Balance

I have walked a tight rope for as long as I can remember. As a child growing up with my adoptive parents, I had to walk a line between who I was on the inside and who I was externally expected to be. There were unspoken, yet apparent, demands on who and what I was supposed to be. My mother loved animals so I should want to be a veterinarian.  Sorry, but I hated science. Why would I openly discuss my desire to be a teacher when all I’d heard growing up was how teachers were lazy union scum since they only work 9 months out of the year but take pay for 12? Why be spontaneous, funny, or silly when I was often told “don’t act like a retard.” I never had my schoolwork or art displayed on the refrigerator. My craft projects must’ve been discarded because I can only recall one project from my school years that lasted long enough to hold a place on the counter. Being creative didn’t hold value. I could be involved in choirs and piano lessons, but I think that was because it then reflected on my parents in a public setting. They received accolades when I performed well, and it validated their successful parenting.

Then I sauntered into adulthood. That was a train wreck waiting to happen. I had spent so long living in conflict with myself that I had no clue who or what I was supposed to be. So, I tried to be a wife, a mom, and an independent adult. Except I wasn’t allowed any autonomy. My adoptive parents still expected me to be an extension of them. I was to continue to live out the dreams they’d had for the biological child that I never was. At the same time I wished for freedom, the core of my being longed to belong. Somewhere. I was the puzzle piece that didn’t truly fit anywhere. I was a fraud with a phony identity.

I’ve recently been working on a project that’s caused me to look back at the last written correspondence I had with my adoptive parents. We’ve been estranged for nearly 3 years. Our relationship came to a festering head, and I hadn’t looked at the letters I received from them for quite some time. I recall how hurt I was by what was said in those letters when I received them. It has been good for me to go back and read them now after I’ve had some time and distance from the initial impact of what was said. My perspective has shifted. What they penned with the intention of being demeaning and degrading no longer has power. I recognize the gaslighting and how they used targeted verbiage. It was an all-out assault and an attempt to keep me in my role in the narrative they’d crafted. Much to their disappointment, I didn’t fall back in line. I was finding my center and I’d begun to stand up straight. There was one more in-person conversation after we’d exchanged letters. When I had heard all I could stomach about not only what a terrible daughter I was, but also what a horrible human being I was, I walked out of their home for the last time. All that they’d convinced me was wrong about me was their story, not mine. I am still working on that, one step forward at a time.