Harmony of Past and Present

In Foster Care Aug '84

My Adoptee Journey Destination: Wholeness

Most of my life, I thought that the only way I could be "okay" with life was if I could rewrite it. The static nature of my past was all to disheartening and condemning to me. It was easier to stop looking back. But then, life kept repeating itself. The past I was avoiding kept on appearing in my present.

It wasn't until I embraced God's call to repent of my ways, that I could look at my past and improve myself. God told me it doesn't matter where I came from (time/history perspective) but where I am now, in contrast. But ultimately, my destiny as a Believer is Heaven. Heaven is the antithesis of my previous life before I became "born again."

My first birth was less than dignified. Without holding on to blame, I can only understand it as the convergence of dismal circumstances with the culture in which I was born. But, my God given desires have always pointed me back to my family of origin. (Not to the exclusivity of my adoptive family, but to have a comfortable duplicity in my life.) 

I know God was trying to orchestrate something big in my life. He juggled the circumstances along with my sometimes unthinkable actions. But that matrix of his Loving Hand and my limited wisdom has brought me to a time where, I have total confidence in what he has in store for me, for my family and for the world. 

Fierce Love

Man's Greatest Fear: 

to love and not be loved back

United Nations against Baby Boxes

Based on: this Jewish World Review article

Why can't people be okay with things that have no guarantee of good outcomes? 

Things that have both good and bad outcomes are perceived inflated threats to our society. The deciding factor is really our role in the outcome. What is the point of an outsider's attitude when it really depends on the actions of those involved?

Equal Opportunity Pain

I no longer think that abandonment is an orphaned person's plight.

But, now I see that there is an epidemic of abandonment.

According2Meredith.blogspot.com

 Children abandoned by one parent

There are generations of people who were abandoned by one of their parents due to divorce and remarriage. In olden days, blended families were not as common. In other cultures, blended families are unheard of and many parents have severed their relationships with children from previous marriages. Abandonment of one parent is as painful as abandonment from both.

Children of Divorces with Sole Custody

Some individuals have court ordered parental abandonment. This is many times in the best interest of the child. But the circumstances are not understood or internalized in a healthy way by a lot of children. Then again, could any child be able to negotiate how it is better not to see a parent?
 

Children Living with Emotional Abandonment

I think that one of the most painful experience in life is to be with someone but to be denied relational gratification. It is not healthy for parents to look at their children "person needs" (emotional needs) as nuisances. If parents don't give their children the affirmation, they will seek it in less healthy places. 

Children Living with Parents Enmeshed with Addictions 

Usually addictions take center stage. That is why they are often unhealthy, especially at the expense of a developing and valuable child (all of them). Sadly, the children will seek marriage partners that treat them the same way in adulthood. I just wonder if the alcoholic parent hopes the child will marry another alcoholic person.

IDENTITY I.C.K.

Irish?    <+>   Czechoslovakian?   <+>  Korean? 

 I was doing this project on the profile of adolescence for my Human Services Human Systems and Development class. And I couldn't help but consider myself in how I compared to the rest of teenagers of the past...

So I hope you see that I got the concept "Identity I.C.K." from Irish, Czechoslovakian and Korean. It is so apropos because I did feel much "ick" from my adolescent phase in life. The identity part just about did me in. It was hard enough being an early bloomer and Asian gal with a "rack." 

My Cause

 

 I woke up this morning to this fundraising promotion. There was no hesitation on whether or not I would participate. If I were bringing in income, I would have donated more. I'm premeditating what my future income will fund: college educations for my children, a wedding that we have  yet to have, and more donations to causes that are important to me.

I've mentioned Jessie Hogsett before in a post called Response to Baby Moved to Tears. I believe I also suffered from this detachment with my adoptive family. I remember having separation anxiety when I was 13. If you ask me, that is extremely old to have such strong feelings towards being left by your parents. 

I don't talk about my ugly young adult stage that much because its, well, ugly. I should rephrase that. My inward existence as a young adult was ugly. On the outside, I was too busy playing musical instruments, writing and studying. But on the inside, I was reeling. I felt neglected and like a non-person in my own home. 

When I went off to college the first time, I started having horrible nightmares, insomnia and a relapse with an eating disorder. All of that led to what I refer to as a mental breakdown. I was a useless mess. I stopped taking my family's phone calls and I decided that I couldn't be healthy AND be in relationship with them. I'm not saying it's all their fault, but I still maintain that I did the right thing for me knowing that I was the only one who was looking out for me.

When my mother came to campus to confront me, she assumed the worst in me. She thought I was pregnant and on drugs. That was far from the truth. I knew at that moment that she didn't know me after 15 years of being "her daughter." I was struggling to make sense of the crap I went through without villainizing my parents whom I was supposed to go back home to over the summer. I just couldn't go back home. And- I never did go back "home." 

I knew that I had nothing going on with my adoptive father after an incident that is burned into my head. I was going to see this therapist when I was around 13 or 14. She kept talking to me like an idiot about her tea and rice. She was not very "culturally competent" and I picked up on it right away. ["Cultural competence" is a theme in my Human Services program.] 
 
My dumb teenage mouth told her how I'd tried to kill myself by taking a whole bottle of sleeping pills. I remember that day. My parents had no idea that I was "out." But, God intervened and pulled me out of that "sleep." I was disappointed and that was why I told my therapist. 

She was legally bound to tell my parents since I was a minor. That particular session, my father was picking me up. She told him that I had made an attempt on my life. All he could muster to say to me (in the most disgusted and unloving voice) was "How dare you do that to our family!" 

I couldn't handle that response on top of the numerous times he told me I should be "thankful," "grateful," and everything else speaking to the fact that he didn't think I deserved the parenting he was providing for me. I was emotionally done with them in that phase of my life. I knew I couldn't survive with that attitude from my parents. 

This was after I had nursed him to health after open heart surgery. I worked for my mother so she could have her dream flower shop. I dutifully mothered my mother the way she always begged me to fawn over her. I was emotionally dead. 

GUEST POST: Living with a History of Adoption

I recently seized the opportunity to submit a blog post on my experience of being adopted. A fellow blogger was so gracious to suggest to me this guest post opportunity with Anglia Counselling in England. I've also been able to meet a fellow blogger who I took forever to realize lives in my town! My husband has been so supportive lately of my blogging venture that he even offered to watch our three kids so I could have more time to fit in this labor of love!

I hope all of my efforts, although amateur, are shining through to you, my lovely reader. It's a thrill to grasp that hundreds of you are spend some of your precious minutes on my blog. Many thanks. I am doing my best to catch up with my comments. Please know that I'm also visiting your internet "domain" in the meantime. Like my business card says, I want to show you my appreciation by featuring you on my blog wherever I can. 

As I mentioned before, I have a guest blogging opportunity open to anyone who wants to blog about giving or receiving blessings and good karma. For more details, contact me at merejasmin@gmail.com Thank you for stopping by! Blessings to you~

Living with a History of Adoption

#TheSundayPost

Kick the Blaming Habit in 5 Steps

1. Bless the Other Person

Just because you are at odds doesn't mean you need to curse the other person. Unless this is the last time you're planning on seeing them...

2. Love in Return for Wrongdoing

Love in this situation reflects more about you as a person than what the other person deserves.

3. Accept the Person as They Are (Imperfect)

When we acknowledge that all people are imperfect, there is less need to alienate each other for being human. If we wait to accept people when they are perfect, it will be a futile waste of patience. 

4. Mend the Condition of the Relationship

Where blaming tends to harm the condition of the relationship, we can purpose to do the opposite. Mending adds to the strength of relationships.

5. Elevate the Other Person

It is hard to be harsh to someone we elevate in value. It would also elevate the standards of the relationship.  

Human Placebo

The Placebo Effect is Real...

Thank Heavens

Dear Reader,

I have gone through 34 years of life to realize that the "placebo effect" is so very real. It is as real as the pain that saturates our human race. We are walking around with deficits from things that were withheld from us-- searching for that placebo. Searching for the thing, the person, the ideology that will "fill us up." The kind of filling that would fill that void to the "T". The placebo would ideally be the exact amount we need to make our lives better, or to at the very least, anesthetize our pain.

We want this "placebo" to fill us up, not to purposefully use it or abuse it, but to make us whole. We have a drive to be whole. It is part of being a living thing. It is in wholeness that we imagine ourselves being the best versions of our-self; we would be smarter, more successful, more popular.

The good news is that everyone has a void. 

REFLECT ON CATT

PART 1 | PART 2

There are some people you meet that you can never forget.

I don't want you to forget Catt. What ever stirred inside your mind and your heart as you read her story, sit with that a while. Let that feeling help shape and soften you to the world outside of "me."

When I read through her core post, I thought to myself: "I don't want to be the same person after I do this guest post with her." Without telling me (or you) what part should or needs to change or adjust, don't resist it. It's your journey, you take the steps.

There were a few things that hit me while editing her story. We have a lot of similarities related to our experience as adopted people. We have some strange ways of relating to people based on our most foundational abandonment. But we also have a fierce sense of loyalty and willingness to change to solidify relationships.

That willingness is something that you won't readily find in non-adopted people. And if you do find it, don't let it go. It's a precious character trait to have in yourself and in your loved one. It's the thing that will take a relationship the distance it needs to go.

She and I both grew up only children. Not having siblings painted the way we learned to associate with other people. Additionally, our feeling of estrangement (distance) with our adoptive family were shared. For her, her "at odds" feeling was resolved, and unfortunately, mine is still ongoing. At this point, and Catt would agree, it is in God's hands.

I was struck by her willingness to bare her bad and ugly side. Perhaps it is because she feels so remade in the "image of God" that who she was does not taint who she is today. That is a really healthy relationship to have with your past.

For me, I don't like to share the ugly of my life. I am at peace with it, but I'm not at the point where I feel like if I speak about it, it will touch people's lives. In that sense, I feel quite ordinary. I have some lesser (from my P.O.V.) issues that I need to work through and perhaps that will be the juncture when I feel led to bare more of my life.

I do feel like I have great purpose in life. I feel like the great things I have done and can do is through God's provision of skills and intuition. I feel like I have a book waiting to be written about my life. I feel that I have an impact on humanity that has yet to take force. I know that this life is more than "about me." 

GUEST SERIES: Catt Peace 2 of 2

Graphic: According2Meredith.blogspot.com, words of Catt Peace

Continued from... "

You have to be a Christian to have 

your prayers answered. Right?

 

How Adoptees Find God

The following are her words with my editing, formatting, brackets and headers:

I Dream of...
Rationally thinking, all these conversations with the two of them must have been on my mind, as one night I had a dream. In my dream, I met the person: the person I had always been needing and looking for. I spent what felt like an eternity with him [feeling] so happy and peaceful. We talked, laughed, and joked.  At the end of my dream, I said "I don't know your name", and this vision of perfection smiled at me with the most beautiful smile and said "I know, I'm Jesus".  I woke up feeling amazing.

Magic of the Subjective Experience
[Although it] sounds corny and weird; it happened. When I told my colleagues, one was amazed and the other was jealous. It was still several months, maybe even a year, before I let this gnawing feeling on the inside get the better of me. I asked the Christian colleague ([that] I didn't get on so well with) when the next 'public' (less full on and less dramatic) service was as I felt I needed my 'yearly dose of religious.' Having grown up always attending Christmas and Easter services at the Catholic Church of England and Evangelical-type establishments, [I could at least do "that."]

Slaughter-er to slaughtered?
My colleague was a bit taken aback. My co-workers, [not unlike other believers,] spent so much time patiently inviting colleagues to church only to be scoffed at behind their backs.  Still, every Christian knows they are setting themselves up for slaughter whether publicly or privately with non-believers [when they broach the subject of religion]. 

Receiving blessing with moral support
I persuaded my best friend at the workplace to join me (strength in numbers) for a service my colleague had forgotten to invite me to. (He says he will never forget that, the one time he gave up asking was the one time I asked instead.) [At the part of the service] when a man was asking if anyone needed prayer, I nudged my diabetic atheist friend to go up. {Mental monologue as follows: I didn't need prayer. I had some form of belief in a higher power having studied various religions only to conclude that no-one had it quite right. "That would do me just fine. Thank you."} But my friend would only go if I did. [So I went because] I felt he needed it.

Challenging the Power of Laying Hands
[Now, we are both in front of the preacher.] In heels, I towered over the man who stood in front of me and asked what I wanted prayer for. I quite cheekily said, "Anything He wants to give me." As this preacher man put his hand on my head, it felt like a battle of wills as to who was going to win. It felt like he was pushing me over 'in the Spirit' (I had done this religious nonsense before) against my heels holding me upright. I won. Ha, take that you religious weirdo.

Church for a healthy social environment
In the time that followed, I started attending Church as something to do. I had made the decision that my long-term boyfriend (the angel who had set me straight again) and I needed to move forward in our relationship. We were living in a tiny dingy little annexe with mould growing on the walls and not enough sunlight.  [It was time for a relationship upgrade.]

I went to Church to meet people in the local area. I went to Church [only] for something to do on a Sunday. On a particular Sunday, I had already decided that I needed to find somewhere new to live and made a precise list of what I wanted in a home. After looking for a week or two all over the internet [of my own power] to no avail, I raised my thoughts heavenward. I said "It's me again. Help us out and I'll make this a regular thing, yeah?" 

Be careful what you pray for... It might come true
[Precisely] that afternoon, I found my dream home in a previously undiscovered corner of the internet. My list was ticked off. On my solo and very modest wages, I would be taking a massive financial risk. My parents promised me assistance and encouraged me. They, and many others by this point, weren't too fond of my long-term boyfriend anyway. [Furthermore, they thought this move would likely move him out of my life.]

Fast forward a few months, my boyfriend and I had none of the same interests and none of the same friends. I decided I needed to learn how to live my own life and make myself happy without him. [Eventually,] we spent a lot of time apart. You can only ever change you, not other people. 

Christian Camp Take Two
I was begrudgingly persuaded by some of my new 'friends' in the Church to attend a Christian camp. [It didn't take much effort as,] I had done it before. I could deal with a week of religious nutters as I needed a holiday, [I sounded off in my head]. They were planning on talking about what the Church was doing in society [and] mobilising 'God's Army.' I thought I'd go along to learn what I could about me. [I planned on] separating the message about God from the general theme of being a good person. "That’s basically what Christianity is, right?"

All Signs looking up
Just as we left the home of the now friends', previously [strange] colleagues, (all packed up [as if we are heading] to a week in the sun), I stopped my car.  I said, "Something special is going to happen. [I noticed all the signs that were jumping out at me.] It's exactly ten years since I last went to a camp just like this and ten years since my parents got our old dog." (My parents were getting a puppy that weekend.) [Those signs gave me] a weird feeling of anticipation.

I was and still am well aware of the politics within any organised group, including and especially churches, so I linked arms with a new friend. We distanced ourselves [physically] from the rest of the Church. Even to the point that on the first night, we sat seperate from each other, and seperate from anyone else we knew. 

Gripping the Heart of the Adopted 

GUEST SERIES: Catt Peace 1 of 2

Introducing a Friend & Kindred Spirit....

This is not the first time I've correspondence worked with Ms. Peace. I met her while participating in the same support group for adoptive families. She is real to the core and can unabashedly talk about herself knowing she is a redeemed and priceless soul.

Now for the Word-Smithing of

Graphic Credit: According2Meredith.blogspot.com, words of Catt Peace

The following are her words with my editing, formatting, brackets and headers:

You have to be a Christian to have 

your prayers answered. Right?

A bit of luck

When I was a young teen, maybe even preteen I attended a Christian camp for a holiday. Having been loosely involved in Church activities (as a clause in my mid childhood adoption from an Evangelical Christian family to an Atheist one), I didn't feel unease at being enveloped in the week-long camp. I had been encouraged to begin attending a lunch-time prayer group at my Catholic school to make friends, and this lead to an unexpected opening to the camp as a friends sister had paid up her holiday and was taken violently ill quite suddenly.

Camp
I went along to the camp, and the girls I roped in with weren't particularly overjoyed at having me hanging around. I was anxious, socially awkward, clingy, bizarre. I have always been good at spending time alone though, or making one particular intense 'special friend' for any needed amount of time. Almost like a hunter, pick off the weakest or friendliest in a group and claim them for my own.

Back in History
My history at this point was as follows, the first few years of my life were spent living with my alcoholic biological mother, who was incapable of looking after me and moved me around a lot. She had a lot of boyfriends. My biological father would follow us and rage about her behaviour. She was in and out of hospital, like I was in and out of foster homes. I was adopted aged 7 after a few years in a more stable environment.  I moved to a suburban housewife's paradise, a world away from the poverty and trauma I had experienced with my bio-Mum. 

Reflection: "Motherless by Choice"

SOURCE

This woman, student and author, has had a pretty hard lot in life. Her article that I linked to under "source" is raw and moving. I felt her conflicting emotions and tug of loyalty between herself and her mother. I felt drawn to reflect on her story as it is reminiscent of mine. I am also "motherless by choice," but I'm also family-less, and I've been involuntarily motherless through "virtue" of adoption. As I recently wrote an article about my life living with adoption, I came at a new understanding of my experience in life. Please scroll through the infographics and my accompanying words.

(I have forgiven my parents and myself for the condition of our relationship. They did the best they could with the tools & experiences they had.)

Katie Naums Toxic Relationship | Create Infographics

Can you relate? I can...

More than you Bargained For

When you deal with me, 

you deal with my Parent's 

influence on me

According2Meredith.blogspot.com

I listened to the Focus on the Family Broadcast (Daily Edition 05/29/14) by pastor Louie Giglio talking about generational impressions and influences. He proposed that we have to look into our past and deal with it so we don't bring it into the present and future.

I've mentioned this theme of family legacies, for bad or for good, before in different ways. But, after listening to pastor Giglio, I realized that I'm screwed. I mean, my family doesn't have a chance, but for the Grace of God [or whatever source you have].

Childlike Belief + Updates

Hi There~

Birthday Highlights...

More than Mother's Day

According2Meredith: 9/25/13

My first Mother's Day with the Little Man...

My husband was afraid that I was not going to love him because he wasn't a girl...

And now he has been proven wrong in the best way. =)

This is going to sound terrible, but I know many of you step-parents can relate, that having an "ours" child makes the holidays feel more "normal." There is no awkwardness between the parents and their child together, especially around holidays.

To my stepson, I feel guilty that he didn't have his mother to celebrate "Mother's Day" with. Then, my daughter also has another mother, that couldn't be included (her stepmother). All holidays seem incomplete (without the "other parent") except for when the "ours child" comes along. 

All of the sudden there is a sense of normalcy. We don't have to explain: "Yes, I'm the stepmother" or "I'm the stepfather." There are no qualifiers needed in concern to our baby, Gabriel. He is OUR baby and THEIR brother. It's as if the other details don't matter anymore. We are sealed and bonded by Gabriel. We all have equal ownership of him and it feels comfortable and wonderful.

**********

It is such a gift to be a mother this time around in the selfish sense. It is the first time, I feel like my husband cares about our child as much as me. I really feel like we're both in this, and with that knowledge, I can endure anything. There is no "parenting plan" other than ongoing communication. There is no "custodial arrangement" other than shared and at the same address. It's as uncomplicated as we have to deal with in this blended family.

Gabriel is our "If all else fails, we've done right by him" child. He is our one child who does not understand the pain of divorce; and we plan on keeping it that way. I have come to accept myself thus: as long as my "last effort" is a success, I can forgive myself of my failures. In this way, I can be okay with being, plainly put~ human.

Gabriel is special to me in the sense that my own relationship with my mothers are so complicated. He gives me the inspiration to do the mother relationship right in some capacity. I vow not to be a total failure, with God helping me. He is God's gift to me, that my life might not end in failure but with a victory.

Gabriel's name means "Strong Man of God" in Hebrew. I want to believe that he is part of my life as evidence of God strengthening me for this ever meaningful and worthwhile calling of motherhood. The fact that I shrugged off my original fears of motherhood because of my adoption history speaks to my desire to parent to the Glory of God. I will break the curse of relinquishment in my family. It stops with me.

Mother's Day reminds me of the utter happiness I felt when my first child was born. I felt as though I broke the chains of my past burdens. So yes, motherhood and Mother's Day reminds me of a small victory in this messy journey called life. God bless all of you mothers and future mothers.

Thank you for reading my personal reflections on Mother's Day. Did you have any reservations to becoming a parent like me? Care to share in the comments below? Thank you!

#mothersday2014 #adopteemom #remarriedmother

I almost listened

A Glimpse into My studies

Click on the <  to remove the sidebar



Despite my errors in English, I found this interview paper to be a great edifying experience for me as a student and as an adopted person. I wrote it in four hours. My fingers flew over the keys as if I was playing an opus on my long neglected piano. [ I have a story about the piano... for a future post! ] I felt like I could see clearly how my career endeavor intertwines with my own adoption experience. I could finally make sense of why I feel okay. I'm not a tattered mess from my life, although I'd have plenty excuses to fall back on.

I almost listened...

It's not your fault

This is a post that portrays me as 

a fallible human being. 

[Enter Human] 

 Maybe this is more of an adoptee thing, 

but I think it has to do with a relapse with co-dependency.

The other day I was not reading my husband very well and he said to me in frustration: 

The Heart "Out of Order"

"Emotional Heart Transplant" Nancy Thomas

Do you know who Nancy Thomas?

I watched the interview I linked to above a few weeks ago and I really resonated with the term she used as an "emotional heart transplant." For some people, this is in fact what they need- no fault of their own. Some people have been taught that the world is such a dangerous and painful place that they turn their hearts off. My heart breaks for theirs as God would call us to have a heart for in our fellow man. 

At first this concept sounds unthinkable, but it is something of a social deficit that is on the rise. I don't want to go backwards and point fingers; all I know is that we, the collective, need to work together to nip it in the bud. We need to change minds and hearts with an "emotional heart transplant" as Nancy Thomas suggests.

How do we do that? Isn't that abstract? Do I need to be trained?

Dear Sister...

(DSi front facing camera is soooo bad!)

[This sort of photo analyzing program is of interest to me as an adopted person. I think that most adopted adults are very curious to see how similar their kids will look like themselves since they usually don't share a resemblance with their adoptive families. Actually, I had a different program online having my daughter look 51% like me so this DSi app is confusing to me.

When I look at this I also wonder about my long lost sister out there who was also given up for adoption. Does she look 25% like me too? Would I know her if I passed her by on a street? Would our resemblance be so striking? I can only imagine for the time being. Does she even know about Eun Kyung (me), who was born the fourth month of the lunar year and the sixth day afterward?]

 ********************************************************************

Dear Sister,

It is Sibling Day 2014 and I cannot have a picture with you in it. I didn't know you existed until 7 years ago. Or at least, the expanse of time lead me to forget about you-- about us. Before I never felt a loss because I didn't remember or know about you. But now, I sit here on Sibling Day and wonder and wish we could know one another.

I don't know if you know or remember me either. Is it a secret that's locked in the mouths of our aunts and uncles? Am I on your orphan records? You did not appear on mine. Such a shame that I must make such flailing assumptions about what happened between us besides miles and time. But I remember so very clearly that as a child I hated being the only child. I was so lonely... left to my journal to sort things out. Imagine if I had you there to walk through that with me. My chest swells with a big sigh.

I feel regretful that I am not searching for you actively. I guess I have little faith in the haystack of info that is available to me. I want you to know that you have family (me) out there. You have a niece and nephews in the USA. I know your (oh my gosh, OUR!) birth mother and aunts. [I really never ever had to say "our" in reference to parents- ever.] I wonder who your new parents are. We should go to Korea together some day to reunite with the rest of the family.

How is your life? Are you happy? Find me.

Love,
Your Sister Meredith Y.







*************************************************************


It's surreal to even imagine that I have a close link to someone out there that I do not know or see. Please, God, if it is your will-- please bring us back together. Please let us put the puzzle pieces of our family back together. More pieces are good, just no more missing ones. Okay?

Many blessings to you and your siblings. Would you comment below to help me imagine what it's like to know my sister? How would life be for me... through your life as a sibling? =) I appreciate the insight!

#nationalsiblingday2014 #longlostsister #reunitesisters #treasureyoursiblings