I'm Coming Out

My brother somehow scraped together $8 in prison to send AND insure a package for me. In the package was a plethora of cassette tapes. It is a wonderful gesture that is completely lost on me. I do not have the means of actually listening to them and from what I can see, it’s all rap music. I hate rap music, but he wouldn’t know that considering we only just met about 3 years ago.  He’s 37, I think, and I am 35.  I am not ashamed to say I do not know how to react to him or act around him, although I probably should be.  I know, even though he has not said it, that I really do not live up to his dreams of the sister he was looking for.  I’m trying . . . just not hard enough.

I’m coming out. I have never told anyone this. That’s a lie.  So far I have told 6 people and it only matters to one, Nigel. He is the reason I actually met my brother in the first place. It really matters to Nigel.  It creates a lot of pressure in an already awkward situation. I knew I was adopted at either 2 months old or 2 years old without anyone ever telling me. Whether you believe it or not, I remember every important event in my life from the age of 2 on. This is confirmed. I actually would lean towards 2 months, but I digress. I have an older sister and brother who were also adopted. For some oddball reason, our mother never told us. I found a picture of Michael, my gift-giving brother, when I was 7. It was like looking into a mirror. I asked my mom who the lil boy was and she absentmindedly and flippantly said he was my brother. She expected me not to remember or not to be able to absorb the gravity of what she said. I hid the picture in my room and I still have it today. I found some paperwork in my mom’s room pertaining to my adoption like my birth mother’s name and my real name . . . .

I tucked all of this stuff away just like I tucked away the reality that I was adopted. My adoption is a dirty lil secret. A secret that my entire family kept from my siblings and me our whole lives.  Until my mother died, the fact that we were all completely different; we all look different; I am way smarter than my siblings; was ignored. By the time I was 5, I realized that the only way out of this situation would be chin down and good grades so I could go to college and get the fuck out of there. That is not a hyperbole. I viewed the first day of kindergarten as my first step towards college. My adoptive mother was a monster to put it lightly. She should not have been trusted with the care of children. Even without telling me I was adopted, she made sure I felt out of place at all times.

Not once in my childhood did I want to seek out my birth mom. When I reached adolescence, I tried to ignore the whole thing. I grew smart enough to appreciate the beast that was my mother. I could have been adopted by someone who didn’t live in a good neighbor like my mother. I could have been adopted by someone who didn’t make me strive so hard to be the complete opposite. I had goals in my childhood. And I met them all except one, so far. That was all fueled by my complete and utter hatred for my mom. I really didn’t have the time to seek out another mother who was already not a fan of mine. So why am I coming out?  Michael. I would prefer to hide my adoption forever. It is my opinion that there is no sure fire way to make a kid a head case than to give him/her up for adoption. There is no amount of therapy that can reconcile the fact that for 9 months you heard the voice of your birth mother [good or bad] and upon birth, that is the voice you seek out and it is not there. That is a reality. When I was a kid, I always thought if I told someone I was adopted, they would look at me and realize that I wasn’t worthy. Read me up and down and try to figure out why my mother would throw me away. I never sought her out because I didn’t want all of my fears confirmed.

That’s where Michael comes in.  You can’t really hide a brother in prison. I mean you can, but the brother everyone knows about lives in Queens so i get quizzical looks. I’ll explain meeting Michael in another post. And I love Michael and he really loves me and it would be disingenuous to lie about him. So I’m slowly beginning to tell people I’m adopted because of Michael and my friends have surprised me with their reactions. No one cares. No one looks at me like I’m unworthy. They look at me exactly the same way as they did before they knew. They do have a lot of questions though, and I will answer a few now:

1.       Michael somehow, while in prison, found me. I will never lose my amazement of him because of that.

2.       I, after meeting my brother, still have no intention of seeking out my mother.

3.       I feel like my brother completes me. He has confirmed the existence of unconditional love which I was skeptical about. I’m grateful to have him.

 The story of my relationship with Michael is evolving, but I am not. I am me. I am unabashed, not ashamed and adopted. The only time I wonder about my worth is when I know I need to be a better sister. I will continue to try. As of now, I’m coming out. Loud and proud.