If everything goes as planned today, a birthmother will view our profile. We are cautiously excited. We got a message from our agency yesterday that there was an expectant mom ready to view profiles of families and that we needed to respond if interested. Heck yea we’re interested! Of course we can’t reveal the details but the background of the birthmom is one that we are very pleased with.
Now this isn’t our first time down this road. I mentioned in our last post, which was a while ago, that, once we we’re approved there were 3 birthmoms looking for families. We were excited beyond belief. Well, the first mom who was due in a few weeks and needed families right away, chose another family ☹ Then the second mom, who had been looking at families for a while decided on a family she was already viewing and never saw our profile. That was fair, but I just wish they had not put her in the mix. The third mom is still undecided and has not viewed families yet.
So obviously we have reason to proceed with some caution. I am almost glad for going through this experience because I was getting the impression that this was going to be super easy. We’re a black family looking for a black or bi-racial baby. But God said, hold your horses and be patient.
Since then we have been patient and have just gone on with our lives. Which could be a reason for my lack of posts. Ted describes it as being at a party waiting to be asked to dance. It’s a lot like that. It’s also like being on the Amazing Race where you get all of these cryptic instructions to do this or that, but everyone is at the finish line at the same time and someone has to choose a “winner”.
Here we are again, technically being shown a second time, but we have experienced the emotions of requesting to be shown to four birthmoms. Here are a few lessons that we are learning in our wait and we hope that this can serve as advice to those who may be considering adoption:
1) Live your life – as my mom used to say to me the best way to get a guy’s attention is to ignore him. She always comforted me when I was distraught over some knucklehead. But the same holds true here. While Ted was chilled, not so much anymore though, I was eating, breathing, and sleeping adoption. It was all I could think about. When the birthmoms chose other families Ted wasn’t as phased, but I was broken-hearted. While I concealed it as much as I could, I was broke down. My husband reminded me to keep the faith and to remember all of the things that we learn from our pastor. Yes, he ministered to me. The point here is to go on with life while you wait. I became very busy with work and church. Since it’s the holiday season, I am focusing more on helping others who are less fortunate. The best way to get over hurt is to help someone else. We are also focusing on each other. Because we know that our alone time will be limited once our blessing arrives ☺
2) It’s not all about altruism – Adoption through an agency is a business. Sort of. It’s non-profit but they have a job to do. We want a baby. The agency is in the “business” of finding families for babies/children. In order for them to operate, couples pay a fee for their services. Our worker, whom I believe is well meaning and has a good heart, has a job to do. She recruits and prepares families for adoption and “recruits” birthmoms in hopes to make a match with a family. If she makes a match, that looks good for her and the agency. As a result, we may have been the victims of her enthusiasm to do a good job. Now we get it. We have no hard feelings, but we have a better awareness, which allows us to better manage our emotions. Adoption is what it is and you have to be aware of this or you will be an emotional wreck.
3) Birthmoms are a mystery – when we made our different profiles, we have several by the way, we tried to make them as reflective as possible of who we are as people and who we would be as parents. We may be biased as well as our family and friends, but on paper, I think we look pretty darn good! In reality too. But we don’t know what the birthmoms are looking for. Some choose families because the family resembles their life, some choose because the family has children or pets. Who knows? We just viewed a webinar on open adoption and the birthmom talked about her process of choosing adoptive families. She initially eliminated families based on their looks. If they looked like they wouldn’t do better than her, they were eliminated. I must admit, although this sounds superficial, I have looked online at different adoptive families through our agency and after looking at some couples, I joked with Ted that surely we would be better parents than them. So I get it. But she chose because the adoptive mom was going to be a stay at home mom, like her own mother. This is where prayer and trust in God becomes more important than ever. We are just trusting that God will make the road smooth and direct us to the right birthmom, whether it’s tomorrow or next year. Of course, we are hoping it’s closer to the tomorrow.
This is where we are folks. I will be more consistent with my posts, at least weekly. One of the major purposes of this blog is to allow you to walk this journey with us, as it happens, so I promise to do better. By the way, if any of you have any questions about adoption or our process, please leave a comment or click on contact us. See you soon.
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