfort, my pain, my time.

I also decided that if I want to do something about connecting with my nfamily, I can do so, advisedly, of course. I texted with my brother a couple of nights this week, and we decided we'd get together this coming weekend. I am flying down to San Diego to hang out with him on Sunday. Yes, it's a bit decadent to go only for the day, but this relationship is never going to go anywhere if we don't get some face time. We'll see what happens. The lonely little girl in me is beside herself with joy, as A is one of the people she loves terribly much. It is odd to me how much this is the case; I never would have predicted it before we'd met in person.

Then today I called C on a whim. She didn't pick up, and of course I didn't leave a message. I went to PT, and I was surprised to see that she'd left a message when I checked my phone after my session. She said, "Hi. This is C. I saw that you called. I will be out the rest of the day until late, so don't call back today. Hope you're feeling better." Nice, but not exactly what you'd expect after almost three months of silence. What do I do with that? I'd like to tell her that my feelings are hurt, but I am afraid to put any pressure on her. Why couldn't she call me back in May, or just call if she knew about my broken arm? Conversely, I cannot write off the weird exhilaration I get from hearing her voice: this is my MOTHER. A year ago I would never have thought she'd EVER leave a message for me. She fights so hard to make me into a nobody in her life, probably because there is some deep feeling there. Damage. Adoption has hurt our family profoundly.

There is always a price to be paid; now I am trying to do the best I can with the choices left open to me.

It is at least good to remember that I am best as a woman of action.

And what is it with people telling other people not to fuck with them after they've already fucked with others? It's a lot like closing the barn door after after the horses have already left. I am so bored by this apparent lack of ability to think outside the box or be able to see how self-righteous declarations about how adoption *is* can affect others. I love Joy's blog post today, tangentially on this topic, and our great conversations about the occasional interest of taking a look at rock collections.

On Paper, or Themes and Variations

I saw my surgeon yesterday and am apparently healing quite well, at least physically. The x-ray showed an intriguing fork-like contraption screwed with tiny worm-like pins to the distal part of the radius and then with larger screws to the proximal end of the radius for leverage. I expected to get a cast, but he instead put me in a removable splint and gave me free rein to begin to rehabilitate my poor left hand. He told me to resume typing with two hands, which I am doing right now, sans splint per instructions.

I can tell I will tire quickly, but it is lovely to be able to type as rapidly as I think, or nearly so. The wound is not as gory as I had expected at all; it's held together by four steri-strips and it looks like he did a very neat suturing job. Good man. He was so solicitous about the clotting and pain management. I am relieved that I am able to find some of the decent doctors out there!

Over the past few days I have been feeling the waves of depression wash over me and hearing the siren call of the damned again (on this subject, I recommend the unsettling film Submarine). It's strange how several months ago I couldn't imagine how I was ever in this place, or how it felt, and now I am here again. The fragility of my position has its ebbs and flows, I suppose, and right now I feel myself imprisoned by solitude.

I have many great and wonderful people who love me, and I love them back. It's just that they can't help me get over pain, and sometimes I am not sure that I can do it. There have been times and places when I've been with people in which it seemed like the cage could crack, but something always happened and I was left again. Sometimes I might be able to blame myself for driving people away, but other times I know it wasn't my fault. I will obsess over those times and watch the light recede through the cracks again.

I have moved on from Bach to Tchaikovsky and Swan Lake, which made me think of Black Swan, which made me think of Vincent Cassel, which made me think of La Haine, which made me think of one of my exes. I remember watching La Haine with him in our living room, resting my head in his lap while he stroked my hair. We had this funny code for when I was despondent; I would tell him that I was feeling fragile, and he would gather me up and make me feel loved and taken care of (including the tiny little girl in me) in such an amazing way. Then again, he also knew, better than anyone else, how to devastate me. That's what got me to thinking about things being good on paper.

He and I were excellent on paper. Except for being blond, he is definitely my type: very tall, handsome, extremely well educated, witty, a bit wicked. We met through a mutual friend in graduate school, but we could have met two other ways in real life. His sister was the year ahead of me at Haverford, and he was at May Day at Bryn Mawr when I was there. He is half English, and his cousins went to the same school as one of my English exes. It's uncanny. We had the same taste in many, many things; he is a true polymath: brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. He grew up in an 18th century house on a gorgeous farm on the outskirts of Charlottesville, a descendant of Stonewall Jackson. He and I loved to travel and went to odd places together, like Orkney, where we visited prehistoric burials and Viking churches. We spent Christmas in a  small village in Provence one year, going to midnight mass, eating boudin blanc, and making fun of how every French town has a monument to the Heroes and Martyrs of the Resistance, as if they were ALL in it. We drove around in his sister's 2CV, visited the ruins of the Marquis de Sade's castle, drank in Roman and medieval history and tons of wine, took a train to Monte Carlo, and then I cried my eyes out on New Year's because for all of this, when we weren't together, I was an afterthought. I would be in England doing research, and he wouldn't call or send me e-mail. I just wasn't important enough. Basically, he loved me but he would also abandon me. And when I told him it hurt, he would do what A does: change the subject or ignore it.

I loved this man. Really, really loved him. This went on for about three years. I remember being in the middle of Yellowstone, camping with him, when he said that he didn't see a future with me. That was fair enough, but it was horrible. I was 27, I hadn't begun to look for my first family, but I felt a punch to the gut that must have triggered something primal. I lost it. What was it with me and people not loving me enough to make an effort?

We had a miserable drive back to Berkeley. It was LONG. We broke up. We were still living in the same house, which was hard. He went to Laos to juggle (he is also an expert, world renowned juggler) for Thanksgiving, came back, and said that he had decided he wanted to really try. That he loved me. Problem was, I didn't love HIM anymore. The trust was gone, and even after all that, he said he didn't want to commit to anything. What's the point? You either love someone and want to make time for them, or you don't.

Which brings me back to yesterday. I got home, watched Black Swan again, and could really understand how Nina lost her mind. The pressures to find yourself often lead to dark places. Perfection and love have hefty prices.

Ah, you say, but you have your wonderful husband who loves you now. Yes, I do. He is great. But he is handicapped in his own way, a very traumatic way, that leaves me alone in my fortress as well. He will never leave me, that I know. But he will also never love me the way that I need to be healed, that perhaps HE needs to heal himself. It's a big, big mess.

As my dear friend Nalini said to me the day before yesterday, "You can hold and comfort your younger self, but she needed someone to be there for her then.  That's the tragedy you must live with."

I hate feeling like I have to go through the rest of my life just marking the hours from sunrise to sunset, knowing that I look very good on paper but feeling otherwise very much like an erudite, emotionally empty shell.

Unless you piss me off, that is ;-)

Valkyrie

I am named after one of the Valkyries, which is kick ass. In Old Norse, my name means either "the wild, stormy one," or "the curly one," presumably having Odin's curls. So DON'T FUCKING CALL ME "CARE-AH" or I will come slay your sorry self. And not politely.

Yes, I am having one of those days.

I knew it was going to be hard when I instinctively began listening to Bach's work in minor keys. Then I had a great long talk with the smart and supportive Amanda; that went a long way to cheering me up. It is good to feel that I am not alone.

I got home and saw that someone from Osnabrueck in Germany had read my blog and I got to thinking about 20 summers ago when I was haring around Connemara and trying to learn Irish in the company of a wonderful German man named Oliver. I remembered eating delicious fresh salmon and hiking across the Inis Mhor and trying to pack declensions and difficult syntax into my head and despairing. It was great craic, though. I drank way too much Guinness, but I was 22. Who cared?

Oliver was very serious about friendship and what it meant to stick by people. He told me that Germans don't take friendship superficially and build friendships slowly, usually only over years. This being so different from the American veneer of smiles with nothing underneath, it struck me profoundly. It was exactly what a lost young woman wanted to hear: that Freundschaft was real and tangible, and very difficult to rupture if it were true.

I looked around and saw a plethora of falseness, in myself and others. Perhaps it is not such a surprise I married a German after all. Not that I love all the formality and some of the stickier parts of the culture, but German friends really don't let you down. They don't.

I hope Oliver is doing well and enjoying life. I have a very special place in my heart for him.

And then...my own family. I am in this funk in part because I despair of ever having a "normal" relationship with C's family. I spoke with A yesterday, and it was great, sort of. We caught up, I got my endorphin high talking to my little brother, and then I crashed. He is busy with his fellowship applications and was a bit distracted, enough for me to ask if he was upset with me. I hate feeling like I am yet another annoying obligation, which was how I felt afterwards. Will we ever just get to know each other? Is it simply too weird to find a sister in midlife? Do we have too little in common to sustain this? Can he reach out to me, a little? Am I too much of a reminder of a family mistake they'd all like to forget? Can we talk about the awkwardness instead of pretending it's not there?

Hence the lugubrious Bach all morning and me telling Amanda that I don't feel strong enough to deal with this. I am sick of having to feel strong, and then at one point I broke down and felt all the pain of my loss welling up inside me. My little self, the one who feels things most acutely, was crying about all the people she wanted to love and hold her but who couldn't, didn't, or had just failed her. It's a long list, including exes, C herself, etc. I imagined my grown-up self bending down, enfolding her in my arms, and just listening, softly murmuring, "I know, I know." After a minute or two, the pain passed. I couldn't tell if I'd stuffed it down or if it had dissipated because I had acknowledged the child's sense of failure. We'll see. I know I am on the slippery slope to self-loathing/hopelessness/suicidal ideation again, and it's not pretty.

At least there's always Valkyrie Kara as backup.

Trolls

Not that kind of trolls. The REAL kind. The fairytale kind that my dad loved to tease me about, and that we'd see on our trip through the Norwegian countryside visiting family.

I went to see the Norwegian film Trolljegeren with my parents last night and had a great time, although perhaps the 7:30 pm showing was past all of our bedtimes these days. My dad had seen a review and thought he'd like to see a Norwegian film, a rarity even in the Bay Area, and quite unlikely to show in the corner of the desert where they live.

It was bittersweet to see the landscape where we'd driven with our VW Westfalia nigh on 40 years ago; recognize the hutte where people would stay; know how the road would end and you'd simply drive onto the ferry to cross the fjord; understand the smell and feel of the wool Nordland jackets. I have the jacket in my closet that my dad's relatives made for him in Norway in 1959. It's still going strong with its heavy buttons emblazoned with Viking ships.

I needed the subtitles but could recognize some words from my childhood that my father had used, and knew other cognates from German. I loved the dry wit skewering longstanding enmity between Christians and trolls, and jokes about troll diets. It was really quite enjoyable.

And while I was happy that I understood many cultural references, my Scandinavian identity is borrowed. I'm not like my mom, who married into it. I wasn't born into it, like many of my blond, blue-eyed Olsen cousins. I am not a lick Norwegian, although I once used my Olsen-ness to bag myself a very nice Scandinavian scholar boyfriend. (I did 'fess up and have all forgiven, for the record.)

I love my dad with all my heart, and always will, and I know that my also belonging to the Newmans bothers him some. He took my boys to see Kung Fu Panda 2 yesterday, and when he came home, he told me his favorite part was at the end when Po returns, after finding his first family, to tell his adoptive dad "I am YOUR son."

Yes, Dad, I am your daughter and always will be. I just wish the Newman part of me could be as loved as the part of me that has always been yours.

I know you wish that your love could heal it all, but it cannot. And I love you just the same.

Tusen takk.