Diabetes Talking

Question:

Thanks to whomever changed the subject title. <snip Well, technically no.  That’s all it takes.

Agreed on current definition of "mother".  Perhaps there should be other terminology, especially since so many children are being "gestated" by women who are paid to do so and who will, by design, have zero connection to the children after birth, etc.   <<How many times do I have to go back for more emotional abuse before you and the rest of the denizens of this ng will be satisfied?  Sorry, but I am not going to sacrifice my newfound happiness for HER sake – her finite amount of chances with me are definately (permanently!) exhausted. You don’t have to go back…EVER…as far as I’m concerned.  

More total agreement on this point. <<Of course, if I had emotionally abusive ADOPTIVE parents, the outpouring of support I’d get from this group for my decision to cut them off and never look back would be overwhelming.  Funny how this group works, isn’t it?  

I wasn’t aware of this dynamic. If this is the case, I’d like to go on record as saying that maybe we don’t deserve open records if we’re such total nitwits. It sure does upset some folks around here.  I get constant flames in my e-mail box which is one reason why I stopped going into detail about my own reunion.  Don’t you know, according to those flamers, "I just didn’t try hard enough"!  No, it is not I who did not "try hard enough".  

Beth, are we (alt.adoption) really so into the fantasy of the perfect reunion that we flame you "constantly"?, frequently?, too often? I’ve tended to overlook those who clearly had a terribly naive view of adoption reunions (as well as those few for whom I no longer had any hope) but maybe I should have spoken out more … The I’M AFRAID OF OPEN RECORDS (AND I’M AN ADOPTEE) subject certainly has been an eye-opener for me! At our local search/support meeting last evening an adult adoptee (in search) was telling about her adopted sister’s recent reunion.  This woman may win "Worst Birthmother of the Year" award — maybe it’s time to have such a contest, to vent a bit, bring some humor to the subject, and by doing so to honor those first mothers who are okay or even exemplary, and to educate fellow adoptees that they don’t have to meekly submit to the walking dysfunctions who introduce themselves as birth mother".                                                                    Sue T.

Response:

- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Hello… "Why do you single out "birth"?  what is it about the moment of emurging Ummm, Kim. If some people have to learn how to use aspostrophes, you’ll have to learn how to spell "emerging". (You knew that was coming, didn’t you?)  ;-)   Uhhh… DON – if you are going to continue to present yourself as a God of the Usenet, you should learn to read posts for comprehension before firing off your witty little replies.  Tim was the one who wrote "emurging", not I.  (You knew that was coming, didn’t you?).

LOL! Guilty!!! But…I will point out that your non-standard attribution ANGERS the Gods of the Usenet!  ;-) Why don’t you use the arrows like the majority of the civilized world? And, yes, the "Adoptee’s" thing drove me nuts, too…but I know what’d happen if I said anything.  :-)   What?  You’d get flamed for nitpicking?

No, I knew it would cause me to make some huge and obvious fuck-up of my own…see above.  So what?  It’s damn annoying – not to mention damn funny, considering that the very same person who wrote that subject line is attempting to teach "correct" (in his opinion) word usage to the rest of us.

Yeah, it’s important to not make any grammatical, spelling or attribution errors when correcting those errors in others. from the private parts of you natural mother that makes it the thing you focus on to the exclusion of all else in choice of a descriptive term?" Tim’s got a real weird thing going over the "birthparent" term. Rest assured that it’s not rational.   Are you replying to Tim or to me?  I’m not the one who wrote the bit about "private parts".

I know. I was warning you about Tim…just in case you didn’t know.   You know, maybe Tim has a point here – maybe "birth" parent isn’t the best term to use in this situation.  In my opinion, the term "birth" mother gives far too much credit to the wrong person, as someone who gives birth to and then abandons a child doesn’t really qualify as a "mother" of any sort in my book. We’re all waiting for your book, Kim, but, in the meantime, they do technically qualify as "mothers" — now, good mothers…well, that’s a different issue.   It takes more than the act of creating a child and giving birth to said child to qualify one as a "mother" in every sense of the word.

Okay, okay, we won’t get into this. But, consultation with a dictionary will probably result in you rethinking this. Hey, I don’t like "bastard," but I gotta live with THAT.   I consider the woman who raised me to be my REAL mother – after all, SHE was the one who was there for me.   We are in full agreement.   Hear that?  It’s Lucifer starting his new snowplow.

Nope. We’ve agreed many time, Kim. You’re just in denial about it.  :-) For all that she has contributed to my life, I might as well refer to my "birth" mother as my Gestational Unit. Right. That person has given me NOTHING but sadness and pain. I’m not going to agree with you on this one, Kim. That’s all you’ve gotten out of her, Kim, but I’m sure there’s more to get.   You’re right – there’s shame, blame, and hatred.  Already got THOSE from her, too, thanks.

I don’t think anyone can give you "shame" or "blame." You have to give those to yourself. Someone can direct hatred toward you…but, that’s never bothered me. It says everything about them, and nothing about me. As you know, it’s all in your perception. If you don’t care about the negative stuff she has to say, it’s a lot easier to make the most out of the rest of whatever she has to say. But, if you find it to be overwhelmingly negative, cutting her out of your life is certainly the best way to go.   Well, I just returned from six days in New York.

As Fear sang, "New York’s alright, if you like saxaphones."  LOL! Have fun? Kelly spend most of her childhood growing up on the Lower East Side. I especially like driving there. Really! It’s a blast! But, then, I come from a motorcycle racing background and don’t mind banging bars. This was the most enjoyable time I’ve had there, mainly because I didn’t tell my birthmother I was coming up, thus eliminating the tedious middle steps in the process, such as getting pestered into changing all of my plans and making carved-in-stone plans with her only to be blown off at the very last possible second, and listening to insults about my boyfriend and his family.

ROTFLMAO! Boy, I wish I had your birthmother. I would enjoy nothing more than verbally chopping her up in little pieces and feeding her to my cat (who’d probably turn his nose up at something so vile…he prefers rats). As good as you are here on a.a, I can’t believe you aren’t just as good (or better) in person. Flame her face to face…and then come back and tell us about it so we can all enjoy it vicariously. She has every right to feel however she likes about me and those whose company I choose to keep, and I have every right not to subject myself to the company of those who delight in ruining my happiness and making me feel like shit.

This just seems so weird to me. No one can make me feel like shit. Only I can make me feel like shit…and that’s on the rare occasion that I feel I’ve done the wrong thing. Instead of feeling like shit when your birthmother tosses some your way, toss it back and laugh at her. I know…you can’t do that. But, I wish you could. Good luck with this. We all know you deserved better.   Everyone deserves better than her.

Right. It’s just too bad you didn’t kick her ass right from the start. It worked great for me. Oh, I am sure that Tim will hasten to point out to me that she gave me my life, so allow me to remind you  all that she gave me life only under duress – her first choice was abortion. Hardly the loving mother type, I promise you. Perhaps not toward you, Kim, but maybe toward the kids she actually "mothered". My birthmother would taken the option of abortion, had it been available to her. She certainly never "mothered" me in the past and hasn’t done so presently.   Does she gleefully tell you how many times over the years she’s wished you were dead?

Nah. But she’s probably said "shut the fuck up" to me about a million times. This, of course, is in response to me telling her to lose weight (for health, not appearance, reasons) and stop smoking (it’s unhealthy and gross — I won’t even let her smoke when she’s talking on the phone with me!),  or when I rib her about being married eight times. That’s okay, because they give me shit about being cocky and elitist (both true — what can I say?). Ultimately, Judy and I share the "happy gene" and we really like being around each other because that "happy gene" really clicks when we’re together. Both Kelly and her kids just sit and stare and how we look and how we interact. Kim, is there anything you share with your birthmother? Mine did – the very first time I spoke to her.

Judy did tell me that she had wished she could have aborted me. Admitting she would have rather had an abortion and being deliberately cruel are two different things – trust me, my birthmother has cornered the market on deliberate cruelty.

I still think it’s caused by pain within her…but you know her better than I do — I think. But, that doesn’t mean she’s not a good mother. Despite the fact that she’s been married and divorced 8 (!) times, the three kids she raised all love her deeply and are extremely close to her.   I wonder if my birthmother will be able to say the same about her children in twenty years or so.

That’ll be interesting. I spoke with each one of her kids (including the other adoptee) before speaking with her. I would have blown off contacting her if her kids hadn’t all told me how much they love her. What do your birthmother’s kids say about her? Kim, I think your existance and how your experience with adoption is very painful to your birthmother, but she doesn’t know how to show it to you or to express her pain in an appropriate manner.   Are you kidding?  If she’d been told I was dead, she’d have gone and danced on my grave.  My pain makes her HAPPY, Don.  She is glad that she caused me misery.

It’s hard to imagine that she’s really as evil as you protray her, Kim. BUT, as I’ve said before, you know her and none of us do. OTOH, I could be wrong and she could just be a sack of shit. You know her better than any of us, so I’ll leave her characterization up to you, BUT, given your widened horizons on the subject of birthmothers, I’d like to ask you to consider re-evaluating yours.   How many times do I have to go back for more emotional abuse before you and the rest of the denizens of this ng will be satisfied?

Kim — never go back. If that makes you happy, then that’s what you should do. Fuck anyone who doesn’t support you in that. Sorry, but I am not going to sacrifice my newfound happiness for HER sake – her finite amount of chances with me are definately (permanently!) exhausted.  

I wouldn’t expect you to sacrifice anyone. I just wonder if things would be different if you came to her from your current position of strength, rather than your previous position of weakness. Oh, well, I’ll guess you’ll never know. But, hey, there are always things in life you’ll never know. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text –

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Response:

<<I don’t think anyone can give you "shame" or "blame." You have to give those to yourself. Someone can direct hatred toward you…but, that’s never bothered me. It says everything about them, and nothing about me. You are quite right, Don.  But I think that you’re in a "better place" than I was when my reunion happened.  I was very emotionally vulnerable at the time.  Throughout search and first contact and "getting to know each other" my mother…my real mother…was dying of bone cancer.  It left me very open to all the crap my birthfamily had or wanted to throw at me. <<This just seems so weird to me. No one can make me feel like shit. Only I can make me feel like shit…and that’s on the rare occasion that I feel I’ve done the wrong thing. Instead of feeling like shit when your birthmother tosses some your way, toss it back and laugh at her. I know…you can’t do that. But, I wish you could. Unfortunately, for me anyway, that was easier said than done.  But after awhile I did get to a place where I just said "I’m not going to do this anymore.  There’s nothing of value here.  I’m walking away and I’m not coming back."  I refused to sink to my birthmother’s level and start slinging mud, I didn’t think that would get me anywhere except running around in bigger circles than I already had been.   <<It’s hard to imagine that she’s really as evil as you protray her, Kim. BUT, as I’ve said before, you know her and none of us do. Hard to believe?  Yes, probably it is.  But from my own experience I can tell you that it’s also true.  I don’t think my birthmother is "evil" I just think she doesn’t know her asshole from her elbow and in her confusion she said and did a lot of very hurtful (almost to the point of being hateful) things. I think that *now*.  Back when I was in the situation I did see her as being an evil nasty person.  But you know hindsite(sp?) is 20/20.  I had to speak with her about two weeks ago regarding my daughter who was recently diagnosed as having diabetes, for those of you who missed it the first time I wrote about here I called her and explained the situation to her she hung up on me.  I waited until the rage in me subsided and wrote her a letter explaining how important this information was to both my daughters.  Then I get a phone call from her.  She gives me the low down on diabetes in the family starting with her side, she tells me about her mother’s side first then hits me with "Well, my father had it but he was adopted so he doesn’t count."  Huh?  Excuse me?  "Doesn’t count?"  Doesn’t his genes, adopted or not, make up half of her?  She said it so off handedly, so casually, like it was nothing.  I choked it down and said nothing about it in order to get the info I needed for my daughter.  But that one statement said everything to me.  She hasn’t dealt with any of her "issues" since our parting and probably never will. He was adopted so he doesn’t count. <<We’re not. But, most of the adoptees with good adoptive parents are not on a.a. They don’t have issues. They don’t care. That’s how I was until I made that fateful "mistake" to see what in the world people in an adoption newsgroup would have to post about. Hey!  Don!  We got trapped in here the same way!  Have you found the way out yet? :}   Kim:   Of course, you know what the late Erma Bombeck said about the grass

being  greener… Don: <<Uh, no, I don’t. You don’t?  OK, here it is.  "The Grass is Always Greener Over the Septic Tank". Beth

Response:

<<It takes more than the act of creating a child and giving birth to said child to qualify one as a "mother" in every sense of the word. Well, technically no.  That’s all it takes.  But I know where you’re coming from and I hear you and I agree with you.  There are other words out there that we could use in place of "birthmother" how about…venter or genetrix or originator?  They’re good for describing my birthmother anyway. <<How many times do I have to go back for more emotional abuse before you and the rest of the denizens of this ng will be satisfied?  Sorry, but I am not going to sacrifice my newfound happiness for HER sake – her finite amount of chances with me are definately (permanently!) exhausted. You don’t have to go back…EVER…as far as I’m concerned.  There’s no reason on this Earth that you (or anyone) should sacrifice your happiness for someone else’s sake.  Especially for someone who is not trying to have you be happy and well and in some cases not even taking the other person’s happiness into consideration at all.  I, too, gave my birthmother numerous chances and tried numerous times with her to no avail.  One gets damn tired of beating ones head against a brick wall after awhile, not to mention getting one hell of a headache from it. <<Of course, if I had emotionally abusive ADOPTIVE parents, the outpouring of support I’d get from this group for my decision to cut them off and never look back would be overwhelming.  Funny how this group works, isn’t it?  (and NO, Don, I don’t think you’d be among those cheering me on – sometimes I think you and I are the only defenders of adoptive parents on this forum). And me!  Don’t forget me!  But I think you’re right in your perception of how this ng works sometimes.  It’s a little strange but we get used to it after a while.  <<We’re just BAD, UNGRATEFUL adoptees, Don.  You, Beth, and I are proof of what can happen when adoptees stand up for ourselves and don’t act like victims and allow ourselves to be victimized – by ANYONE, birthparent or otherwise.  Funny, but you’ll notice that this upsets some people around here. It sure does upset some folks around here.  I get constant flames in my e-mail box which is one reason why I stopped going into detail about my own reunion.  Don’t you know, according to those flamers, "I just didn’t try hard enough"!  No, it is not I who did not "try hard enough".  ’Twas them who did not try or could not communicate or whatever the hell their problem was.  To this day I still don’t really know what their problem(s) are/were.  But I do know that I do not intend to allow my birthfolk to dump huge amounts of crap on me any more. (haven’t allowed it for about 18 months now)  Not only did they dump it, they expected to me to take it…almost joyfully.  Well, I wasn’t joyful about it and never will be. Yeah, I raise my hand and admit that I took it and sucked it down at first.  I took all the guilt she had to dump on me and honestly thought these were my problems and that somehow they were also my fault.  But not anymore.  I did nothing to them.  I’m not going to be their scapegoat. But that’s OK, I’m sure they’ll find someone else to blame all of their life’s problems on.  Because it’s better to dump and blame your problems on someone else then to accept the responsibility for yourself, don’t ya know? I really feel for that person whoever he or she turns out to be.   Beth

Response:

I consider the woman who raised me to be my REAL mother – after all, SHE was the one who was there for me.  For all that she has contributed to my life, I might as well refer to my "birth" mother as my Gestational Unit.

Right on, Kim!  We are in full agreement. Oh, I am sure that Tim will hasten to point out to me that she gave me my life, so allow me to remind you all that she gave me life only under duress – her first choice was abortion. Hardly the loving mother type, I promise you.

I’m sure he will too.  That and more.  My own birthmother’s first choice was also abortion but it wasn’t available in ‘66.  My birthmother is not the loving mother type either.  She’s raised 3 kids, two hers, one her husbands.  The only one that’s gotten any kind of real attention from her is the child she had with her husband (my birthfather).  The other two were pretty much left to their own devices because (and I quote my bio-half-brother) "She didn’t want to raise a child that wasn’t hers and he didn’t want to raise a child that wasn’t his.  Sometimes I wish I’d been adopted too."  Don’t ya just love that?  Didn’t want to raise kids that weren’t theirs?  Yet they expected two total strangers to raise a child that wasn’t "theirs" and they expected them to be happy about it to boot!  (My parents were happy about it, I’m not saying that.)  What a double standard!  Sorry, Tim, but I refuse to worship at the Alter of The Holy Superior Birthmother, the First and Only Mother.  Perhaps if you had a birthmother like mine, you’d feel the exact same way.

No worshiping here either.  No how.  No way.   Beth

Response:

Hello… "Why do you single out "birth"?  what is it about the moment of emurging Ummm, Kim. If some people have to learn how to use aspostrophes, you’ll have to learn how to spell "emerging". (You knew that was coming, didn’t you?)  ;-)

  Uhhh… DON – if you are going to continue to present yourself as a God of the Usenet, you should learn to read posts for comprehension before firing off your witty little replies.  Tim was the one who wrote "emurging", not I.  (You knew that was coming, didn’t you?). And, yes, the "Adoptee’s" thing drove me nuts, too…but I know what’d happen if I said anything.  :-)

  What?  You’d get flamed for nitpicking?  So what?  It’s damn annoying – not to mention damn funny, considering that the very same person who wrote that subject line is attempting to teach "correct" (in his opinion) word usage to the rest of us. from the private parts of you natural mother that makes it the thing you focus on to the exclusion of all else in choice of a descriptive term?" Tim’s got a real weird thing going over the "birthparent" term. Rest assured that it’s not rational.

  Are you replying to Tim or to me?  I’m not the one who wrote the bit about "private parts".   You know, maybe Tim has a point here – maybe "birth" parent isn’t the best term to use in this situation.  In my opinion, the term "birth" mother gives far too much credit to the wrong person, as someone who gives birth to and then abandons a child doesn’t really qualify as a "mother" of any sort in my book. We’re all waiting for your book, Kim, but, in the meantime, they do technically qualify as "mothers" — now, good mothers…well, that’s a different issue.

  It takes more than the act of creating a child and giving birth to said child to qualify one as a "mother" in every sense of the word.   I consider the woman who raised me to be my REAL mother – after all, SHE was the one who was there for me.   We are in full agreement.

  Hear that?  It’s Lucifer starting his new snowplow. For all that she has contributed to my life, I might as well refer to my "birth" mother as my Gestational Unit. Right. That person has given me NOTHING but sadness and pain. I’m not going to agree with you on this one, Kim. That’s all you’ve gotten out of her, Kim, but I’m sure there’s more to get.

  You’re right – there’s shame, blame, and hatred.  Already got THOSE from her, too, thanks. As you know, it’s all in your perception. If you don’t care about the negative stuff she has to say, it’s a lot easier to make the most out of the rest of whatever she has to say. But, if you find it to be overwhelmingly negative, cutting her out of your life is certainly the best way to go.

  Well, I just returned from six days in New York.  This was the most enjoyable time I’ve had there, mainly because I didn’t tell my birthmother I was coming up, thus eliminating the tedious middle steps in the process, such as getting pestered into changing all of my plans and making carved-in-stone plans with her only to be blown off at the very last possible second, and listening to insults about my boyfriend and his family.  She has every right to feel however she likes about me and those whose company I choose to keep, and I have every right not to subject myself to the company of those who delight in ruining my happiness and making me feel like shit. Good luck with this. We all know you deserved better.

  Everyone deserves better than her. Oh, I am sure that Tim will hasten to point out to me that she gave me my life, so allow me to remind you all that she gave me life only under duress – her first choice was abortion. Hardly the loving mother type, I promise you. Perhaps not toward you, Kim, but maybe toward the kids she actually "mothered". My birthmother would taken the option of abortion, had it been available to her. She certainly never "mothered" me in the past and hasn’t done so presently.

  Does she gleefully tell you how many times over the years she’s wished you were dead?  Mine did – the very first time I spoke to her.  Admitting she would have rather had an abortion and being deliberately cruel are two different things – trust me, my birthmother has cornered the market on deliberate cruelty. But, that doesn’t mean she’s not a good mother. Despite the fact that she’s been married and divorced 8 (!) times, the three kids she raised all love her deeply and are extremely close to her.

  I wonder if my birthmother will be able to say the same about her children in twenty years or so. Kim, I think your existance and how your experience with adoption is very painful to your birthmother, but she doesn’t know how to show it to you or to express her pain in an appropriate manner.

  Are you kidding?  If she’d been told I was dead, she’d have gone and danced on my grave.  My pain makes her HAPPY, Don.  She is glad that she caused me misery. OTOH, I could be wrong and she could just be a sack of shit. You know her better than any of us, so I’ll leave her characterization up to you, BUT, given your widened horizons on the subject of birthmothers, I’d like to ask you to consider re-evaluating yours.

  How many times do I have to go back for more emotional abuse before you and the rest of the denizens of this ng will be satisfied?  Sorry, but I am not going to sacrifice my newfound happiness for HER sake – her finite amount of chances with me are definately (permanently!) exhausted.     Of course, if I had emotionally abusive ADOPTIVE parents, the outpouring of support I’d get from this group for my decision to cut them off and never look back would be overwhelming.  Funny how this group works, isn’t it?  (and NO, Don, I don’t think you’d be among those cheering me on – sometimes I think you and I are the only defenders of adoptive parents on this forum).   I’ve already cut my birthmother a more than generous amount of slack – with which she has finally hung herself once and for all.   Regardless of what Jean says, I am NOT a perpetual victim merely because I am an adoptee.  I am an adoptee who has decided to stop ACTING like a victim and ALLOWING others to victimize me (hey, too bad Jean never attended a seminar on that subject – oops, how silly of me… the cult of victims would never hold such a seminar, because that would derail the gravy train in a rather big way, wouldn’t it?).   Sorry, Tim, but I refuse to worship at the Alter of The Holy Superior Birthmother, the First and Only Mother. I’m right next to you, Kim, NOT worshiping. LOL!

  We’re just BAD, UNGRATEFUL adoptees, Don.  You, Beth, and I are proof of what can happen when adoptees stand up for ourselves and don’t act like victims and allow ourselves to be victimized – by ANYONE, birthparent or otherwise.  Funny, but you’ll notice that this upsets some people around here.  Perhaps if you had a birthmother like mine, you’d feel the exact same way. And parents like yours.

  I don’t think that we can be the only people around who had good adoptive parents.  I think a lot of adoptees jump on the Evil Adoptive Parent/Perfect Birthmother Bandwagon without ever giving things serious consideration.  Perhaps that is why a lot of reunions either drift apart or plain FALL apart after a few years – maybe it’s a case of the adoptee discovering that the grass isn’t really greener on the other side of the fence after all, and that sometimes you have to take the long way home.   Of course, you know what the late Erma Bombeck said about the grass being greener…                                                 – Kim at Pitt. PS  Speaking of reunions and needing to know one’s family of origin, a couple of years ago, there was a made for television movie called "The Other Mother" about an adoption reunion.  During that movie, they showed an AT&T commercial with a different "tagline" at the end (their usual slogan is "You Will") – they changed it to "The only people who can help you get where you’re going are those who know where you’ve been."   Since then, I’ve never seen a commerical in which they’ve used that line again, and I still wonder if it was deliberate or just a coincidence.

Response:

Hello…. "Why do you single out "birth"?  what is it about the moment of emurging from the private parts of you natural mother that makes it the thing you focus on to the exclusion of all else in choice of a descriptive term?"   You know, maybe Tim has a point here – maybe "birth" parent isn’t the best term to use in this situation.  In my opinion, the term "birth" mother gives far too much credit to the wrong person, as someone who gives birth to and then abandons a child doesn’t really qualify as a "mother" of any sort in my book.   I consider the woman who raised me to be my REAL mother – after all, SHE was the one who was there for me.  For all that she has contributed to my life, I might as well refer to my "birth" mother as my Gestational Unit.  That person has given me NOTHING but sadness and pain.  Oh, I am sure that Tim will hasten to point out to me that she gave me my life, so allow me to remind you all that she gave me life only under duress – her first choice was abortion. Hardly the loving mother type, I promise you.   Sorry, Tim, but I refuse to worship at the Alter of The Holy Superior Birthmother, the First and Only Mother.  Perhaps if you had a birthmother like mine, you’d feel the exact same way.                                         – Kim at Pitt.

Response:

"Why do you single out "birth"?  what is it about the moment of emurging

Ummm, Kim. If some people have to learn how to use aspostrophes, you’ll have to learn how to spell "emerging". (You knew that was coming, didn’t you?)  ;-) And, yes, the "Adoptee’s" thing drove me nuts, too…but I know what’d happen if I said anything.  :-) from the private parts of you natural mother that makes it the thing you focus on to the exclusion of all else in choice of a descriptive term?"

Tim’s got a real weird thing going over the "birthparent" term. Rest assured that it’s not rational.   You know, maybe Tim has a point here – maybe "birth" parent isn’t the best term to use in this situation.  In my opinion, the term "birth" mother gives far too much credit to the wrong person, as someone who gives birth to and then abandons a child doesn’t really qualify as a "mother" of any sort in my book.

We’re all waiting for your book, Kim, but, in the meantime, they do technically qualify as "mothers" — now, good mothers…well, that’s a different issue.   I consider the woman who raised me to be my REAL mother – after all, SHE was the one who was there for me.  

We are in full agreement. For all that she has contributed to my life, I might as well refer to my "birth" mother as my Gestational Unit.

Right. That person has given me NOTHING but sadness and pain.

I’m not going to agree with you on this one, Kim. That’s all you’ve gotten out of her, Kim, but I’m sure there’s more to get. As you know, it’s all in your perception. If you don’t care about the negative stuff she has to say, it’s a lot easier to make the most out of the rest of whatever she has to say. But, if you find it to be overwhelmingly negative, cutting her out of your life is certainly the best way to go. Good luck with this. We all know you deserved better. Oh, I am sure that Tim will hasten to point out to me that she gave me my life, so allow me to remind you all that she gave me life only under duress – her first choice was abortion. Hardly the loving mother type, I promise you.

Perhaps not toward you, Kim, but maybe toward the kids she actually "mothered". My birthmother would taken the option of abortion, had it been available to her. She certainly never "mothered" me in the past and hasn’t done so presently. But, that doesn’t mean she’s not a good mother. Despite the fact that she’s been married and divorced 8 (!) times, the three kids she raised all love her deeply and are extremely close to her. Kim, I think your existance and how your experience with adoption is very painful to your birthmother, but she doesn’t know how to show it to you or to express her pain in an appropriate manner. OTOH, I could be wrong and she could just be a sack of shit. You know her better than any of us, so I’ll leave her characterization up to you, BUT, given your widened horizons on the subject of birthmothers, I’d like to ask you to consider re-evaluating yours.   Sorry, Tim, but I refuse to worship at the Alter of The Holy Superior Birthmother, the First and Only Mother.

I’m right next to you, Kim, NOT worshiping. LOL!  Perhaps if you had a birthmother like mine, you’d feel the exact same way.

And parents like yours. – Don — "I don’t believe you can find any evidence of the FACT that I had changed government policy solely because of a contribution" – President Clinton, 3-7-97

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