Meeting My Daughter
A car pulled into mom’s driveway and this beautiful girl stepped out. She came to the door and I put my arms around her and gave her a hug. She came in and I introduced her to mom - her grandmother. She asked questions and I answered as best I could. There are a lot of things I don't remember. Two of the questions she asked were: 1) Why did I put her up for adoption? and 2) Why didn't I search for her?
My answer to the first question - although I'm still struggling with that one - was that we thought it was the right thing to do. I, like so many other girls in the 60s were told we were selfish if we kept our babies. We should give them to a family that can provide for them and give them two parents. It sounds so awful now, especially knowing the bond that forms between a mother and child in the womb. But they didn't tell us then that our babies were bonding and would miss their mother when taken away, that adoptees have issues other children don't have, and struggle all their life to know who they are.
Why didn't I search for her? Because I didn't know if she knew she was adopted and I didn't want to disrupt her life. I didn't search on the internet because I really didn't know where to begin. But I always hoped that one day she would search for me.
I gave her photos of my brothers, and their families so she would know what her relatives looked like and put their birth dates, marriage dates, etc. on it. She gave me photos of her as she was growing up. You can see these photos on the "photo" page of my web site.
Mom and I took her out for lunch. Later, my brothers Larry and Jack stopped by to meet Shonda, and my sister-in-law Tonya also stopped by. We visited most of the afternoon and then she had to leave to pick up her daughter, Rachel (my granddaughter), who was with her dad for the weekend. (Shonda is divorced from Rachel's father.) I hated to see her go, but we promised to keep in touch.
Our second meeting took place at Mom's 80th birthday party. See the next page for that reunion.
