July 27, 2018 was the worst day of my life so far, and today, sitting in a darkened theater next to my two favorite girls in the world, I ugly cried as I relived this moment on the big screen. Instant Family laid bare the brutality of the becoming and unbecoming of motherhood and of family when you are building it all on the crumbling foundation of another family. It also shone a light on the best parts of my life: my daughter and her daughter. It reminded me how much our hearts are built to break and bleed and rebuild. How much love we owe each other and how often we have the opportunity to love if we open ourselves up.
A few really dark moments of questioning graced my door the past 18 months. I loved and lost and loved again. I felt anguish so cutting I didn’t want to wake up. I cried until I puked. I cried until I slept. I didn’t sleep at all. The undeath of losing two children rattles my ribs every time I get a photo of them from my home state with their forever mom and dad. I love those photos while simultaneously feeling shot through with despair with every smile and every centimeter their little Afros grow without my hands to touch them. The night before I let them go forever, I didn’t know anything about foster care, really. I knew I was never going to have them clutch me around the neck and call me mama again. I knew more, as well, but that was the bullet that I thankfully didn’t let define me or my story.
Many people give up on this kind of life. Most refuse to start. Hollywood’s rendition of Rose Byrne telling her entire family to fuck off as they say what they really believe about her choice to foster was like the voice most of us silence in ourselves when we choose to foster. The judgement and naysaying isn’t dealt directly. It comes out in subtle ways. It is every moment that someone is surprised I haven’t been eaten alive. It’s those who treated my last and current kids as temporary. Every person who says something ridiculous about sainthood or looks at me with simultaneous shock and pity. It’s every person who said to me “are you sure?” or “I could never do that.” To a much lesser extent, it is the second go around where the people in my life who loved the twins deeply hold these girls a little further away because of grief. This one I get, even though it’s a dagger. Foster care is a builder of families and shaker of other relationships.
Today is the two month anniversary of the girls coming to live with me and becoming part of my family. I currently feel joy so big, it overflows from every part of me. I was called mom aloud today for the first time. After gripping my daughter to me after the movie and saying “I love you, I love you, I love you,” she awkwardly got in the car with a grin. As we were pulling out of the lot, she called a friend who asked who she was with. She said “My foster mom, I mean my mom.” It’s been five months since I have been mom, and even sideways, it’s something miraculous.
In the seat next to me today, my daughter cried as hard as I did. After 14 years in the foster care system her heartbreak came out too. Her brutal chasm of loss and pain gushed out. Her fear of her own child’s tenuous position in her life and what could be her future wracked her too. This is all I need to know to know that I didn’t rush taking another placement.
The past two beautiful hard months made me more proud and afraid than I have ever been. For their privacy, I will simply say that we are lucky we all have each other. It is not perfect, but I love it. They are wonderful humans, and while I covered my face and sobbed during the worst part of foster care in the film, I also cried tears of hope when they became a family at the end. I may adopt my girl someday. I may officially become a mom and a grandma on the same day, and as always with foster care, I may not. It doesn’t matter. Just like with the boys, they will always be my family. I will always love them.
I’m sure I know next to nothing about foster care, but I do know that the point isn’t how long you are a mom. The point is that you can step up to be mom when a kid needs it. It’s not for everyone, but I wish more people would give themselves more credit. I wish people would let themselves be called mom or dad or grandma or auntie by a kid who needs it. Every kid deserves it. Heart break be damned, I will do this for as long as I can rebuild without cynicism and fear. No bullshit, it is the best and worst thing I have ever done. For the four kids who have been in my home, it is better than nothing. It is so much better.
The World According to Charles 