As parents you both love your child unconditionally , however you love and interact with them differently . Even before the transition , Ty was always more dad and that joking teasing relationship always found them finding how to connect in silly sweet ways.My son never had mommy as a baby so we walked the line between being the support to his growing adulthood and the soft safe little kid space. We became this family that somehow conquered attachment disorder , and trust issues and putting three incredibly stubborn people together in a house. We never thought we were crazy to adopt a kid with a 300 page file and 24 foster homes. We never thought it would be impossible, hard yes but not impossible. We never thought of adoption as plan B, it was just our plan and to be honest we always felt someone else birthed kiddo for us, it just took 16 years for us to pick him up. He was never our adopted child, he was our child and we his forever family . Even in death that is forever. We are still a family of three but only interact with 2.
I understand why parents can run the risk of drifting apart after losing a child. In a healthy relationship there is compromise, no one loses themselves to the other but you make concessions and find balance. In grief , you have to grieve and feel what is going on to you. You can't compromise your grief, even for the person you love. And we all grieve different so that is when it gets tricky, You have to give each other space and patience and that is hard when you struggle getting up each day or in your own head.Its hard not to be in this slice of time , for us June 10th over and over. You can laser focus but you need to look at your relationship as the sum of the whole not just the enormity of your loss.
Ty and I met ironically because the original Mike W Vanowert , his father had passed. My ex had worked with Mike and I met Ty as he was coming home to work on the house sale and estate sale. We have been through deaths on both sides of the family, loss of employment , family living with us,school, and debt . We fought like hell together to get good jobs, stability to buy our house with a child in mind. Not bad considering its going on 9 year and folks said I would just be a fling for him.From the first night we met we have been together ever since, not always easy but not only do we love each other we truly enjoy each other.We see the potential in each other. When became warriors together to bring our child home, to give him a routine, boundaries and unconditional love. Something he never had before. Even when it was hard , even as parents and child we rubbed. Our son once tweeted that his parents were so good together because no matter if something went wrong , we fixed it and moved on. We always resolved it with each other and with him. We were not perfect parents but we were perfect in how we loved him and he to us. When Ty began his transition my son was in a weird way the biggest champion. Telling dad to stand up for himself, making sure he asked for respect from others. In our pain it would be easier in some ways to just focus on ourselves but our son loved us as a family, he participated in us growing as a family. To not continue to love and grow together would weaken what we created without son, it would undermine many many years of being there for each other and enjoying each other. We are a forever family right now and until our time comes to leave this earth and be with out son again,to not love each other they way we loved our family would be a travesty on top of the tragedy. Its worth it even when it is hard or sad because as a couple we were good , as a family we are freaking awesome. Michael made us awesome and we will strive for that to make him proud. Our love our child is not here but our love with each other will go on .
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