Adoption Collateral

In March, Esperanza moved out of state with her boyfriend and his family. It wasn’t long before she expressed being unhappy and during a visit for Easter, she told me she had been staying in touch with a previous love interest who was incarcerated. She felt more like herself with the guy who was in jail and stated her boyfriend was controlling and allowed his family to talk bad about her without sticking up for her at all. Ultimately, she decided to move back to town, with the help of me and Primero. Once back, she seemed to be doing well. She got a job and while she didn’t love it, she managed to do good at it and things seemed to be moving in the right direction for her. Time to self-sabotage! She had been talking to the out-of-state boyfriend and he talked her into moving back with him, which she did this past weekend. She didn’t tell anyone she was leaving until the last minute. When she finally text me about it and I expressed concern, she insisted the boyfriend had done a lot of growing since she left. Hmm… ok. But, when he came to fetch her (I was not home) Primero said he was the same and just as controlling. He snidely promised Primero to bring her back if “she started her shit” and wanted to come back home. I worry this second time around won’t be any different but Esperanza will feel even more determined to stay in a bad place than she did the first time around because she wants to save face. I think that is part of the reason she left quickly without notification. Both Primero and I are bracing ourselves for another long trek to upstate New York.

 

I don’t usually claim Esperanza as my kid, but, especially lately, I feel like I should. I care for her just like a daughter, I worry about her as if she were my child (even though she is an adult), and I only want to see her successful and happy. More than once Esperanza has declared she feels like I’m a mom to her, so what holds me back? I don’t give her the same advice I dole out to Primero, I hold back. I feel like I’m always trying to not scare her away. I’ve been wanting to reach out to her since she’s been gone, but I haven’t because I don’t feel like it’s my place. I don’t like how she left, I don’t like that she seems to want to keep her absence a secret. I don’t think that bodes well for this move and it hurts her relationships here at home. And, of course, I miss her. I miss her popping up at the house, chatting with me about various things, hearing about the crazy customers who came to her job. I wish her well, I hope she will finally get what she wants, but I sense that she will have many more self-sabotaging episodes in her life. I wish I could go back in time and find younger Esperanza and hug her, tell her she is worth more than she thinks and to never devalue herself. I see some of her brokenness but I don’t know how to heal it, I don’t know how to reach her to help her. I just keep trying to be there, if and when she needs a helping hand. These are the things that foster care trainings do not address. These connections are the unexpected collateral to open adoption.