Unfortunately, we did not find our forever baby this year but we learned some valuable things and met some amazing people along our journey in 2016.
The year started out slow with one potential birth mom that chose another family from our agency but got really exciting when we learned about a potential birth mom over the summer. She obviously did not choose us to parent her child (she chose to parent herself) but crazy as it sounds, she impacted our lives and our views on people dramatically. She came into our lives because someone knew our story, someone who even though we weren’t super close with, had faith that we would be good parents to this child. This was the first lesson we learned- there are SO many amazing people that care about and are praying for us; more than we will ever know. This birth mother saw our adoption book and heard our story but wanted to also meet us to see what we were like in person. I cannot image the courage this took… I know we were so nervous to meet her as well! When she came over, she was very shy but you could tell she came prepared with certain questions and knew what she wanted us to know about what she wanted for the baby. She told us she was still deciding if she wanted to parent or choose adoption but if she chose adoption, she did not want to be involved at this point in the child’s life- he would be ours (this is what she believed was best, even though we are willing to have an open adoption), she wanted to give us her breast milk to make sure he had the best chance of being as healthy as possible and she wanted us to know she was always going to be available for family history if he had any health issues. Our jaws hit the floor when she told us these things. We had never experienced this amount of love from a birth mother (not that all of them don’t think this way, we just had never heard it out loud). We fell in love with her. She truly loved this baby and wanted the best for him- which she thought at that time might not be with her. This was the biggest lesson we learned- even though we knew the birth mother would be the hero in our adoption story, she proved this to us. It was getting close to her due date and we were on the edge of our seats waiting to hear what her plans were! On a Friday, I received a call from her. She simply said “Amanda, I am really sorry. I have been thinking and what I believe is best is to parent the baby myself”… I was heartbroken…. but then she stayed on the phone with me making sure I was ok! This must have been the most uncomfortable phone call she had ever had to make and this was what made Ryan and I realize how amazing she was. #1 – She could have had the person we know contact us instead of calling me herself #2- She could have told me quickly and let me go #3- She stayed on the phone to comfort ME! #4- She reassured us that if she chose the adoption route she knew we would have been the best parents for her baby. Even though I was sad, I found myself at peace knowing this baby is going to be raised by one amazing mom. The last lesson we learned from her is how to treat people…. Not to take the easy way out. If we were to have simply received a text or a short call, we would not have had closure which has happened in the past. With this situation, even though we did not get our forever baby, we gained someone we will always care about and pray for. We also found out that there are many people out there fighting for us. This is just one of the many stories we have from 2016. We put a quote in our adoption book that states “Adoption- when you family tree becomes and orchard.” Initially we took that as our family and the birth parents families, now I realize it is much more than that…. It is our family, the birth parents families, our friends, our community and people we don’t even know who are desperately praying for us to find our baby. So even though our dreams of a family haven’t come true yet, this journey has taught us such valuable lessons in 2016. Thanks for all the prayers and well wishes. We truly feel 2017 will be our year! Ryan and Amanda
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