The Zoom Meeting

The Zoom meeting was at 2.30pm. We are all on time and, as the faces come into focus, there is some adjustment needed with birth mum and the social worker in different bottom corners of the screen. They shuffle closer, tilt the screen, heads briefly disappearing and reappearing. I can see birth mum is nervous, still; she is holding herself very carefully.

‘It’s nerve-racking isn’t it, although not sure why, like when you’re getting married,’ I say, trying to break the tension, and we all laugh. The laugh lands, but lightly.

‘I was thinking about what we needed to talk about in this call,’ I continue carefully, feeling the weight of emotion, ‘and thought it would be good to tell you a bit more about Angel, but wanted to know if you wanted to say anything first.’

‘I just want to thank you for giving Angel such a good home and being amazing parents’, birth mum says.

The words hit hard, which feels silly, as I had expected tears. I ask hubby to pass me the tissues, knowing I won’t manage to keep it together. ‘Well thank you too,’ I say, ‘for giving birth to such an amazing human being.’

I dab my face as the tears roll down my cheeks. I see her eyes well. She manages to hold them in check but I see the effort it takes, how still she needs to stay, how even the muscles in her face are held. She attempts a joke about ‘birthing only the best’ and we all laugh again, the laughter doing some heavy lifting. Then she adds, ‘and thank you for not judging me.’ 

It is only later that I really think about her words, about how much judgement she must have faced, how often she must have been looked at through a lens of blame but how I only ever felt her pain and struggle and bravery. It was right from the start, when she agreed to meet us when we were adopting Angel, when her whole world was falling apart.  How she came and stood with the very people who had taken her child away. And how, even when emotions ran high and she had to leave the room after a thoughtless remark by a social worker, she came back to sit and answer our questions. 

I remember how it felt like I was inhabiting her emotions, how I knew she knew. That’s why she ran back to hug me and we had those precious whispered words only between us, ‘Take care of her, love her’. ‘I will, I do. Sort yourself out, don't let them take any more children away.’ And she did! She went on to have two more children, get married, pass a degree. These are not small things when you come from trauma and have your children taken away. It was only when she had another child that she kept, that I felt all was well with the world. Before, with every letter exchanged, I felt her loss even though she didn’t intimate this. It's hard knowing her loss was our gain. 

I tell her that Angel is a young 14 year old in many ways, an innocent who still believes in Father Christmas, or at least claims to (it could be she is just stringing us along to secure double presents). That she doesn’t know much about the world because she can’t follow the news or even a conversation around a dinner table, so much of what other children would just pick up, without thinking, she hasn’t. That she still sometimes plays with her horse farm, although we also get teenage Angel too; hood up, headphones on, dressed entirely in black.

She asks if Angel knows about this meeting.

‘Yes,’I tell her and that Angel read the beautiful letter she sent, that it made me cry. That it made Angel sad. How I reassured her that that was absolutely appropriate, that it was all very sad. 

I had told her then that her mum was ready to meet, but I didn’t yet know when. ‘Tell me on the day,’ Angel had said. I worried if this was the right thing? Would it be enough time for her to process? Should I trust her instincts? I kept gently circling back to it, once a week or so, asking what she thought about meeting in an animal park, whether she’d want to come home the same day or stay overnight in a hotel.

Then, when we had dates, we talked again.

Me - So we have a date for me and Dad to meet your mum on video call and a date for us all to meet up. Are you sure you don’t want to know? I think you might need a little more time to process than the day before.’ 

Angel - ‘You can tell me when you are meeting on video call.’ 

Me - ‘16th January at 2.30pm. It’s a Friday so I’ve arranged for Solonge’s Mum to pick you up from school, as we won't be able to get there on time to collect you.’ 

Angel - ‘OK, are we meeting her in January?’

Me - ‘No, but in the next few months.’ 

Phew I have told her without telling her.

I’ve asked her before why she doesn’t want to know the date. Is she scared her mum won’t like her, that she won’t like her mum, that they won’t connect, or just anxious in a way she can’t yet name? She hasn’t been able to say. But I understand. It’s like this call, it’s so many convoluted, complicated feelings, you can’t unravel one from the other. These are emotions you can’t find names for.

Finally I say, ‘I do think you might need a little more processing time than the day before.’

‘OK,’ Angel says, ‘tell me the day before the day before.’

Relief washes through me. Two sleeps feels manageable. I trust her instinct, but that sits better. 

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I tell birth mum all of this and reassure her that Angel isn’t coming with questions, not yet. That she just needs to know what she looks like, how she sounds, how she smells, who’s belly she came out of.

When birth mum tells us she’s told her girls, Angel’s younger sisters, and that they are desperate to meet her, I am glad. I say Angel is keen too, but we all agree this first meeting needs to be just us, contained, careful, held. There is time for sibling meets later down the line. 

I tell her about meeting the twins, birth mum’s other adopted children. How anxious we all were the first time but that it only took a couple of meetings for it to feel completely comfortable. That having this as a template was really reassuring, even though I knew it was going to be much bigger for Angel meeting her mum. I mention their names and she looks confused and then the penny drops, their names have been changed.

I see the flicker of anger cross her face before she swallows it. I feel the anger too, as I had flagged to the social worker that she would need to be told of the name changes.

‘I’m so sorry you found out that way.’ I say 

‘I’d rather you tell me than the social worker,’ she replies. 

I think about how much else she has had to swallow. 

We talk about our first meeting, 12 years ago, and hubby says how nervous he had been. She says she had been very angry then, that she didn’t even get a goodbye contact with Angel, that that still stung.

I feel her devastation ripple through me. I hold it, even as I remind myself that the truth is probably more complicated. Sometimes the details don't matter, loss is still loss.

Quietly, she says, ‘You have kind of felt like parents to me too over the years. 

I feel how much she didn’t have the parenting she needed. I am glad if I could, in some small way, make up for that. 

‘You have felt like family too,’ I say. 

She apologises for not being ready to meet last year. 

‘No, no,’ I say. ‘If it wasn’t the right time for you, it wouldn’t have been the right time for Angel. It’s good to know what you are able to manage. In fact that is something Angel is very good at knowing too. Perhaps she gets that from you.’

We hold tears at bay, again.

When she asks about a present, about a hug, the questions feel tender, tentative, full of care. Nothing is assumed. Everything is checked.

‘Well, I’ll definitely be hugging you,’ I say. She smiles, ‘Yeah, me too you,’ she says. 

I ruminate and finally settle on a mug with Angel's name, telling her how much she loved the chocolate bar with her name that she once sent. Although, I add, there isn’t a need to bring anything.

When the call ends I realise how hungry I am and drained. The anxiety has lifted. As I thought and hoped, it feels as though I already knew her, the last twelve years of letters had been quietly preparing us for this. There was a lot of love, respect and care. 

Birth mum had said something about looking forward to growing her family, which hubby was slightly concerned about, the low rumblings of insecurity. I remind him of the dad who adopted Po in Kung Fu Panda who realised, ‘It is not less love for me, but more love for Po.’

—--------------------------------

I tell Angel about the call on the way home in the car. How well it had gone, how we had thanked each other and I had cried a little. 

‘Of course you did.’ she smiles 

I tell her that when Dad mentioned she wanted to see a liger at the Animal Park, her birth mum had known immediately it was a cross between a tiger and lion. She smiled at that too. 

I talk a little about her sisters and say her birth mum sent her love and was excited to be seeing her soon. 

At home she pulls out games, humming softly, that old familiar tune that means she’s regulating, finding her ground. She keeps me close, even from the kitchen, calling out dice numbers, checking in.

She curls into me on the sofa as we watch a movie, her body heavy against mine, like when she was little.

Later, I remind her, gently, deliberately, that whatever happens with her birth mum, nothing will ever change between us. That we are her forever family.

She nods. She knows, but I think is glad to hear it anyway.

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