To My Mother

It was a shock to hear it. Not that I was adopted, that I always knew. My parents, my adopted parents, made no secret of it…at least to me. I know they never told their friends, or their family, that I was not their real daughter. That their own daughter died while being born, strangled by the very cord that had given her life. But to me, they never hid it. I grew up knowing that I was someone else’s child, that you gave me away at birth.

For years, I dreamed that one day you would appear on our doorstep and I would finally know who you were. Perhaps it was simply my way of expressing my wish that my parents showed their affection more. Perhaps it was more. Like all children, I pretended you were someone rich, and famous, perhaps even someone whose face appeared on billboards all over the world. But I could never have anticipated this.

How could you do it? I could accept, if not completely understand, that you gave me away because you were too young to look after me or even if you simply didn’t have the money, but this…this is hard pill to swallow. But no, mum says I must try to see this from your perspective too. You say you were caught between a rock and a hard place, that your husband didn’t want me but you weren’t willing to leave him because of your other daughter, who was his child too. That the circumstances surrounding my birth were complicated and that you believed my life would be better growing up away from it all. 

I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to fully understand your reasons, but maybe someday, I’ll be able to forgive you.