Understanding. How important is it to you that your friends and/or spouse can understand you and support you? Do you think they can ever really know what you're feeling and going through? How do you help them to understand things from your point of view? Do your friends and/or spouse seem interested in furthering the discussion? Do they read books, blogs, or otherwise educate themselves about adoption issues? Do you disagree about any of the fundamentals? Do you agree? Do you think that your relationship with that person has altered their view on adoption in general?
I don't think that it's important for others to understand my feelings and what I'm going through, since often I don't understand it, and can certainly not articulate it well. What is much more important to me is their respect of my feelings, even if they don't understand them or agree with them. Hilary and I have certainly had many discussions on my feelings and what I'm going through, especially around the time that I was first in contact with Iris. Did she understand? No, how could she? I don't understand when she talks about growing up with divorced parents. We support each other, we empathize and above all else, we are there for each other, but we can never truly understand that which we have not lived.
"You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view - until you climb into his skin and walk around in it." spoken by Atticus Finch, To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
1 comment:
Well, I beg to differ that you don't articulate your feelings well. I have observed you to be very articulate about your emotions.
I like how you frame this, that even though we may not understand, we can still respect and support.
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