Chapter 56: Pop the Bubble

Y'all, I have a heavy heart over recent events. I'm getting straight to the point of this blog. My heart is so heavy after hearing of and watching the video of the murder of George Floyd. Yes, I am going there. The Lord has always allowed me to use this blog to share our story, to chronicle the parenting and life of our miracle; this week that involves George Floyd. 

          I was raised to believe that ALL people are created equally. Growing up my parents had friends of other races. I had BEST friends (that I still have to this day) of other races. Now, over the years I have heard people say they "aren't racist" but at the same time they have zero people of color in their circle or lives. I'm not saying "we weren't racist" because I grew up more than that. I grew up in a house where my black friends were welcome and encouraged to spend the night. I swam with, broke bread with, and did daily life with people who didn't look like me. I never heard the "n" word until I was a teenager at school. It was NEVER spoken at my home. I'm so thankful for my parents. I am heartbroken to think about the relationships, life long friendships, I might have missed out on if they had raised me any other way.

Now, my plan for raising Dani Marie was the same. I wanted to raise her in a home where she knew nothing of racism. I wanted her to be oblivious to the fact that there are people who judge and hate based on something as trivial as skin color. I have read her the true stories of heroes I grew up admiring. Ruby Bridges, Dr. King, Harriet Tubman are all names she knows. I have even always been discouraged at the times I have read about Ruby Bridges and her teacher, Barbara Henry, to my students. It always makes me sad that they never know who they are. Black students don't know about the little girl who boldly walked escorted by armed guards into a previously all-white school. They don't know about the amazing teacher who taught only her for nearly a year because the other parents refused to send students to school with Ruby. We are failing at teaching our students about these heroes. We had this covered. Dani Marie has participated and won awards for Black History Month contests. She has friends of all colors. I thought we were doing a great job of raising her and protecting her from racism. I have realized with a heavy heart over the past few days, it's not enough. I am still failing her.

I've created a bubble where she truly believes that everyone thinks like we do. She believes that skin color has no effect on anything other than what shade of pageant dress might look best. She rocks her baby dolls of all colors to sleep, never giving it a thought. She has been raised staying at my parents along with her "cousins" who are actually really good friends who have brown skin. I thought all this meant we were getting it right, but I have been so wrong.

I can't keep her in a bubble where we choose to allow her to believe that racism no longer exists. We are doing a disservice to her and to our friends from different races. Years ago as a teenager, I took one of my best friends to a party. She was spending the night with me that night. We heard about a get together going on out in the county, and a guy I liked invited us to come. My parents would have never allowed us to go. We had no business going, but we went. I made the decision to take my friend. This friend happened to be black. I put her in grave danger that night because I was ignorant to the fact that when we arrived she might be targeted simply because of her skin color. It makes me sick to relive this night. She and I have exchanged text remembering it just recently. We arrived and mingled for a few minutes. She was hesitant, but she trusted me. We hadn't been there long when another girl made a comment to the guy that I shouldn't have brought the (insert disgusting explicative) and then a war broke out. They fought and were thrown through a glass window of a nearby car. I was screaming and trying to get to her. I was in horor. How could this happen? How in the world could people who don't know her do this? I had been to events like this several times, but I had never been with a black friend. I didn't think anything about taking her there. She fought and she is a tough cookie. My guy friend finally got to them and used his foot to break them up. We left. We both were covered with blood and broken glass. I remember crying. I remember apologizing. I remember her telling me, "Lee Marie, don't be stupid. People don't think like you. I love you, I swear I do, but you don't see it like some people do. The world ain't like you." She was right. I was scared and sick. She was fine, shaken but fine. How close she had come to not being. I had mistakenly thought that she was welcome wherever I was. I got a hard dose of reality that night.

My parents did a fantastic job of raising me to believe that racism is wrong, but I unfortunately also had been in a bubble where it didn't exist. That led me to make a mistake that could have turned out much worse. The world has grown increasingly more violent. I can't allow Dani Marie to continue in this bubble. In these times, she can't just live in a home where racism doesn't exist, she has to learn to leave that home and be a voice in a world where unfortunately sometimes it does. This weekend we popped the bubble. She knows the stories of the heroes who paved the way for civil rights and equal opportunities, but those are all good stories that make you feel like the world has changed and racism is gone. It's not. We told her another story this week. We explained that even after all these years, some people do evil things. They hate and hurt others because they look different. Her baby blue eyes filled with tears when I cried telling her about the murder of George Floyd. She didn't understand? It hurt her. It hurt bad. Because, she understood that George Floyd and Ahmaud Arbery could have been anyone of the people she knows and love that have brown skin. I explained to her that even though laws have changed and many, many, victories have been won in civil rights on the backs of both black and white heroes, there is still work to do. It's not the change of laws that really changes things. Not really, it's a step in the right direction, but until the hearts of people change we haven't come very far.

If we continued to let Dani Marie believe that racism doesn't exist, she might not see it when it rears its ugly head. We want her to know it's real. It's wrong. And it must be stopped. I want her to see hate for what it is. I truly believe that we can raise her in a home where racism doesn't exist, but we must educate and equip her to step out of the safety of that home and be a voice in a world where it sometimes does. Then she can see it and she can take action against it. Hate doesn't lose it's power when we create a place it doesn't exist, it loses its power when we love in spite of it. When we work together to educate and seek justice for those who are oppressed.

Don't be silent. Don't be ignorant. Racism isn't over, but I firmly believe with love and education one day it can be.

Love y'all!

Chapter 55: The Chance to be her Real Momma

Hey there y’all! I hope you are having a wonderful February! We have been quite busy lately, but Flu is giving us a chance to slow down for a few days. Daniel and Dani Marie have both fallen victim to Flu A. Dani Marie is tough as nails, so no surprise she hasn’t slowed down yet. Daniel, well you know how male patients can be, or at least this one. He thinks he is dying. I have assured him multiple times if a head on collision with a couple of 18 wheelers didn’t kill him, Flu A won’t be how his story ends. They are actually both on the mend.

This blog has grown to be almost a digital diary of thoughts and heartfelt retellings of so many important events and revelations in our lives. It feels almost like I’m writing to family when I sit to pen the next chapter. Adoption is beautiful. We celebrate it every single day, but sometimes we hold hands and face the challenges presented to us on this path, too. This is one of those times. A couple of things have happened over the last week or so that have made us do some thinking and talking about adoption, all aspects of it. I wrote a letter to Dani’s birthmother. It hasn’t been my first and won’t be my last. Who knows? Maybe someday I will actually have a way to get them to her. For now they are just therapy. Since I don’t really know an address to send it to and it’s more just for my personal diary I decided to share it with those of you who follow our story. Here it is:

Dear Beautiful,

Wow. Our girl sure has done some growing up lately. She talks as if she were an adult. You’d be so impressed with how smart she is. She reads so well, but believe it or not her favorite subject is now math. Librarian mom fail, right?  I know you’d be so crazy proud of her. She is still as kind as ever, and still so beautiful. You should have seen her this weekend in the beauty pageant. She gracefully moved across the stage in a black velvet dress with just a touch of sparkle. She still looks just like you, I guess more so now than ever. Her eyes, your eyes, are pools of Caribbean blue that still take my breath away. There was a good bit of talk about her beauty this weekend and so many people complimenting her for winning a beauty in the pageant. We can’t take any credit for that, I mean the outside is all from you. You know the best thing? She favors my niece, Macy, and my mother so very much. I always think it’s amazing how God wove this story so perfectly that while she is the spitting image of your beautiful self, she also resembles some of the other ladies I love most. I have an incredible soft spot for pretty blondes. What we think is most beautiful about her is her heart. Man, does she love people. She loves them hard and recklessly. She loves without reserve and with limitless forgiveness. You’d be so proud, I really think you would.

Can I be honest with you??? I mean, if anyone can understand this I guess it would have to be you.
I’m hurt. I’m really hurt. A couple of times lately (well three to be exact) another child has questioned her and told her I wasn’t her real momma. The first time the child simply asked her, “Who is your real momma?” To which she responded, “Mrs. Martin!” and be-bopped off. Then several months later, it was more aggressive. “You do know Mrs. Martin isn’t your real momma? She adopted you. So, do you know your real momma?” This upset her a little more. Not at the child, children don’t know. They are inquisitive by nature. Especially so when they have overhead bits and pieces of adult conversations. But this last one, man it hurt. The child argued with her. Can you believe that? Argued with her that she didn’t even know who her “real”momma was. She cried. Not in front of them. At home, where she felt safe. She came to me and those big blue eyes y’all share were full of tears.
“Momma, it happened again. You know, remember when ——- asked me about you? Well, this time they said I was wrong. They said I didn’t even know my real momma. You are my real momma and I told them! I even stomped my foot down, and then I used a loud voice and said, ‘Mrs. Ashlee Martin is my real momma!”
I hugged her and we talked. It broke my heart that she was having to defend me. To defend us. Our family dynamic and essentially her identity. I knew these times would come, or at least I feared they would. But at just 7? It seems soon. I explained that some people just don’t understand the difference in the words “real” and “biological” and then we discussed those. I reminded her that she does know her real momma. She knows the way my voice sounds when I am upset. She knows when I am quiet and picks up on when I’m worried. She knows my favorite color, food, and song. She sneaks me home bath balls from our store because she knows I’d never treat myself. She adds them to my bath and then tries to pay me for them later. She KNOWS me. That makes our relationship so real. When others question that, it hurts. It hurts me for her. It’s hurts me for me. It hurts me for you. Because then we are forced to discuss biological, real, authentic, and DNA. It puts labels where they don’t have to be. I realized tonight that you are just as real as I am. What do I mean by that? Well, the love. The real love. You gave her to me. You entrusted that tiny, fragile creature to my care. You loved her enough to let her go. I will never forget seeing tears well in your eyes when you told me she was born for me. When you told me you knew this is what you had to do. Those were the same tears I saw rolling down our daughter’s cheeks when she told me what upset her the other day. What’s so “real” to me is that when we first sat at that courtyard table you told me you had cried all your tears already. You told me you wanted this to be the happiest day of our lives. That was so kind and caring. That was putting others before yourself, and I see that trait in Dani, too. I feel so torn about all these labels now because I’m confused! I have always given you the credit for her beauty, but your selfless love left a mark on her heart, too. IS it nature over nurture? Nurture over nature?  Looks from you? But she looks like my family, too. Does she have my heart? Or yours? When she is good is it from you? Or is it from what she has learned? I don’t know! I don’t know, what is what or who gave her what? I want to explain it to her so simply, but it’s not. She has questions I don’t know the answers to. Why do we have to label this love?? She is so many parts you and so many parts me. I tell her real is the momma who loves her, but that is both of us, too. Sometimes loving someone so much you let someone else love them is the purest love of all.

So you know what I did? I prayed for peace and understanding. God tells us in His word that He will give us a peace that surpasses all understanding. I told you in the hospital, I would pray every single day for the three of us to one day be sisters in Christ. Dani Marie was recently saved. She asked Jesus to be Lord of her life. That means the two of us will be in Heaven one day. We are still praying for you. I don’t know where you are or what shape your heart is in. I don’t know if you know Jesus or have a “real” relationship with Him. I still pray every single day you do or you will. Because that love is what finally made it all make sense. After I poured my heart and confusion out to God, He gave me that peace. See human understanding is weak. People think we have to label everything and everyone. We don’t. Isn’t that refreshing???? We don’t have to! I can be her real momma and so can you! We both authentically love her! We just show it in different ways. Two mothers, so different, but so much the same. Her real momma is me, but her real mother is you, too. She and I share a smile that has come from loving to laugh, and you two share eyes... beautiful blue eyes that can pierce straight to the soul. It’s both of us! All of it. I have been as guilty and anyone of feeling like this love had to be labeled. That I was in one box and you in the other. No more, it’s both of us. It’s all real love, and she is the best parts of both of us and amazing parts that are all her own.

But, there is one thing. The chance to be a real momma? Well, you gave me that. You shared with me. You gifted me the most wonderful opportunity of my life. I owe so much to you, and most likely it’s a debt I will never be able to repay. Thank you, beautiful lady. Ashlee Martin is that sweet girl’s real momma, but only because you allowed me to be. We love you. I hope God whispers this thank you straight to your heart.

I love you more than you will ever understand,


That’s it. It won’t get mailed, just filed away. I wanted to share with y’all. Maybe you have some labels to shake yourself. Maybe you have boxed yourself in and labeled a relationship in your life. I don’t know. I’m so thankful this week for God’s faithfulness at revealing His peace to me. I was so worked up, angry, hurt, and insecure this weekend because of a label. Not realizing, I was as guilty of labeling as anyone. Stepped on my own toes and realized any love modeled after Christ’s love is REAL. There is enough real love to go around. :)

Love y’all!