Through the years …

I haven’t made a traditional St. Patrick’s Day boil dinner for years, and this year was no different.

Don’t get me wrong, I grew up eating the traditional corned beef, cabbage, and potatoes, and I loved it.

I loved the leftovers more. The year I realized I didn’t have to eat the boiled flavorless version to have the good stuff the next day was huge.

It made me question all the traditional food I made through the years. Yes, I’ve changed other stuff too.

This year we had corned beef sandwiches on mock GF rye bread, caramelized cabbage, cole slaw, and doughless knishes.

Mmmmmmmm!

I went through my memories on Facebook and was pleasantly surprised there were no photos of the traditional boil dinner.

Photos of me were shocking, showing how differently I looked through the years. Yikes!

When I looked at some of the photos, memories flooded in—some bad recollections, especially from 2014.

This was the St.Patrick’s Day after my adopted mother, Eileen’s stoke in November 2013.

My face was swollen along with my eyes from crying, stress, guilt, and exhaustion.

The month of February I spent cleaning out Eileen’s apartment since she wasn’t ever going home.

It was a enormous job. It sucked. I thought I would never get through it, but I did somehow.

I prayed a lot to not completely lose my shit every day. I drank like a fish. I felt alone working on her apartment every day.

I went through and touched everything she owned. I kept looking for a folder different from the one with her legal paperwork I needed the night of her stroke.

The folder I was looking for contained my adoption paperwork and all of my biological information.

My mother promised me she had this information for decades. She used it like a carrot dangling in front of a horse.

She told me she didn’t want me to have the folder until after she died. I never found it.

I laid on my back in her living room in her clean and empty apartment on the last day of February, also my birthday, sobbing.

The realization that Eileen lied to me all of those years promising me she had all my birth information.

Well, she didn’t die, but she was dead to me when I realized what a lying bitch she was.

I was in complete disbelief that there was nothing. Zero. Zip. It was like a bad dream I couldn’t wake up from.

This may have been the biggest blow I have ever received in my life. This was worse than anything I could ever think of.

I wouldn’t wish that heartbreak on my worst enemies, not that I have any I know of.

She ripped my heart out, stomped on it, and threw it to the fucking curb. How could a mother do that to her child?

For the next nine years while she was at the nursing home, I pretended being her daughter, looking after her like I promised my father I would when he was dying.

I didn’t think that one through when I said it that’s for sure. Lol.

All I could think of was now I would never know where I came from , who my birth mother was, what were my nationalities.

Did my birth mother ever think about me, especially on my birthdays? Did I have any siblings?

I walked around in a daze, drinking heavily at night and cried my eyes out for weeks. I was in a deep state of depression.

Well, the good news is I got my shit together and I divinely found my birth mother the next month and everything I ever wanted to know was answered.

Yes, she always thought about me on my birthdays. After all the years I spent crying and wondering about that on my birthdays, this made me so happy.

The rest is history and I never said a word to Eileen about it. It did make pretending to be Eileen’s daughter easier after I found J.

Gosh, in the photos, my hair went from red to black, and now my natural color brown. My eyes were like slits from drinking so much.

I was 52 pounds heavier than I am now. I felt like shit all those years. I was unhappy, I can see it in my eyes. It breaks my heart now looking back.

Back to St. Patrick’s Day, as a child I dreaded St. Patrick’s Day and not knowing my nationalities.

My mother upset me every year telling me I was allowed to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day because everyone was Irish on St. Paddy’s Day.

As an adopted child, I wanted to feel like I fit in, and this, “you’re not Irish” thing made me feel horrible like she was rubbing it in that she knew she was.

That made me madder and madder through the years. After I found out my nationalities I never told Eileen I was 78% Irish.

She didn’t deserve to know but I felt smug as hell every St. Patrick’s Day after finding out.

The end of last March, I forgave Eileen for everything she put me through. It made me who I am today.

I am finally free of pain, agony, hurt, and disappointment. I can live in peace and finally take care of myself.

This St. Patrick’s Day is the best I have ever felt mentally, emotionally, and physically. It’s really quite unbelievable to me.

I am grateful where I am but I am even more grateful I never have to go through those degrading St.Patrick’s years again.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day guys. ☘️

***For the record, I didn’t intend for this blog post veering off the subject of corned beef.

However, after I looked at myself in the St. Patrick’s Day photos things changed.

I never know where a post will take me until after it’s written.