So Doug and I went to Chicago for three days this week - he for a training class, I as a tourist. It's strange, but I can go hours into days without thinking about adopting, or preparing for a child, and then BLAM! Something will happen or my mind will just turn to the subject, and it's all I can think about. Like in Chicago I didn't think about it for 2 days, and then a woman came on the "L" with a baby stroller and whump, there I was thinking about it again for the rest of the afternoon. Funny.

I have been reflecting a lot about my own adoption these past few weeks, which I suppose is not that unusual. The best analogy I have come across describes it this way, in a paraphrase: "Consider adoption like a box of old photos or memorabilia in a closet. Most of the time it sits on the shelf - you are aware that it's there, but have no need to look inside the box. Then some days, sometimes without explanation, you will want to take some time and look into that box, to examine it and mull over it. This is like adoption."

I had made the comment to Doug once that now we have decided to adopt, if we never have a biological child, I will not be blood-related to anyone that I know. Sometimes that makes me feel like... I was plopped into my life. No history of what came "before", and no future to bless with my great genes (although sometimes I think that's a blessing!). Kind of like an island in the middle of a sea of people who love me. I was just "given" to my parents one day in early summer 1974 and my life began. I know nothing of what came before.

Now, I am intelligent enough to realize that raising a child is more than good hair or bad teeth. It's the values and morals and good sense you wish them to have, so they can go out and have their best life in the world. However, I also cannot help the emotions that I have. I have commonly kept my opinions and deeper thoughts about adoption to myself as I grew up, and maybe on some level I didn't want to explore them. I am just now digging deeper into myself and holding these thoughts up to the light. Doug is sometimes taken aback by the things I will blurt out. Such as the following thought, which I came out with after a visit with his family:

Sometimes when families have discussions about being pregnant, or bringing their baby home from the hospital, or the birthing process - or anything that's related to the first month or so of life - I get sort of sad. There is a small group of people in the world that knows that stuff about ME, but I will never be allowed to know it. And that makes me angry.

Doug is reading a book called "20 things adopted kids wish their adoptive parents knew." He is finding it interesting and often brings up a point to see what I think about it. I am currently reading "The Adopted Self." It explores how adoptees feel about adoption at different stages in their life. It puts to words a lot of what I have felt, but never realized. If that makes sense.

Now, I believe my parents did an excellent job with my brother and I explaining our adoption, what it meant, and allowing us to question. However, there were always things I kept to myself because either I was afraid of hurting my parents, or not wanting to cause pain to my own self. As a result, I think I am just now wrestling with some topics I probably should have resolved as a teenager. This is a fascinating journey.