I missed my son’s birthday. For the second year in a row.
What kind of a self-absorbed asshole have I become?
Something about putting your identity issues on the back burner for over four decades which can not sustainably be denied creates a pressure that, when it does surface, is suddenly the most prominent thing on your screen. It’s like that car where your speed is projected onto your window so, though transparent, no matter what you’re looking at, you must always look through the projection.
abandoned – adopted
It’s foremost in every thing and every thought and you can’t erase it.
I’m sorry, David. I love you.
Oh God, blogging is so painful sometimes. But this is a fucking real-time document of a life in shambles and picking up the pieces. So here are tears for your camera now, so where are you and why aren’t you shooting?
You know, it’s not just me that’s affected by this, it’s my children too. They had to live with a woman who preemptively rejected social interaction, who disdained celebrations, who discounted holidays, who rarely laughed or smiled, who had no joy, and could share nothing of herself with them because she couldn’t even share it with herself.
They had to live a life always on the move, unstable, as their mom spun her wheels searching in vain for something fulfilling to do/become. They had to live a life divorced from extended family and normalcy. They had to explore race and ethnicity on their own because their mother wouldn’t and couldn’t help them. They had to travel from her island to the world and back again every day as they were growing up.
I always swore I’d never visit upon my children any of the crimes committed against me. But we create new crimes in that vacuum. And we all know that as we age we become more infantile. Yet the person who breaks down does it prematurely. And my children have had to raise me and take care of me the past two years.
The sins of the fathers shall be visited upon the sons the scripture goes…There is this Korean blood thing, this lineage thing, this heritage thing. And this han thing, this tragedy thing, this fate thing. How do you stop this ripple. How do you stop it.
I must stop it.
Hello Korea ! 
Isn’t having just wrote that most of the battle? Wouldn’t surprise me if your children are proud of you.
My mom never managed to swim back upstream against her struggle. I doubt she had the opportunity to stop and look around at her life.
And yet, she is the one person that I feel no bitterness towards in my entire family.
As a mother, I understand your guilt. As an adoptee, I understand your struggles. As a fellow survivor of abuse, I believe that what we survivors are looking for most is acknowledgement and we vow not to make the same mistakes to made to us.
Unfortunately, sometimes we do…. and I know that I have been guilty of it too.
If I could snap my fingers today and not pass on any bad stuff to my children, I would and I sincerely believe you would too.
Although saying I’m sorry to your son may not seem enough at times, it’s a step in the right direction.