The Best Second Mother
Not long ago, Andrew and I were trying to move the girls through their evening routine. We had just finished dinner, and it was time to start the bath. Andrew reached the top of the stairs first, toting a chortling Cleo, and Annie Rose scrambled up behind him. As Katie and I climbed the stairs, I reached out to give her a squeeze. She turned to me, and with a rush of affection, she gave me a fierce hug. “You’re the best… second mother in the world!” she blurted out.
Andrew was down the hall in the bathroom, helping Annie Rose get undressed. He heard Katie’s declaration of love and whipped his head around to catch my eye. I couldn’t help it. I burst out laughing. It was just so funny, so classically awful, so straight at the heart of an adoptive mother’s insecurities. I had to laugh. And then I turned to Katie and replied, “And you are the best… oldest daughter in the world!” I couldn’t say “You are the best daughter” because I have two younger daughters, so I threw in “oldest” daughter. Or I could have thrown in “the best seven-year-old daughter” or something like that. But I certainly would not have responded with “you are the best adopted daughter in the world.” Because I don’t walk around thinking of Katie as my adopted daughter. She is just my daughter, my daughter who happens to be adopted.
I was reminded of Gene Hackman’s character in The Royal Tenenbaums who always introduced Gwyneth Paltrow’s character as, “… my adopted daughter, Margot.” Andrew and I saw that movie ten years ago, long before we knew what life held for us, long before we knew we would be adopting, and even then we talked about how horrible it was for a child to be introduced as someone’s “adopted daughter.” And here we are, adoptive parents with an incredible little girl of our own.
After Katie professed her love for me as her “second mother”, Andrew and I mused about my reaction. “It’s a good thing I am so okay with everything,” I told him. And, really, that sums it up. I am okay with everything. I am okay with the fact that Katie has a relationship with her birth mother. I am okay with the fact that she called me her “second mother,” because I also know that she is calling for me when she calls for Mama. I am secure in Katie’s love for me, and that is what allows me to encourage her expressions of love for M, her birth mother.
In the past month or two, Katie has been very interested in connecting with M. When she asks for my phone so she can call M or send her a text, I hand it over. My willingness to let Katie connect with M actually keeps us closer. Katie can sense that I accept her love for M, and so she doesn’t sneak around trying to communicate with M behind my back for fear of hurting me. My daughter will never be the adopted child who secretly launches a search for information about her birth family. Everything is already out in the open, and Katie can ask me whatever she wants. She can run toward her birth family, and I will be waiting with open arms when she turns back towards me.
This journey to personal acceptance took time. I wasn’t always secure in my role as the adoptive mother. When Katie was a toddler, I remember the first time that she referred to M as her “mother.” I gently corrected her, saying that M was her birth mother. In the beginning, I marked time by how long Katie had been away from me. There were the nine months she spent growing in M’s womb, months that I can never replace for any of us. Then there were the months when Katie was in foster care as a baby. I ache for those months when she was not with me. I grieved and made my peace with that loss of our time together. After we adopted Katie, our months together eventually caught up to, equaled and then surpassed our time apart.
From the time she was a toddler, we openly discussed her adoption. We visited her birth mom when Katie was ten months and again when she was 22 months. Then we had a four year gap in our visits. Katie learned to talk and grew into a kid. We continued to discuss her adoption, and she dutifully claimed that she loved her birth mother, but it didn’t feel scary to me, because Katie didn’t really know her birth mother. We finally had a reunion again when Katie was nearly six. After that visit, I felt edgy and tense when Katie would ask to call M, because now M represented a real person, not just an idea. I made excuses when Katie asked to call M, and I tried to minimize the connection. But it dawned on me that this was a complicated situation, with complicated emotions, and I couldn’t control the way people felt. I decided to focus on sorting out my own feelings, so that I could better assist Katie with hers.
When I wholeheartedly accepted that our family structure is different from others, I stopped feeling threatened by Katie’s relationship with her birth mother. I love M, and Katie knows it. Her birth mother is funny and perceptive and kind, and I am glad that there is another person in the world who loves and cheers for Katie. I am able to hand Katie the phone so she can call M, and I no longer want to hang around in the room to hear what they are talking about. It doesn’t matter. What matters is that Katie is able to feel a connection with M, and she knows that I support her. She can call me mommy. She can call me the second mother. She can call me Mama. She can call me Mom. The important thing is that when she calls, I answer.
Carrie Goldman is an artist and writer living in Evanston, IL. Carrie contributes to the blog "Portrait of an Adoption (click on the linked byline above) on Chicago Now. She is also writing her first book, an examination of bullying prevention, that will be published by Harper Collins. Carrie and her husband have three daughters.
