Choiceless: A Birthmother’S Story of Love, Loss & Reunion

By Ruby Lee Cornelius

This memoir details the events and emotional struggles surrounding the authors teen pregnancy in the 1970s Midwest. Shunned first because of her interracial relationship and second for her out-of-wedlock pregnancy, Ruby Cornelius ends up against her will in the homea place created to temporarily house and hide the shame of these girls condition. Spanning more than four decades, the author poignantly shares a journey of motherhood lost and gained.

• Language: English
• Publisher: LifeRich Publishing
• Release date: Jun 19, 2018
• ISBN: 9781489717504

Ruby Lee Cornelius

Ruby Lee Cornelius is a mother, grandmother, and business owner. She is a lifetime musician, singer, and recent songwriter. For the past five years, Ruby has been researching and writing about the topic of adoption, focusing on the ever-changing relationships and emotions in the triangle of adoptees, adoptive parents, and birth parents. Raised in a Wisconsin, working-class family, she currently resides in the Pacific Northwest. Visit her at: www.rubyleecornelius.com

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Copyright © 2018 Ruby Lee Cornelius.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This book is a work of non-fiction. Unless otherwise noted, the author and the publisher make no explicit guarantees as to the accuracy of the information contained in this book and in some cases, names of people and places have been altered to protect their privacy.

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ISBN: 978-1-4897-1751-1 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4897-1750-4 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2018945702

LifeRich Publishing rev. date: 06/13/2018

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments

Prologue

Ebony and Ivory

The Home

Home from the Home

Twists, Turns, Surprises

Reuniting

Mirror Images

Epilogue

About the Author

For my children and grandchildren

For Ann

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to thank my many friends in life and recovery who have encouraged me these past few years. Your interest in my life and my story, and our shared tears of compassionate joy, are deeply appreciated.

Thanks to my late parents, who may not have always known the right path, but nevertheless raised six children who produced more children who live in love and integrity. I never would have finished this project had it not been for the strong work ethic I learned at your capable hands. And, to my siblings and siblings-in-law: thanks for answering my questions and filling in the blanks of my fragmented memories in service to an honest retelling of some of these events.

Thank you to my two husbands past, who made space for me in their own productive lives to grow, to learn, and to achieve. Thank you for the lessons in loving and leaving, and for embedding within me the belief that relationships do not fail; they sometimes simply end. Thank you, John, for your daily, loving reminders to focus, focus, focus on my writing!

A huge thank you to my writing mentor, Jennifer Wilhoit, of TEALarbor stories. My dear friend, I could not have done it without your love, wisdom, experience, expertise, and belief in my story. Thanks for hanging in there with me, for crying and laughing and sometimes prodding … week after week … month after month … year after year!

I extend the sincerest gratitude to my children and grandchildren, who bravely gave me permission to write an honest story about an imperfect mother and grandmother. Bless you all!

A special thanks to Kenny, my daughter’s birth father. I couldn’t have done it without him. And to his sister, Sandra, and her daughter and grandchildren who warmly welcomed our Ryanne into their lives—I am forever grateful.

I owe a debt of gratitude I can never repay to Pat, Marcus, and Ryanne’s seven siblings. You gave my daughter a loving, midwestern home filled with all of the usual large-family trappings. Thank you for raising our girl to be the bright, beautiful, and wonderfully talented woman she is today.

And finally, I can never adequately thank Ryanne and Evan for allowing me into their lives. You have given me the gift I thought I would never receive. Your unconditional love, patience, and willingness to know me fill my heart to overflowing. And … without you there is no story!

PROLOGUE

It was 1970, and an out-of-wedlock pregnancy was still considered socially shameful. The Civil Rights movement was in full force. The lawful integration of public schools was in its infancy stage. Black families were cautiously moving into white, urban neighborhoods.

And, I fell in love with a young man who was African American; I fell in love with a young man who was the wrong color. I innocently gave myself to him and became pregnant before everyone else thought that I should. I dared to stand my ground, insisting on giving my child the gift of life rather than to seek an abortion. As the saga played out, those were the last real choices I was allowed to make.

In the end, I did the right thing. Everybody said so: my parents, my social worker, the birth father, and the ladies at the Home for Unwed Mothers. But, it didn’t feel right to me. It felt unfair. Unreasonable. Unnecessary. Childless, I left the home where I served the five-month sentence of my pregnancy.

Eventually I got married, birthing and raising two more children. I have known birthmothers who felt it would be disloyal to the relinquished child to allow themselves the privilege or joy of becoming mothers again. Some were immediately aware they would never be able to do it. Others were oblivious to what feelings might arise and were caught off guard by feelings of guilt and remorse when they found themselves enjoying the eventual role of motherhood. I fell into the second category. I was ill-prepared for the enormity of the emotions, and I had no compass by which to navigate my way through them.

Guilt is a subtle foe, the kind that lurks in the shadows and jumps out from behind doors you swore were securely closed and locked. For me, it would pop up in the middle of a night breastfeeding. Sometimes it was the uninvited guest at a toddler’s birthday party. Frequently, guilt was buried among the gaily-wrapped Christmas packages under the tree. Commonly, I would feel it walking beside me in a mall or at an amusement park whenever I saw a white family with a mixed-race daughter in tow.

When I began writing this book over four years ago, I thought I would simply draft my story. I didn’t expect that in doing so I would finally learn how to navigate the profound grief associated with the loss of my first child while simultaneously experiencing the joy of mothering the two that I raised. I wanted to tell this story for my children and my grandchildren. I wanted to tell this tale of love and loss for myself.

Now in my seventh decade of life, I understand that we make choices and we live out the consequences of them. I also understand that we live through the consequences of the choices that other people make for us. I was confused. I was afraid. I was lonely and ashamed. And, I was choiceless.

I humbly share here the way it was for me.

EBONY AND IVORY

I  first met him in junior high school. I was a smart eighth grader, in a ninth-grade algebra class. At the time, I would not have considered dating a black guy. But it was not an option anyway, because it was painfully obvious that Kenny did not think much of me. And, yet, I liked him. He was cute, smart and funny … a winning threesome! By the time I ran into Kenny again in June 1969, I was sixteen and had dated a number of young men. On that particular Sunday afternoon, I was technically going steady with a white boy named Gus. My girlfriends and I were dancing to a local band under a covered pavilion.

Dancing in the super-flare bell-bottomed jeans, a white T-shirt, and scarf stylishly tied at my neck, I was giving it my all. I looked over, and there was Kenny watching me and smiling. He had a look on his face that became familiar to me over the next two years: a smile and a furrowed brow. I was drawn to him with a force that I had never before experienced. Today, that feeling would warn me to run for my life. But at sixteen, it didn’t matter that I might one day get burned. I just wanted to touch the flame!

I stopped dancing, and I walked right up to him. He said, You’re Ruby.

And being no stranger to the quick response, I said, And, you’re Kenny. Uninhibited by the half bottle of cheap wine I had drunk, I kissed him long and hard. Peering over his shoulder I saw two of my brother’s best friends watching me. One of them simply stared in disbelief, and the other shook his head in disgust. No one in my family’s social circle had dated outside of our race. It just wasn’t done. I knew my brother would hear about Kenny and that he would eventually confront me to discuss it, but under the temporary courage of too much wine, I didn’t care. I was smitten!

My then-steady beau Gus was eighteen years old, and I had met him through a friend. I had accepted his oversized class ring, and wore it wrapped in mohair yarn to fit my left ring finger as an obvious symbol I was taken. He liked me. As was my habit for most of my life, I found myself involved with someone I would never have chosen, but who had chosen me. Tall and thin with longish, messy black hair, he was not really my type. But he was nice enough. To be completely honest, I was really fond of his 1965 red Mustang. Our relationship was brief—perhaps a month long—and unnoteworthy. He would have been an okay friend, but I didn’t know how to have guy friends. Gus was fun, in a casual drinking and partying sort of way. If I wanted to spend time with him, then I would do it on his terms. After all, having any boyfriend was better than having none at all.

A few short days after running into Kenny, Gus and I were sitting in his Mustang on Main Street. A Volkswagen bus was parked directly in front of us. Scooping the loop downtown was our version of social network in 1969. We would drive around for thirty minutes or so, just to see who else was cruising. Then, we would park and loiter on the sidewalk, smoking cigarettes and stealing into someone’s car for a quick drink of beer or wine. Suddenly, the back doors of the VW opened from the inside, and a couple of guys stepped out. Sitting inside in an overstuffed easy chair was Kenny. My mouth agape, I looked through the windshield at his beautiful face, which held that same expression I had seen the week before, the face that challenged me to make a move. It was up to me, because he was clearly available, and, I was with my boyfriend.

Do you know Kenny? Gus asked.

I do.

Why is he staring at you?

I think he wants to talk to me.

I don’t think that’s a good idea.

And, with that, I crawled out of the Mustang, walked to the back of the bus, and asked, Can I come in?

What do you think? That nonchalant, non-committal approach which would become the absolute foundation of our relationship pulled me into the vacuum that was the intense power he held over me. Kenny always said just enough to engage me, but rarely enough to affirm his actual interest in me. I was left to fill in the blanks and proceed based on my interpretation of what was he was communicating. So, I just did what I wanted to do: I crawled up into that bus and stood in front of him while he watched me, waiting for my next move. We smiled at each other. And then I kissed him. I wanted to hold him forever. He peered over my shoulder with a smug expression on his beautiful face. Don’t you think you should lose the extra guy? he asked.

Jumping out of the van and approaching the Mustang, I was already tugging at Gus’ class ring. I reached in through the open window and handed it to him. I have often wished I had been more kind to him. Word spread like wildfire through my group of friends: I had wronged Gus; I was dating a black guy. The friend that had introduced me to Gus wanted nothing more to do with me. She called me and told me to just stay away from her and from her friends.

The 1960s was a time of racial strife throughout the country. Just a year prior, immediately following the local election in which my oldest brother was elected into public service to our city, there was a huge race riot. Only ten days into his term, my brother was thrown into the untenable task of bringing order to the hundred-thousand citizens of our fair city. He enforced a curfew that began at sunset and lasted until dawn. Only people commuting to and from their jobs were allowed on the streets. Within a few days, the climate calmed and order was restored.

At the time, I was a sophomore in high school, and the black students had planned a march on City Hall. A group of black boys thought taking me hostage as the little sister of a prominent city official would be fodder for a good negotiation tool. At least a dozen young men approached and then surrounded me in the hallway. They pushed me from one to another within the tight human barricade they had formed with their bodies. Eventually, a young black teacher approached and insisted they let me go. I dropped my books right where I stood, walked to my locker, cleaned it out, and went home. I never went back to that school. With racial tensions high and my safety uncertain, my parents insisted that I transfer to a private, Catholic high school.

Taking that bit of history into consideration, it would seem that my decision to date outside of my race might have been an unwise choice—one that would eventually become a very disturbing revelation to my parents. After all we did to keep you safe! Common in times past, white people had a tendency to group them together, and it was inconceivable to Mom and Dad that there could be militant, rebellious teenagers as well as studious and responsible ones in the African American or Mexican American cultures. There was an underlying impression of them against us, despite my parents’ declarations that they were above prejudice.

When I made the decision to begin dating Kenny, my troubles began immediately. I was rejected by both friends and family members. Shortly after Summerfest my brother did confront me, telling me his friends had seen me kissing a N-word. I was aware that my next-door neighbor and some younger girls in the neighborhood were dating black guys, so I knew I had somewhere to go just to talk about my relationship. Eventually, I introduced the neighbor girls to some of Kenny’s friends, which made it easier for me to go out with my girlfriends for the evening (always with the intention of meeting Kenny and his guy friends). Kenny and I lived on opposite sides of town and attended different high schools. Neither he nor I had a license to drive, but Kenny had friends who drove and I could usually arrange a place for them to pick me up.

This dating routine was exhausting, particularly keeping all of the stories straight in order to keep our relationship from my parents’ notice. Not surprisingly, it did not always come off without a hitch.

One summer Sunday Kenny and I were cruising in a car with several friends, playing music and drinking beer. I had to go to the bathroom, so we stopped at a gas station. The following day, two police detectives came by our house to investigate a situation that had occurred at a local gas station. They informed my mother that I had been identified as someone who had used the women’s restroom just prior to the attendant finding the sink pulled out from the wall. Their theory was that I—with all of my 120-pound strength—had committed this act of vandalism. I assured them that I had not. After asking many leading questions, with no evidence at all, they reluctantly accepted my denial of the charges. However, one of the officers left with this parting comment: Your daughter’s companions were black boys. Following intense interrogation by my mother, I admitted that I had been in a car with several black guys, one of whom was my boyfriend. That revelation began the summer of perpetual groundings as I continued to see Kenny whenever I could.

I worked a split shift. During my breaks, Kenny would meet me at my downtown office and we would often spend time at the nearby lake.