My Sobriety and Her Secrets Revealed

My birthday came and went like most birthdays normally do. Part of me was secretly wishing to find a letter in my mailbox from Colette. The other parts of me were toying with many other ideas, one in particular- that I would mail her another card for my birthday, and as I think about it more and more, I still feel like I should, yet I'm positively hesitant.

As I have told my story to the people in my life who care enough to ask or read this blog, I have always been left with new outlooks after our conversations. It's true you never know what another person is going through until you have walked a mile in one's shoes. The truth is, we will never be anyone else, never walk in another's shoes, unless we leave ours on the roof of the car and drive off forgetting they were there, and never fully grasp what another is thinking or feeling. In my stuckness, in my Brookeness, I will never truly know what Colette is going through when she thinks of me, and how I would play a role in her life if we were to meet today.

I equate what she might be feeling with my ceasing to drink alcohol. I have never been fully aware of what it's like to be sober on my own accord for my entire adult life, except during pregnancy. I have gone a month here and a month there, maybe a few months at a time, but I never intended to be sober forever like I plan to now. My whole way of life will be altered, changed forever, for the good I am certain. My friends will probably drop like flies, my outlook will modify, my activities for sure will change, not being consummed with where the next drink will take place or when. Everything will change, again I am certain for the better. I will not be the same Brooke anymore. I will evolve, just as Colette has evolved from that scared 21 year old college student who accidentally got pregnant by her boyfriend. She is not the same person anymore, no longer a kid full with dreams and excitement mixed with nervousness. She has gone through a lot since I was born- had more children, been married and divorced, lost both parents, made a career and name for herself. She has evolved.

I too shall evolve.

I was planning to parallel the changes that could take place in both of our lives based on uncertainties that could arise from a first meeting that hasn't taken place yet, and maybe never will, but realized as I thought through it more today on the green couch, while sipping my overly stout coffee, that there are more locked boxes that need to be pryed open. Way more.

There are so many things to be accounted for.

She doesn't know what our lives will be like if entangled with one another just as I don't know what living sober will be like. It's likely I will become withdrawn over the course, pouring into my writing, into Sarah, and certainly be engulfed in self-discovery when I have for so long tried to mask myself of who I was- a drunk- powerless and often misunderstood. I will emerge a butterfly through my change, with sparkling colors and a wing span that screams immense. My upward mobility will not be squandered in thoughtless acts, in a drunken disguise. I will finally be myself again, what God wishes for my life, what I have wished for, for so long.

It will be a choice and not a consequence.

Colette will be able to put her shame behind her, her fear of the unknown, her disguise. She would be able to  say to someone that she couldn't talk to before, "Yes, I had a baby. Yes, I did it in secret, and now I am not afraid to tell the world that I did those things because  I am not that child anymore. I can be myself. I can let go of my anxiety, my overwhelmed feelings, my hurtful past that was squashed over and over for all the wrong reasons." She can let go of it all just by meeting me. She can see that she did the right thing by giving me up. There is nothing more appropriate than a meeting with me to release her of those feelings forever. So I think. One meeting could be the closure that she needed- one time seeing my face and wrapping her arms around me, and feeling my heart when she speaks to me, when we speak to eachother, and knowing my soul is good.  That would be all it would take.

That sounds like a fairy tale probably because I believe in fairy tales. Of the many things I struggle with, helping to set her free is one of them, and if not meeting me ever, never looking into my eyes is what will ultimately heal her, I guess that will be that. It will make me sad to know that she will never invite me to see her, but at least I will know that I conquered a major setback in my own life while trying to help someone else with theirs. I will be sober, and I will notice the little things, become acquainted with beauty and understand that relationships aren't driven by disguises. I will be able to account for everything in my life, and without shame.

Shame is another senseless depressor that ties us together in this tangled web. I will be released from mine, and she will also. Simultaneously, we could  lose it forever- the shame, the paralyzing guilt. We can bounce good energy off one another, share in our successes, leave the quiet desperation behind forever.

If I were to dive deeper into this whole thing called life, I would also notice that my unemployment has pushed me into things that I needed to settle. I needed this break of the schedule. I needed to work some things out, and push myself in ways that people don't normally gravitate towards, but instead are usually pushed into. I can't complain about my life. It's pretty amazing right now. I have a lot to be thankful for, and I have a mother who loves me unconditionally, who takes great pride in loving me that way, and to her death always will. She is amazing, and more and more I realize that she is the only mother that I will ever need. Thank God for my real mom- Lynne. I am truly blessed, always have been.

All in all, I will be fine, and so will Colette if we meet or not.

Lord, keep me thankful, keep me sober, and please Lord just keep me.

Most recent invitation to Colette that I definitely won't send

I wrote this the other night. I am not sending this but writing this was therapeutic for me. I have so much going on upstairs these last few weeks about Colette, my birth mother. So I asked God for a sign to tell me if I would ever be meeting her in person. I was driving to pick up my friend in the rain, and all alone, so I was praying, and probably not paying enough attention to the road, and I just asked God to give me a sign if I would meet her. Well, instantly my phone made a ding from a text. So I cried thinking that I was either too popular or that God responded quickly that time. Later that same night, with friend in tow, I noticed on the back of a city bus the words NOT was highlighted on the back...not in service was the intended message I assume, but all it read was NOT. So there again, I was left torn, but as the laughter ensued during said car trip, I pushed the darkest questions further to the back of my mind. It's not that deep, so I don't have to worry about ever losing anything up there. Hahahaha. This is pretty brazen, and I would never call out the pain that she probably went through like that. I;m sure it would hurt her, and that is never my intention, ever, for anyone for that matter. I like creating smiles, not frowns. 

Dear Colette,

I hope you are doing well, and that this letter finds you, and at just the right moment in time for you to read this. I have prayed for that, so I know it will happen. I say that with a slightly smug grin on my face, but in truth, I have relatively strong faith- depending on your idea of strong.  At this point in time I’m wondering if it’s even worth trying anymore since you have made it a point not to respond to me, and considering most people have led me to believe that I am absolutely bat shit crazy for continuing to borderline harass you with passionate pleas that very well might end in utter disappointment, scarring me further, and leaving me feeling even more rejected and dismissed than I already feel now as I am sitting here in my bed writing to you at 12am on a Tuesday night. I should be sleeping since my daughter (your granddaughter) is out a friend’s house overnight. I should have also probably taken some ibuprofen for this doozey of a headache which I’ve convinced myself is from watching 3 bratty 6 year olds all day and carting a friend around since he got a DUI (innocent until proven guilty)- just until he gets his day drunk license. 

He was one of my closest friends in college. Still is. If he wasn’t gay, I’d probably marry him because we argue like a married couple, and he enjoys telling me how to drive (just like a man.) I think I would probably have to be the husband, and I don’t like changing faucets and lifting heavy objects. I hope you’re not a gay hater by the way.  Don’t go getting all judgey on me please.  I have a feeling you wouldn’t be...

But then again, everything I know about you is something that I have most likely formed in my mind- mostly fiction, surely with a happy ending that just begins with you meeting me.

Admittedly and rightfully so, I have thought too much about what it would be like to meet you. What it would be like to look into your eyes and see a reflection of myself, to hear your voice, to hug you. These words sound so pathetic and sappy, which are both uncharacteristic to me, and quite unappealing if you ask me, although I could cry at a Hallmark commercial. The thought of verbally divulging my deepest feelings to someone who I am unsure of sounds a little too horrifically brave and unrequited to me.  Nevertheless, I am going out on a limb here and taking the risk. I have always been a risk taker. It has not always ended miraculously, but I am doing pretty well regardless, all my limbs intact, no visible scars, no repressed anger, pretty normal for whatever normal might be.

I would love to show you more of who I am, who I have become in your absence. I’m sure you wondered what I would turn out like. I wonder if you thought about me often.  I wonder if you thought of me on my birthday every long year that we were not together, if you wondered what I was doing. How I was faring in life? I often wondered what you were doing on my birthday. If you felt sorrow or regret? If you wished that you had done things differently? If you wish you had never met my birth father so  you wouldn’t have to relive this again. If you wish Nancy hadn’t ever said anything to you because you were safely out of the woods and into a life that was non-inclusive of who you once were? I have often wondered if you would be scared to admit to people, to strangers, to your family, that you had a baby in secret 37 years ago and never held her, and never saw her again. You were a child then. You are not that person anymore. You’ve evolved, blossomed, grown, and outgrown, and probably outgrown the thought of ever meeting me which makes me sad.

I would like you to know, that I am not mad at you. I have no ill will towards you. You did what you had to do with what you had. The circumstances that you were in were nothing that I would ever understand, having not been you or been in your shoes, or in your mind. You must have been tormented during those months that probably trickled into years.  I cannot imagine. Knowing how much I love my daughter and adore being with her every moment of her life, I cannot imagine what it must have felt like for you. Were you detached? Did you have a theory that if you pretended like it never happened then you would be fine- go on and live your life as if it never happened?  Would therapy and eventual love mend you? Did you ever truly heal? Did you throw yourself into your studies, become a workaholic? Did you quit dating?

These are all questions that I have a feeling you would like to answer for me. But I wonder if it is pride that keeps you from it. I wonder if it’s heartache and guilt that keep you from finding healing in meeting me. I wonder if you feel ashamed. I’ve been told that those are feelings that many birth mothers experience and reuniting with a birth child can be terrifying for birth mothers. I have heard that birth mothers never actually healed because they went into hiding, keeping their pregnancies a secret from the world. They were ashamed of being pregnant. Their parents were ashamed of their daughters being sexually active when they were Southern Baptists, active in the church and with other family members active in the local community. Even though you came from a small town, you might have been judged by a large crowd. That would probably be pretty painful.

It could be the other way around. It could have been that you were completely selfless in the whole thing. You could have been thinking so much about the birth father that you forgot about yourself. Or maybe, you didn’t even know the birth father. I am taking these guesses because I have never been told the exact story. I have been denied the right to know where I came from because of some antiquated laws that left many children rightless and voiceless, as if their existence was a means for a family who couldn’t bear children to have their own children, to start a family. It was almost as if, the unborn nameless babies, the baby Veras of the world were just that- babies with one name. Without a last name, who are you? You are just you. Plain and simple. You are not attached to anyone. You are not born into money, into poverty, into incest, out of lust, from rape, from sin, from love.  You are just an individual. And maybe that is what I am. Maybe that is what you are, and that’s all we need to be.

I doubt it. Not today. Not 37 years ago. God made me for a reason. And you played a special part in my life. And I’m giving you the opportunity to come back into my life just to see what it would be like. Aren’t you curious?

I think it’s time for you to realize that I am not here to hurt you. You knew this day would come. You prayed about it. You wished it would, and your prayers have been answered. God’s watch doesn’t work like ours. He decides when the time is right, and we don’t have much to say about it. But I guess, you have the opportunity to not respond to me again, to decide that the timing is not right for you. I hate that again we are in this position. You are the decision maker, and I am left with it. My opinion jar is left empty and lifeless.

But the truth remains.

I am alive, living, breathing, beautiful, intelligent, grateful, generous, helpful, encouraging, strong, called, and redeemed. Don’t you want to see for yourself? My word can’t be good enough for you. It shouldn’t be, and you shouldn’t let your pride fill you up and steal this chance of a lifetime.

Please meet me.  Don’t wait. Life is precious and before you know it, I will be gone again, and you will be left regretting not having me for the second time.

I will be at _________________ in Jacksonville, NC on Friday, April 12 at 6pm. I would really like you to meet me there. If you can’t meet me, please send Nancy.  I will have Sarah with me. I will be devastated most likely and then just send you hate mail. Probably ruin your life. That was a poor attempt at a joke that you are probably wondering about right now.  I have a very dry sense of humor that only few appreciate and many try to unsuccessfully pull off. Bitterness and anger help. Another joke.

Brooke

My idea is to send her a note (not this one) that tells her I will be somewhere and she can come to meet me there. Yes, I will have to drive about 250 miles away for this to happen, and if she doesn't show, I will be a train wreck. I guess that's the price you pay for forcing yourself on someone. What do yall think? Is that a good idea? Is that totally nuts? Leave a comment.