Longest Vacation EVER!

When we got home, my sister and I waited until my parents left to run errands and we broke out the paperwork. For the first time in my life, I had some more information about my natural parents. As odd as this may sound I had never given my natural father a second thought. I figured that if he was a good guy I wouldn’t have been put up for adoption. As I’ve come to find out, I couldn’t have been more wrong. The information I was given included their names, NeverTooLate and SinginInTheRain*, and their birthdays, and some basic family information. I knew that NeverTooLate had a brother, her mother was born on St. Michael, and her father was an engineer. AN ENGINEER! I was so happy when I found that out. SinginInTheRain was in the Army reserves and had a huge family that didn’t know about me when the paperwork was filled out. He was also a year younger than my natural mother, which put him at 19 when I was conceived.

I started to form a picture, but wasn’t sure what to do about it. I didn’t have last names, I didn’t know how to continue, and I wasn’t sure what to do next. I copied down the information and left to start my senior year without a clear idea of what was going to happen next. I should have talked to my parents about it, but I didn’t want to rat my sister out for snooping and I didn’t think they would believe that I would have done it on my own. I wasn’t exactly thinking clearly because I should have just asked them for the information and I’m sure they would have given it to me gladly.

I kept thinking about what I should do. I did a couple of late night Google searches and found nothing that was really useful, except for a website that allows you to search for a person by their first name and birthday, the two pieces of information I had. The catch was that it would cost me $15. This was something I wasn’t ready to do and I figured I’d give myself a bit more time to find them without paying for it.
I’d be lying if I said that I knew what I wanted to do and that it was an easy semester for me. I really struggled with everything. I had always had my family to lean on but I was afraid to tell them what I was going through. My friends didn’t know either because I didn’t know what I was feeling, and I felt like I needed to figure that out before I talked to anyone. I was afraid that someone would be able to talk me into or out of finding my natural parents and I wanted the decision to come from me. I normally would have called my mom to tell her, but in this situation I wasn’t sure what I wanted. Added to that was the fact that my mom came down for a visit.

Right before she came down, I had a friend tell me that adopted people don’t count in a discussion about family.  Needless to say I was livid.  I was so hurt I didn’t stand up for myself, which made me even more upset afterward.  I told my mom about my frustrations.  We had a talk and she told me that if I ever wanted to find my natural parents she would help me. I was presented with a perfect opportunity to tell her everything, but I didn’t take it. I wish I had and then I wouldn’t have been struggling through everything alone, but I wasn’t expecting us to have that conversation and I wasn’t ready to talk about it. It was a very confusing time for me and I’m glad that I managed to get through it.

*Names have been changed