Navigating New Terrain

It came to me all in a rush this morning, I feel scared of losing Angel. There, I’ve said it. It feels somehow unspeakable, unevolved. I wonder if other adopted parents feel like this, but I guess other adopted parents don’t often go seeking to meet birth mothers.

But it’s not just meeting birth Mum, I feel the shifting waters anyway as she turns away from me to the phone, her friends, a darkened room with the door firmly shut. Fourteen feels like a territory all its own.

I remember a mum once saying parenthood felt like a series of incremental losses, but I didn’t really get it until now. I’ve felt it in moments, but I’ve been so busy riding the waves with Angel, I didn’t notice she’s increasingly on her own board.

And it’s so much loss to look at, my loss of not having a birth child, her loss of her birth family, one foster family and then another, and birth mum’s loss of Angel and the other children that were taken away. Our whole story was born of loss and I feel it all interwoven in an intricate, delicate design that’s impossible to distinguish one strand, or colour, from another.

If I look back, it was all there before we even confirmed meeting birth mum, I have felt her not wanting my enquiries, turning away when I go into her room, the sigh not audible but felt.

She is moody and withdrawn at times, but I feel when I have managed to get her to engage, she seems happier after. 

The Sunday before last, I had asked if she wanted to get a picture of her birth mum and put it in a frame in her room. I thought it might help, a little bit of processing every time she sees it, so on the day it isn’t so much. I had ordered a batch of frames, as we had also talked about clearing one of her shelves and putting up other pictures as well. We went through her memory box, looked at pictures of her birth family, read her life story book from when she was little, pulling together the bits of her life that we don't look at so much anymore.

It is light touch, we move on when she wants to, listen to music, reminisce about things we are putting away, remember when….

She moves the bedside picture of her foster sister onto the newly cleared shelf and replaces it with a picture of her birth mum and two younger sisters.

It is a lovely few hours, but we are exhausted. We have done enough. We agree to finish putting things away in the week.

In the week she keeps blowing me off, sprawled across the bed, stomach down, blinds closed, lights off, glued to her phone, text and ping, text and ping, each ping a small dopamine hit. By Thursday I am more insistent, ‘Come on, let’s make your bed, finish sorting your room, play some Uno, it’s not good for you to spend so much time on your phone in a dark room.’ ‘Na, I’m alright,’ she replies without lifting her eyes from the incoming message.

I cajole some more, ‘Na, you’re alright,’ she says again. I am seized by a violent desire to snatch the phone out of her hand and fling it across the room. I contain myself but say, ‘OK, forget it!’ and huff out of the room.

I don’t often feel properly angry with Angel, so when I do, she feels it. I need some time out myself, but I see it clearly.

She is growing up and trying to assert an identity separate from her parents, as do all teenagers, but she also desperately needs connection and that’s what she thinks she is getting on the phone with her friends, or worse still, a chatbot. But texting isn't a real connection, it can’t replace being in the room with someone, but as each ping delivers that dopamine hit, she mistakes it for the real thing.

I leave her for an hour, but can hear her moving around her room. She is off the phone!

When I pop my head round the door, she has put the duvet cover and pillow cases on the bed (something she has never done alone!), written her diary and is looking at her sign language cards.

I say, ‘I’m sorry I got angry, I just worry about you being on the phone so much and want to spend some time with you.’

The rift is immediately healed. We finish sorting her room, ask the ‘Book of Answers’ lots of questions, laugh at the answers. She doesn't ask the burning question, what will meeting my birth mum be like? But that’s OK. This is us, how we have always been and she seems happier after.

What I don’t say is I feel like she is falling into an abyss that I keep needing to haul her out of. I can see from our Apple Family Sharing that she is back on PolyBuzz Chat, a 17+ chatbot. I worry about her using this not only because the conversation could go anywhere, but also because she has enough friends to talk to and I don’t want her talking to an AI that’s sole purpose is to keep her on her phone and reinforce any particular point of view she might express.

We have talked about this already and she had agreed to delete the app. I block it, reconsider, give it a 30 min time limit, reconsider again. Google how to talk to a 14 year old about using PolyBuzz! I can’t quite believe I am googling how to speak to my daughter, but it actually makes some useful suggestions and explains safety issues. I decide not to do anything until I have spoken to her. I feel it as a weight when so much is also weighing on me.

I know she will say that she isn't using it, so come up with a plan and pick a moment when we are in the car.

Me – I've been seeing PolyBuzz coming back up on your phone usage. If you aren’t using it, I can just block the app from my phone, but if you are using it, I’d really like to understand why you like it so much.
Angel – Well I’m hardly using it, but it’s kind of fun.
Me – I can imagine you can maybe try having a boyfriend?
Angel – Eww, no! More like frenemies.
Me – Ah, I can see that might be fun too, but it is 17 plus for a reason.
Angel – Yeah, I know.
Me – And you know people can try and steal your identity, so you mustn’t ever give any of your real details or share any images.
Angel – Yeah
Me – It’s tricky because it's programmed to keep you on the phone, so can be really addictive. I think you’re old enough to be responsible for your usage, but I don’t want you hiding it from me, as if a conversation did go down a road you weren’t comfortable with, I’d like you to be able to come to me. What do you think is a reasonable amount of time to be on it?
Angel – Maybe if you see it popping up more than 2 hrs a week, just block it.
Me – OK, that sounds reasonable.

And just like that she is off it. I haven’t seen it on her screen time since. She may go back on with friends, as I know some are using it, but I feel really chuffed; I didn’t take away her power, but still got the result I hoped for.

The vice on my heart is loosening. This separation business is complicated, let alone if you have another Mum, and I mean for me as well as her!

In therapy, I dare to whisper, what if she loves her more than me? I want them to love each other, but this is not easy. I say, I wish she didn't have a birth mum, I wish she had come out of my belly, and all that old grief washes over and through me. I had only ever considered Angel, her needs and wants. I guess this is what good parents do?

Today after school I just say, ‘hello,’ I don't ask any questions. I notice her door isn’t closed. A small thing, but a chink. I go up and see her at 9pm and can tell she is glad to see me. I lay on her bed and she puts her foot on mine. I don’t say much, just listen to music with her. I feel inextricably sad, but also OK, glad of the weight of her foot. 

She gets ‘The Book of Answers’ again. A few questions in, she asks, ‘Will it be fun meeting my birth mum?’ The book says, ‘Don’t bank on it.’ She groans. I try to tell her that perhaps that isn't quite the right question and how I felt when I met my dad, having not seen him for 15 years. ‘Sshhh,’ she says, holding her finger to her lips. She has asked the question. That is enough. We play Dobble, which she always wins, and I tell her I see she needs more space now she’s a teenager and that’s fine as long as we have dinner together and our once a week family night. ‘But I do,’ she says, and I say, I know, you’re really good like that.

An important shift has occurred and I am getting to grips with this new way of being. I pick up a book about parenting teenage girls, ‘Untangled’, that I read a few years ago. It talks about how much we worry when our girls pull away and how bereft we can feel, but how it's a critical part of teenage development. They know they need to learn how to function in the world without being reliant on us. These are their practice steps.

This is all textbook stuff. It’s just hard to be living it at the same time as birth mum is arriving in our lives. We are finding our way. I had to be brave enough to take a step back, and Angel, it turns out, is making sure the gap doesn’t get too big.

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