My Other Mother by Whitney Nolan
By Whitney Nolan Today my birth mom sent me flowers. It’s not my birthday, Valentine’s Day or any other special occasion. “OOOO Whitney, who are those from?” I would nonchalantly shrug my shoulders and lie, “Oh, I don’t know…there wasn’t a card,” not caring that the card was in plain view and not caring if they saw it. It was my business, and it was a part of my life I was trying to forget. My “mommy” raised me around my biological mother so I wouldn’t grow up without knowing where I came from. She didn’t want to place the heavy burden of deceiving me and finally confessing that she wasn’t my real mother, like most adoptive parents do, but what she failed to realize is that an even heavier burden weighs me down. It was always hard and confusing, sharing my very “special” circumstances, forcing myself to act as if my childhood was an adventure, forcing myself to alter the truth, but most of all forcing myself to think that she would return to me, that she would change. Whe...