In order to properly convey everything that happened during that birth parent visit, I feel it would best be told in parts. All parts will be from my perspective, but we will first start by focusing on the different people at this reunion. We shall begin with the adoptive parent focus.
Knowing our children, we were not able to tell them about this visit with much lead time. It ended up being less time than I thought as they were squabbling in the car on our way to the meet up. I was going to tell them as soon as we crossed the state line, but sibling relations had soured. We waited until we stopped at McDonald’s to eat. They love McDonald’s for some reason that I will never understand. They ordered what they wanted and after we got our food I told them what was going to be happening. I told them they did not have to meet her if they did not want to. Nobody would force them to, but I was going to meet with her regardless of their individual decisions. They proceeded to flip back and forth rapidly for the five or ten minute drive to the park where the meeting would take place.
The park had a nice indoor cafe and gift shop as it was part of some public botanical garden. It seemed like a nice place. We never got to see it. Rain was pouring during the entire two hour meeting. I headed in first while the girls got their rain jackets and continued to agonize over their choices.
Birth mom was exactly how I expected her to be. She was clearly on edge wondering what the girls would decide. I introduced myself and she introduced me to her friend she brought with her. As I organized the photos I brought with me, the girls came in and she told me she wanted to run up and hug them. She asked if that was okay. I asked her to please not run at them. I am pretty sure they would have run away and none of us needed to deal with that.
They eventually got themselves all seated at the cafe table. Six of us sitting at a round table with each girl on either side of birth mom. My partner would end up getting everyone drinks and snacks during the next two hours. I did end up taking a walk through the gift shop halfway through to give myself a break from all the feelings happening at the table. I picked up some fancy pens and cards at the gift shop. Near the end of the visit I gave them to the girls and their mom and they took turns writing notes to each other. I wanted them to have a little keepsake of the visit. I got myself a cute little flowerpot for a houseplant. Something I can put in the house that shows them we have a place for everything in our lives. They really notice things like that.
I had prepared some photos of each of the girls and their activities and just nice cute pictures for the girls to be able to talk about their lives and stay in the present. I also brought a couple family photo books. Birth mom got to take all the loose photos home. I included copies of all their school photos. We spent time tracking them all down after the adoption went through, so we have all of them from kindergarten to now.
Birth mom showed them pictures of her kids, their half siblings. She showed them pictures of her husband and a couple pictures of their birth dad. She had a pair of their shoes from when they were toddlers. She split the pair and gave one shoe to each child.
Even with our prep work with birth mom she still struggled with taboo topics for a first visit. She asked the girls if they wanted to hear about their birth dad. They declined, but she kept saying bad things about him while saying she “does not like to bad mouth people”. She kept bringing up her adoptive mother who is also the girls’ first adoptive mother. She kept blaming others for leaving them with her mother. She told them of some of the abuse she received from her mother. She offered the girls to live with her, which was shocking. She did quickly rescind that, but she did say it. She also said it would be a financial hardship, but she would do it anyway.
There was a lot of crying from birth mom, which triggered my oldest to cry because she always cries when others cry. My oldest had to hold her and console her many times. My youngest honestly looked mostly uncomfortable. My partner was concerned a few times. We would squeeze each other’s thighs under the table every time we felt concerned. If we agreed, then we would interject with a way to move the conversation back to appropriate places.
The cafe eventually closed and the poor staff were so patient and kind as we slowly got out of their way. We went into a small gallery room that was still open to the public and took photos in front of the paintings. They had really nice lighting in that room for such a dreary day outside. We got pictures of all of us together, just the three of them, and then pictures of each girl with their birth mom. We will always have those. The girls have just received the print outs in their vacation photos, so we will see what will happen with that.
As we were walking out and saying good bye, things got very uncomfortable for us. She very dramatically thanked us for saving the girls. She also thanked us for loving them and caring for them, but she put so much emphasis on the “saving the girls” bit that I wanted to go hide in a hole. Then she commented on how badly we receive compliments.
It was such a relief to get in the car and drive to the airport. I was able to finally relax once we were in the air. The girls were so quiet and sullen. Their behavior was putting me on edge. I even let them get souvenir key chains to perk them up. It worked after I let them also get a bag of candy or chips to eat later on our connecting flight.
While I was hyper aware of the children after we got home, I did actually feel much lighter. I no longer felt guilty. There is a tremendous amount of guilt when you adopt. You are not their birth parent. Your child has lost that first attachment. Adopted kids always have that birth parent rattling around in their brain with all the “what if”s. Our kids’ adoption story also comes with the added layer of guilt of the birth mom thinking she had no agency to keep her children. There were many avenues available to her, but she did not utilize them. As well as her statements that she thought the children would not be treated like she was in that house, so she did not think it would be a problem. I still feel guilty knowing these facts. Then on top of that, I felt guilty keeping them apart all this time, but really they were not ready for it. In fact, my oldest said she may never want to meet her which also made me feel guilty for springing this on her.
At the end of the day, I feel lighter because it was the right thing to do for all three of them to heal.
Mother of Trauma 
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