I want to be honest and real about the journey of adoption...
When anyone asks me about adoption, one of the first things I say is, "Adoption is not for the faint of heart!" And when I say that, I mean for anyone involved... First and foremost for the the birth parents, in some instances members of their family, the caseworkers, and the adoptive family...
I also want to be abundantly clear on how much we want to love, honor, care for, support, and respect the birth parents of our kids. The reality is that most birth parents (I know that isn't always the case...) really aren't coming from ideal situations at all... Many are in these situations because of drugs, alcohol, homelessness, abuse, neglect, rape... I could go on and on...
In a perfect world, lets be realistic, there is rarely a birth mom who wants to give up their baby... after they have carried that baby for 10 months... Most if given a perfect situation would parent that child... But unfortunately very few of them are in that position...
So enters the beautiful redeeming and very difficult possibility of adoption for these women...
But even women who aren't really in any position to parent, those that seem firm in their adoption decision, those that may have even sought out an abortion as an option, those that don't seem to be bonded to that baby at all during the pregnancy... All of these moms can and will often change their minds and decide to parent the babies they have been carrying...
Like I said there is no easy adoption... for really anyone involved...
And so it was and probably will continue to be in this adoption journey... sometimes absolutely beautiful and sometimes.... absolutely heart wrenching...
Christmas morning... like no other really... Our gracious friends were so sweet to have an additional 10 people in their home, on Christmas Day, and given it was a pretty tense situation... none the less... they opened up their home and hearts so graciously to share Christmas day with all of us...
In a home with 18 kiddos it wasn't long before we were all crowded around the tree to start opening some presents... The kids had all had a chance to hold Kaliyah the night before and they were smitten already... Some might think it odd to spend the day together; the birth family and my family.... But it really wasn't. I knew that if she needed time with the baby this was really all she was going to have... And I wanted her to not have regrets about not spending this short time with her. It was a different, but precious time for everyone. Even our birth mom and her older daughter, through the generosity of friends had lots of gifts to open. We got the most beautiful gift from our friends... I love it and am going to have to find a perfect spot to hang it in our home...
Most of the morning that sweet little baby girl was resting in her birth mom's arms... with an occasional break with one of us holding her... I could see the gravity of the situation and the tension of having to potentially say goodbye was weighing extremely heavily on her... She was in turmoil... What was really hard and making things harder by the moment, were the constant calls from home...
Even in the hospital she shared with me that her mom was telling her, "just bring that baby home!" (She had hid her pregnancy from most back home so when she left not many knew she was even expecting... well that wasn't the case anymore) She had family members that had spilled the beans about the pregnancy to pretty much everyone back home... She was getting calls constantly from home saying numerous really mean, hurtful things... even those closest to her, people you really should be able to trust were telling others that she was selling the baby... Many, many hurtful things said by those you would expect would be supporting her at a time like this... that wasn't the case... And really... the calls kept coming...
By mid afternoon my stomach was in knots... I KNEW she was wavering... I could see it all over her face... she had made a couple sort of off comments that made it even more clear... Not comments saying she was changing her mind, but more subtle comments that I could tell she was now uncomfortable with her previous adoption plan...
Our friends have a big hunting tent set up in the back for the kids to have an extra place to hang with 21 of us in the house... The big kids were out there so I went out to visit with them. Our birth mom had taken the baby to the bedroom and been back there with the door closed for a couple of hours... I needed prayers... The teens and I were discussing things and we prayed together... I sincerely felt like, if I had known that she was still firm in her adoption plans I wouldn't have cared how much time she spent alone with the baby... but that peace over her plans was no longer there in my heart at all... it wasn't in the kids hearts... it was not longer in the case workers heart. (prior to this day since the day this adoption was set into motion, she had consistently felt that this birth mom was extremely firm in her adoption plan... more so than most moms)
After she finally came out of the back room, The husband, our friend, went over to the birth mom asked to hold the baby and asked how she was doing? Her words were, " I think I am going to have to keep her..."
I went out and shared with Anna, who was immediately in tears. I went to praying in my room... The husband had the teens praying and texting friends they knew would pray...
I want to tell you... I wasn't praying that she would place the baby with us... One thing I remember my sweet friend Becky saying to me many years ago regarding waiting and adoption was... " You don't want a baby God doesn't want for you... or one that isn't meant to be yours..." I have held fast in that over the years. In an adoption journey, there are a lot of families you get shown to... and I have always wanted to have the exact baby God has planned for us... not one sooner, in all honesty!!!
Truly, I was praying that His will be done and I was repeatedly telling Him that I trusted Him... I also recalled the words of my wise friend Linny, "Praise Him ahead of time for what He will do!" I wasn't claiming to know that she would still place her with us, but I was praising Him for what He was going to do regardless of if it was going to be in line with the desires of my heart or not... I was on my knees in my bedroom earnestly praying...
I knew that our friend, the caseworker was just in the other room talking with the birth mom... basically she was asking what her plans were, and when she confirmed that she was thinking that she was going to have to keep her, the caseworker pretty much said, that if she was intending on parenting or was wavering at all that she and her daughter had to go back to her apartment, that there were too many hearts that were getting attached to this baby and it wasn't fair to make it any worse. Our birth mom went to one of the back bedrooms to pray and decide if she would take the baby with her now when she went back to her hotel or if we would arrange for cradle care till she was sure on her decision to parent... but the baby would not be staying here with us...
I was immediately told that she had pretty much changed her mind and was leaving... Honestly, I didn't cry right away... I was actually pretty shocked... While you know it is always a possibility, this situation seemed really good right from the start. I am not sure we would have dragged the whole family out here if we thought there was a decent chance she would change her mind and parent this baby...
Our friend the case worker was calling the head of the agency and I was in the kitchen with the husband... He still had Kaliyah in his arms and something happened where he was going to have to hand her off to me... He asked if I was ok with it... Of course I grabbed her... I told him, I was fine with it... I knew she was God's girl first... not really mine... And that is when the tears started flowing... I knew she never really belonged to me... kind of like any of my kids... They belong to HIM first... They are HIS, really they are just on loan to us...
Could I understand why she was wavering and was now planning on parenting that precious one? 100% If the roles were reversed I don't think I could do it... Could I relate to all that she was feeling? No way... I haven't walked in her shoes. I could empathize, as I have carried a baby full term that didn't get to come home to me, but went home to Heaven... But I could also TOTALLY recognize that this was a completely different situation...
My heart was breaking... I was hurting for Greg and I and our kids... but I WHOLEHEARTEDLY was hurting for her... Really, even more so, I was hurting for her and her older daughter... First to be at the point in life to have to consider adoption for your child, and even more so for the lack of support, love and care she had in her life during this time... to have to walk through this alone (she has great support here from agency people, and new friends... but not in her own life personally)... It just wasn't fair...
Here right before me, I was seeing the full pain that goes along with adoption and it was gutwrenching...
All the teens were in the kitchen with us... silent prayers constantly being lifted up... They had texted numerous people and we had a small little army of prayer warriors praying all across the US... After talking with the the caseworker too, I decided I would head in to her room, Kaliyah still in my arms and share my heart... Never with an intent to change her mind at all... NOT FOR A SECOND WAS THAT MY INTENTION, but really just to sincerely express to her how much we loved her, her older daughter and Kaliyah...
All I could ask was that the Lord would give me the words she needed to hear, His words, no matter what they were... I prayed before I knocked on the door and went in...
Part two... coming tomorrow... sorry... too much to share in one sitting... Thanks for journeying with us...
