My parents had a metal biscuit tin on the top shelf of their wardrobe. A filing cabinet of sorts, this is where bills and fortnightly cash pay from dad’s work would go, at least until those payments became automated and deposited straight to the bank. We would regularly be told to go and get some money from the tin if we needed it for school excursions, lunch orders or whatever.
I’m not sure how old I was on this pivotal day, at least 17 I’d guess by the sequence of life events I can recall from the time. Having jarred the tight aluminium lid open as normal, atop the usual pile of bills and papers was a light blue document, folded in three and official looking. I don’t actually know why I was even drawn to open it. Maybe there was something printed that took my eye, perhaps it was just the fact that of all the times we had opened the tin to get money out, I had never seen a document like this in there before.
The paper was a record of adoption. A male baby, born several years earlier than my date of birth and presumably prior to my parent’s marriage. In that moment, a million thoughts played through my mind. In the blink of an eye, the unifying event that explained much, if not all of mum’s behaviour and functioning suddenly made sense to me.
I went and found my younger sister to show her the document. I’m not certain why I had the foresight to do this, but I have been grateful since that day, that I was not the only person to carry the knowledge of that document. Looking back, I think my disbelief at having found this necessitated someone else to confirm that what I was looking at was in fact what I thought. I remember processing whether this document was trying to indicate that one of us kids had been adopted. The agreed facts were that this was not the case. Eight years my junior, my brother was too young to involve at the time. It would be several decades before I shared knowledge of it with him.
I placed the blue document back in the biscuit tin and closed the lid. I knew that I could not discuss this with mum and dad. I was unsure that mum’s mental health would survive if I told her about it. I thought it might very well send her in to a spiral of guilt and depression that could have distastrous consequences.
So I put it away. In the back of my mind. For thirty years. It was a secret too dangerous to share. My sister and I never discussed it again. Eventually though, the day would come where holding that secret would become too much.
I don’t even know where to start writing about how I’m convinced that adoption process impacted on not only my mother’s mental health but virtually every aspect of how she interacted with family, friends and even with the physical environment. Many of those patterns have persisted through her life.
My mother was fastidious about the home we lived in. Growing up as the eldest, it was my duty to dry the dishes after meals, until we got a dishwasher at least. The washing up process wasn’t complete until every drop of water had been dried up with a tea towel, not only from the dark green tiled benchtops but also from the stainless steel sink and taps. It seemed normal at the time, but looking back it strikes me as completely bizarre. My own kitchen sink has never had the indulgence of such an experience. Mum was adamant that her place was at home and she was perpetually critical of women who worked part or full time in any capacity to support their family. She was forever saying of other women ‘she ought to be home looking after her kids instead of out working’. I always thought this was just part of a nasty streak that mum had, perhaps jealousy at not having a manageable job with which to combine parenting, or the associated financial benefit. Discovery of the adoption documentation led me to believe that this was actually a guilt response. That she would be at home to look after her kids as a remedy for the guilt of having surrendered a child in the past.
The house was, and still is, always cleaned on Monday. From top to bottom. It was the worst possible day to be sick from school because nothing got in the way of cleaning day. Mum was always present to make toast and Milo for breakfast, to prepare school sandwiches and the evening meal. Clothes were always washed and cleaned, ironed if necessary. Bedrooms were organised and clean.
I like to think of these things in terms of a love language ‘Act of Service’, because it detracts from some of the more insidious impacts of the adoption on mum’s mental health and attachment to others. As the eldest, I think I was at the pointy end of this, and it is clear that my younger siblings escaped much of this exposure. More importantly, mum never really seemed to be capable of engaging emotionally when I was growing up. She was present, but I wouldn’t describe her as being a happy and engaged parent. She was not one to read a book to us at bedtime. I don’t recall her playing games with us as children. Certainly, we played in the backyard and did our thing, but mum didn’t really get actively involved.
I don’t think mum ever really reflected upon the impact of her mental health, or the adoption itself upon our upbringing. To the contrary, I think she placed herself on something of a pedestal for being the model parent that all the other mothers failed to provide. Because she was a ‘home’ mum, not a ‘working’ mum. Unfortunately, the routine of being home alone most days of the week, I believe actually had a negative effect on her mental health, with way too much time to spend thinking and probably ruminating about her life, and to search for criticism in others. Inevitably, most conversations about other people, be it friend or family, involved some degree of negativity or criticism.
Mum, and dad to a lesser extent, were unable to demonstrate love through words or physical touch. We would give a kiss on the forehead at bedtime, but there was very little in the way of other demonstrations of affection. I would describe mum’s attachment as distant. Attending any sort of activity that involved sport, Scouts, birthday parties or events at school was always a massive chore. Dad was the main provider of transport to such events, he even became a leader at Scouts. Something I have never forgotten and always treasured as a memory. Mum always needed a huge amount of begging to get her to come and watch swimming carnivals or basketball games or scouting days out. It always needed to be extracted rather than expected. I’m not sure if this was social anxiety, a general dislike of other people or part of the distant attachment style. I remember one scouting event we attended, in which our family won a radio cassette player in a raffle. We had never ever won anything before and mum was happy and excited about it. It feels even now, like it was one of the few events where she was talkative and happy on the way home. Interestingly, when I won a pile of swimming ribbons at scouts or the premiership trophy with my basketball team on one occasion, I don’t recall any words of congratulations or physical affirmation. This was to be a recurring theme through high school and adult life.
There is no sense or order to these blog posts, as warned at the outset. They are reflections, generally written in real time and with little in the way of editing. But here they are.
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