The Encore

I was just reminded of something precious that happened after I had given birth to Brit.

I was laying in bed snuggled up with Brit in my arm and her birthfather was on the other side of us.  He and I were talking about how surreal it was that we were there.  Looking down at the only daughter either of us would ever have.  We talked about how we were closer to 40 than we were to 30.  And how neither of us would have ever guessed that we would be holding a brand new child of our own at this point in our lives.

Her birthfather looked down at our precious sleeping baby girl and said "You Brit, are our encore!"

I just laughed.  How right he was.  Brit was our encore.  And while she was a finale for her birthfather and me, she was a new beginning for her parents.

It makes me smile just thinking about it.

Brit sleeping while snuggled with her birthfather.  A beautiful encore indeed!

6 days until our first visit!

I am so excited and anxious.  We are 6 days away from our first "real" visit with Brit and her parents.  I can hardly wait!!!

I have been praying for Brit's mom.  I hope that she has a peace about this visit.  I know how she has struggled with being an adoptive mom.  And I also know she is a worrier.  So my guess is that she is probably anxious about this first visit.

I wish I could call and tell her how excited I am to see all of them.  I miss the relationship we all used to have.  I want to be able to sit and laugh and chat like we used to.

Please pray that our visit will go very well and that when Brit and her parents leave they will have a peace with our relationship and their role as her parents.

I am hopeful, excited, and nervous all at once.



This is the last time C and I held Brit.



If I could create the perfect adoption relationship

The Rebekahs are my heros.  It's as simple as that.  Yes, it is weird that they have the exact same name, and one is the birthmom and the other the adoptive mom.  But after learning more about them, suddenly the shared name makes perfect sense.  They were meant to be a part of each other's lives. 

If I could paint a picture of an adoption relationship that is seemingly ideal, their's would be the relationship I would model.

Thank you for sharing your story with the world Rebekah(s). 

If you aren't already followers of their blogs, you should.  Even when the story is painful, it is filled with hope and love.

An interview with the Rebekahs

Heart Cries - The adoptive mother's blog

Sailing My Way Through - The birthmother's blog

PS - Adoptive mom, Rebekah, has been a most inspirational cheerleader for me.  She has listened to me pour my heart out and she encouraged me and prayed for me in my days of unbearable grief.  She is completely AWESOME!

The best part about blogging

I just became a blogger.  It was supposed to be a private journal for me.  A quiet therapy to help me make sense of the thoughts that swirled in my head after I became a birthmother and my adoption story didn't turn out how I expected.

But as time has gone on, I feel like I have met some of the most amazing women.  Adoptive mothers, birthmothers, couples waiting to adopt, moms with very sick children, a young mom who just lost her husband (while she was pregnant with their 3rd child), and just regular moms trying to make sense of parenting like we all do.  I pray for them.  And it is amazing how healing it has been for me.

Never once have I met any of them face to face, yet I feel like they are an intimate part of my support network. 

So today I am thankful for my blog friends.  And you may not even know you are one of them, but I have come to love each of you.  I love how we are all flawed, trying our best, women of faith just trying to make sense of it all.

Blogging rocks!

So much to think about and do

I am still dancing in air thinking about the visit next Sunday.  I want it to be here already.  But I keep thinking about how nervous Brit's mom must be.  Since she has the been the aprehensive one all along, I bet now that there is an actual date set it is probably even worse.

I hope that some day they will not feel obligated but instead excited to meet up with us.  And maybe I am assuming feelings that she may not be having.  Maybe she really is much better with all of this.  Just knowing how she acted prior to Brit's birth, I think she is probably worrying.

Today I am thinking about what we will buy little Brit for her first birthday, which we will celebrate during her visit.  Her brithday is the 25th.  Hard to believe it has been a year ago!

I have already bought her two books and a Veggie Tales movie.  C wants to get her a Leap Pad (or whatever it is called), but it says it's for ages 2-4.  Brit is very advanced, but I still think she may not have the coordination needed for a toy like that.

I want C and me to go shopping for her gift together.  At Christmas he and I each bought Brit gifts, but we did it separate from each other.  I would like for this to be different.

In addition to all the excitement with the Brit visit, I also have a few other really big things happening this week. 

1. I am supposed to get a court reccomendation about custody of my two little boys on Friday.  Their dad filed for primary custody of them so he wouldn't have to pay child support. (Which he has never paid in the two years we have been divorced. I never requested any until this past November when I realized I am paying 100% of the kids expenses and he has never helped.  And his response to that request was to file for custody.  That has been a huge financial drain on this single momma.  $3,500 already spent on legal fees.  I expect probably another $2,000 before we are done. Yuk.)
2. L has a two hour baseball practice Friday evening.
3. I move to a new townhouse on Saturday.  Finally a place of our own for the boys and me with a bedroom for everyone. I just hate moving.
4. L has a basketball tournament on Saturday. D has a Young Marines new recruit meeting right before L's first game. (Who knew a 9 year old boy would want to do that?  I didn't even know such an organization existed until we saw a booth about them at a local air show.)



Mom and L (the soon to be 12 year old!)

5. L's 12th birthday is Sunday - We are postponing a party with his friends until the 26th because of the move.  However, he still wants to go play video games at the arcade with his brothers that day.
6. I get to particiapte in the interview process for a new Children's Ministry Director after church on Sunday.

It hardly seems like there is enough time in a single weekend for all of it.  Then follow it up with the excitement of a visit with Brit the following week!

I will take things one at a time.

I am so glad I have something so great to look forward to!

Finally!!!!

The date has been set.  We are all getting together for lunch next Sunday.  I have butterflies in my tummy!

I am so very excited.  Not only will I get to see Brit, but hopefully I can repair the relationship I used to have with her momma.

I miss having her as a friend like we were during my pregnancy.

I AM SO EXCITED!!

Still waiting

I have neglected the blog for over a week. But I wanted to wait until I could announce when we were going to get to meet Brit.

However, that hasn't happened yet.  I asked my boyfriend (such a strange term for a man who is almost 39), if he had heard back from Brit's dad, but he hasn't.  He assured me this is OK, because Brit's dad is a basketball coach and he is super busy right now.

I asked the boyfriend (herein after referred to as BF), what he and the dad talked about on the phone.  I wish boys weren't so hard to get information from!!!  You have to drag every single word out of them.  Or at least the ones I know.

Anyhow, some of the things he told me that stuck in my head.  Most significant of them all was when he met the dad at Christmas time and gave him the presents that we had bought for Brit, the dad told him that several times he has wanted to tell Brit's mom that she needs to quit worrying about whether or not I want to take Brit back.  The dad told BF that he often wants to just say out loud, "they signed the papers, there is nothing they can do to take her back."

I guess in the back of my mind, I probably knew that this was a possible thought that she might be having during this time that she has not communicated with us, but that was the first time I had heard it out loud.  (Side note: WHY DIDN'T BF TELL ME THIS IN DECEMBER?!?!?)

We talked about several things, one that made me cry which I will share later.  But here is what I was most struck by.

BF (I guess that could even stand for birthfather - just thought of that!), is really excited about being able to see Brit.  He talked about what he would like to see our future look like with her.  How he hopes our relationship changes.  His dreams for transparency and intimate contact with her parents.

This is the same man who never even speaks of OUR future together.  As a matter of fact, today when I asked him point blank about what his plans are for "us" he walked over, kissed me and said, "let's find some night this week when we don't have kids and talk about it".

Does that scream fear of commitment?

I digressed. 

Anyway, he is so excited about the possibilities that opening up our adoption could offer.  The things he was saying are all things I feel but never say out loud to him because I know it makes him terribly uncomfortable when I get upset about Brit and how much I miss her.  So instead I just don't talk to him about it at all.  Yes, I know, not healthy.

So even if the visit doesn't happen as soon as I would like it to, at least I know there is someone else who wants it as badly as I do.

So like so many of the endings I give to my posts.  I will wait.

God is teaching me patience.  I don't want to LEARN patience, I want to be GRANTED patience.