{"id":6702,"date":"2026-01-04T21:43:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-04T21:43:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thepatswalk.com\/?p=6702"},"modified":"2026-01-04T21:43:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-04T21:43:11","slug":"my-mom-said-temporary-her-return-to-sender-crushed-my-hope","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thepatswalk.com\/?p=6702","title":{"rendered":"My Mom Said \u201cTemporary.\u201d Her \u201cReturn to Sender\u201d Crushed My Hope."},"content":{"rendered":"<p>My mom told me leaving was \u201ctemporary.\u201d I was nine, sitting on a worn couch as she said she couldn\u2019t handle me anymore. Social workers came, and I was sent to foster care with only that word\u2014<em>temporary<\/em>\u2014to hold onto. For years I waited, hoping she\u2019d come back.<\/p>\n<p>At eleven, I mailed her a birthday card, only to have it returned \u201cReturn to Sender.\u201d The social worker wouldn\u2019t say it, but I knew then she wasn\u2019t coming. By thirteen, after multiple homes, I stopped hoping and learned to survive alone.<\/p>\n<p>By twenty-nine, I had my own loving family and a life I was proud of\u2014until one day a woman showed up at my door with cookies, claiming to be my mother. Her regretful explanation was that she struggled back then and \u201cthought about me,\u201d but her eyes drifted to my children\u2019s photos.<\/p>\n<p>When I asked why she came now, she said life was hard, then mentioned \u201che\u201d\u2014my brother I\u2019d never known. She admitted she left me to make room for him. I realized then she hadn\u2019t abandoned me temporarily\u2014she\u2019d replaced me.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\"><p>My mom told me leaving was \u201ctemporary.\u201d I was nine, sitting on a worn couch as she said she couldn\u2019t handle me anymore. Social workers <a class=\"mh-excerpt-more\" href=\"https:\/\/thepatswalk.com\/?p=6702\" title=\"My Mom Said \u201cTemporary.\u201d Her \u201cReturn to Sender\u201d Crushed My Hope.\">[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6702","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepatswalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6702","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepatswalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepatswalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepatswalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepatswalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6702"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thepatswalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6702\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6703,"href":"https:\/\/thepatswalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6702\/revisions\/6703"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepatswalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6702"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepatswalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6702"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepatswalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6702"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}