After posting of my letter I suddenly realised I have not explained why I decided to place my son for adoption.
It was not a decision which was easily reached. And I spent months agonising whether I was doing the right thing, even after the wheels were put in motion and my son's (adoptive) parents were found. (You might wonder why I keep putting adoptive in brackets, this is so readers of this blog will understand that to me my son's adoptive parents are his real parents - he was raised by them.)
There are a few reasons why I decided to have him adopted, but the main reason was that I did not have anything to offer him. I was working in a backpacker hostel in Athens - although I knew I would have a place to live and a job - it was not realistic to raise a child by myself in those circumstances.
Another reason was that I wanted him to have both a mother and father who were in a stable relationship and were ready to provide for him, both emotionally and financially, rather than me who was not - I was not ready to become a mother and the one thing I had learnt from my so-called family in Norway: you cannot raise a child on love alone, they tried in they own strange way!!!
But I hear you shout, you could have gone back to Norway or had an abortion. Yes I could have, but there were NO WAY I would have brought up my son around certain members of my family. I didn't have the worst childhood in the world, but it was not "normal" whatever that is. Don't get me wrong, it had a part in shaping me into the person I am today, and I am happy with myself, but I have no interest in having contact with any of them. For me, Mana was my mother and Joy's Hotel my home and as for an abortion, that's fine for others but as I loved my son since I realised I was pregnant, there was no way I could have killed (aborted) him.
I decided that, rather than not being able to provide my son with a life, where I was fully capable to take care of him and for him not having father - I was worried that I would have fallen into the trap, where he would have grown up with different "uncles" who would be there one minute and disappear from his life the next.
Another factor in my decision was also that, I was lucky in finding a family, who I was told wanted him no matter what.
I do not regret what I did and if I was able to go back I would have done it all over again, with a few minor changes. These are things which I would not blog about as they are personal to my son, his parents and me.
Now I just have to wait and see what will happen with my letter, I hope that I will get a chance to meet my son and his parents soon but have to prepare myself for not hearing anything back from them.
But I hope his parents will at least send me some photos of him.
