- Hey, humans.
How's it going? Susan, Ruth here.
Thanks for listening to another episode
of Hey Human Podcast.
This is episode 402, and my guest is Vanessa McGrady.
Vanessa is an award-winning journalist.
She's the author of a memoir, rock Needs River,
which details her struggles conceiving
and ultimately becoming an adoptive parent.
And I read the book, it's a really great book.
It is a roller coaster ride.
The, uh, the, the story that
of her life is a fascinating one.
And the journey that she took
to become a mom is a fascinating one.
That it involves the birth parents, it involves, uh,
an ex-husband who passes away.
I, there's just so much.
It's a really incredible story,
and it's my understanding it's being made into a
television show as well.
It's up for that. So it's very exciting.
Uh, she's also a ceramicist on top of all that other stuff,
and she just opened a new Etsy shop called Art and Intrigue.
So that's exciting.
All right, check out, hey human podcast.com for links.
And to learn more about my guests in the show,
check out Susan ruth.com.
To learn more about me
and my other artistic endeavors, follow Susan Ruths
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Hey, human Podcast on iTunes or iHeart,
or gosh,
pretty much anywhere you get podcasts these days, you will find it.
All right, thank you for listening.
Be well, be kind, be love. And here we go.
Vanessa McCrady, welcome to Hey, human.
- Thanks. It's amazing to be here.
- You and I met at a mutual friend's birthday party.
We were sitting next to each other
and struck up a conversation,
which I absolutely love doing by the way.
I don't know about you, but anytime I'm sitting at a bar
situation talking to strangers, the best ,
and I thought, you're so interesting, your story
as it unfolded as you were telling me about yourself,
I thought this is the perfect person to come on the show.
So I appreciate you, uh, trusting me,
with your story.
- Well, you trusted me. We went to the theater that night
'cause I had an extra ticket, so you didn't know if I,
you know, who I was, but you just came right along.
So I guess that's true mutual admiration and trust.
- Tell me about your upbringing. Where'd you grow up?
What was family like?
- So, I am originally from New York
and my parents divorced when I was very young.
And so I grew up in New York primarily.
And then, um, at 12, my dad moved us
to the Pacific Northwest, and that's where his family was.
Um, and then we would see my mom intermittently
and sometimes have vacations with her.
And then when I was a junior in high school, I just
couldn't live at home anymore.
You know, my dad, I just, I, I'll preface this
by saying I love my dad.
He is, he was bigger than life.
He was the most generous, funny, smart person,
but also I don't think he really knew how to raise a girl.
And so by the time I was in high school, I was just too
confined and ready to leave.
And I was also way out in the country,
and I just felt I needed the city again.
So I went back to New York
and I became a roommate with my mom, which sounds weird
to say, but she was not really a traditional kind of mom.
She was an artist and very, uh,
airy end up there in the, in the clouds.
And then I stayed there and went to college and,
and then kind of bopped around a little bit after that.
- Did you know who you were yet at that point?
- I feel like a lot of times we al, you know, growing up,
we always think we know who we are
and we're consistently evolving.
So I think at any given moment in your whole trajectory,
you can know who you are,
but that might not be the same in five minutes,
- You wrote a book, rock Needs River,
and you express who you are very much through that story.
But I think just knowing you for the short amount
of time I've known you, it feels very much like you have
a strong sense of self grounded sense of self
and reading the book, I feel like that was hard earned in,
in some aspects, but also in other aspects,
it seemed like you kind of started from the get go
with a tenacity.
- Yeah, that's actually a really lovely insight.
Thank you for that. Well, now I'm 56
and I feel probably like the best I've ever felt in my
life, and I've felt the best about my choices.
I, you know, I will say
sometimes I feel like my life is kind of like a,
the trajectory of breaking bad where, you know,
they make one bad choice
and then it leads to another bad choice.
And then, I mean, I've never like, you know, tried
to hide a dead body,
but in the way just, you know, like the chain reaction
of choices are not so, so great.
I have not always been proud of those choices,
but I feel like they did lead me to now
where I am super happy.
I have a beautiful, talented, lovely daughter
and a sweetheart, menschy husband,
and, you know, we're just, you know, trying to, trying
to live the life we want.
- Let's get into young adulthood for you.
Take us through what that was like.
- Well, right now it's kind of a blur.
Um, I, uh, again, not great choices.
I, uh, I came out of college, um,
and I had this wonderful boyfriend
and we moved, he got a job in New Mexico, so I followed him
to Gallup, New Mexico, which is a very small town.
And we stayed there and we worked at the newspaper there.
Um, and it was really quite a learning experience.
And I was, in my early twenties, we were in the middle
of seven Native American reservations,
so we learned a lot about Indian culture.
Um, and we made so many friends.
Um, then it was a very, you know, it was small.
Um, and for our careers, we both had to move on,
and I was ready to get back to the northwest.
So we did that. And then we split up,
like people in their twenties do.
And I, you know, I will say my twenties were kind of, kind
of a blur way too much drinking, for sure, way too much.
And of course, bad choices.
But I lived in the cabin, off the grid.
I had to find a place to live.
And I asked my, my friend who lived on the same road,
I said, do you have anything, a room that I can rent
for you, or a shack that I, this is in Port Townsend,
Washington, so, you know, it's like lots of hippies
and that's normal to, you know, live in somebody's bus
or , whatever.
And she said, no, but there's a place for sale.
It's five acres for sale up the road from me.
And so I just put a down payment on a credit card.
It was a $25,000 piece of land.
Um, I was working as a waitress, so I paid, I think I paid,
I think my mortgage was $200 a month. Those
- Were the days .
- Yeah, I mean, of course I, it was,
it was completely off the grid.
There was no hot water except for
what I would heat up on my stove.
There was, I had solar panels.
It was really drafty and cold and, um, but it was mine.
So that was, that was my, uh, most of my twenties.
- H how did you take care of the ne, especially as a woman
who menstruates every month, uh, how did you deal
with all the general things
of living bodily functions,
- , bathe, you know, I had, um,
a water runoff system.
So in the summertime I just took, uh, there was a,
there's the shower bags,
and you fill the shower up with warm water
and you hang 'em on the side of the
house and you take your shower.
My mom lived in town, so when I needed a really good,
you know, head to toe scrubbing, I would go see her.
But I really had a, you know, I had a stove and I had water
and light and fireplace and a propane heater.
So it was just, I will say
that I do appreciate every single hot shower
I've ever taken since then.
And also I am glad I don't have
to pee in a tomato can anymore ,
But I'll always, I'll always be able to do that.
So now I know that if I ever had to do it again, I could,
but I would do it better.
I know that one time, there was one time where
as I was single with my dog,
one time I was replacing the chimney and I was on the roof
and I was putting the chimney through the, the hole
and I was just wishing there was somebody below to catch it
and to help adjust it.
And that I, I remember that moment so clearly thinking, wow,
this would just be easier with someone who was as
invested in this as I was.
So I knew I could do it again, but,
but I'd just do it better this time.
- Do you still have that land?
- I don't, I sold it. I was,
I was winter waitressing in a northwest tourist town,
you know, and sometimes I'd have like $7 tips at night.
So I ended up having to take a job job in Seattle
where I worked for a magazine
and, you know, had a regular apartment and a salary. And
- You always had a writing inclination.
Was that in the back of your mind to pursue
or did it just come that you fell into things?
- Well, I came at it from a couple angles.
First, I come from a writer family.
My dad and my uncle Mike were,
and my grandfather as well were all writers.
And they were pretty, um, pretty prolific.
And my dad, uh, fun fact, my dad, uh, pat McGrady
and his brother Mike McGrady were the first two brothers in
history to be on the New York Times bestseller list.
So, I know, I know you can't see this if you're listening,
but I'll show you this picture.
This is, that's a picture of them from People Magazine
when they, when, so what the picture is for,
um, anyone who doesn't see it,
and maybe if you wanna post a copy of it, you can.
But it's two middle aged men
with Smith Corona typewriters in front of them,
and they're each tapping on each other's typewriter.
So, and it's black and white.
Um, so, so yes, I come from a family of writers,
but also I don't feel like I was like really
good at anything else.
And I couldn't think of what I would, what else I would do
my, most of my career besides, uh, service work.
I've been, I've been a writer one kind or another.
- What was your dad and what were their book that,
was it a book they wrote together
or was it a book they wrote separately?
- My dad wrote a book called The Pritikin Diet,
or pr a Pritikin program for diet
and Exercise with a guy named Nathan Pritikin.
And my Uncle Mike wrote,
co-wrote the Linda Lovelace autobiography.
- Whoa. - That was called Ordeal.
So those, yeah, two very different books,
but they both were, were on the
bestseller list at the same time.
- Was your dad a big health nut?
- Well, you know, this is funny.
I was just thinking about this this morning.
He was, you know, most of the time as he got older,
he was not super healthy.
I mean, he always had extra weight
and sort of wasn't exercising 'cause he had bad knees,
and he would stash Oreos and ice cream for a company.
I'm making air quotes here for a company,
but we were very restrict, like we had
to be on the Pritikin diet when we were kids.
And I was just thinking, wow,
I feel like I was thinking this this morning
as I was feeding my daughter that I feel like we spent a lot
of time really hungry for, for food that was not,
I mean, we never, you know, we're purposely starved,
but it was a low fat, low protein diet back then,
and they didn't, I don't think they knew enough.
And it was, I feel like we just were so hungry all the time.
I mean, I guess he was a health nut in that way
for other people, but not necessarily for himself.
- That's always the way, isn't it? ?
What happens now after college,
after the land? What happens next?
- So, I had moved to Seattle, I guess it was the year 2000.
And I was working, I came
to visit in California to visit friends.
And I was just so struck by how beautiful it was
and how vibrant I was actually in your part of town.
It was in Santa Monica, and the beach was so gorgeous
and everybody seems just like anything could happen here.
Like if you wanted to build a rocket ship,
you could find people who also wanna build a rocket ship.
And by gum you're gonna get that rocket ship up in the air.
So then I went back to Seattle where I was living
and I was being, um, a playwright, uh, and a producer.
And I had kind of failed.
I wasn't a great playwright at that time
because I was so concerned about what the product
was going to be.
I sort of lost sight of the actual art of it.
So I had finished a, a second round of a show
that was really successful the first time.
The second time I, my theater was too big
and the run was too long and it wasn't that good.
And, and then mean, in the meantime, the boyfriend
that I was living with started cheating on me.
And then he moved right next door, .
So I could see him all the time.
And I just felt, you know, I feel like it's time to go.
I feel like it's just time to time to move.
So in two, and then my dad had died two years before that,
and I just felt like, I think it's time to leave.
So I thought either I'll go back to New York
or come to California.
And I just thought, well, I'll try California.
And that was in 2005.
And here we are 19 years later,
and I, I guess I'm still here.
It's still my home. So,
- And it's sunny all the time, unlike New York .
- It's true. - Although I love New York and I don't,
- We build your rocket ship with you in New York,
either. Ah,
- All along you we're starting to feel the, the Call
of Mom hood and that became a battle cry almost.
- Yes, in my late twenties, I started thinking, oh,
you know, maybe I'll have a baby in two years.
In two years. And it was always two years.
And then I got pregnant
and I was surprisingly so excited to have this baby.
I was just over the moon
and I had, um, my, I was working in a, at a magazine
and on my office wall, I had a list
where people could write names, suggest names,
and, um, people started giving me little
things 'cause I was so excited.
My cousin's wife gave me this beautiful blanket.
And, and then at 12 weeks I miscarried.
And it was really devastating for anybody who, um,
I mean, I guess it's, it's understandable whether you've
miscarried or not, but it was just,
and then I realized like, oh, I actually really do want
to become a mother,
but I also had never really found the right partner.
I, I have a very close friend we had dated on
and off from the Port Townsend days,
and he is, you know, a lovely guy.
And he came to stay with me in, in California
for a little while, and we actually tried to have a baby.
We, uh, we had two more miscarriage,
early miscarriages after that.
And then I started thinking like, wow,
maybe this baby is not gonna come outta my hoo-ha.
Like, I feel like this baby has
to happen a different way, probably.
And then cut to, uh,
2008 when I, uh,
I met my daughter's father and we worked together
and we got married and ex, but he also had had a vasectomy.
His kids were mostly grown and, but he was on board.
And so I had already started the adoption process
and I, you know, had done all my paperwork
and background checks and, um, and he got on the train
and, and did that as well.
And then exactly nine months
after we got married that we,
I held my daughter for the first time.
- Let's dig in a little to the story around that.
You wrote an entire book about this whole journey,
and I highly recommend it.
It's, it's a great book, really, , what struck me is
that every time you would step forward one foot, you had
to step backward two feet.
And, but you kept stepping forward, which a lot of people,
I think would give up in, in, in feeling overwhelmed
by it all, but you just kept moving forward.
- But don't you think that's true
with almost anybody who wants something?
Like if you're an actor?
- No, no, I don't, I don't think that,
that's why I, I, that's why I find it.
Oh, when I see it in people, I, I like to remark on it.
It is remarkable. 'cause I think there are a lot of things
that we do and don't do for ourselves that really lead
to a lot of self-sabotage
or feelings that we're not worth a life
that we think we want or deserve
and that we might work toward it,
but still do things to
ebb away at that goal, even if, you know, a lot
of times it's unconscious.
I think that people just have this self-sabotage default.
It's funny, you could read some of your history
as being sabotage esque,
but it never felt, it never really felt like that.
It felt more the opposite.
It felt more like, I'm gonna do this thing
and see what happens next.
It felt more like leaps of faith, if you will, than
I'm gonna do a thing that is probably not gonna work out.
It was, it was almost like an optimistic view
of a pessimistic world or something.
I'm not, I'm not sure how to, to phrase it exactly.
- I, in my pottery studio,
said something the other day about his work
and he said, it's ready, fire, aim.
And I think that's a good way to, to, um,
to describe what you're saying.
Yes.
- Yeah. Does that, I mean, does
that feel like an accurate description of you?
- You know, it does, but I, you know, I don't think, I mean,
I'm just not the person who planned out their life.
And so, so many people do.
When I wanted things and set my, I'm good at manifesting,
I'd say like, there was no way I was not gonna have a baby.
Like I just knew somehow.
But it was also a knowing that I'd had for a long time,
that I would, that I would be,
and I was for many years a single mother.
And I don't know how I knew that,
but I just always knew that.
- Well, you got signs along the way as well.
There were what some might consider woowoo,
but you seem to, the universe seemed to keep winking at you
- Love how you put that.
Yes. So I would say the first sign was
I went to Israel to visit my brother who was raised there.
He, um, his mother was from my dad's first marriage.
And we were standing at this beautiful church.
It was a beautiful Russian Orthodox church on the top
of a hill in Jerusalem.
And I start, I just went by myself
and I started walking around
and I was standing, standing in the graveyard
where they buried, you know, the nuns and everything.
And, and suddenly I just heard this voice
and there was nobody around me.
I cannot tell you if it was male or female
or where it came from, but the words were,
it's okay to ask for a miracle.
And I, you know, I heard this and I looked around
and there was nobody there.
And so I just felt like, okay, well I guess this is,
you know, good place as any to ask
for a miracle top of a hill in a holy city.
So probably can't get much closer.
So I just said, I would like to find someone to, who wants
to have a child with me, and I'd like to be a mom.
And then I came back from that trip
and I met my husband at work like the next week.
So I mean, I met the man who would become my husband. Yeah,
- I've heard that voice before myself.
And it also had to do with the concept of miracles.
I'll have to tell you that story sometime. Oh,
- I'm so happy to detour if you want to now.
But , we, yeah,
- It, well, it's kind of a long story,
but the, the gist of it, not only am I a miracle,
not only are you a miracle, but everything is a miracle.
Our ex, our existence,
- It's a miracle.
And I, you know, I was thinking about this, I was in, um,
Ireland last summer, and I'm, our family is Irish.
And I started learning a little bit more about all
of the evictions and the unfairness
and the persecution that Irish people had, um,
under the English rule.
And I wrote to my cousins
and I was saying, do you know how amazing it is
that we are here?
We have survived all of that.
And I mean, you think about really everybody,
you think about everybody in this country
who survived coming from somewhere else,
or, you know, if they're indigenous, survived, you know,
white people, white people, colonization, you know,
if they came from Africa, you know, if their ancestors were
so slaves, they survived that.
- Or women who have survived sexual violence
throughout history. It's,
- I mean, it's even a miracle that like,
that sperm chose that egg.
- Every little thing that had to happen for, for us
to even be sitting here right now.
- Yep, yep.
Just sitting in a miracle all the time,
even though we forget, you know, it's so easy to forget.
Of course. And I mean, how lucky are we now
that we can sit about, sit here and talk about miracles
and not have to worry, like, oh,
where am I sleep tonight? You
- Know?
Exactly. I think that's, yeah,
- We have a, we have certain privilege to be able to do that
- For sure.
Or the fact that we can talk about anything we want to.
And no storm trooper will come through the door
to haul us away, which is happening today in lots of places.
- Not yet anyway. - Yeah, not yet. Anyway.
Well, let's get back to you. You come home
and you meet the man,
and he agrees, even though it's my understanding
that he was a little on the fence about it,
but he loved you.
- Yeah, he loved me. We loved each other.
He had a very messy divorce, uh, that was
impending when we met.
And then of course he kind of moved it along once we met,
and then we were married, became parents,
and then his alcoholism took over.
And I, you know, I really
love addicts so much.
Like, they're so fun.
They're so generous, they're so gregarious,
and it's so wild and amazing and free
and fun until it's not, if you've ever known.
- Oh, yes. I preferred them in my younger days
as well. Yeah.
- So, um, so we had to split up
because I was very well a, I was, you know,
just kind of turned off.
- You, you sounded like you were in denial of it
for quite a long time.
- Well, I mean, I was complicit in it for some of the time.
There was like the, for the year
before I didn't drink so that
we could have at least one sober person in the household.
I didn't drink at all. And, you know,
I always liked my glass of wine or, you know, a cocktail
or whatever, but I, I felt like I couldn't even do that.
'cause we had a little baby, and then there was another time
where we were going to a Christmas party
and he veered across a four lane highway
with a baby in the back.
And I felt like, oh my God, this is not safe for us.
I didn't realize he'd been drinking
before we got in the car.
So we turned around and went home.
And that was really the beginning of the end.
And very, very sadly, he died in 2019,
um, of alcoholism and liver failure.
So we miss him every day, you know,
and I, I wish it had turned out different.
- Yeah. How did your daughter,
how old was your daughter when he passed?
- She was seven, and she is almost 13 now.
She is very protective of the memory of her dad.
She does not talk about him a lot,
but I know she clo holds him close, you know,
close in her vest.
And she has, um, you know, she has her pictures up
and her, you know, we talked the other day
and I said, you know, I've never seen you cry about daddy,
have you, you know, is that something
that you feel like you can do or you don't wanna do?
Or, and she said she has.
But I think grief in children is a lot different
and less straightforward than it is in adults.
- Mm-Hmm. . Yeah.
And it can manifest in a lot of different ways,
of course, for anyone.
What's interesting also about your story, , is that
you were not, you were not closed off to the idea
of knowing about her birth parents
or her knowing about her birth parents.
And that took you on an incredibly interesting journey,
in my humble opinion.
Can we talk about that a little bit?
- Sure. So her parents, uh, were named, are named,
her birth parents are named Bridgette
and Bill, we met them four days before Grace was born.
They had already kind of gone
through another prospective family
and a single woman, I think didn't work out.
And then my, our social worker called us.
I, we had done all this work
and I had been waiting basically, you know, in the,
in the mix for two years.
So just to back up the history of adoption, um,
I'm not going to give you a novel or a book or,
or treat us on it, but,
but people should know that up until about the eighties,
most adoptions were a closed file.
So, or they were like with kin
and children would not know who their birth parents were.
And unless they actively did a kind of a search
or a records, uh, request
or something, most of the time there was really not,
not any contact between the birth parent
and there was there, the birth parents were not able
to pick usually who, you know, would become
caregivers for their children that they had.
And so it was just, you know, you're,
you're next in line, here you go.
Did you want a boy? Did you want a girl?
Here's your, you know, here's your child.
So, so that changed quite a bit starting in the eighties
with open adoptions.
And that allowed, um, all, all three,
uh, three pieces of the, of the puzzle, the birth parents,
the adoptive parents and the children to know each other
and to be equally important how the birth parent wanted
to place their child, who they wanted to place, place them
with, what terms they wanted.
So some, you know, some birth parents want no contact,
some want, you know, in the occasional photo.
And then some want to be ingrained in the lives.
It's not legally binding what you ask for initially.
And then often it changes.
So sometimes people are pretty sure they want that,
but also, you know, their circumstances change, um,
and they don't, or vice versa.
So, um, we had met Bridget
and Bill, we thought we were a good match,
and we were, they were, um, musicians.
The, the pregnancy was a surprise.
Bridget said she did not know for six months
that she was pregnant until one day she looked down
and there was like a basketball in her middle.
And so they were not really in the position
to parent at that time.
They were very close to being homeless.
Bill worked at a fast food restaurant.
Bridget could not find a job.
She had just come from Ohio the year before
and had been working in grocery,
but she just couldn't, could not land a job here.
And they just, yeah, they just were not in a good position.
Uh, I, I wanna footnote this by saying that, uh, I hate,
one thing I hate the most about the United States is
that we don't care about mothers
and children as much as we say we do.
I would never, ever, ever want a decision to be financial or
because, you know, for someone to place a child
for adoption, I actually think that's inhumane.
And it's inhumane that, um, you know, that
so many people do have to make that choice.
'cause we don't take care of our people.
But that's, I agree. Yeah.
So, uh, but they also were not, you know, emotionally
ready to do that either.
And so, uh, so then on, you know,
on the day she was born, uh, it is funny.
I, uh, I had to go, I was at work,
I was at working at this big corporation,
and I had to go to this business trip
and I asked if I couldn't go
because, you know, my baby was gonna be born soon.
And my boss was like, well, you know, why don't you just go,
she's a first time mom
and it'll take a while, you know, you can come back.
And then I'm at this hotel for like a, I don't know,
12 hours or something,
and I get this call, this text from Bill Bridgets
and Labor Send Steve, you know, husband.
I'm like, wait a second.
And so I have to come from Northern California,
and I'm like running for the plane
and I'm saying, my baby's gonna be
born, my baby's being born.
And people are like, ma'am, excuse me, classic.
Running through the airport.
And then my friend who was gonna pick me up
and take me to the hospital was late, you know?
And he's just like, on my way, on my like,
I'm like, oh my God, it's just Burbank.
You know, you live like 10 minutes away, really.
But finally, you know, we made it.
And Grace was, you know,
well Steve was already in the hospital room and Bridgette,
and he's called Peter in the book,
but his name's really Steve, uh, Bridget
and Bill were there, and there was this like tiny little
fussy baby in her clear plastic bin.
And I picked her up and she stopped crying.
And then she, you know, I became her mom.
- At first, you didn't really know
how involved you were going to be with the birth parents.
- I definitely didn't know
that they would live with us for a while.
So they became homeless when Grace was about two.
Steve, by that time, had moved out because of the drinking.
So I was single momming it with, you know, with just me
and Grace in my little apartment in Glendale.
They let me know that they had become homeless
and they were sleeping on the street.
And it was, I wanna say it was like Thanksgiving.
It was around Thanksgiving,
and I had invited them over
for like a little pre Thanksgiving where they could,
you know, see Grace and, you know, we could all be together
and kind of be like this family.
I mean, it was the kind of family.
And then it was this year, it was 2010, uh,
it was 2011, and it was one of those winters
where it just did not stop raining.
Those, you know, LA Rain I think is different than a lot
of other place Rain, like when it decides to rain, it goes
for it, you know, , there's no stopping it.
Um, they were living in a tent
in on the street at that time.
So I just thought, well, that's not acceptable.
I think, I think almost anybody would say
that's not acceptable if they knew somebody who was,
you know, knew and loved somebody who was like,
living on in a tent.
So I said, well, why don't you come stay with me?
I guess the mistake there was really not putting
boundaries or expectations around that,
or how long they could stay
or, you know, what my terms were for them staying,
you know, so they were in
and out for a while, you know,
sometimes they would wanna go back to the street
or to the shelter because they were closer
to their services, I guess.
Um, but then every now
and then they would like show up on my doorstep.
And then there was one day where I just like,
you know, I had tried to you, I,
and this is how naive I was, I thought, oh, if I just talk,
you know, if I bring in my friend who works at Trader Joe's
who can tell 'em how to get a job at Trader Joe's,
they'll go get jobs, you know,
when not realizing like it's systems.
Like they needed entire systems to help them.
They needed housing systems, medical, mental health,
you know, just so many other systems that I was just not
able to even understand until much later they decided.
And I think there became some friction too,
because like, I would, I don't know what they did all day.
So I was, you know, out working at this like, toxic job
where I had to wear Mrs.
Separates and, you know, drive to work and drive back.
And my baby was in, you know, grace was in daycare.
And um, and I was like, oh my God,
what did you guys do all day?
And like, I guess they just played music
all day in my house.
So I became a little bit like, all right, well let's,
let's get a plan going here.
And that just never really happened.
And so when they left, they left,
but in the meantime, we, you know, I was doing a lot
of personal essay and I wrote a story
for the New York Times at that time,
the column was called Mother Load,
and it was a parenting column.
And I wrote about us,
and they asked me to write about it as well.
They were completely on board
because they felt like, well, if people know our story,
maybe they would wanna help us.
And they actually did get quite,
I put it post in my mom's group,
or I, again, no, I guess it was on Facebook.
And tons of people gave, they sent them gift cards,
they sent them clothes, they sent them,
one guy from Michigan sent them a bunny cage
for their rabbit, like an actual bunny cage in the mail.
Like they just, people just came out of the woodwork
to help them, um, which was truly lovely
and inspiring that human heart just has no bounds.
But, you know, we af after a while, like,
it was just really not a sustainable situation.
And the thing that clinched it for me was Grace,
I think was starting to become very anxious.
So she was crying, she was clinging to me.
She wouldn't, she wouldn't go to sleep without me sleeping,
you know, like right on me.
And I was like, okay, I think this coming
and going is not good for her.
I think it's good for her to know them and to love them,
but the coming and going is not working.
So I, you know, I didn't invite them back.
And then we'd, we'd, we saw each other
several times after that.
But I think when the book came out, they, uh,
I don't know, I, I just felt like they maybe thought they
were too exposed or something.
Um, I don't know. I don't really know.
How long has it been since you've heard from them?
Um, since 2019.
And I do have a, I have a contract with them
that I would give a portion of anything I make from the book
to them, from the book sales.
You know, when I got my advance, I cut a check
and then the second time I cut, I cut a check
and I still have those checks in my file
because they didn't want them
and they, you know, refused to take it.
So That's interesting. Yeah.
So someday, you know,
if they ever want it, there's money for them.
But, um, but I, you know,
and hopefully if Grace ever wants to know them, um,
they will be accessible to her.
Yeah. Let's talk about the book a bit.
I'd never written a book before,
or I guess I'd had like, pieces of books
and I never really felt like I had enough to say
for one book enough about one thing to say for a book.
And then, so the New York Times article ran,
it got a lot of attention.
There was a, an enterprise at that time called She Books,
which was shorter eBooks kind of geared toward women.
And these were like smaller books, like 20,000 words maybe.
And so I contacted somebody there
'cause I thought, oh, well maybe I'll
just expand this article.
And she first accepted it
and said, actually, this should be a real book.
Call this agent, see if, you know, she's interested.
And then I called the agent and the agent said, not for me,
but it is for Cheryl pka, I think,
who was an agent in New York.
She had done her, um, this, uh,
thesis on open adoption 'cause she's adopted.
And we had a wonderful conversation and she became my agent
and she helped me a lot with a book over,
gosh, probably about five years.
You know, she really helped me shape
that book and figure out.
And then, I mean, there were times where I was like,
I don't think I have enough to say.
And she's like, okay. And like, well, but wait a second.
You know, maybe I do. But she, you know,
she was like a real reality check person.
And I mean, there was a little bit of, ah, I know I told you
to do this, but not working for me.
And so, you know, finally
after the umpteenth draft, I just said, all right,
the next person who changes this book is gonna be the
editor who buys it.
And, uh, it was acquired at by little a
and they were wonderful there, the literary imprint, um,
of Amazon's publishing.
Not self-publishing, but publishing arm.
And, um, they were really like a wonderful,
wonderful publisher, wonderful experience.
I know people have thoughts about Amazon,
but for, I think they do take care of their creators.
It was very supportive and really wonderful.
- Yeah. And you did the Audible as well,
or the voice version?
- I did, yeah. I got to go to, I had to audition to
voice my own book, ,
but I guess I passed the audition and I went to Michigan.
Beautiful. Beautiful.
I wanna say it's not, it, it wasn't Grand Rapids,
but it's where Audible headquarters are.
And spend a few days recording the book,
and yeah, it was, it was a, it was a great experience.
It was exhausting, but it was great.
- That's wild. You had to audition to read your own book.
- I can see why they would do that though.
Because what if you were an author who didn't either,
didn't want to, or just didn't sound like,
wasn't comfortable reading?
I know that, um, I was listening to a Roxanne Gay audio book
and I was really surprised
and I was like, oh, Roxanne, that's like,
she's got such a beautiful voice
and speaking voice, but it wasn't her.
That was, it was somebody else,
but she, I totally believed it was Roxanne Gay.
'cause they got such a good match for her. Yeah.
- Yeah. I love her books. - Yeah, she's, yeah,
- She's great.
Well, what happens next? And tell people
where they can find the book
and tell people what you're working on and,
and how is Grace doing and all of that.
- Um, you can find the book at any
bookseller if it's not on the shelf.
'cause it's a little, it's five years old at this point,
so it's probably not, you know,
on all your indie bookstore books, bookstore shelves,
but you can definitely find it online.
bookshop.org is a great one if you wanna support
independent booksellers.
Also, Amazon, of course, it's called Rock Needs River.
And now I am working on a couple things.
I'm working on a memoir that
connects grief with things that are growing in my garden.
So it's, uh, it's essays, it's, it's highly personal.
I'm not sure like anyone will ever wanna read it,
but I like working on it.
And then something completely different, which is an adult
graphic novel about a reluctant superhero
called Laser Pussy.
- Okay, dig it. I dig that.
So who's the Rock and who's the river in your title?
- The reason I chose that title was because I went to Texas.
So Bridget and Bill had moved to Texas
and they were staying in family, a family house, weirdly,
I think they didn't have running water either,
so they would, you know, have to go get their water from,
from the, um, store or something, the library or something.
I was exhausted
after interviewing them, talking to them for three days.
'cause I really wanted to find out.
I, I thought their story was so important
and they told me so many things that I didn't know about,
like social workers tried to talk, talk them out
of placing their child, placing grace for adoption.
And it was a wild ride for them too.
So I wanted to know more about that.
So I flew to Texas, interviewed them,
and then to kind of decompress after all that I drove.
And I was in Kerrville, which is a beautiful little spot.
I just drove and drove and there was like a rainbow.
And I sat on this, uh, rock near,
near a riverbank, I guess.
And I just noticed like, oh, they're symbiotic.
So the river would not have its path
or its form without the rocks,
but the rocks kind of need the river
to shape them and to move them.
So it was very symbi symbiotic.
So I would say, you know,
sometimes you're the rock, sometimes you're the river.
But in this case, I think because they were so moving
and flowing, Bridget and Bill were the river,
and I probably was the rock that could provide that stable
home for, for grace
and the love of a, you know, parent,
like proper love for a parent.
- Yeah, in a way, I suppose the fact
that they haven't been in touch shows
that they have faith in you as a mom.
But I wonder for grace, I've read about kids
who grow up, who were adopted
and grow up, have this, no matter how loving the family is,
have a a sense somewhere in them of abandonment or,
or a, there's something missing feeling
and it's well documented with adopted kids.
And I'm just, I'm curious how she has found
herself in all of that.
I know she's young, so it's a little tricky
to speak about her, but, uh,
but that idea that now they've gone away, how,
how does that all figure in?
- So t yes, typically they, they say that, you know, people
who are adopted do have some kind of original wound from,
you know, the parents that they grew with versus the parents
who, no matter, I mean, I was there the first day, so,
you know, I was always her mom,
but also I didn't want her to have any mystery
or, you know, wondering who they were.
And so that's why I was so adamant about her knowing them,
arranging the visit visits, you know, she even went to,
maybe this was a mistake, I don't know,
but she even went to see, you know, where they lived
and they explained, it was like camping
and she was little, she was like six
or seven, they explained, oh yeah, this is like camping
and you know, this is what we cook our food on, et cetera.
But I think she, you know, she learned like, oh, I,
I think she clocked very early on that like,
they were not well suited to parenthood.
And that's what I wanted for her is to under,
you know, have like a com.
I never lied. I, you know,
I always show like when she turned two,
I gave her this picture book that showed her in the hospital
with everybody and her, you know, the day legalization,
you know, when we're all in the courtroom together.
And, you know, so she, you know, she has those
tangible things that she can look at to, you know, remember
I ask almost every single
person who tells me they're adopted.
'cause people always come up and tell, you know,
after, you know,
they know Sure wrote about it, always tell me about it.
And it's a, I just love our adoption community so much
and, you know, whether they're birth moms
or people who were adopted or adoptive parents, um,
and I ask every adoptive person, you know,
about their experience and some of them, you know,
or do you really have this like aching yawning chasm of,
you know, some emptiness in them
that really wishes they could know.
Um, I would say for the most part though, you know,
some people, I've met people who just do not care.
Like they couldn't care less. They've had a great life.
They love their family.
They, you know, are grateful that their parent, you know,
their birth parent, um, placed them for adoption.
And then I know, uh, other people who say
I finally met my birth mom, I, it was amazing to see that,
you know, we had the same hair and we both like this thing
and you know, like all these genetic, you know,
wonderful surprises,
but they're also like, I'm so glad
that my parents raised me.
So I mean, it's really a huge, huge spectrum.
And no one adoption story is the same as another.
- That makes complete sense. Absolutely. Yeah.
What is your other creative outlets?
Let's talk about that for a moment.
- Okay, so I've always considered myself a pretty creative
person, but I really stuck to writing.
My mom was a wonderful, wonderful artist. She was a painter.
And then, you know, my husband goes,
he is like constantly going to improv.
So he goes to improv, as you know, as a theater
that does unscripted plays.
And it's usually long form plays or genre plays.
It's not, you know, like joke after joke after joke.
So I found myself getting like a little jealous
that he was doing that and wishing that I could do it.
And then I thought, wait a second, I can do that.
Why don't I sign up? And so I started taking class at Inpro.
So that's one creative thing I'm, uh, doing.
Another thing is I always wished that I could play guitar
and I picked it up a few times,
but I never really, I never stuck with it.
Or the class was over or the guy moved away or whatever.
And then I just, I, uh, found a teacher
and I just, I've been learning guitar for a year
and a half now.
And then the other thing is ceramics.
Like I always wanted to do ceramics.
I just felt like I kept wondering why I'm
not doing these things.
Like everything is not, doesn't exist in the future.
You have to make it exist now.
So I'm super happy with my prolific creative.
I think I glazed like 24 pieces this week or something.
So it's a lot of nature based ceramics that I'm doing
and super into now.
- And you've got an Etsy store
- Called Art and Intrigue Studio.
- Love it. That's wonderful. Congrats on that. Thank
- You. Thank you.
- What are your socials for people to find you? Oh,
- I'm on, uh, Instagram at, uh, Vanessa McGrady.
- And do you have a website? - I do.
It's vanessa mcgrady.com.
- Yeah, I thought you did, but always like to ask
and I put links on hey human podcast.com for people
to find all of the stuff we talk about easily
and accessibly.
Thank you so much. I just, I find you delightful.
Anytime you wanna hang out, you let me know.
I, I, oh my God,
- We talking, I actually saw our mutual friend Charles the
other day and I'm like, she's so interesting.
Like, what can't she do?
But also, I mean, you're an artist, you're a musician,
you're a podcaster, you're a writer.
I mean, you have so many things you do
and you're a nice person.
Like, you're like a truly, genuinely like caring,
loving, beautiful person.
So I'm so happy I got a chance to know you. Well,
- Right back at you.
Thank you for that. I appreciate it.
You're a miracle , and so am I. Yay .
Thank you for listening everybody. Thank you Vanessa.
And I will be sending you a text
so I can go get lunch. .
- Thanks for having me. Bye
- Bye.
Rate review and subscribe to Hey, human podcast on iTunes
or wherever you get your
- Thanks.
Bye.