Falling Tears

What are you supposed to do on days when you just want to give up? Days when waking up and getting out of bed and going to work and doing what needs to get done is so much hard work and takes up so much energy? I wish I had stayed under the covers all day today. My head hurts, my heart hurts and my eyes hurt from so much crying, and really, to be honest, I'm not sure why.

Yesterday was C's birthday party. It was a lot of work and it sucked the life out of me, but I made it through and my little guy had a great time, his friends came, he got some great gifts and everyone enjoyed themselves. My parents and J's parents finally met and they got along really well, probably better than I could imagine. I should be happy, right? Yeah, not so much. The moment the party was over, I just felt really sad. I felt like I stepped into a deep hole and I am trapped. I have felt overwhelmed, emotional, sad and even lonely. I can't even explain what it is that made me feel this way especially after a day that was supposed to be happy.

Granted it was a birthday party for my son, it really hurt me that my "friends" that I invited didn't come. They didn't even call. I am grateful that one of my friends showed, as did one of J's friend and his girlfriend who also become a good friend, but no one else did, not even his "godmother". I am really disappointed and have come to the conclusion that I don't really have friends, and if I do, I don't really know who they are. I have no one I could count on and really, honestly, my heart breaks because I feel alone. I can't always depend on J to be there by my side forever.

I have been overly paranoid and sensitive lately, more than my usual emotional mess. I have been clingy and have needed reassurance just to get through my days. I am even sick and tired of myself, but I can't snap out of it. I almost feel like giving up, and I really don't want to go back to that dark part of my life. I am fighting and willing to do anything I can so I don't fall into the hole that was depression. I have too many good things going in my life for me to go through all of that again.

I hate that this has carried into every aspect of my life. I practically cry when J leaves. I feel so empty when he isn't around, and yet lately, when we've been together, we haven't had very much quality time. I am having a really hard time with the fact that his female partner at work is carpooling with him. I HATE it, to be honest, that another woman is spending more time with my man during the week than I do on the weekends. I HATE that I don't know her, and while I don't want to know her, I should. I am so angry and upset and it's not even his fault. I think I'm more upset because I want him to hold me and hug me and let me cry in his arms and never let me go, but that's not reality... yet, I forgot what is.

I don't understand what did me in like this. I was fine just a few weeks ago, and yet here I am talking about giving up and having all this pain and sadness and not even knowing where its coming from. Ok, well maybe I do, and I wish there was something that could make it go away...

A few posts ago, I think I wrote about R & H. J has known R since second grade and he is one of his best friends. His wife, H, has been pregnant and due in a few weeks. Two weeks ago, she had some problems and went to the hospital where they performed an emergency C-section to deliver the baby. The baby was born with some complications, as well as had some swelling in her brain. R kept J updated through text with news about the procedure the baby had to undergo. She was a little fighter, or so it seemed. Unfortunately, she was faced with too tough of a battle and left this earth to become a little angel in Heaven on Friday. We found out Saturday and things just haven't been the same with me ever since.

I can't stop crying or thinking about her. I can't stop thinking about the pain and sorrow that R & H are dealing with right now. They have constantly been on my mind, and honestly, while I was celebrating my own wonderful, healthy child, I couldn't help but feel sad for them. I think that this has affected me more than it needs to because it was a reminder of my own loss. Granted, Hope hasn't passed away, and she is still a smiling, beautiful healthy child, but she's not my child. I felt like learning about the baby's passing brought on so many feelings of guilt and resentment, feelings I haven't had in a long time.

I can't stop thinking about how much pain both R & H must be in, but I feel the most about H. She carried that baby inside of her for 8 months. She felt her move and kick and grow. She rubbed her tummy like a proud mommy to be and talked about this baby with excitement as she showed off her brand new stroller that would be great for walks with the newborn and their one and a half year old daughter. She gave birth to this baby and has the scar to prove it, but nothing more. Just like me, she went home from the hospital empty handed, but unlike me, she has a bassinet and a freshly painted baby room with no baby to put in it. Life is so unfair and so messed up.

I've been questioning God a lot, lately. I have been so incredibly angry and upset with him. Why did this have to happen to such amazing people? Why couldn't this have happened to me six years ago instead? I was the one who got pregnant with a baby she couldn't possibly take care of. I was the one who hid my pregnancy for 9 months. I was the one who didn't go to the doctor and get prenatal care. I was the one who woke up every morning, mad at God for giving me another day of life. I was the one who contemplated ways to die or at least ways to make the thing growing inside of me go away. I was the one who gave birth to a beautiful and perfectly healthy baby girl who has just celebrated being on this earth for 6 years. Why me? I couldn't even take care of this child, and granted, I gave her the gift of life and the opportunity to live a long and happy life that I otherwise wouldn't have been able to provide for her, why was she born healthy, and not R & H's baby.

I can't even put into words how deeply this has affected me. I am sitting here at work choking back tears because this all makes me feel like a terrible person, an awful mother. I didn't want my baby and she was born perfect. This wonderful, happily married couple wanted their baby and she has lost her life. This has cut open old wounds and opened up new ones as I find myself so incredibly sad and hopeless about the situation. I also feel like how can I sit here and cry about how much I miss my baby when there's hope I may someday hold her, yet here is this woman who will never be able to hold her child in her arms until she meets her in heaven.

I feel like I can't breathe. There's a heavy weight on my chest and an overwhelming sense of sorrow within me. I decided I need to go back to counseling. For the sake of my sanity and my relationship, it needs to be done. I have way too many issues to deal with and the last think I want to do is regress to the old me, especially when I have worked so hard to be the new me. I want to be happy again and I want to be able to genuinely smile again. I don't want to feel so sad and so angry and so whatever it is I am feeling. I need to change, and if I don't make that change soon, I'm only headed on a downward spiral. There's no way I could go through that again, not now, not ever.

Fear

Anyone who knows me really well could tell you that I am a very fearful person. I fear a lot of things, such as spiders, moldy sandwiches, and the dark (don't laugh at me). I fear losing someone I love, losing my job, and losing my life. One of my biggest fears, however, is getting hurt by someone I love, or even worse, me hurting someone I love.

C's birthday is 6 days away. On top of being busy with work and school, I have feverishly been trying to plan a little extravaganza for him to enjoy his special day. As with every year I plan a party for him, I go into reflection mode, and not the good kind. I fall into this "woe is me" mood and I admit it isn't healthy. I hate that my thoughts keep me up till late hours of the night, they cause paranoia within me that spread into my own current relationship as well as cause me to create problems in my life when there aren't any.

Why am I like this? I'm not sure. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that C turning a year older is a reminder of how much my life changed when I found out I was going to have a baby 8 1/2 years ago. His birthdays are a reminder of the pain I endured as he grew inside of me - both emotionally and physically, as I found out I got cheated on when I was 7 months pregnant and the abuse and threats he put me through when I confronted him about it. His birthdays remind me of my constant struggle throughout the past 8 years as a single mother - of me having to learn how to grow up, be responsible, and truly care for someone else. His birthdays remind me of the greatest gift God has ever given me, a gift that I haven't always appreciated as much as I should have throughout the past 8 years.

I'm sitting here at work, crying my eyes out as I write this blog. No one understands what you go through until they go through it themselves. No one understands how hard it has been to get through the darkest days since I became a mother. They don't understand all the pain, tears and sweat that has gone into trying to raise my son on my own. I've been blessed to have the family I do, even if they aren't good to me. Without them, I probably wouldn't be where I am at today and neither would C.

Last night, J and I had a talk on the way home from his house. We talked about C's Sperm Donor. We talked about how he thinks I should give C the opportunity to meet his SD. He said that if he finds out I knew where he was all along, and that I am the one that kept him from meeting him, that he will resent me and be upset at me for doing so. I feel that this situation is such a Catch-22. I am trying to protect my son from all the things I went through. I want to protect him from being harmed in any way possible. I also have to admit, though, that I am scared.

I am scared that after all the hard work I have put into being C's mom - the waking up in the middle of the night, the taking care of him when he was sick, the sitting together and doing homework or projects - will all go out the window when he meets him. I am afraid that he will forget about all I have done for him and that he will love this person more than me. I am so afraid that his want and need of a dad in his life is so great, that he won't want me anymore. Granted, these are probably irrational fears, but it really hurts to even think about it.

This is all territory that I am so unfamiliar with. I grew up with both a mom and a dad, a good one at that. My dad has always done his best to be there for us, day in and day out. He and my mom worked as a team to raise us three girls, and he was always the pillar of our family, holding it down, especially through tough times. That was my ideal and something that I always wanted for my own children - a mom and dad to love them unconditionally, who never missed a birthday, or holiday or special event. I feel like I have failed my son by not being able to provide him with that.

The sadness and reflection that has fallen upon me as we celebrate the life of my Lil guy is not only about his life, but mine as well. I have come a long way from the 20 year old girl who was pregnant with a baby she was unprepared for. I had such low self-esteem and didn't love myself enough at that point in my life to think I was worthy of anything good. I felt that if my own boyfriend, the father of the baby growing inside of me, didn't want me, no one ever would. I always felt inferior to the world. As disgusted as I was by the situations I had to deal with, situations that no one should ever have to go through, I felt that maybe that's what I deserved because I simply wasn't a good enough person. Sadly, as much as I have grown and changed throughout the years, I still carry that fear.

It has taken me a lifetime to find a man that I want by my side for the rest of my life. I never thought it would be possible to feel love like this, to miss someone so much the moment they drive off, to plan a future together and pray every night that my dreams of waking up with him by my side will come true. I want J to be the father of my future children, to be my husband, to always be my best friend. I want to grow old with one another and hold his hand, throughout the good, the bad, and the ugly. The one thing I don't want is to continue punishing him for the mistakes of others.

My irrational fear is that J will hurt me. That he will break my heart into a million pieces. I fear that he will find a prettier, thinner, smarter woman and cheat on me with her. I fear that the promises he has made to me will be broken, and not only will I have to deal with heartbreak, so will my son. I find myself in a mode of paranoia, fearing that the person who I think is "The One" will turn their back on me and leave me to fend for myself once again. I don't think my heart could take that sort of pain, and I would much rather die if it happened.

My fear has caused me to push and push and push myself away from J, becoming a person who I have always feared to be. I checked our phone bill, find myself worrying about who he is being friends with on Facebook and having completely irrational thoughts. J has NEVER given me a reason to think he would hurt me, and if anything, has only given me more reasons to love and trust him. I just struggle to believe that I, of all people, am worthy of something so amazing in mine and my son's life.

I almost can't breathe right now. I am so overwhelmed with emotions. Like J said, reflection on the past isn't good. It's time to look forward. I know I need to change and I definitely have to stop thinking so much of the things that COULD happen based on my past, but probably won't. I have to try and forget about the pain I have endured throughout my adult life and remember the great things that have come my way this past year. I know I have to work through my fears, and get through this, for myself, my son, and for J. This is my family now, and I have to believe that I am actually worth of something good.

Not Fitting In

Throughout my entire life, I have always been different. I have always dressed different, acted different, and thought different than most of my friends. I realized that being different was just a fact of my life, and learned that when I did try to conform to try to be like everyone else, that's usually when I got into trouble.

My adult life is no different. When I got pregnant with C, one of the first things Dad said was "Now you're gonna be just another statistic. You're another Latina who has gotten pregnant out of wedlock". Since that moment, I have made it my goal to NOT be like every other unwed pregnant Latina. I may not always be the best mother, or the best Latina, or the best anything, but I am most definitely not like most women who have been through the adversities I have had to deal with in life. I work full time, go to school full time, am C's mom, and J's girlfriend, and am as good of a friend as I could possibly be to the people who have proven themselves to be worthy of the little bit of time I have left.I live my life everyday with strength and courage and the hope that someway, somehow, my life experiences could help someone make different choices. I always say that if what I went through helps change the life of someone else, everything till this point has been worth it.

I've come to realize that although I have grown proud to be the non-cookie cutter woman that I have become, there are times when I wish I could just be like everyone else. I want to be a regular woman who doesn't have half the responsibilities on my plate, who lives life carelessly and who has the circle of friends she always dreamt about.

I think I had mentioned in a previous post about a Birthmom Support Group on facebook that I recently joined. It's a group of about 70-80 women who are all birthmothers at different stages in pre- and pos-adoption. When I first joined, I was pretty stoked, since it seemed pretty normal and harmless and since I was going through Hope's birthday and really could have used the friendship and support. Throughout the past month or two since I have been on, I have commented here and there, but mostly sat back and read alot of the posts. There are alot of Debbie Downers, women who are struggling and going through a tough time, as well as women who complain. I should be thankful to have the opportunity to get to know so many women who have been through the same sacrifice and heartache that I have been through, yet I am irritated.

Why am I so irritated? Probably because being a birthmom is one of the only things in my life that I wish could be cookie cutter. I wish that I could be just the same as everyone else. I wish I had been more informed of my choices before I placed. I wish I hadn't been so taken advantage of. I wish I hadn't been so scared to ask questions and to know my rights. I wish I can connected with more support as I went through the process rather than wait 5 years to meet the amazing women who have come into my life. I wish there was such thing as a cookie cutter birthmom, but unfortunately, there isn't. We are all different in so many different ways.

I see women who complain about not seeing their child enough or about their child's adoptive parents. I see so many different types of adoption situations these women are faced with on a daily basis, and I almost feel silly for complaining about only getting pictures and letters a couple of times a year rather than quarterly. Then I pause and think to myself, "What a minute, these women made the same choice I did, to place our babies for adoption." The moment we made that choice and signed those relinquishment papers, those babies were no longer ours. Anything and everything that occurs from the time those papers are signed and on is no longer in our control and we just have to live with it. I just wish that other women could understand that the things they are complaining about are the same things that other women wish they could be dealing with. Complaints about only seeing their children once a year or so are what some women, such as myself, could only dream of. Seems to me like no one is ever happy, and that's not fair, because there has to come a time in life when enough is enough and things need to be let go of.

I probably sound like I am ranting and raving, which I most definitely am doing. I posted a rant on the support group and I'm not sure it was accepted. I probably sound like I am bitching and complaining, just like how they sound to me, but I can't help it. I just want to get the point across that I would LOVE to be in these women's situations if it meant holding Hope for the first time in six years, especially because there is no guarantee that I will ever have that opportunity in the future....

Beyond Tired

Lately, things in my life have been weird. I have so many things to be grateful for, yet I am not content. I am frustrated, because for the first time in my life, I have the pieces of the puzzle that make up the majority of my life, and yet the puzzle is complete and it frustrates the crap out of me.

My work has me stressed out to the max. I work 38 hours a week, at one job, but it feels like I am doing two, now that I am working at one office Monday thru Thursday and doing the job of four days at the other office on Fridays. I am only one person, and I am getting burnt out. People say that things will settle once a system is set on how to run things, but I honestly don't get paid to work this hard as I'm in no management position to be taking on so much stress. With all of that, I am looking and applying for new jobs. I can't stand the fact that I am working so hard with no possibility of moving forward or up from the position I am currently at. 

I hate that I am working so hard at my regular job, that I am re-thinking this weekend job at Options United. As excited as I was to be able to work with a non-profit that would put me in a position to help change lives and reach out to women who were once in my position, I don't think I can do it. At least not in a position working every Saturday and Sunday of every weekend. It seemed like a great idea at first, but my weekends are the only time I could relax, and adding another job to my already busy schedule is more than necessary. It sucks, but I'm just not in a position to take on such a responsibility. I'm disappointed, more so because I felt that this was more of God's calling for me than anything, but I am just not in the right place to take this on at this time.

In addition to being stressed out at work, I am stressed out at home. I am sick and tired of the way things are here. I can't stand seeing the way my "sisters" have no respect for anyone or anything. I am tired of the way they talk to my mother, or how they boss around my father or my son. I am sick and tired of the way they have no regard for anyone but themselves. I am tired of the fact that my "traditional" parents let their boyfriends stay the night multiple times a week since they moved 70 miles away (they are twins), and the boys come and go into their room as they please. They treat everyone like crap and expect to be treated like royalty. The girls place blame for their lives being crappy upon me and my mistakes that I made in the past, not taking into account that I have become someone my son will eventually be proud of. Their genuine meanness and my parents double standards are more than enough to make someone on the outside looking in sick to their stomach. But this is my reality, day in and day out, and I am at the point where living out of a cardboard box sounds more appealing than being in this hellhole, called "home".

As if problems at work and at home weren't enough, J and I haven't been on the best terms the past few days. A lot of feelings came out in the least expected ways and we had probably the worst fight we've ever had to deal with in our 10 months of dating. Yup, that's right, this past Tuesday marked 10 months since our first date - the best 10 months of my life thus far. Just like the 7 year itch, the ten month curse fell upon us and we had a fight bigger than we've ever had before on Thursday night. J and I yelled at each other, I said things I really didn't mean and he broke up with me... for like 5 minutes. But still, the worst 5 minutes of my life. We made up, but a lot of feelings were still being held onto and we got into another fight last night. It basically boils down to the fact that he and I are stressed out with all the things we have on our plate. Unfortunately, we are very alike in the sense that our way of handling things when stressed is to deal with them on our own... We push the other way without realizing it and then the stress of our lives just explodes into something like what we dealt with these past few days. In the end of it all, we need to learn how to count on one another and know that it's ok to be stressed and to share those feelings without worry of being judged or hurt. I know that this is all a part of being in a healthy relationship, but I honestly don't ever want to have to feel this way about the only positive thing in my life. I love him too much and too greatly to feel such pain ever again.

On a positive note, I officially start class tomorrow. Yay to the school approving my appeal and allowing me to retake the course I failed last quarter. There are no excuses this quarter. I have to get on it and succeed so that I can move on and hurry up and finish school. It's the key to opening up the doors ahead of me on this journey. No more allowing work to get in the way of my studies. No more allowing anything to get in front of this road ahead of me. The consequences of not succeeding are far too great. I've put in too much money and time into this thus far, and I cannot allow myself to be put in a position where failing is an option - because it isn't. 

On another positive note, I started with a personal trainer last week. I only made it to one session because I unfortunately had to work late on Wednesday, but I have been on a mission to lose weight and I am only a few pounds away from my first weight loss goal. Lately, with all the stress in my life, I feel that working out is the only way to feel better. I get on that elliptical and keep going for an hour, sometimes even longer. The payoff is positive and I am enjoying the results that my once too tight pants are fitting better. I still have a long way to go before I get to where I want to be, but there's no better feeling than fitting in a size 12/13 when I've been wearing 15/16. :) Talk about a big smile on this girl's face.

I wish there were more hours in the day to accomplish all the things that I need and want to get done. I feel that the more I do to become a better person, the less I have time to do the things that make me feel good about myself. I just want the hard part of life to be over with because I am tired, actually, beyond tired...