The Ultimate Mother’s Day Gift
It’s been a dozen years since we talked, but I still think of her this time every year, usually when the ads start appearing, suggesting Mother’s Day gifts.
We only exchanged a few emails, so maybe it’s odd that someone I never met in person has remained with me the way she has, but she touched something in me. Opened my eyes to a suffering I’d not considered until we talked.
She’d emailed initially because of a column I once wrote mentioning some friends I’d been avoiding because their children were about the same age my youngest would’ve been. She said she could relate. That she’d been doing the same. That every time she’d found herself around a child of a certain age, she’d feel the stabbing pain that accompanied the thought, “That’s how big she’d be now.”
Except her daughter wasn’t gone in the same way as mine. Hers had been given up for adoption.
The woman said she hadn’t experienced sleepless nights from teething or gotten to witness crawling or seen her daughter’s first steps. She’d never had her little one sneak into her shower or crawl into her bed in the middle of the night. In other words — she had just as many nevers as me.
I saved her email and, over the years, have run across it a number of times. I find it strange how you can know something exists — like adoption, for instance — but not really see it for what it is: that it isn’t just a choice, but also a loss. I’m a little embarrassed I didn’t see it that way until she showed that to me.
This woman’s generosity, and her loss, enabled her child to have a shot at a better life than she believed she could provide. I find it humbling that a mother could be selfless enough to make that big of a sacrifice. It says something about what mothers should be. Mothers are supposed to look out first for the best interest of their child, regardless of the personal pain such a decision might bring.
Before someone races to their computer to scold me, please know that I understand that not every woman who gives a child up for adoption does so for selfless reasons. But I also know that not every woman who keeps her child does so because she wants to be a mother. I think many are often shamed into keeping their child, even though they know that child’s life could likely be so much better in another home.
Before my emails and hers passed back and forth, it never occurred to me how giving up a child would be such a lingering pain. It wouldn’t be something you’d do, and then forget and move on as if nothing had happened. It wouldn’t be like yanking a tooth — an instant of hurt, then not another thought after the wound has closed.
Mothers who lose a child continue to receive sympathy, even many years after, from those who respectfully acknowledge the loss. I wonder if moms who lose a child to adoption are ever afforded that same sort of regard.
I wonder how Mother’s Day feels to them.
In the email from this woman, she admitted to constantly scanning faces in crowds, hoping to spot a redheaded child who bears some resemblance to her. When shopping, she said she sometimes couldn’t resist going to the children’s section, looking at outfits that might fit her daughter. Who I believe would now be finishing her senior year.
But since she knew she couldn’t properly care for her baby, she took great care in choosing parents who could. She said she didn’t regret the decision. She knew it was right. But knowing doesn’t make that loss disappear.
The Saturday before Mother’s Day is recognized as Birthmother’s Day. While the nod of recognition is nice, I wonder if setting apart a separate day isn’t a bit of an insult. Sure, they aren’t the ones who stay up nights soothing fevers and helping finish last-minute homework assignments; they weren’t the ones who drank after a toddler or raced to the pet store hoping to find an identical hamster, or any of those other tedious and disgusting things a parent will do. But for every single rough time they missed, they missed out on dozens of sweet ones as well.
Today might technically be Birth Mother Day, but these women are still mothers. Regardless of whether they raised the child.
Or made the sacrifice that allowed someone else to be blessed.
