I don't understand"family." My heart is full and the concept is weighing on my mind. I'm still struggling with this idea of family. The more of my biological family that i meet, the more that these assumptions I have been operating under are being challenged. Assumptions like, biology isn't that important - it's about who takes care of you and who you can depend on that matters. Much to my shock and surprise, I have some very distinct emotional connections to my biological family now that they have been brought to my conscious attention. What does that mean? My great grandpa was an attorney, my great aunt is an attorney, I have two cousins who are attorneys, and one of my bio mom's dreams has always been to go to law school. My chosen career path is an aberration in the family that raised me and yet, it is perfectly normal in the family that I share genetic material with. It honestly blows my freakin mind. It was always just about my unknown mother. Who she was, where she was. I had a family, I didn't need another one. But now, I meet this huge family of fabulous people... find out they have been thinking of me and praying for me all along. To them, it's almost like, I've come home. I was gone and now I'm back. What does that mean for me? what does that mean for the richartz/matlock families who have always treated me as one of their own. I am trying my best to just open my arms and my mind and be like woo hoo - 100 more family memebers!!! but I am nonetheless conflicted (big surprise). I have been experienceing this deep emotional connection with people that I've never felt before. meeting my aunts this summer and then spending time with them a couple weeks ago, it's like deep deep down we are linked - inextricably, unexplainably linked. I never knew you could have that kind of a connection. Is that what I've been missing all these years? and then it makes me angry. That's not fair! the matlock richartz family took care of me and did everything they could. Why couldn't I just have that connection with them? I think people who adopt do so with the intention of just taking a child and raising it as their own regardless of former ties. that day 25 years ago when my parents signed those papers, I left their families forever.... but did I? apparently not, to them. To my bio mom's family, I was one of their own.... lost, misplaced.... but still one of their own, hopefully to return someday. How do I reconcile these things? I'm angry because I feel like we've all been lied to. and I don't know how or where to find the truth anymore. what about my kids (God willing, I have some someday) in genealogies in 50 years, where will they be listed? where will I be listed? in both? to confuse some poor genealogist? is this the same person in these two separate families? I feel like everyone believes this lie that genetics, biology doesn't matter. We can buy and sell and trade children, because it only matters where they grow up and who raised them. ITS NOT TRUE! It's a damned lie. i'm not complaining- I am so thankful for more and more family. I'm thankful I can know them.... but I'm angry with society - angry that we don't take having children more seriously. Angry that we don't take our biology more seriously. Angry that we have divorced our minds and our emotions and our bodies. Nope, sorry, they are all linked - hate to tell you. What if we as a society had a more holistic approach to having children? to seeing them as part of us, not just their noses and their fingers, but their career choices and personality quirks? I don't even know how the world would be different. God is a covenantal God, from what I've been taught. He carries blessings and curses through families. we never think that means through genetic families, but it does! Really! What does that mean for us?
Don't get me wrong. I believe adoption is wonderful. I am so grateful for what I was given. I hope that I have been a blessing and I know that God works in mysterious ways and who knows what he is doing? I just think that maybe we need to, as a society, change the way we view children, families, procreation.....
I don't know who even knows this blog exists or if anyone reads it. If anyone in any of my families reads this - please don't be offended or hurt or feel negative emotions as a result! I love you and always will, regardless of my deep inner anger, frustrations, and wanderings of my mind. because, at the end of the day, my definition of family is not resigned to biology or legality, but it's about the people who I love and who love me - who I will take care of and who will take care of me - that's all that really matters.
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