Growing up is hard to do!
We got through the adoption that cold December afternoon in 1991 and somehow, I was able to move on with my life.
I had a daughter to raise, and I needed to process what had happened the past 8 months. The problem was I didn't deal with the emotions and feelings of this particular trauma until many years later. Per usual I pushed those feelings aside and buried them because I was focusing on being a mom and girlfriend. How was I to know that at 17 I should have dealt with what I was going through?
I was 18, I knew everything. Right?
I had already gone through so many tragedies which was a big part of my trauma response.
The holidays came and went and we, as a family, were blessed to be celebrating Ashley's second Christmas. She; of course, was spoiled rotten with gifts and love. Christmas, New Years, and Valentine's Day all came and went, and it was now 1992. Ash would be having her 2nd Birthday party that April.
That spring would also the first time her dad and I broke up.
He wanted to be single and that horrified me. I spent a lot of time alone walking, sitting in my room, and just being with my parents. I was trying to learn how to live life without Scott. I lived through it but of course at the time, I thought my life was over.
My parents would also drop a bomb on me that year. They were planning on moving to Bloomington, MN which would be about 45 minutes away. It was difficult parenting Ashely sometimes while living with my mom and dad yes, but how was I going to do it without them?
I had so many things to figure out. I didn't have a driver's license, where would I live, how was I going to care for my special needs daughter without my mom's nurse experience and expertise?
My parents had their own lives too and needed to live them. Moving was on their radar and had been for a while, I just wasn't sure I was ready for that to become a reality. I had them for Ashely's first two years of life for whenever and whatever I needed.
Could I really do this alone?
I would soon find out, because mom and dad moved to 98th street that very summer.