Sad today…

Most days, I’m able to feel a sense of family from the extended biological family that I’ve found who’ve accepted me equally into the family, or from my friends who I love dearly as my own created family. I try and keep and keep a good attitude, because honestly I am lucky to have some phenomenal people in my life, people who have the biggest hearts, and are honest and loyal and all the other amazing traits that they posses.

There are a lot of days though where I feel adrift, kind of like a tumbleweed with no roots to attach to and not being able to find my home. Today is one of those days. Today is one of those days that I feel like if I just disappeared everyone who is in my life would assume that I was busy and would get in touch later. I could just disappear and no one would really know. (This is my fault because I’m horrible at keeping in touch!!)

This sense of being adrift comes from not feeling like I don’t have a true immediate family. For a brief period the summer before last I felt like I’d found my immediate family, and there was so much peace in that. Unfortunately, surrogacy is messy and complicated and there was some fallout due to people not really knowing how to interact with the surrogate, and feeling forced into a relationship where they’d always been told that surrogate children were meant for other families and not theirs.

It’s days like today where my heart hurts a bit more over a surrogacy agency, doctors, lawyers, and the rest of the adults involved not successfully making sure that this product they were creating would be o.k.. I really don’t have a full understanding of how rigorous of psychological testing the intended parents are put through, in the case of traditional surrogacies it’s only a ½ adoption. The intended father is also the biological father. It wouldn’t really benefit an agency to be thorough they’d lose the money they were going to make on the brokering of the product they are selling. The intended father, what was his motivation did he have a need to make sure he grew his family tree?  What about the adoptive mom, did she feel an obligation to go through with the surrogacy scenario because she had guilt about not being able to provide a child? For the most part I believe that the biological mom had good intents about starting a family, but there is always the nagging feeling in the background though that I wouldn’t have been brought into this world without the paycheck. Altruism only extends so far I suppose. Did all of these adults who were participating have a complete lack of awareness that there are a lot of issues that products of surrogacy are at risk for? I believe that for everyone involved had this surrogacy story worked out ideally we’d all be happy. However, it didn’t the one who truly has to deal with the fall out is the product.

Today is also one of those days where I can’t quite shake the feeling of being less then. Most days if that is a fleeting thought I can check myself and remind myself that we’re all just people getting through life the best way we know how, and hopefully learning lessons as we go. Today though it’s harder to believe that. Today is a day where I see that my bio-dad and adopted mother’s wants were more important than my needs. Today is a day where I feel the sting that I’m less then to my birth mother. I understand that I wasn’t created to be your child, but how is there that divide for you? I know there is no obligation for anything towards me, there were contracts signed and honored, and I wasn’t intended for you, but how do you deny your own flesh and blood? For me, I see that I have your height, your sense of humor, your hair/ eye color among other things. I don’t have the luxury of ever having seen myself reflected back from family before, maybe it’s something you can just take for granted b/c you have always had that around you. But how do I not feel like yours after all the similarities and the carrying for nine months? It does make me feel less then, In my childhood home I my needs were not considered, that taught me that I didn’t have the right to my feelings. Now that I have found my birth mom, I feel less then her children that she planned to have for herself. I waiver back and forth between feeling guilty that I do want things from her when I know she’s not obligated to me, and just feeling so rejected and alone that I’m not seen as worthy of those things.

The part to me that is truly sad though, there are more of us products speaking up now that we’re not happy with how we came into the world, and all I see when I scour google, facebook, youtube etc are surrogacy agencies advertising their services to families. Where are the resources and communities for us products of surrogacy?

I’m sad today, but that’s o.k. it’s bed time and I’m sure after I get some sleep I’ll be able to hit the world with a better attitude tomorrow. No, if I'm being really honest with myself... I'm saying I'll have a better attitude in the morning b/c that's what we're supposed to to do.. pick ourselves up by the bootstraps. Life is challenging for everyone we have our own crosses to bear, but I still don't understand intentionally putting children in the world with a high potential of dealing with these burdens.

Maybe one day i'll be married, and start my own family and i'll know what the feeling of being in a immediate family truly is like, not just the glimpses I've gotten throughout my lives.