12.17.08

anyone playing armchair psychiatrist, who knows a few key events that occurred in my life prior to the unplanned conception of The Kiddo, could point a finger at me and say "low self esteem much?"

one of the main reasons why i chose adoption was trying to do the proverbial right thing. raised in a middle class, wasp-y environment, i tried very hard to "be a good girl and do the right thing". i mean, my mother was all for adoption, so it couldn't be wrong. right?

at 25 when the Kiddo was born, i had no real sense of self, of my capabilities. so add a little unplanned pregnancy onto an already shaky self worth/esteem base, with very little "you CAN parent - it's okay to be freaked out" support and a whole lot of "this is what you need to do" pointing toward adoption...here we are.

i remember the first few years, post-placement, thinking that i'd never have low self esteem again because for once, in the biggest event in my life, i'd made the right decision. i was The Good Girl. finally.

obviously that feeling didn't last. in hindsight, i could have parented. i could have bucked my family. i could have struggled as a single parent. women do it all the time. and thinking back on it today, i have to wonder how the people in my life at that time really saw me, those who were encouraging me to place. was i that lousy of a person? would i have been a crap mom? of course not. i used to say that The Kiddo deserved "someone better than me". and that's truly appalling to me now. i would never utter such a thing at this stage in my life.

it's never ending, the low self esteem. it merely ebbs & flows like the tide.