It's all going to be ok...and I'm going to be a grandmother

My oldest step daughter always reminded me so much of the line in Ferris Bueller's day off (one of my fave movies of all time btw) but anyway back to my point...

Ferris: "Cameron has never been in love - at least, nobody's ever been in love with him. If things don't change for him, he's gonna marry the first girl he lays, and she's gonna treat him like shit, because she will have given him what he has built up in his mind as the end-all, be-all of human existence. She won't respect him, 'cause you can't respect somebody who kisses your ass. It just doesn't work."

It reminds me of her because somehow, when a kid finds someone who confirms their views about themselves, confirms the things that shriek loudest in their head, they cling to them...and usually sleep with them. (It happened to me too.)

Take one girl with no self esteem (credit here goes to psychotic step-dad and biological mom) let her hit puberty and she'll cling to, and sleep with, the first dirt bag that confirms just what she feels about herself, no matter how much love you tried to pour into her, that negativity usually seems to plant the seeds that sprout the most quickly.

We tried to get her away from the situation, even moved 4000 miles to Tx for a while to see if we could get her away from it all and help her change. But she bolted back to her mom's (where she could do what she wanted in spite of being treated like poo) back to AK and so we returned to AK too...right around the time she conceived...

But somehow, it's all going to be ok. There was no point in being angry with her, she was broken hearted and hurt enough as it was. Through it all, her complete and utter emotional desolation and panic when she found out, somehow we kept her head above water...and slowly, it has gotten better.

When she felt the baby move for the first time, I felt it a moment later, fluttering beneath my hand, quick as a nervous heartbeat beneath her skin. We hugged eachother and cried-a rare moment of vulnerabilty from her.

Slowly, I think she began to realize what I knew all along-unexpected life is not the end of the world. She considered giving him up for adoption and we resassued her that was fine but along the way, the life that turned under her heart became hers, her baby boy.

Black and white images converge on a sonogram screen...a baby, too tiny to live outside the womb, sucking his thumb, touching his face and little upturned nose turns his bottom to us, we count his toes and listen to the throbbing of his heart...

His mother, my stepdaughter, has slowly grown a little calmer...she is not so frantic now. Her horrid step father and biological mother have moved away for now and she has stayed with us over the long months of morning sickness and blossoming belly, and dawning revelations of motherhood.

She has a long way to go before she realizes how worthwhile she is, before she begins to love herself enough to see herself differently and to know that the right relationships in her life make all the difference. I think someday she will know, someday she will find the courage it takes to love herself.

Life is difficult, messy and somewhat unpredictable but full of dichotomous beauty at every turn. And any day now, I will be holding my first grandbaby and yes, I will be crying...