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| The last birthday that my sister and I celebrated with our birth mother |
The last time I saw my mother, I was three. My father told me that my sister and I clung her leg, begging her not to leave. "She didn't even look back" my father told me with great pain. He told me that she shook me and my sister off of her, opened the door, and walked into the night, each hand holding a bag filled with her belongings. She never looked back.
28 years later, and for only $299, a search company led me to my mother who moved to South Korea close to 10 years ago. Her voice, much lower than I expected, was the only connection I had to her as I began to rebuild our relationship over the phone.
There was the honeymoon period. All throughout my life, I had a reoccurring dream of a little girl in a bright, red jacket. "Do you remember the time I spent all of my money on a red coat for you? I took you to Korea with me and you met my family in your beautiful coat. I accidentally left it on the subway and we rode the train all day looking for it. Do you remember?" Even though she desperately wanted me to remember the first time I went to Korea, I didn't. But I knew now why I dreamt of that girl in the red coat. And then there was my strange fear of indented, circular patterns. Whenever I saw an advertisement for lotion in a magazine and there was a close up of pores, the magazine would be thrown into the air and I would end up in fetal position, my heart racing and my palms sweaty. I kept this strange fear from my friends and family but I couldn't keep it from my husband who eventually noticed my anxiety around beehives and decor with this particular pattern. "Do you remember that time you were hospitalized because you burned yourself with hot tea? I sat in the hospital with you for two weeks nursing you back to health. I helped the nurses change your bandages every day." That was it! The bandages used on my burns had indented, circular patterns. So many questions were being answered and I was beginning to feel more complete. I learned about her family, a half brother I have who currently lives in New Orleans, and memories from the three years we spent together.
And then, the honeymoon period ended. She was determined to cleanse her consciousness and purge her anger toward my father for their failed marriage. I put up boundaries: "What happened between you and my father is between you and my father. In order for this relationship to grow, we are only to speak about the present and leave the past behind us." Every conversation, she tested the boundary, falling into a state of rage and anger, trying to convince me to listen to her version of the past. On July 12, 2015, over 30 years later, my mother picked up the phone, heard my voice, and chose her anger over me. Like the three-year-old on that dark night, I pleaded with her. No matter how much I asked her to stop screaming at me about my father, she did not listen. I had to shake the emotions from my heart and end the call. "I hope you find love and peace in your heart." I put the phone down, walked out of the room with my husband by my side, and I never looked back.
