- finally posting this about 5 years later since it has been sitting in my drafts for this long. It's part of my history and will forever have a piece of me.
Being able to have a kid for us took years and years of everything that we had. It took money, emotions, heartache, hope, betrayal, fighting, talking, praying, confusion, and all the other emotions in between.
You might think - hey they have their kids, so what is she writing about this for. It has taken me almost 5 years to be able to post this personal experience and then leave it behind.
Matt and I started off like any couple. New and madly in love. Trying to find out who we were together, build a life together, bring our two single lives into one, while still having a history behind us that filled our current memories before we had the time and years to fill our memories with each other.
We started in Sugar House in a small apartment, with two small bedrooms. Just in case we had a child. We then move to South Salt Lake and again had two bedrooms, just in case we had a kid. We moved into our first house and it had lots of bedrooms and we no longer thought just in case, but what is taking so long. We lasted 3 years there while waiting for a pregnancy to take. We finally started the adoption paperwork Halloween 2008. After 4 years of being married, we took the route. While we were in the adoption process, we got pregnant! I heard the heart beat, but Matt was at school, so he missed it. We announce it to his family during a reunion and then waited for my family the next week. I had another ultra sound and found out "no heart beat". Had a D&C with genetics to see if there was anything wrong and nothing but was told it was a girl.
Day after my D&C, Arlee was born. I made myself go to the hospital and hold her. I was always good at being happy while in the presence of such happiness but then I would fall apart afterwards.
Onward with the adoption process.
Picked to be placed with a child, but the agency went out of business with our money and the hope of a child.
No news
Some news
Lots of news -
you've been picked, oh never mind.
you've been picked - child has some health issues - what's your choice of having this child
Last time - birth mom contacts -
12 weeks of communication.
Suppose to meet her the day before Mother's Day -
We are going to announce to our families on Mother's Day.
Birth mom doesn't show.
Find out - she no longer wants us and has picked another family
Heart broken - we have resigned ourselves to never having kids.
We decided to move on with life and build a home - 2 months later - me - Abbie is pregnant. Kara is now 4.
Below is my blog about the feelings and communication with the "last time" for our adoption experience.
March 2012
This post is going to be long but well worth the read.
Today is March 12th, 2012 and I am going to write what has happened over the last week. 1 week and our lives have changed so much.
Sunday, March 4th, 2012
I wrote a blog post about "Don't forget....we are still trying to ADOPT. Help us get the word out!"
Monday, March 5th, 2012
I got a phone call from a friend letting me know that one of her co-worker's friends had emailed us about an adoption placement. Well it turns out we got our first email from our birth mom letting us know she wanted to pick us to be parents to her baby. The weird part is her email was in our SPAM folder that we usually don't look at or just delete everything that is in the box, especially when there is no title in the subject line. So without the phone call from my friend, I would have deleted the email from the SPAM box and Matt and I would have never of gotten to know our birth mom and that she had picked us to be parents. We responded to her email letting her know that we were excited. In the email, she let us know she was about 10 weeks along and that her first appointment would be on March 27th, 2012.
Today is March 12th, 2012 and we have 15 more days to wait until she goes to the doctor and finds out how everything is going. TIME is currently our ENEMY!
Matt and I also decided to wait awhile before telling everyone that a birth mom had picked us in case things changed. We decided to tell our Moms on Mother's Day with a present.
Tuesday, March 6th, 2012
We received an email back from our birth mom that she has contacted our case worker, Amber, and would wait to hear back from her. She also wrote, "Congratulations on YOUR BABY!" I love to go back to this email and read this part over and over. It makes me tear up every time I think about it!
I ended up telling my boss today that we had been picked by a birth mom. He was excited for us. He has been there for me to talk to for the past 18 months about adoption situations. The most supportive boss I have ever had. His wife was also adopted, so he can help gives me an insight to how she feels about being adopted from her point of view.
Thursday, March 8th, 2012
I contacted our case worker, Amber, to see if she had heard from our birth mom. Amber let me know she hadn't received anything yet. Amber suggested to have patience with correspondence, because 30 weeks is a long time. I can tell you this is hard with how instantaneous communication can be with emails on your phone and text messages.
But the worry still set in:
- What if our birth mom had changed her mind? It has happen to us before.
- What if she has had a miscarriage? It would be a terrible loss for us and her.
- How long do we wait before sending another email? We don't want to sound over anxious.
Saturday, March 10th, 2012
Patience in responding is what was suggested, so we answered her back on Saturday, March 10th. We talked about where we worked, what we liked as individuals, and as a couple. We discussed the level of openness we were comfortable with and asked her what level of openness she had in mind. At the end of the email, we mentioned that it our case worker hadn't received any communication and asked if Amber could contact her and if she had a phone number to contact her at.
Sunday, March 11th, 2012
We had dinner with my family for Kali's birthday. Coincidence though is that Kali is 11 or 12 weeks pregnant with her first child. Matt, Kali, and I went for a walk after dinner, during which, I casually asked her about her pregnancy, while listening to her responses about how she was feeling, what her baby's size was, the statistics her doctor had given her, and when she was due. I was calculating and determining how our baby and birth mom were doing.
Checked my emails 6 times to see if we had heard from our birth mom.
WORRY has set in again.
Monday, March 12th - TODAY
Checked the email currently over 10 times. Matt and I talked about the baby and not having heard back from our birth mom. He told me to have patience and relax. I let him know my fears and worries about our birth mom having changed her mind, how she and the baby were always on my mind, how I was wondering how the next 30 weeks were going to be (he mentioned, I was of course crazy), and wondering what he thought.
He helped me calm down by teasing me and making me laugh. I love him so much. It is hard when you have wanted something so much and it then presented to you ALMOST and all you can do is WAIT.
My worries are harder at night when Matt isn't around because he has to work. He helps distracts me. Well until next time.
No response email as of 3/12/12 at 10:09pm. If she writes back, will definitely need to ask if we can set up a day to email once a week and have a response on a certain day. Hopefully she likes that and will go for that!
