THANK YOU FOR GIVING ME LIFE

• Posted by Deleted Member June 26, 2010 - 51 views

  I LOST HIM TWICE. He was my birth son. His father deserted me before he was born. I was soon to be homeless with no place to live. My sister who was suppossed to be renting a house with me moved out halfway through the lease without ever having paid rent or utilities and I was struggling. We were renting from someone out of the country. She left me high and dry.

  I allowed some "friends" to talk me initially into having an abortion but GOD had a different idea. Not realizing how far along I was when I reported to the women's center they instructed me they could not perform a third trimester abortion. Before being able to think too long about what I would do next, all of a sudden I was in labor. Things moved quickly. I was asked what I would do while on the table. Adoption I asked? Could I place the child for adoption? I was a mess. I was in tears. GOD wanted this child to be here and I didn't have the courage to raise him without a father. Adoption then was my hasty decision. I felt so guilty. I had abandoned my child because his father had abandoned me. I didn't want a reminder of him or a child caught in the middle. As a very young woman I was torn apart, confused and spent a year in therapy listening to a female therapist try to convince me that abortions are just operations. But my heart and soul never accepted that. I eventually dropped the therapy despite coming close to trying to take my own life about halfway through the year. Convinced that only GOD could heal my broken heart and forgive my decision I slowly came back into the world and began feeling human again.

  YES, I LOST HIM TWICE. Let me explain the pain. Three years ago this young man decided that finding his birth mother was very important. At the time my son began his search I was intensely involved in the challenges of dealing with a husband who had almost died in a car accident several years before. He had to learn to walk again. I was preoccupied with the pain of accepting that he was also beginning to rapidly lose his sight due to nerve damage. THEN CAME THAT PHONE CALL. " Hello. Your name is Mary, right? The University gave me your contact information for your office. They said you are still working here like you were when you gave birth to me 22 years ago. " " Yes I did place a son for adoption. " As the story unfolded and the tears flowed I began to feel a warmth like nothing I had felt before. The warmth of forgiveness. " I've had a great life. I'm a musician and my parents are great. I was raised with an adopted sister also. " We spent a little time together and agreed to talk again. E-mails began arriving daily with questions about me, my background, my daughters... and then came the distraction. My husband decided to leave town for a year.

  I LOST HIM TWICE. The father of my daughters was leaving me. Not my son's father this time but my husband of 21 years and the father of my 16 and 21 year old daughters. I had not consented but he was hard-headed and determined and I could do nothing but sit and watch helplessly as his Social Workers who were "acting in his best interest" convinced him to walk out the door three days before Valentines Day not knowing when and if this bitter, angry man who was blaming me for everything would ever return to our home. He went several hundred miles south for a rehabilitation program and didn't return my calls saying as he left that I didn't care about him and I just wanted him to die. I buried myself in the work I had to do and worried constantly about having to leave my 16 year old home with the dogs (there were 4 of them and an alarm system) while I worked a night shift in a security booth 3-4 times a week in addition to a day job. Her older sister wasn't visiting much these days as she was living independently and feverishly pulling all-nighters to finish her last semester of college. My younger daughter who was still at home would stay up all night messaging me via e-mail, sending me silly songs and videos. Then came that horrible Valentine's Day 2007 ice and snow storm. I was suppossed to get relief at 11 pm but nobody was coming in and no one was going out. My husband hadn't called me all day and I was practically in tears. Then came a call from a booth on the north end of campus near the mailroom. " Hey, girl, there's some roses here for you." It took time to work my way up to the north end on foot the next morning after working that double shift. What kept me moving through the cold was the hope that my husband had really sent me ROSES.

  There were 12 of them. Deep red and a card. Well maybe he misses me after all I thought. But no the card was not signed by hubby at all. It was from my SON. It was simple but profound. " I love you Mom. Thank you for giving me LIFE. " Today I am holding that card again and its time to tell the world what happened to that LOVING SON on April 23, 2010. Another woman's son was driving a car too that day. But he wasn't as responsible. He was drunk. Stone cold drunk. AND MY SON didn't live to tell about what happened next...

  HE'S GONE. I LOST HIM TWICE. The mother that raised him didn't want him to look for me. She called me when he first contacted me and told me not to speak to him any more. I told her I would honor her wish if it was her son's will. But I also reminded her that my daughters whom I HAD raised had the right to make some decisions on their own too. WE would have to leave this up to our SON I reminded her. Letting go is difficult I said softly to her. I don't think she heard me with her ears or her heart. I prayed right then and there when she hung up the phone. When the time for the funeral came, I didn't go out of respect to her wishes. His college classmates and the high school students he taught as well as his sister (also adopted) contacted me with condolences and information about the memorial.

  I LOST HIM TWICE. Just like the men who gave me my children. BUT I HAVE NEVER LOST THE LOVE OF GOD. HE WILL SEE ME THROUGH...AGAIN AND AGAIN AND AGAIN.