Tomorrow, as you all know, is Mother's Day. A holiday, yet not. A special day, for some. Just another Sunday, for others.
Three years ago, we were trying to conceive the old-fashioned way.
Two years ago, we found out our first IVF was negative on Mother's Day.
Last year, we were on the paperchase for our homestudy.
This year, I get to snuggle with the most adorable, wonderful, precious baby girl I could have ever imagined. And I guess I get to actually celebrate Mother's Day for myself. Wow.
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Today is Birthmother's Day. Or it is for some...I am not sure how I feel about this, so I can't bring myself to 'celebrate' just yet. I have nothing against this day, nothing at all...but the day simply seems strange to me. See, in my opinion, Tulip's first mom is also a mother--HER mother. We will celebrate her tomorrow along with all the other important women in our family. I guess I understand having a day for birthmothers (as the day is called, but I prefer first mothers). For those of us who have adopted, whether openly or not, it distinguishes their place in our children's lives as moms, while also recognizing that their motherhood is different than ours--they are not parenting their children. On the otherhand, I choose to see Tulip's first mom as her mom, and setting her motherhood aside to celebrate on a different day seems unnatural to me. It makes it seem as if her motherhood isn't as real, as present, as mine because I happen to actually have a child in my home, even though I know she thinks about being a mom every single day. I don't even know if she knows that today is Birthmother's Day, but we sent a Mother's Day card that said something to the effect of "You are a woman who deserves to be celebrated every day, not just one."
Really, in all honesty, I think that is the most important message we could send.
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To all mothers--old, young, new, soon-to-be, to-be-sometime-in-the-future, birth or adoptive, first-time or 20th--I hope you get to enjoy your day tomorrow. I am honored to finally get to join the club!
2 comments:
This is a beautiful post and definitely left me pondering "birthmother's day." A woman adopted from our agency and she has a blog. She wrote a few days ago that today is birthmother's day and that she took her daughter and her daughter's birthmom to brunch and spent the day celebrating her daughter and her daughter's mom. I thought it was a beautiful way to honor her daughter's mother and then I come here and read your blog and I love what you wrote.
Happy Mothers Day to you, and bless you for thinking of your Tulip's first mother. I know it must have meant a lot to her that you were thinking of her.
Love to you all
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