Oct 06 2008
Adoptive Relationships
I adopted my nephew when he was ten years old. However, he has lived with us since he was around three. He is the birth child of my younger sister who has lived a life filled with drug addiction. I don’t know how many others have this experience of raising your sister or brothers child but I have been very blessed. I would have done this in a heartbeat.This young man was in need of a normal stable home life, from the moment he was born. Where he could count on sleeping in the same bed every night and not worry about being carted off to a strange place day in and day out. I was in the middle of separating from my husband, after many years of trying to live with the turbulence of Manic Depression. It was a difficult tough time in our lives, when I got that knock on my front door, I knew it was a new beginning. My mother always said when something is taken away, something new comes into your life to replace it. I already had four children to raise so one more to me was no different. I struggled to contain a somewhat decent relationship with my sister, (the term loosely comes to mind) though she stayed angry and hostile towards me and everyone most of the time. I had to work hard to remind myself this was the “drug talking” and not her. She was so addicted to that horrible life and everyone she knew, all her so-called “friends” were in the same boat. On Jeremy’s 10th birthday I had a surprise party for him with some very special news. His adoption was final and he now belonged with our family and he was an official little brother to four of his other siblings. From that day on, he was never thought about or called nephew or cousin. Now he was proud to be called brother and SON.
I invited all our family and close friends to share in this wonderful news and he was the happiest boy that day! He just wanted to be like the other kids in school and in our neighborhood, belong to a family. We had many social workers come and go through out these years, but I remained optimistic that this day would eventually come. The family courts do their best to give a parent plenty of time to regroup, get help, find a job and be vital to their child’s life. So after 8 years when my sister could not get a handle on a few of the corrections the court needed her to make it was official, and it was over. I will never forget the day our last social worker came over and had me sign Jeremy’s Birth Certificate…it was very bittersweet. There is no way another mother wants to put her name in a place that only belongs to the birth mom. That day will always haunt me, and I will always feel bad for my sister because that was the day, all parental rights were taken from her. Many years later, my sister and I talk on the phone, she has since had two other children and still struggles with her life. She has been sober for sometime now and I am very proud of her for that. But, as life goes her past will be a haunting reminder of things she will need to answer to and address as things come up. We, our family do not point any fingers, we want her to succeed and are proud of her changes. It will be an uphill struggle as she has a daughter that is about to start on the same path she herself started on many years ago.
She knows she has to be tough and set boundaries, but she is riddled with guilt and shame, and I feel badly for this. I pray for her to have strength, and patience. I love my family of five wonderful kids and I love my sister more for the son she had to let go. For now it’s a slow process to recovery but I am here for her as a sister and a friend.