by Diane Burke
It also saddened me that I had missed out on both my grandsons’ lives. I’d seen pictures of them as toddlers and as young boys. I saw them playing at the shore and clowning around at family gatherings. But I had missed being able to develop that unique relationship between grandparent and grandchild.
Now I was sitting at my first grandson’s graduation. It was an awesome, exciting, happy time.
But I also had a very heavy heart.
I smiled and nodded and said very little to Nancy when she was telling me those stories. I wondered why she had. She must have known how difficult it would be for me to sit there and listen to her reminisce over events and activities that I would have given almost anything to have lived through myself.
I hate to admit it, but I was jealous. Green-eyed envy raced through every pore of my body. I truly believed, at that moment, that she was purposely telling me those stories to mark her territory, to remind me that she was the mother to my son and she was the grandmother to my grandsons.
Jealousy is an evil thing. It sees deception and pride and manipulation where none exists. I am ashamed that I harbored those feelings. It took me a very long time to understand that she had done nothing wrong and that I was the one who had character flaws that needed work.
Nancy bragged about her son and grandson that day because she was a proud mother and a proud grandmother. She would have bragged to anyone and everyone she could. She was happy and excited and cheering Steven on. She let out a whistle that would have stopped a train when she saw him step up on the platform to accept his diploma.
Even though I thought she was a threat to me, I was wrong. Nancy already knew what it took me much longer to figure out: Steve’s heart was big enough for both of us. We both have equal but different roles to play in his life. He needs us both. He loves us both and he always will.
Nancy knew from the first second I showed up on Steve’s doorstep that I was going to be a permanent fixture in their family. So she accepted it and welcomed me with open arms. She was secure enough in her relationship with Steve that I posed no threat to her and she was genuinely grateful that because of me, whether willingly or not, I had provided her with the opportunity to raise and love a child.
I learned a lot from Nancy. I just wish it hadn’t taken me so long.
When I hugged my son, Steve, good-bye at the airport the night after the graduation, I thought my heart was going to break. The more I got to know him, the more I wanted to be with him. The more time I spent with his family, the harder it was for me to leave.
We had lost so much time.
Forty years.
How was I going to live with frequent telephone calls and every-other-month visits?
Instead of being grateful for what I had, my human nature came to the forefront and I wanted more.
I hoped and prayed that no matter how painful the good-byes were, I never would stop wanting to be with my son. I found out fast enough that I didn’t have anything to worry about. I’d wanted to be with my son for more than forty years. Those feelings certainly weren’t going to stop now.
Chapter
15
Diane
One of the inevitable challenges Steve and I had to face—and are still facing—is how to build a healthy, long-lasting relationship when, biological mother and son or not, you are still strangers with decades of living separate lives between you.
But one of the most beautiful, awesome blessings that God gave Steve and I was an instant bond and an almost overwhelming love for each other. We couldn’t explain it to others because we couldn’t explain it to ourselves.
I only know from that very first telephone conversation on April 10 when I heard my son’s voice say “Hello, Mom” that my heart burst wide open with love and happiness and joy. This was my lost baby, the one I was certain I would never see again this side of heaven, speaking to me. Wanting to meet me. Wanting to build a relationship with me. Wanting to love me. God had given me such an awesome gift.
In the first few months of our relationship, we both did everything in our power to connect, to savor every second together, whether it was morning texts on our cell phones, lengthy phone conversations every night, or visiting each other every opportunity we could. It was less than forty-five days into our relationship when my son approached me with news.
He had decided that due to his father’s failing health, he wanted to be more of a help to his adoptive parents as they aged. He planned on selling his house and buying a larger house, one with a comfortable ground floor apartment for his parents so he could be there when they needed him. What surprised me is what came next.
One evening, during the week I was visiting so I could attend my grandson’s graduation, Steve and I were sitting on the porch, which had become our favorite place to disappear after dinner. He was swinging on his swing. I was sitting in the wicker chair beside him.
“Mom, I’d like to talk to you about something.”
I smiled and waited to hear what he had to say. He’d already told me on the phone the week before that he planned on selling his home and moving his parents closer.
“Since I’m going to the trouble and expense of buying a larger house,” he said, “I want you to know that Barb and I and the kids took a family vote and we’d like to invite you to move in with us.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Move in with them? I was surprised and thrilled and honored. “Are you sure?”
“Of course I’m sure,” Steve said. “I’ve talked with the family and they agreed. There wasn’t even one negative vote or remark.”
He grinned at me. “If I can do this for my adoptive parents, then how can I not find a place in my home for my mother?”
I was deeply moved by his sincerity and by the revelation that his feelings for me were as strong as mine for him. Obviously, in hindsight, neither one of us was thinking straight. We’d been back in one another’s lives only forty-five days and we were still flying high with happiness and excitement.
When he saw my hesitancy and uncertainty, he continued. “We’ve lost too much time, Ma. You and I don’t know how much time we have left together. Ten years? Fifteen? Less?
“I only know that I don’t want to waste a day of it. I don’t want to settle for telephone calls at night and weekend visits every other month. I want to see you every day … in my home … sitting at my dinner table … interacting with my family. We’ve waited years for this, Ma. It’s our turn now. We both deserve this.”
Even though I make my living as an author, I am unable to find the words to express what an impact my son’s decision had on me. I can only tell you I was touched beyond measure and that I didn’t know a human heart could truly feel such absolute joy.
Whether I moved into his home wasn’t as important to me as the knowledge that he wanted me to, that his family wanted me, as well. Steve, Barb, my wonderful grandchildren, and Steve’s adoptive parents had already blessed me with more than I ever expected or felt I deserved. They had already opened their family and their hearts to include me. Now Steve wanted to make me a permanent daily fixture in his home. My gratitude for their love and acceptance was endless.
When Steve prepared to put his house up for sale and we told everyone our plans, family and friends on both sides of the fence had understandable reservations.
Steve had someone close to him respectfully ask, “You’re moving in all three parents? Are you sure you want to do this?”
He replied, “Yes. My parents need me and I need my mother.”
On my side of the fence, one of my brothers, who always had my best interest at heart, asked, “Aren’t you moving too fast? It’s great your son found you. I’m happy for you. I really am. But you are still strangers to one another. You should be taking baby steps. Slow things down. What’s the hurry?”
When Steve and I discussed their well-intentioned hesitations, he said, “They don’t understand, Mom. Nobody can understand this except us. But don’t worry. In time, t
hey will. It’s going to take time to sell our homes and it’s going to take even more time to find the right house, one that will satisfy everyone’s needs. By then everyone will be able to tell that our relationship is solid and lasting or it isn’t.”
My son never spoke truer words.
Time reveals everything.
Steve and I discovered over time that no relationship can sustain that happy, honeymoon-period high that people experience when love is new and fresh and exciting. Whether it is a mother with her brand new baby, a teen falling in love for the first time, newlyweds adjusting to married life—or a mother and son who had been separated for more than forty years and were now together again.
As I’ve said before, we all know there are no such things as perfect people. This applies to Steve and me, as well.
When the thrill and excitement of reuniting wore off and day-to-day living came into play, it was another major adjustment for both of us.
For the rest of the world, relationships start out slowly. You meet one another, start to like one another, grow to know one another, and then over time come to love one another.
Steve and I had to go through the process backwards. We felt a strong instant bond and love for one another from the very beginning. Now we had to find out whether we liked one another. We had to learn all about each other. Then we had to hope and pray that the feelings we had in the very beginning were not only real, but that they were strong enough to survive the backward journey.
Steve never lost confidence. He’d always say, “Ma, don’t worry about what anybody else says. Our relationship might take some dings and scratches, maybe even a little dent here and there as we get to know one another, but that’s okay. Because the core of this relationship is solid. The core is built on love. You are my mother. I am your son. Nothing is ever going to change that.”
Steve was so certain that we could withstand anything that came our way that he showed me a picture of the two of us together. “Mom, remember that bible verse from Ruth that you sent to me? I’m going to mount this picture on a plaque and have the verse engraved beneath it.”
The Bible verse was Ruth, Chapter 1, Verse 17:
“May the Lord do terrible things to me if I allow anything but death to separate us.”
Over time, my son’s belief that our relationship could last was tested. The early hurdles were subtle, but slowly escalated and became more difficult. From the very first day, we discovered the surface things about each other and it was fun. Physically, Steve had the same shaped hands and feet as me. He had the same color eyes and the same round face.
We discovered several things we shared in common. We both liked the color blue. We preferred our meat cooked well done. We loved our family more than anything on Earth. We loved dogs and couldn’t tolerate cats. We liked swimming pools and the beaches in Florida, and we both had a creative side geared for writing.
I also discovered he could clean a house better than anyone I’ve ever met. Me—not so much. He has a wicked sense of humor and the ability to make you laugh even when you don’t want to. Me—not so much. He doesn’t watch much television and isn’t into movies. Me—I’m a movieholic and TIVO every show on television if I think there’s even a remote possibility I might miss something. He is an extremely hard-working, responsible person. Me? I’m working on it.
But then came the harder part of getting to know each other. The part that involved questions of character, habits, and expectations. The part that required patience and dedication and digging beneath the surface if we truly wanted more than a simple, superficial relationship. We both had to decide if we were willing to risk disappointment, if we were willing to delve deeper no matter where the road took us.
After a lifetime of disappointments and heartache, I believed that when it came to dealing with people, the wise thing to do was to protect your heart, expect nothing from them, and be pleasantly surprised if you got anything in return. I didn’t believe much in people’s ability to be loyal or honest and for years I had found it very difficult to trust.
But here I was—opening my heart without reservation, trusting, believing, loving—confident that this time it was going to be all right.
When my son started his search, he had only wanted one thing: answers. I don’t think he ever imagined that the last thing he wanted—a relationship with a stranger, a second mother, a complication in his otherwise ordinary, happy life—just might be the one thing that he really needed.
So as we slowly climbed down from the euphoric high of that mountain top and planted our feet firmly on solid ground, we learned more about each other, and they weren’t always easy lessons to learn.
How do we cope with disappointments? How do we handle having opposite opinions on important matters such as religion, politics, ethics? Are we cut from the same moral cloth in regard to honesty, integrity, and keeping our word?
What about arguments? How do we react the first time one of us snaps at the other? How do we handle true anger? Are we spiteful people? Do we belittle and call names or do we calm down and talk things out? Do we hold grudges or do we have the ability to forgive and move on?
Everyone needs to discover these things about the people they want to form permanent relationships with if the relationship is to last and grow. But usually they have the luxury of taking their time, like my brother said—baby steps.
But when you’ve lost forty years, when one of you has more time behind than ahead, time becomes critical.
Steve and I already thought we had the love and the bond. But did we?
Learning about each other’s character was similar to taking a very complex college course in the accelerated summer program. The material to be learned was the same as through the more relaxed fall/spring semesters, but the pressure and the time restraints to learn it during a brief summer course comes at you at breakneck speed.
So we experienced our first skirmishes, our first disappointments in each other, our first hurts. We didn’t have a family history between us to draw upon to help us through it, either—I didn’t raise this child so I didn’t recognize his hot buttons, his temperament, his personality quirks. He didn’t live with me for forty years, either. He hadn’t built forty years of trust. He didn’t know what he could and couldn’t say or do without hurting my feelings so he often held back saying things he should have said and it led to frustration and eventually hurt and anger.
A tiny example of how a little thing blew up into a bigger one:
My son likes to start his day at 5:30 a.m. He likes the quiet and solitude of his house before the rest of his family gets up. He is a private person and, although equally sociable and people-oriented, I believe he is able to be that fun, loving, people-person by stoking up on his quiet, personal time when he needs it.
I was staying with him for a week. I am not a morning person. I even wear a sleep mask to bed so the sun doesn’t wake me when it filters through the window.
My son had to work during my visit, resulting in only having a few hours in the evening for us to spend together. So I got the brilliant idea to get up every morning and keep him company before he left for work.
He never told me he is a private person. He never told me how important it is to him to have his alone time for fear of hurting my feelings. I never told him that I couldn’t stand getting up at the crack of dawn and plastering a smile on my face when I don’t normally open an eye until nine. So we suffered, and frustrations grew, and it bled from one visit over to the next.
Such a little incident. One of many inconsequential things that could have been avoided if we had just felt comfortable enough with each other to speak our minds. Those unspoken frustrations led to more disappointments and more hurt feelings as other problems surfaced and our communication skills faltered and our ability to speak honestly with each other didn’t seem to exist.
Forty years makes a difference. Those years were lived by both of us with other people in other places. They were gone and there
was nothing we could do to get them back. We both discovered the hard truth: it isn’t easy to love a stranger.
These skirmishes and disappointments were just the beginning. The biggest hurdle was yet to come.
In time, the offer to move into Steve’s house was rescinded. When he really had time to sit down and think things through—which he admits he should have done before he invited me to move in, but he had acted with his heart and not his head—he realized that privacy would be a major issue. His youngest child, Kevin, was just two years away from graduating from high school and heading to college.
Two years.
For the very first time since the day Steve had married Barb, it would be just the two of them. They’d never had a honeymoon. They’d never taken a vacation that didn’t entail taking children with them. They’d done things backwards, started their relationship with three children and built from there. They never had that special one-on-one time in the very beginning of their marriage before children arrive that almost every other marriage has the opportunity to experience.
Steve and Barbara were about to enter a new phase of their relationship. A house without children. A life without family responsibilities.
Oh, wait a minute!
Not with Steve’s original mother living in the house and his adoptive parents living in an in-law apartment below.
So there were many discussions. Some hurt feelings. Some disappointments.
Steve’s adoptive parents had no problems with his change of plans. They had a forty-one year history with him. They loved him and knew he loved them. They knew what kind of man he was. They were secure in the knowledge that whatever the new plan would be, Steve would be there for them, helping them when needed, loving them for the rest of their lives. This was their son, a good man, a reliable man, and they knew without doubt that they were in good hands.
Me—not so much.
When I took my house back off the market and faced the reality that I wouldn’t be moving into Steve’s house, it honestly devastated me. Like I said before, it never mattered to me whether I moved into Steve’s house. I had a house already that I had lived in for fourteen years. I am independent and quite capable of earning my own living. I’ve done it all my life. What mattered was the fact that he had wanted me to live with him. Now he didn’t.