I feel sick today. Okay, actually for the last few days. I have slowly been getting sicker and feeling more blah each day. Not the “slight sniffle” sick, nor the “bit of a cough” sick, but a flat out “feel like staying in bed, unconcious” sick. I left work once last week, and spent the other days on generic claritin.

I have woken up with that “cotton tubes shoved up the nose” feeling. (You know the ones, those little cylindrical pieces of cotton that dentists and their assistants have a running bet on to see how many they can get in your mouth each visit?) My throat feels like I have been eating sand and washing it down with iodine. My stomach feels like it is reliving my Navy days, specifically every storm we ever went thru in rapid succession. My body has that tingly feeling like a billion little baby spiders crawling all over it.

I’ve been drinking the required fluids and eating the recommended soups. Still no go. I rested the entire weekend, even went to bed an hour earlier than normal last night, which is VERY unusual for me. And yet, off to work I went this morning, got the important things done then hid in the server room with the computers, checking the logs and backups while listening to the droning of their fans, staring at a screen tyring to remember what I was just doing.

I drove home listening to a Harry Potter novel (Can’t you just here Umbrage telling Harry, “I’m sorry Mr Potter. I don’t feel you have the right to know your parents, but I will fix that, Obliviate!!”)

So I’m home again, getting ready to crawl into bed, after some hot Ramen, gatoraide and a bit of tv. Man I hope I feel better tomorrow.

“To resist the influence of others, knowledge of one’s self is most important.” Teal’c (Stargate SG-1)

Well, I’m still waiting for the adoption agency to get back to me for my “one more hour” of searching. I’m more than a bit frustrated by it. I don’t like giving up control and while I understand sometimes you have to in this world, it really frustrates me with them.

I want to call them and ask how it’s going but at the same time I am afraid to because they can easily just say they couldn’t find anything and I have no recourse to prove otherwise. Talk about feeling loss of control.

This would be so much easier if they would just open records for Florida. However, if you have read this post by The Daily Bastardette, you can see that isn’t happening any time soon with the direction they are headed.

My parents have offered to help anyway they can to speed things along but I find it hard to talk to them about the search other than the basics. I guess I don’t want them to see the pain I feel about all this because I don’t want them to feel that’s any of this is their fault, at all. I have tried to get across the fact that they offered is probably the best help they could probably offer.

One thing I asked and they agreed to is to write my story down. I realised I didn’t know my “adoption story” or at least all the details. I have seen pictures of the day I was brought home, read the notes my mom took of my first few months including temperatures, food, occasional rashes, etc. Now I want to know. I want to know what they thought as they were going to the adoption agency, what kind of stuff they had to go thru. What they thought when they first saw me. What happened as they introduced me to the rest of the family. You know, my birth adoption story. So now, I’m waiting for the first two chapters in the book of me.

At a “Daddy’s Day” at my son’s school one of the speakers recommended a book called “The Five Languages” by Gary Chapman.
If you haven’t read it, you should. The theory is that people display/accept love in 5 basic ways (although there are “dialects” with each language) which are:

• Words of Affirmation: Such as saying I love you or thanking someone.
• Quality Time: Time really paying attention to each other.
• Recieving Gifts: These can be homemade stuff as well
• Acts of Service: Doing stuff for your loved one.
• Physical Touch: Everything from holding hands to sex.

Okay, I know it sounds kind of odd but after reading the book, I am really starting to agree with it. See the theory is that a person feels love a certain way, and it’s often the way we display love as well. After the “honeymoon” period of a relationship, we start to calm down and that’s when we can start feeling unloved in the relationship because we aren’t speaking the same “language.” The book talks about ways to understand what your language is and to recognize what your significant other’s language is as well.
My wife and I both read the book and realised that we were “speaking” completely different languages, hers is acts of service and mine is a combination of words of affirmation and physical touch. The past few weeks since we read it has been great and I’m looking forward to the future. I would recommend it to anyone, whether married or just dating.

It also comes in an unabridged CD version which is really handy while driving to work. There is also a guys edition because I guess we need a little extra help.

(Okay, so this was a sales pitch post, but it’s a really good book.)

I was asked the other day what it was like to be an adoptee, if I could condense it into something simple. I thought of the loneliness I sometimes feel and the feeling of lost. I thought about the helplessness, the lack of control, of being able to see my “vital” records. I thought about the birthdays and family holidays that hurt.

But how to make someone understand all that? How to make someone who has grown up with their blood understand what it means? So I asked them to try to imagine waking up every day and never seeing anyone who looked like you. No one with your eyes, your hair, your nose or mouth.

I have noticed that when a reunited adoptee is sharing pictures with other adoptees, the first comment is almost always something along the lines that the family looks just like the adoptee. I’ve met a few adoptees who couldn’t even see it in themselves. They would meet family and then say they look nothing like me, yet everyone else could see the similarities, some sharing exact facial features, but the adoptee in question could not see it. Was it because it was so much of a shock? Or maybe they had given up searching and just stopped looking?

In my son, I can now see my reflection. I can’t look at him sometimes without feeling the hint of tears in my eyes. Last night, as I tucked him in to bed and he said his prayers, he prayed that we would find my family. I’m not alone anymore.

My buddy, whom I will just call Farmer Boy, and I were driving back from an adoption retreat last year and we got to talking about the word Triad in relation to adoption. neither one of us really like the triangle so we started discussing a way to better represent it. Below is what we came up with. Be advised, this was done while driving on a lazy Sunday afternoon by two guys who were tired, eating junk food and drinking way too much caffeine.

The Triad

The three main groups of adoption are usually represented by a triangle however, this can misrepresent the reality of the members of adoption.

The triangle appears to:

• demonstrate an equal distance or separation between the three members.
• show an equal or harmonious connection between the adoptee and the adoptee’s two families.
• symbolize that the birth family and adoptive family are raising the child’s interest above their own.
• exhibit that the relationship or communication between the adoptee and their adoptive and birth family is equal and similar.

These are rarely true.

The Plane

The plane (a flat or level surface) shows the adoptee between the other two members.

This better represents the truth behind adoption and it’s members. It can also display the way many adoptees feel like the center of a tug-of-war between their loyalties to the adoptive family and their longing to know their heritage and and blood.

By adjusting the image, the plane can illustrate an adoptee’s emotions or state of mind, moving back and forth between the two families.

This plane illustrates an adoptee moving (searching?) towards their birth family. It is also important to note that the arrow only represents the status on that side of the plane. In this case, the adoptee and Adoptive family are not moving away nor moving closer.

This plane illustrates an adoptee moving towards their adoptive family. (Retreating to familiarity?) Again, this movement has no impact on the birth family side in this diagram.

This plane can illustrate an adoptee’s emotions being torn between their two families.

The following plane represents Wraith at the time of writing, an adoptee who is currently searching for his birth family. The relationship with the adoptive family is good and they are supportive of the adoptee searching.

As you can see, the birth family is a question mark since they are unknown. The adoptee is moving towards the birth family, however, they are also moving toward the adoptive family and they toward the adoptee. Note also, the connecting line between the adoptee and the adoptive family has grown shorter to represent the closeness and support.

Here is another representation of an adoptee who is pulling away from his adoptive family and they from him as he moves toward his biological family.

The Goal

The goal is to join all three representative circles into one family. A melding, as it were, of the adoptees two families into one united family which still have characteristics of each family.

While we understand this is not an exact method of measurement, we believe it is a much better visual of the true nature of adoption.

So what do you think?

I don’t know what to write about this and I can’t stop shaking…

Underground Network Moves Children

I have been asked before by some adoptive and soon to be adoptive parents what my recommendations would be to them. My first response is to comment on how brave they are. Sometimes they misunderstand and think I am saying they are brave because of the adventure they are about to embark on, so I have to bring them back to reality and say they are brave for asking an adoptee that question.

Anyway, on a more polite side I usually give the following recommendations:

1. Educate yourself, read every book you can find on adoptees and on being an adoptive parent. (If you need any recommendations, ask me)
2. Decide now, if you are doing this for a child, or for yourself. (Is it about image or love?)
3. Mourn what you may not have. (As in blood children of their own.)
4.Never say, “We love you as our own.” The adoptee will be your child and that’s a mixed message if there ever was one.
5. Don’t overdo the “you are so special/lucky” thing. They aren’t going to feel that, so actions will speak louder than words.
6. Always be there for them, they may have anxiety when you leave them at daycare, or anywhere else. This is normal for most kids, but often worse for an adoptee.
7. Join a support group, somewhere they can play with other adopted kids and you can talk about your life with your child.
8. Love them unconditionally. Even when they shout you are not my family. Even more so then.
9. Find out everything you can about your child’s heritage and family and try to incorporate some of it into your own. Allow them to freedom to explore their history as well as yours.
10. Don’t take it personal if they decide to search for their blood. It’s not about you or something you did wrong, it’s about wanting to know where you came from. After all, you probably know where you came from right?
11. Be honest in all things.
12. Love them, UNCONDITIONALLY.

So there you go, my recommendations. Anyone want to add to them?

oh two more
13. If a member of the birthfamily comes around searching, be honest and truthful with the adoptee about it. Let them make the decision or if still very young, ask their opinion. Don’t hold it against them and don’t think you need to “defend” your child from these people. After all, from a biological stand point, your child is theirs as well.
14. If the adoptee is reunited, try to not hold animosity toward the birth family. Also understand that the adoptee may spend more time with them for a while. He or she hasn’t forgotten you, they are just reveling in something new, like looking at someone who looks like them. (Want to know what I mean? If you are ever around a bunch of adoptees and one of them just reunited and is showing pictures, the first comment is probably going to be “Wow, you look just like them.” It’s one of the first things we notice, because we don’t see it in ourselves.)

“The true measure of a life is not how many people know our names when we die… but whether we touch the lives of others.”
Control (The Outer Limits)

Our pianist at church today, acknowledged his mom who is eighty. He went on to thank her for the lessons and for just being there. He closed by reminding us we should all tell our parents how much they mean to us in person while we still can.
This really touched me inside and I thought to myself that I really want to do this with my birthmom and birthdad. I want to tell them, thank you for my life.
When I first started this search all I wanted was medical information (yeah, I know that’s bogus, but there you go.) As I continued, I decided I want to know my history, my past. Now I realise, it’s deeper than that, I want to meet these two people face to face, tell them thank you as I look them in their eyes and then introduce them to my son. After that, I will probably only want a kleenex, or maybe two.
So that’s my goal, to reach out and touch the lives of the two people who gave me life.

Throughout history, man has been driven to seek out his origins, to determine whether he’s the result of a divine plan or merely the sum of all his yesterdays. But what happens if, at the end of his search, he should discover that he’s neither? Every life is a destination unknown; a journey of tragedies and triumphs that ultimately allows us to discover not only our world, but more importantly, ourselves… Control (Outer Limits)

I think I know what’s been bugging me. This should be the week I get the call about the last hour of searching the agency will do. (see post One More Hour) I’m getting antsy about it, yet at the same time, I don’t really expect them to find her but I can’t stop hoping. It’s annoying, scary and exciting at the same time.
How cool would it be though? I see so many others reunite and it’s driving me crazy. I want to be happy for them, I am happy for them, but I’m so jealous as well. Why can’t I get a break?
On the flip side, I hae started going back to the adoption forums and reading. It’s strange how argumentative people get. You make one generalization and you’re guaranteed that someone whom it doesn’t apply to will jump all over you.
I asked to be listed in my church’s prayer bulleting again for continuing search for my birth family. Everyone there has been pretty responsive to it, many coming up and wishing me luck. When I first asked it to be listed, I was so nervous because I wasn’t sure how people would react, silly me. People can surprise you every day.
The best thing about being on this journey is learning who I am. I never had another face to look at until the birth of my son, who looked like me. Never had someone who has a similar genetic makeup to base myself against. That may have been a good thing or a bad but it is what it is. Like the song “Just Like Me” by DMC, “He came into to this world like we all do, but he never ever knew how he came thru. Do the best you can do, if this happened to you….” That’s it, I just have to do the best that I can. It’s all any of us can do.

I have been in a foul mood this week. I’m not sure what the underlying thing is that is bothering me, but I do know the trigger that really set me off.
On Tuesday morning, I arrived at work and reviewed our employee handbook. I had written several new policies which were supposed to go into effect at he beginning of the year. (I had actually written them back in June, but with everything else going on, they didn’t get approved until late. That actually gave me time to make a few more adjustments to them.) Anyway, I was very careful in the way I wrote the policies, taking care to ensure the rights of the employees was not violated.
I was told the policy was approved with only the word “shall” replacing a few of my “woulds” and “shoulds. ” As I read it, however, I realised that the spirit of what I had written had been changed and piece of it was removed, an important piece. I was pissed. Here my work was changed and then I was lied to. On top of that, several of my other policies, the oldest ones I had written were not posted because there wasn’t time to get them in, however the person who lied and told me this stuff had time to get theirs posted. This took a good weekend and monday off and brought it to a crashing halt.
Oh yeah, the policy was on blogging.
To top that off, I had several calls this week for tech support which started off with asking me if my systems are down or just basic phrases like “my printer isn’t working.” Why is it sooooo hard to give details? “What were you doing?” “What is the error on your screen?” Even the form they fill out to request assistance asks for details yet people don’t give it and then they don’t want to give them when asked. Then people are surprised when techs are short tempered. Get a clue people, we are smart, not omniscient. If some stranger called you up and said, “Hey, I can’t cash this check!” would you immediately offer to send them money? No, you would ask them what check they are talking about, confirm who they are, and that it was a check you even wrote. How about if a friend called you up and said they were in pain? Would you merely offer an aspirin? NO, you would probably ask why they hurt. Details, what a concept.
So, I have been in a foul mood this week.