It would be easy to see a mom struggle to recognize she is incapable of dealing with her child’s illness and wonder why she can’t see how much more her child needs but maybe doing I only wonder because my parents always gave me what I needed.

It would be easy to see a mom fail to recognize her child’s cries for “mom” are cries for another and wonder at her being out of touch but maybe I only wonder because I see her child’s relationships and suspect her concepts of “mom” are based on experiences beyond her biological mom’s experience.

It would be easy to see a mom fail and think the child needs to be elsewhere, but it’s difficult to think of the pain the mom must feel faced with the choice, relinquish parental rights in exchange for a yearly visit or go to court and lose even that shred of mother-daughter bond. At least the foster parents forced a different arbitrator to hear the case because the first one was pressuring the mom to settle. I wonder which would be easiest to live with five years down the road, fighting to the end, risking no contact in a battle for custody of my kid with very little hope of winning versus option B, watching them grow up well cared for with little contact knowing I gave them up.

Some times “best for the child” is still a crappy solution.