The Unchosen

Big post today guys.  A post I've had in my head for years but haven't had the guts to fully write.  But today, I can't seem to get the thoughts of it out of my head and they have been attacking me full force.  Some old wounds have reopened and I'm realizing just how much they never healed, but rather they were ignored.  And I'm afraid to write some of these words because I'm afraid that everyone reading them will end up with the same question about me that I've been forced to have about myself.

What is it about me, what is so fundamentally wrong with me that no one will choose me to be a mother?

I'm terrified that these next IVF attempts won't work.  And it's not because I so desperately want to have my own biological child.  Honestly, the only benefit in my mind to having a child that is biologically mine is because if there are medical emergencies in the future, my husband and I can donate whatever body parts that child might need.  Yes, I want to feel what it's like to have a baby kick inside me, and to see a mixture of my husbands and my face staring at me from a high chair, but those things are so unimportant in the bigger picture.

I never thought I would try to grow my own.  I've always known that I would have trouble conceiving and I decided early on that I would never put myself and my husband through all of this debt and emotional roller coaster just to produce a child.  I was always firm that I would adopt.  Spend those resources on a child that was already in need of parents.

And then we started filling out the paperwork.  We applied to one adoption agency and were turned down, probably because we checkmarked the box saying we would want more information on the financial assistance available.  And so we started filling out the paperwork for 2 more agencies when we decided to really learn what our options were in the grow your own arena.  And we learned that there aren't nearly as many kids in need as we thought.  There are far more parents who want children than there are children who need parents.  Frankly, hubby and I look really bad on paper.  We aren't rich, I have mental illness in my health history (depression issues that are no longer a problem), and we aren't Christian.

We would have a better chance of actually raising a child, and it would be less expensive, to go through all of the IVF than to rely on being able to convince some scared, pregnant woman to let us raise her child.

And the final decision came down to one fundamental belief - no one will ever choose me.

But here's the wound that hit me so deep that lead to that fundamental belief.

A few years ago, when we first moved back to the Seattle area to be near family after a 10 year absence, my brother and his wife had their first child.  As they wrote out their will, they asked me if K and I wanted to be named guardians should something happen to them.  Of course we said yes.  And a few days later, my brother told me that we were off the hook, they decided on someone else.

Out of a very short list of candidates, my brother decided that I wasn't the person he would choose to be a mother.  If my SIL sibling were someone who wanted children (he actively does not want to be a father), I would understand if they chose her sibling over the fathers sibling.

My brother witnessed what the "mental illness" in my health history means.  And he's someone who should know that while it looks like crap on paper, the truth of it isn't bad.  He's the one person who was raised by the example of parenting that I will most likely follow.  If anyone on this earth should have true knowledge of what kind of mother I could be some day, it should be him.  His understanding of what kind of mother I will be is deeper than even my own husbands.  And he didn't choose me.

The one person in all the world who should have chosen me, when it came right down to it, he decided to go with someone else.  Someone else was a better choice than me.

And I've been hit with that message over and over and over again.  The adoption agency didn't even think I worth talking to.  My best friend dumped me because she came to the conclusion that I shouldn't be a mother.  The IVF clinic has refused to treat me because I'm too fat.

And when the cosmic power weighed in, I thought finally, someone chose me.  The cosmic power decided that not only was I good enough, but I was good enough to have 2.  I felt like all the doubt, all of the naysayers could kiss my ass because whatever deciding force has the final say on the subject of who can and who can't, I was chosen as someone who can, and I was chosen to do it 2x over.

And then that cosmic power reconsidered and apparently decided that choosing me was a mistake.

So what is it?  What is so fundamentally wrong with me that everyone who is ever given the opportunity to chime in on whether or not I should raise children, they all come to the same conclusion that no, I'm not someone who should be given that responsibility.

What is it about the bitches on Teen Mom that makes them worthy over me?  I don't have a mug shot.  I've never thrown a punch at anyone in my life.  And yet nature itself has decided that they are more suited to being a parent than I am.

Why is it that virtual strangers on the internet seem to have more faith in my ability to be a good mom than the person who has known me since I was born?  It doesn't help when we're chatting and he's a bit free with the phrases "you don't understand because you don't have kids" and "you'll think differently when you have kids."  As if any thought I have is inferior because I don't have kids.

I've thought about these things.  I've thought more about how I will handle various parenting situations and I've done more research on child psychology and behavior than just about anyone who doesn't yet have kids.  Why?  Because it's quite likely that in order to ever have a child, I will be asked those questions and I will have convince someone with my answers that I'm going to be a good mom.  I can't just have faith that when the time comes, I will know what to do.  I have to convince someone that I can do the job before I'm going to be given the opportunity to do the job.

But if the one person who should know better than anyone else in the world what I will be day to day as a parent, if I can't convince him that I'm the best choice, how can I ever convince a complete stranger that I'm the best choice out of hundreds of desperate couples who want that same child?

I haven't forgiven my brother.  And if I haven't yet, I honestly don't know if I ever can.  Even if I'm able to forgive one day, I can't imagine ever forgetting.  I was able to ignore it for a while, but I just can't seem to escape that wound anymore.