I have always been aware that placing my daughter for adoption could negatively affect other people's lives. For example: my parents would lose their first grandchild. I frequently said the choice I made was between God, my child and myself - and that was all.

That is just not true. How blind I have been. I realized for the first time, four years later, that my son, and my future children, are living through the impact of my decision as well.

On that chilly November day, I did not just separate Mother and Child--I separated choiceless children. One is now an adoptee living with another family. Another, my son, is left behind in a wake of unanswered questions and broken dreams. He is left to pick up where his sister left off--to be the firstborn of the family, but never of my heart.

My son: Living in the shadow of my choice. He will not see that I was too young. He will not know that I was left to fend for myself. He will not understand I did what I felt was best. He will only forever question if there is enough room for him in a heart torn by a choice. I am the 'could have been' mommy to another child, a child he has grown to love as a playmate. What will he say to me on the day he realizes his little friend is much more to me, and to him? She will forever be the child that came before him, the child I gave to another. I always knew I'd have to answer to my daughter one day, but now I know what the agency failed to tell me: I'd have to answer to my son (and future children) as well.

My only excuse is: "I could see far enough to know that I wouldn't be able give my daughter what she needed, but I could not see far enough to know what I was doing to my future children."

I stood there, a fresh twenty years old, and signed the rights to my daughter to another. Barely breathing from the act of relinquishment, my yet conceived children were far from my mind. They had no voice, for they were only a glimmer in God's eye. I made the choice for them, just the same as I had for my daughter.

A choice. How seemingly insignificant one choice can be. Even when you take in consideration how a decision will affect your life ...there is always something waiting around the corner. I had severed the rights of my children. We have advocates for adoptees, thank God, but what about the other children? The children of Birthmothers yet to come? Who will be their voice when they cry out for their blood-bonded siblings? And they will cry out. Sooner or later.

I know that for the rest of my life, I will have to face such questions as, "How many children do you have?" -- there is always that moment where I decide if I am going to say one or two. There is always that fear of the ackward silence that comes from sharing my birth-motherhood. And I am prepared for that. That is part of the choice I had made when I chose adoption. However, it tears my heart to know that my future children will have to face that same ackward silence when they are asked "How many brothers and sisters do you have?" -- will they carry a simliar fear in sharing about their birth-sibling?

No one at the adoption agency told me about this. They barely told me of what I would face, let alone my future children. But now, I know. And in a few more years, my son will know too. He wasn't the first. There was another who came before him. When I hold him close, will he wonder if I am longing for her? A child should never have to doubt his place in their mommy's heart, but I fear ... will he wonder, "will she give me away too?"

I can hear my son softy cry upstairs as he settles down for a nap. Now, more than ever, am I aware of what I have chosen. I did what cannot be undone. In saying that, I have no regrets, but one: I wish I could have seen a bit further.

While helping to build a family, I only broke my own.

-- Updated 9/16/03 --  

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