Every Friday Kelly over at Kelly's Korner does "Show Us Your Life Friday." The topics vary every week from showing a certain room in your house to missions trips to sharing your favorite charities. This week's topic really hit home for me. I've never participated in SUYLF before, but I felt compelled to do so tonight.
Every link posted before mine has been from the parent's point of view, and I wanted to share my story from the "baby's" point of view.
For those of you visiting my blog for the first time, I am a 21 year old college senior at the University of South Carolina. I have such a fortunate and blessed life, and none of this could have happened had I not been adopted.
My parents decided to look into adoption when my mother was diagnosed with a kidney disease and the doctors highly advised against getting pregnant. So they immediately began looking into adoption. My parents were very fortunate and on October 11,1989 they got a call saying their baby was waiting (me!)
As I got older I always knew I was adopted. My birth mother decided to place me up for a private adoption because she got pregnant at a young age. My parents were very open about the fact both me and my younger brother were adopted from birth and it was never a "secret". I can't even remember a moment that they sat my down and "broke the news" to me. It was just something I always knew. Having said that, I consider my adoptive parents MY parents. I will always and forever be grateful to my birth mother (and father) for having the strength and courage to do the most selfless thing I think a person could do. I never felt unloved or abandoned or unwanted. I know my birth mother loved me so much for her to be able to do this.
Whenever I tell my story alot of people ask me if I know who my birth mother is and if I have any desire to meet her. I answer with 100% honesty. I do not know who she is and at this point, I do not feel this need or desire that I have to find her. It stems back to the fact that I never felt abandoned by her. Whenever it's brought up my parents have said that they have the file and if I wanted to they would give it to me and I could see who my birth mother is. At this point all I know is that she was really young, Catholic, and still lives in town. That's all I want to know (at this point). My feelings may change years down the road, and if the situation came up where she wanted to meet me, I don't know that I would object. At the least I would be able to meet the woman who gave me the greatest gift imaginable and thank her for her selfless decision.
My whole point of this post was to show a successful adoption story! To couples considering adoption, DO NOT GIVE UP!! I know more often than not its a long and expensive process, but I am so thankful my (adoptive) parents were there when they were. Your baby will come when the time is right, and that WILL BE YOUR CHILD. To pregnant women/couples considering adoption for their babies, take it from one of those "babies", we will be forever grateful!! I will NEVER forget that my birth mother loved me enough to give me up.
I feel like this post is very rambly and not well organized, but these are my thoughts. I am sitting here with tears in my eyes thinking just how incredibly blessed I am! I don't want to imagine what my life would be like had I not been adopted. Not to say that my life would have been awful, for all I know it could have been just as great, but it wouldn't have been this life.
This was a difficult post to write, just because I haven't shared something this personal on here before. To all my loyal readers, I appreciate every single one of you. And to new readers, thank you so much for taking time to read my story! If yall have any questions/comments, feel free to email me or leave a comment :)
xoxo
Natalie
**January 25 2013 - I originally wrote this post almost 2 years to the day, but wanted to share it again via Kelly's linkup. All the feelings I expressed back then still hold true today. If anything I believe even more now that adoption is such a special, priceless gift I couldn't be more grateful now. I've even become more open to the idea of one day meeting my birth mother, simply to show my gratitude and thankfulness. Hope you guys enjoy this post!**
