Adoptive Families Magazine

A recent email came from Adoptive Families Magazine asking readers to respond to the stories in the most recent issues. The message gives you a little box into which you can type your reactions. I think that's hard. I've been fighting with God a little about whether I should try to write more, even professionally. I think I'm a good writer. Not a great writer, I wouldn't liken myself to Jane Austen (actually I have a hard time understanding her), but generally I like to read my own thoughts. Vain much?

So instead of trying to type my response in the space provided, I thought I'd address my reactions here first and then go to the little box.

In the April 2009 issue of AF (funny, right, IF ladies?) there is an article written from an adoptive father's perspective called Grief and Joy. The description of this article is this: "Our birthmother match and my daughter's birth were picture-perfect. But after years of grappling with infertility, I could only focus on what might go wrong."

Once Randy and I shared a meal with some cool friends who were waiting for the birth of a baby with whom they had been matched. For those readers who are not hip on open adoption, a "match" is somewhat like a referral in an international adoption. In domestic infant open adoption the expectant mom chooses adoptive parents from their profile presented to the expectant mom from the agency (not sure how private adoptions work). You are then considered "matched." In our case, we were matched with BB's birthmom two weeks before he was to be born.

(A quick clarification. I use the term "birthmom" now because BB is legally our child. Before the baby's first mom signs the Termination of Parental Rights paperwork (TPR) though, she is an "expectant mom" if pregnant or "mom" if the baby has been born.)

One of the topics of discussion that night was how Randy and I felt during that waiting time and during the 48 hours in the hospital before K could legally sign the TPR paperwork. The author of "Grief - and Joy," Mr. Cuchens, felt that the disappointments of infertility led him to miss out on some of the joy when their daughter was born. I don't really feel like those disappointments played in to that circumstance for me. I think in our case the reality that K could decide to parent after BB was born was a part of adoption rather than a continuing saga of infertility. Adoption felt like a whole new ballgame to me after the monthly ups and downs of infertility.

We only had two weeks from the time we were matched to the birth of our son, so that two weeks wasn't too hard. We barely had time to replace the carpets in our home before we brought home our baby! We met K and BB's birthdad on a Tuesday and Thursday of the next week he was born. Were we scared and nervous? Yes. Excited? Oh, yes! I think you have to be guardedly excited in this situation. If not we may have missed the joy of anticipating our first child. But we did have to protect ourselves for the possibility that K would choose to parent.

Although it would have been devastating for us to anticipate this baby and then have that not come to pass, I convincingly told myself that our baby was going to be born somewhere, and if this wasn't the right baby and K was meant to parent, that God would lead us through that. I couldn't have been any more devastated in that loss than a biological mom who placed her child for adoption and then regretted that decision. The loss that we might experience would have nothing on her loss.

The two days in the hospital were agonizing, made better only by the close proximity of Taco Bueno and a gas station that sold beer by the bottle. We are not big drinkers, but definitely enjoyed a beer on that occasion (yes, one beer each)! We went to a movie on K's induction day (Flags of Our Fathers) and went to the hospital around 6pm. The doctor had anticipated BB's (Oh, heck, I'll call him Matthew as that was his birth name) Matthew's arrival at 8 pm. We sat in the hospital, treated like your garden-variety visitors, which was difficult but fine, and waited. And waited.

Matthew was born at 2 am on Thursday October 26. We watched his bath and newborn screenings with a video camera in hand, called our parents and our caseworker, and headed "home" to the hotel around 4:30 am. The next afternoon we went back to the hospital and visited for most of the day. Friday was pictures, the big snip, and more interacting with K and Matthew. That was the night of the brew-ha-ha, Friday night. The next morning K left the hospital with Matthew around 10:am and we met them and their caseworker at the agency for the placement ceremony.

The hardest part of the hospital wait was Friday night. At that point we had had two days getting to know this baby and watching his mommy struggle with the weight of her pending decision. When the hospital photographer came she kept calling me "Mom" and I just wouldn't answer. I played dumb, you might say. I was not the mom yet! It was heartbreaking and K cried. Her mom cried. I cried. I wanted to kick the photographer. I couldn't wait for that to be over.

By the time we left the hospital that night I felt like a ticking time bomb. I wanted my baby out of there! It was turmoil having to handle all of the emotions I felt for myself, for Matthew, and for K. I didn't sleep hardly at all that night (the first of many sleepless ones). The ride to the agency the next morning was emotional, too, but at that point it all became so surreal that I don't really think I knew what was happening. Only when the papers had been signed, Matthew had been placed in my arms to be called BB, and all of the supporting cast (caseworkers, witness, etc.) left did we finally get to let down our guards.

I went back to some newborn video of BB and made a little movie. Don't cry. (Good luck.) I tried to fade the music out at the end for an artistic touch, but I worked on it for awhile and it didn't work out. I'll figure that out some other time. Also, I apologize for some intact male nudity footage, but just pretend you don't see. When BB watched it he pointed and said, "penis." No tact, that kid.