Raw and angry

I had an appointment with the eye doctor today.  First exam I’ve had in several years.  Loved the doctor.  Since it looks like we will be permanently relocating to southern Michigan in the very near future, it will be easy for me to keep seeing this particular optometrist.  Yeay!  Feels like I’m putting down roots again.

Since this was my first visit, I had to fill out the usual patient registration forms.  Get down near the bottom of the page – “Any familial history of…” -sigh–  Pick up the pen and draw a line through it all and write, “no familial history available, patient is adopted.”

Nice doctor brings me back to the exam room.  We spent a good 15 minutes just talking about my vision and the potential for my high blood pressure to impact my vision.  I think it is the longest I’ve ever spent just TALKING to a doctor of any kind, let alone an optometrist.  I explained how it has felt like my eyes have to “settle” before I can really focus on anything, and how much that has been bothering me.  Also explained that this doesn’t seem to happen when wearing my prescription sunglasses.  Well, it turns out that the “eye doctor mill” I went to last time gave me the wrong prescription on my regular glasses.  They were too strong!  All this time, I’ve been thinking I was going to need bifocals.  Turns out the script was too strong.  No wonder I was having such a hard time.

He then spent another 15 minutes very carefully weeding out lenses until it seemed I was seeing ok.  It will take a few weeks for my vision to really improve with new lenses – I’ve “trained” my eyes to compensate for the wrong prescription for so long they have to be retrained.  I also got contacts again.  I’ve worn them on and off since I was 14.  This last time, they just didn’t feel right.  Well, yeah, duh, they were the wrong prescription too.  Right now I’m sitting here typing wearing the right lenses.  Mostly right – I have to pick up new ones for my left eye on Saturday because these aren’t the ones that will correct the astigmatism I have in that eye. 

So anyway, needless to say, writing that “no familial history available, patient is adopted” just brings it all up to the front again.  Maybe you’ve noticed from my recent blog entries – I’ve been in avoidance mode again.  When I start posting about all kinds of crap that has nothing to do with my feelings (Google home pages, linky links, etc.) it is a good sign there is something I’m trying to avoid.

I’m avoiding anger.  I’m avoiding that raw, vulnerable feeling.  I’m avoiding how betrayed I feel by a system which still, 34+ years later, hasn’t gotten it right.  I’m avoiding how angry I feel when I read really scary comments by adoptive parents who just don’t seem to have a clue.  I’m avoiding how angry I feel when I encounter an adoptee or a first mother who thinks that because “they don’t have a problem” no one else should, either. 

I still haven’t given my best friend T a link to my blog.  I did, however, copy some of the posts and email them to him.  Yes, I know, he can use Google to search out a sentence from what I sent him and find my blog - that’s ok.  I’m ok with him “finding” it, just not ready to “give” it.  That makes no sense. LOL  Last night we were chatting on Yahoo and I told him that I really need him to promise that he’ll read them.  He said he promises, he’ll read them this weekend.  I love that, actually.  I love that instead of glancing over them in the midst of a busy week (for him) that he’s holding off until he can devote his attention to them.  I love that he gives enough of a shit to wait and really read them.  I love that I mean enough to him that he wants to know how I feel.  I love that I know he’ll hold my hand through this.  I love that I know he’ll move heaven and earth to protect me from pain.  I love that he is a safe haven.

I mentioned that his little sister is having a baby in a few weeks.  So I went shopping for baby stuff.  Fun!  I went a little crazy. LOL  Put it all in the mail yesterday with a really nice “Grandkids” picture frame for his mom and dad, along with some aroma therapy bath stuff and a Zen relaxation CD for the soon-to-be mommy and daddy.  I also put in a little valentines day present for him.  I used to know his address by heart, but for some reason, couldn’t remember the house number.  So I called his mom to get it (he was at work).  Now mind you, I “disappeared” on them for almost a year.  You’d think one of them would be angry or something.  Nope, mom says “Hi Heart!  It’s good to hear from you!” and we chit chatted for a few about how excited she is, etc.  I love his parents.  I love that they care about me.  I love that they never encouraged him to stop being friends with me through any of my major fuck-ups.  I love that they’ve always treated me as if I’m important, as if I belong.  I love that I have a rock from their garden.  I love that they never thought it was weird that their son and I are best friends like so many of that generation seem to. 

With T’s little valentines day present, I included a nice card I found.  (Side rant:  Why is it that every single “best friend” card on the market, regardless of holiday, is always one woman talking to another????  My best friend is a GUY for crying out loud, not some girlie girl!)  So I was sitting here signing all the cards that were going in the package – card for mommy and daddy to be, card for grandparents to be, card for T.  Card for T. -sigh–  I started writing.  Signed my name, thought I was done.  Nope, had to write on the inside panel of the card.  I don’t remember the exact words, but it went something like this:
Please don’t ever let me get away with disappearing like this again.  Please don’t let me run, don’t let me hide.  Please don’t let me do this.  You are too important to me.  I need you in my life, even when I pretend I don’t.  I need both you and hubby in order to feel complete.  Don’t let me walk away.

I basically went on like that for a few sentences.  And before I get any snotty comments from anyone, hubby reads this blog too.  There is NOTHING I would say to T that I wouldn’t want hubby to know about.  Hubby knows how much I love T, how important T is to me.  He also knows there is a world of difference between loving T and being in love with T.  And fortunately, my husband is one of those men who realizes that love is not a finite quantity.  He does not receive LESS love because someone else also receives love.  If anything, he receives more – because not only do I love him but T loves him, too.  So please, keep the prudish comments to yourself. 

Anyway, back to what I was saying.  I probably could have told T those same words over the phone, or in email or in IM – but for some reason, it felt more right to write them out by hand.  They are things I need him to hear, desperately.  But things I have a hard time saying.  I need for him to hold onto me even when I’m trying to push away from him.  (Attachment therapy, anyone?)  I can’t do all of this without him.  He forces me to face things I don’t want to face.  I need someone who can do that for me.  Left to my own devices, I bury it.  I can’t keep doing that.  I can’t keep running away.

Thank the gods this is a burden T has always willingly taken upon himself.  And thank them again for giving me the strength to write the words begging him to not let me run again.  I can trust now that he won’t.  I can also trust that he’ll help hubby keep me from doing it as well.  The two of them work very well together. LOL 

I just feel really raw right now.  My copy of my non-id still hasn’t arrived.  Every morning I wait eagerly for the hotel staff to slip the letter under my door – it hasn’t happened yet.  The agency said they’d get it out at the end of last week.  I hope it is on the way here.  I feel a strong need to hold those papers in my hands.  I keep thinking I’ll find something in them that will help me find my family.  Please let it be so.  I need to finish this before I run away again and it is too late.