I was pretty disgruntled on Valentine’s Day this year. But it just came a little late, that’s all, and in a different form than I’d expected.
My spouse and I went to see “Away from Her” on Sunday. It was an incredible love story; and all about looong love, the kind that we have, the kind that is not all woo-woo romantic, but often hard and with strange detours and rough spots and then lovely oases and a sense of true refuge. I leaked tears starting about fifteen minutes in and really did not dry out for hours. At one point I had to really restrain myself from all-out bawling. (but really, this to me is the best kind of movie ever, because it makes me feel, feel deeply, feel alive)
After the movie, we went out to a little coffee house and had one of those great, in depth talks about the movie, the characters, how we felt about the REALLY STUPID ENDING which departed abruptly and terribly from the original story, but how overall it was an incredibly excellent film which made us feel glad to be humans and glad to be together.
I don’t want to spoil the movie/story for anyone who hasn’t seen it, but the husband in the story does a truly extraordinary, loving, almost incomprehensible thing for his wife. And I wept throughout the movie, and for a long time after, because I realized that my husband would absolutely not hesitate to do the same for me. And yet I don’t know, because of my own insecurities, if I would be capable of doing the same for him.
Harlow’s Monkey wrote an incredible post on her blog about her spouse, Mr. Harlow’s Monkey, and all he has had to deal with and support and understand in their long relationship. I felt such a jolt of recognition when I read this.
I have many friends who are adopted and one thing many of us have in common, whether placed in same-race, domestic, international or transracial adoptive homes, are issues with trust and attachment.
For some adopted persons, that can translate as being stand-offish, cold and commitment-phobic, with a tendency to leave people before they leave us. (in all my relationships, I was always the one to leave first)
For others, this might translate into clinginess, jealousy and neediness with a tendency towards suffocating the very people we love the most. (this is me, too!) This is what’s referred to as insecure attachment.
Either way, it can be very difficult for the partner or loved one of an adopted person, especially if it seems that they’ve suddenly become obsessive about their adoption.
As Harlow’s Monkey points out, being married to an adoptee is no picnic in the park. I know that Mr. ReadingWritingLiving could certainly attest to that. And yet he has hung in there with me throughout thick, thin, complete irrationality and hysteria, confusing behavior, maddening behavior and more.
And realizing that has been worth one hundred times more than any flowers or chocolate on Valentine’s Day.
May 15, 2007 at 9:07 am
susan – love this post. was just pondering today about adoptees and spouses..and wondering if they tend to “marry their adads” or something else. if all men marry their mothers…that kind of thought…but your post prompted something else in me, which I will have to write about someday. how hard, very hard, it is to married to a mother of loss. not much different in the attachment/intimacy issues than you and harlow reference…perhaps different cause. (and i say this as a mother of loss in the midst of a divorce…part of the cause was indeed my adoption related trauma…)
May 15, 2007 at 3:39 pm
Though not an adoptee, I nod my head in recognition to many of the things Harlow’s Monkey mentions as a daughter abandoned at age 2 by her father.
But I love this passage: “It was an incredible love story; and all about looong love, the kind that we have, the kind that is not all woo-woo romantic, but often hard and with strange detours and rough spots and then lovely oases and a sense of true refuge.” In my opinion, these are the best love stories, the ones worth living and telling.
May 17, 2007 at 7:34 am
It’s all about expectations, isn’t it? Valentine’s Day, I mean, but I wonder if that’s a bit true of adoption as well.
Dinner out, an expensive card, or flowers make an ordinary day quite romantic, but for this one day the movies, television – our culture in general – makes those just the ante in some weird game of blackjack where Hallmark, 1-800-Flowers, and chocolateers everywhere are the house, raking it in.
There are plenty of people who suffered a childhood of wildly imperfect parents, but our culture holds out such images of superheroes and sainthood that it’s a wonder an adoptee can endure the limbo of not knowing exactly which level of beatification they missed out on.
May 17, 2007 at 8:01 am
Expectations have a big role to play in Valentine’s Day, for sure, but adoption? I don’t know. For me, that’s not it. I expect that I should know the truth about my origins, who and where I came from. It’s not about superheroes or saints, it’s about knowing the simple truth of my history.
May 17, 2007 at 10:31 am
Admittedly, I love tearjerker movies. I have to go see this.