what I want you to know: incest

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What I Want You to Know is a series of reader submissions.  It is an attempt to allow people to tell their personal stories, in the hopes of bringing greater compassion to the unique issues each of us face. If you would like to submit a story to this series, click here.  Today’s post is by Sarah.

 

On this blog, the conversation often turns to orphaned and abandoned children. What I want people to know is I consider myself both orphaned and abandoned. This is not to minimize those that have been abandoned or are truly orphaned by tragedy. But it is true that incest took away the only family I ever knew. While many survivors are left with a "non-offending parent" or other relative to care for them, every relative from my own mother, to my grandparents, to my aunts and uncles chose to turn away and not believe me. While my biological mother was not my abuser, she accused me of "stealing her man" and ruining her family. She cut me out of her life, unless I would recant my story and say it never happened. I wish people understood more that I can't just "reconcile" with my biological parents. It's not safe physically or psychologically for me to do so. Not only was I victimized before I became a legal adult, but when I tried to "bury the hatchet"and "put it behind me" I was attacked again at 22 years old. Incest took away my family. Now as a 30 year old, I wish people knew that I feel rootless in my life.I feel like I have no "soft place to fall" as people say when they think of "family"and "home".

Holidays are some of the worst. Despite the many people I know and interact with, most knowing my situation, I have almost never gotten an invitation to a holiday. On some level I even understand that. Nobody really wants an outsider at their table. Family is intimate. And there' that whole appropriate boundaries thing. This is one reason I've chosen a career that forces me to work on holidays, so I can keep busy and try not to think about it. It is hard for me to admit that at my age that I desperately want a family. I miss being told "I love you", or getting a regular hug. That phone call at the end of a long hard day of "how was your day?" Looking forward to going "home" for a college break or holiday. I desperately want that place to belong.To know that someone is waiting for me somewhere.

As I look to the future of starting my own family, I grieve that I will not have grandparents for my children. But I also want them to have a sense of family too. I want my child(ren) to have aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents. Sometimes I fantasize about who will play "adopted family" roles. However, will those people agree to fill that role? In dating relationships, I fear that the issue of "family" and my past will come up. Why I moved to one of the biggest cities in the US as a teenager, where I knew not a soul is already a complicated conversation. "How did you just wind up here?"" they ask. Forget about the "When do I meet your parents?" question. I anticipate my wedding looking very different than the traditional big family ceremony that they have in the movies.

Family is who you choose it to be. At least I believe this. I feel like people are still much too hyper-focused on needing to be related by blood and legal relationships.I know that my experiences have shaped who I am. Everyone that knows me understands I have an open door policy if we have a relationship. If you need food, I will feed you. If you are about to be homeless, as long as I have a roof over my head, I will be sure you are not on the streets. I think of it as treating others as I've hoped to be treated. To me, it is what Jesus would do.

People of faith need to understand that "forgiveness" is not the band-aid or the clean slate to start over. Recently I was told, "It's never too late to try again" in regard to a relationship with my mother. I have learned to believe that God does not want to see me be hurt. This is sometimes a daily affirmation that I have to say in the mirror Stuart Smalley style. I can love and honor her better at a distance then standing before her. Forgiveness is accepting that in her current state of brokenness, she cannot love, believe, protect me like she should have. It's not that she acting maliciously, she is simply not capable with her heart and soul in the state that it has been. I am not the enemy.

What I want you to know is when people say, "I don't have any family" perhaps think of how hard it is for them to say that. What deep pain led to that? There might be fear that you might assume they are perfectly happy being a "lone ranger", or judge them in some way. Instead, say, "I understand. Is there perhaps anything I can do for you?" I do not want anyone feeling sorry for me. My circumstances have made me the strong, brave woman that I am But I do want you to know that you can help ease the pain.

That a person can be 30 years old and still want to be part of a family.

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why does adoption cost so much? (and why we didn’t just send that money to Haiti)

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I hear a lot of questions about why adoption is so expensive, and honestly, I don’t always have a good answer. 

This month, we added up all of our adoption expenses and I was a little shocked at how much we spent on our adoption from Haiti. Because I had to type up an itemized list for our taxes last week, and because I’m a believer in transparency in adoption, I thought I would just share what we spent, so people can have an idea of where the money goes.

Our adoption expenses are a bit atypical because we didn’t use an agency.  There are some pros and cons to this – the pro being that had we used an agency, it would have added about $8,000 to our total cost.  I really didn’t love the idea of handing over a lot of money to an agency, and I was comfortable doing a lot of research and legwork myself.  In theory, an adoption agency cam help to assure than an adoption is ethical.  In reality, every adoptive parent needs to research and dig to make sure their own adoption is handled in an ethical manner.  We had a lot of trust in the missionaries who ran the orphanage and who would be handling the paperwork process.  I didn’t have a lot of trust in the Haitian officials, but being with an agency would not have shielded us from getting stuck in the their social services quagmire.

Anyways, here is a breakdown of our adoption expenses:

Before compiling this list, if someone had asked me how much our adoption cost, I would have said around $10,000.  I knew that the big expense was the $8000 we paid to Heartline, but I don’t think I really realized how much the rest of it added up over the course of those three years. 

The fees we paid to Heartline to process the adoption are often referred to as the “in-country fee”.  This money went towards the orphanage taking care of him, but also went towards an attorney processing our paperwork, and any fees on the Haiti side.  Because it took three years for Kembe’s adoption to finalize, I can tell you that $8000 was insufficient to even cover the orphanage’s cost of caring for him, especially because he had a private hospital stay during that time.

The next largest expense was travel – which again was affected by the three year span it took to finalize the adoption.  During those three years our family took a total of eight trips, and we often took our kids.  In total, we spent $6,156.  That number only involves airfare.  That expense is a lot more than we expected, but for people adopting from African countries that require two trips, travel expenses can be even higher.

The next expense is the $2600 we paid to US social workers to approve us to adopt.  Honestly, I don’t think these fees are all that exorbitant.  Home studies by professionals are a good thing. 

I think one other surprise is that we spent nearly $1.500 on filing forms with the US government.  This one seems high to me.

So . . . even looking at our own expenses, I can’t really directly answer the question of why adoption is so expensive.  There are a lot of steps and a lot of people involved in making sure a couple is eligible, and then making sure a child is truly in need of a family.  I think those steps are good.  I understand the concern that people are “making money off of adoption”, but at the same time, these people (the translators, the government officials, the lawyers, the social workers, the notaries) certainly shouldn’t be expected to work for free.   I think it’s a fine line.  I do think that adoption fees are too high, but when I look at our expenses, I don’t see a clear area where it could have been trimmed (beyond USCIS).  Now, had we paid an additional 8 or 10k to use an agency . . . that might be a question mark for me.  If we paid this much to adopt an infant in the US, I would definitely have some questions about where the money went.

I do think that there are some professional who make a lot of money from adoption, and I don’t like it.  But I didn’t really like seeing my OB driving a Porsche, either.

Speaking of my OB, this was an interesting revelation.  I actually paid more money to deliver Karis than I did to adopt Kembe.   Our adoption cost just under $19,000.  Karis’s delivery cost nearly $26,000 out-of-pocket.

Okay, so now to answer the two inevitable questions that arise from a discussion of adoption expenses: how did we afford it, and why didn’t we just send that money to Haiti?

We definitely didn’t have $19,000 just laying around.  Our first step was to take out a home equity loan in 2006 when we started the process.  (I haven’t even calculated how the interest rates of a three year adoption have affected our expenses.  I think maybe I don’t want to know that.)  In addition to the loan, our church gave us a gift of $2000 from their adoption fund to pay for our homestudy.  After Kembe came home, we did a t-shirt fundraiser and, along with a grant from Lifesong for Orphans, we raised $4000.  We also expect a tax refund of $13,000 thanks to the adoption credit.  So, that is how we could afford to adopt.

Now to the other question we get in relation to adoption expenses: why didn’t you just take that money and give it to a Haitian family/give it to a mission in Haiti/buy a well?  First of all, because we wanted to build our family through adoption.  I don’t think it’s either/or scenario (we DO give money directly to Haiti) but I don’t think you can put a price tag on a forever family.  Also – I don’t think that adoptive families should be held to a standard of charitable accountability that is beyond what we would hold the general public to.  I mean, why isn’t everyone sending $20 grand to Haiti?  Yes, adoption is stupid expensive, but so is a boob job.  So is a new car.  So is having a new baby.  (For the record, I’ve never had a new car or a boob job.  I’m just sayin’, adoption is not the only expense that could be foregone in favor of third-world financial assistance). Ironically, I have never had someone leave a comment on my blog asking why I chose to have another biological child instead of sending that money directly to Haiti.  In fact, the next time I’m asked that question, I might ask that person to go around and quiz pregnant women on why they are being so selfish.  Or I might just punch them in the face.  I’m going to wait until the moment and see how I feel.

I mean, why are we questioning adoptive parents about money when there are people buying these things?

I feel really passionate about helping families in Haiti, and I would venture to say that most adoptive families tend to be pretty involved in assistance after they’ve spent any time in the sending country.  But I don’t like the way the decision to adopt somehow raises the question of how money might be better spent because there are a million examples in this world of how money could be better spent, and providing a family for a child is a really, really worthy use of money, in my book.

If you have adopted and feel like sharing, I would love to hear your perspective on the expenses of adoption.  Where did you spend the most money?  Were there fees  you were uncomfortable with?  Why is it so expensive, and is there something to be done about it?

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the makeover

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You might have noticed that my blog has undergone some changes in the last week.  I am so thrilled with the results.  I’ve been wanting to change the design of my blog for two years now, but I just couldn’t commit to an idea or a designer.  (This is the very same reason that I have never gotten a tattoo, despite loving tattoos.  I can’t seem to commit to the artwork.)  I  kept searching for a designer who understood my vision and also worked with the blogspot platform. And sadly, the designer of Backpacking Dad’s amazing widget was unavailable:

I finally stumbled upon Heather Hamilton’s work at Life Made Lovely and fell in love.  I was thrilled when she agreed to work with me and I love what she did.  I am still figuring out a few tweaks but hopefully everything is readable and loading well.  I was having some issues with the comments last week.  I was about to ask that you let me know how the comments were working and realized that it might be a bit difficult to leave a comment if they aren’t, so . . . tweet me? 

P.S. Check out our guide to organizations doing great things for Mother’s Day at ShePosts!

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Perpetual Motion and the Wall of Noise.

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If these two decided to be a wrestling team (or a rock band) I would call them Perpetual Motion and the Wall of Noise.  One never stops moving.  The other never stops talking.  Together, they are a force to be reckoned with.  They make me tired.  Oh, so tired.   But they also make me laugh . . . and lucky for them I’m a sucker for cute boys with a good sense of humor.

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happy birthday, baby (who is not a baby)

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Today is Karis’s 2nd birthday.  I am trying not to think about it too much, because if I think about it too much, I will have to acknowledge that being TWO definitely catapults her out of the baby stage, and I am in total and complete denial about that fact. 

We celebrated her birthday on Sunday, when the grandparents were here. For reasons that are beyond my comprehension, I admitted to Jafta that Sunday was not her real birthday, and today he has been very, very concerned about how we would celebrate her birthday today.  Perhaps we need to go to Disney?  Maybe we should maker cupcakes?  Should we rent a bouncehouse for the evening?

I’m not quite sure to how explain to him that two is the PHONE-IT-IN birthday (right?), and that a candle and a couple gifts is as good as she’s gonna get until she’s old enough to actually remember my efforts. (Not to mention, she got to go to Disney with her grandma and aunt yesterday.  And I mean that literally.  Don’t mention it.  Because Jafta’s compassion stops just short of someone going to Disney without him).

Photos of the celebration that Jafta has deemed invalid:

I will probably attempt to buy off Jafta’s indignation with a trip to the cupcake store after dinner. 

Man, these kids are a tough crowd.

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listen to your mother

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`On Saturday, I attended a read-through for a show I am doing next Sunday afternoon.

There was a time in my life when terms like “read-through” and “doing a show” did not make me feel like a giant phoney.  There was a time when the passions that are now dormant had regular and tangible outlets.  So I’m a little giddy to be “doing a show”. 

Next week I’ll be taking part in the LA version of Listen To Your Mother – a national show that highlights personal stories of motherhood, read by the authors.  The LA cast is nothing short of amazing, from writers to comedians to actresses to producers.  After I saw the cast list, I knew it was going to be powerful.  But I don’t think I was really prepared for the impact of the read-through.

You know that feeling, when you are sitting around a circle with a bunch of girlfriends, sharing tales of motherhood both intimate and hilarious?  You know that feeling, when you move from tears to laughter in the course of one perfect second?  You know the feeling of your cheeks hurting from laughter, and the lightness in your chest that comes from hearing someone else tell your story in a way that makes you feel known?

That’s what the Listen To Your Mother Show is.  A big, funny, poignant, authentic lovefest for moms, and anyone who ever had one.  If you are near LA next Sunday afternoon, you really need to come.

May 1, 2011
3 PM
The Rosenthal Theater
Inner City Arts
Downtown Los Angeles

(And if you live near AUSTIN, MADISON, NW INDIANA, or SPOKANE, get yourself to your local show!)

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laptop giveaway

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I have a fun giveaway to announce today – Betty Crocker, arbiter of those insanely delicious fruit snacks that my kids always beg for – is going to give away an XO laptop to one lucky reader. 

The XO was created as a laptop that could be used for educational purposes in developing countries.  The XO One Laptop Per Child initiative is to provide each child with a rugged, low-cost, low-power, connected laptop. To this end, they have designed hardware, content and software for collaborative and self-directed learning. Betty Crocker has created their own initiative with the XO Laptop called Win One | Give One, offering families the chance to win a laptop while one is donated to a child in need.

To enter to win one of these laptops for your own child (or to gift to a child of your choosing), leave a comment answering the following question:

How do you give back?

This contest will run until Saturday at midnight, when I will announce the winner.  The winner will also receive a gift of Betty Crocker’s assorted fruit snacks, which you can share with your kids or hoard for yourself.  (Those Gushers are good.  No judgments here).

Good luck!

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happy easter

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We had a great Easter today, full of all of the important rituals that remind us of our risen Lord.  Like easter baskets, candy, crap from the Target dollar bins, and an unhealthy focus on matching outfits.

I sort of can’t help the last one.  It’s genetic.  Growing up, Easter Sunday was all about the white gloves, the white hat, the white tights, and an outfit that looked like a Quincenera dress that had been dipped into pastel Easter egg dye.  (And apparently, in the year 1985, about feathered bangs).

I consider it showing great restraint that my girls went bare-legged and that their outfits were color-coordinated but not entirely matching.  Given my upbringing and all.

There was some outfit drama with the boys, too.  Jafta had it in his mind that he wanted to wear a tie, but the only one I could find was dotted with skulls.  It wasn’t exactly screaming He Is Risen. But it’s the best I could do.  The shirt I bought Kembe did not have a tie . . . which he was very sad about.  So he ended up wearing his shirt and tie from last year. Meltdown averted.  Color scheme ruined.  Womp womp womp.

The kids got bug nets in their Easter baskets. They put them to use very quickly, though not in the ways I’d envisioned.

We managed to make it to the early service (and by early I mean 9am.  You “sunrise service” people are crazy).  Francis Chan gave a great message, and the baptisms made me bawl.  They do every year.

(photo by Brittani Ehrhorn)

(photo by Brittani Ehrhorn)

(photo by Brittani Ehrhorn)

After the service the children demonstrated all they had learned about God’s love by fighting over a donut and refusing to look at the camera.

We had Mark’s parents and aunt over for brunch at our house.  I’ve always been a fan of the blog Girls Gone Child but since her mom started writing a weekly healthy food guide, I’m even more hooked.  I made both of her recipes from this post and they were both delicious.

After brunch we had Mark take the kids on a walk because it had been drizzling all morning so I hadn’t been able to hide the eggs.  Can we talk about how many questions my 6-year-old had about the specifics of the Easter bunny this week?  He is at the age where he is really having doubts, so he was asking me pointed questions all week long.  Confession: I am OVER lying to my kids.  I’ve never told them about Santa or the Easter Bunny or the Tooth Fairy, and yet they know all about these traditions.  And I’m willing to go along with it, but at the point where my skeptical son is asking why the stuff in the Easter basket was the stuff he saw in the garage and why did the Easter bunny not hide the eggs in the middle of the night and how does a bunny carry all that stuff?  I just want to scream BECAUSE IT’S NOT REAL!!!  I’m ready for the charade to be over.  I only like to tell lies about things that benefit me.

Mark went over the rules of the easter egg hunt. During this time, Karis took her basket and started collecting the pokey balls from the yard.  (I think these things have a more technical name but at this point, I actually cannot remember what it is.  At all.  Pokey balls?  They fall from trees?  Anyone?).

Karis got so involved in the acquisition of pokey balls that she actually refused to transition to the backyard, where the eggs were hidden.  Mark had to carry her kicking and screaming into the backyard, while she reached out for her blessed pokey balls.  Did I mention she turns 2 this week?

Then my kids found the eggs and gorged themselves on candy.  He Is Risen, Indeed.

After the egg hunt we tried to get a family photo, and despite grandma taking 2,136 shots, not a one of them had all four kids looking at the camera.

Oh well.  At least my Spanx aren’t showing.  Happy Easter!

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how to dye eggs with small children

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I’ve been seeing a lot of tutorials posted around the web about how to make stunning and creative dyed eggs with your children.  I’m going to be perfectly honest – most of them are so elaborate and detailed that I don’t think any actual children were involved in the making of them.  And if you want to make a bunch of Martha Stewart-inspired eggs by yourself, that you artfully photograph and then post on twitter, well, knock yourself out.

There’s an ap for that!

If, however, you are like me and you have a handful of small kids and don’t want to get all Tiger Mom about what is supposed to be fun for the children, then here are some simple suggestions for you.
The first order of business is procuring the egg-dying kit.  This is really dependent on the developmental age of the child.  Here is a breakdown:

If your child is a toddler, skip the dye altogether.  Hand them a hard-boiled egg and let them peel it for a half hour.  The end.

If your child is preschool aged, there are two important questions to ask yourself:

1. Does this kit make white eggs a different color?
2. Wait, there is no number 2. Number 1 is all that matters.

If you child is school-aged, it gets a little tougher. They’ve likely been more exposed to consumerism and product promotion.  At this age, their dreams for dyed eggs probably involved some kind of character endorsement.  I know that growing up, my Easters were marred by the crushing disappointed that my mother refused to buy the kit that would allow me to put Jem’s face and logo all over the egg.

So, while the silked-dyed eggs and and leaf-rubbing transfer you saw on Real Simple may appeal to your own modern aesthetic, if you really want to help your child revel in the Glory of Easter, it’s probably going to involve a little more Spiderman and Dora and a little less stenciling and muted soy-based ink.

A few other random tips:

Costumes and sunglasses can make the event feel more festive.

So can a bottle of home brew.  (But keep your cup out of reach of the kids, so they don’t try to drink it.  Or drop an egg into it.  Trust me on this one).

Have your husband do that trick where he makes his arm transparent.  Kids love that one!

Use a tablecloth and just let it go.

Now, in terms of how prevent your children from emitting sulfur farts for the next week as they consume these eggs?  I can't help you there.

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mom2.0 conference recap

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I’m back from another blogging conference.  Mom 2.0 was a great conference.  Really great.  But I just don’t know how to recap a conference without saying the same thing I’ve said after every conference I’ve attended.  Conferences are such a wall of overwhelm for me, and even I’m tired of hearing myself repeat how much angst and anxiety they cause.  But just to recap, here are some of the emerging themes from this weekend/every-conference-I-have-ever-been-to-ever:

• feeling anxious about leaving the kids
• feeling guilty that I didn’t spend better time with them before I left, instead of ignoring them while I frantically packed
• feeling elated to see old friends
• feeling anxious to meet new people
• feeling concerned that my introversion will seem stand-offish
• feeling inspired
• feeling community
• feeling awkward
• not talking to people I admire and don’t know because I don’t want to be stalkerish
• lamenting that I didn’t talk to people I admire and don’t know
• staying up too late because I’m on west coast time, and because I’m having great conversations with people I rarely see or new people I really like and then regretting it in the morning when the conference starts at 9am
• missing my kids like crazy, and being frustrated with myself for not being in the moment
• vowing to be a better mom
• vowing to stop going to blog conferences because of how stressed I get
• wondering if I can swing the EVO conference in June
• feeling gratitude for stumbling into this blogging thing
• feeling like I somehow missed half of the session
• thinking I should make more effort to work with brands
• thinking that I don’t really want to do that
• feeling cognitive dissonance about going to swanky dinners and cocktail parties when the next day I will be back at home swiffering up caked applesauce and running four loads of laundry
• feeling completely exhausted

Bla bla bla.  We’ve hear this before, no?

This is the part of the recap where I should hyperlink to all my blogging friends old and new.  Only, I’m really tired, and I’ve yet to unpack, and I have a final to give tonight and an inbox that hates me.  And also, I have anxiety that I will leave someone out.  So, I’m not going to do that.  But, I loved that conversation we had.  You know who you are.

Now for some pictures.

This is the first walk I took in the city, and it’s pretty much the only stretch of the city I saw the whole weekend.  I took a bunch of lame photos that pretty much look just like this.  Karen was on the same walk, and she took this amazing set of photos of the very same walk.  This is why she is a photographer and I am not.  Check out her photos.  And then check out these photos of another photographer who went this weekend.  I did not see this part of the city.  Or anything like it. I mostly saw a lot of drunk people on spring break stumbling around Canal Street.  And a lot of food that looked like the creature that Jafta ate at the beach.

This little roundtable event was one of my favorite discussions of the weekend.  Doug Block has a documentary coming out on HBO called The Kids Grow Up – it’s about his journey documenting his daughter’s childhood and then having to let her go.  I could weep just thinking about it.  He asked us some hard questions about telling our kids’ stories in public spaces.  Lots of food for thought.

One of the cocktail parties.

Chillin’ in the club lounge at the Ritz Carlton.  You know, just my typical everyday stuff.

This picture is a nip-slip waiting to happen.  Much thanks to BodyLogicMD for our spa day.

On our way to dinner.

Quite possibly two of the funniest ladies of the internet.

Some of my favorite people ever.

Alright.  Blogging conference recap complete.  I think I will just copy and paste the above feelings for the next blogging conference.  If I even go, because I may quit going to them altogether.

(I’m so still going.)

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