by Allison Wallenberg

Created on: April 02, 2008

There are few memories etched so clearly in my mind as the day I came home without my first child. It was the last day I would be her mother, and by any standard, my motherhood was heartbreakingly short lived. I was, and still am, certain that the decision I made that day almost eight years ago was one of the best and most loving decisions I have made over the course of my entire life. It might come as some surprise then, to know that I also consider it one of the most selfish choices I've ever made.

Let me explain. At nineteen years old, I found myself staring down at a very bright, very duplicate set of pink lines. Instantaneously a flood of emotions overwhelmed me, while simultaneously underwhelming my then significant other, whose response was both apathetic and hurtful to say the least. I was consumed by guilt, regret, fear, in short all the emotions one would assume goes with this territory. And yet, still more powerful was love. That this love was so singularly bent on concentrating its energy on the new life within me was wonderful and terrible, and I knew I was not prepared to carry it for the rest of my life.

Although at the time I masqueraded this reticence as fear of failing as a mother, or fear of single parenthood, the reality was something quite different. I was not ready, or perhaps willing, to love any being that was not myself so completely. Yet, it was this same love which demanded that I find the perfect family for my child, and as soon as possible. So it was that at five months pregnant, I was already cultivating a relationship with the future mother and father of my unborn daughter. They were intelligent, caring, generous, successful individuals with another adopted daughter, and I was certain these were the ones to look after my first real love. My own love for her would settle for nothing less than absolute certainty, if she was not to be with me.

Still, amidst all the anguish of leaving the hospital empty armed, and my daughter behind with her new family, there was an underlying current that I could not name until the not so distant past. It was relief. As I cried that night I was crying in sadness, but also as I have come to realize, in thanksgiving. Thanksgiving for the family who loves my daughter as I do, and was ready to love her in such a way when I could not; and thanksgiving for the life I still had ahead of me.

I now have five more children, and a wonderful husband. I am a good mother, and I feel the same profound love for each new life I am blessed with. The difference is not the emotion between now and then, it is the maturity, the selflessness learned over years of personal growth. So while I understand that some see the choice of a birth-mother as selfless, I disagree, but empathetically. In choosing to place a child for adoption there must be a very personal sense of peace with the choice; as I see it, this peace is the result of a woman's ability to judge that her own self interest is not in the best interest of her unborn child. Thus, her decision is selfish in two ways; out of love she places her child because she cannot accept the selfless love she feels for the child, and yet, because of this same love she would have someone else provide what she will not.

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