One hand gripped the wheel while the other pressed my phone against my face. Blinking away hot tears, and swallowing past the growing tightness in my throat, I heard her ask, "Hi Jenny, What can I do for you?" Pavement passed beneath my car, and distance grew between me and the foster home where I had left our "maybe baby."
"We were not prepared for this," I blurted out to the director of our adoption agency.
"Yes. You're right. We did not prepare you for this possibility."
With the weather finally turning to spring this week, I open the windows, savor the walks outside and lingering daylight. I can't help but reminisce about where we all were last year. All of us. I was working full time as a social worker. Nathan was in the helping profession also. Tedy was a few weeks old and was the most beautiful newborn I've ever seen. And three times a week, I would get in my car, drive the hour to the family he was staying with and hold him. Hold him to my chest. Breathe in his baby sweetness. Cuddle his warm floppy little self. Try not to fall head over heals in love with him. But who was I kidding? I would find myself whisper with every exhale onto that fuzzy little head, "I love you, I love you, I love you."
But he wasn't mine. He wasn't my son, and in those months he might not have ever been. I lived with the reality of two worlds. We were just being considered to be his parents. Waiting as his birth parents wrestled through grief and emotions that I can't even imagine. Firming up decisions, making choices, and doing hard things. And while they wrestled, we waited. And visited. And three times a week, got in the car, turned the key and left our hearts in the arms of his foster mother.
After one tough goodbye I called Nathan in tears. He asked if maybe it wouldn't be easier to limit the visits and subsequently limit the goodbyes. I answered, "When we started this adoption process we decided that we weren't going to make our choices based on fear. So I can't let fear of stop me. What if he's our son and I totally miss his first few weeks of life because I'm afraid I might have my heart broken?" So that's what I said. And bravely visited a baby that might or not have been mine forever.
Yet there is a fierce wound left with any mother who can't be with her baby.
Ask any parent who has been separated for whatever reason: illness, hospitalization, adoption, incarceration, state foster system. No matter what the reason, if the choice to be away from your child is not yours....something cuts deep, and heals slow.
Through those two months, I was resilient and brave. Only after he was in our home for seven months and legally in our family forever did the grief hit. Once the adoption was final, the holidays were celebrated and put away, and the days freed up, did my heart and head have the stability and freedom to understand and unpack our loss. I looked at friend's newborns with envy, poured over Tedy's pictures with tears.
Through two months of Iowa winter, I held my sweet baby in my arms and yet cried over the months I lost with him. What a rare sadness to be filled with joy at the sweet life I held in my arms and yet grieve over the days, weeks, and months I couldn't be there. What a sad math to calculate with every milestone. "Eight months with us, ten months in this world."
As his birthday grew closer, I was excited to celebrate his life with friends and family yet felt a deep dread of the anniversary of hard days. Would I be consumed with "where were we a year ago?" type thoughts? Would the tough times of last spring loom heavy over this year?
So I hand made cake bunting, crafted banners and tissue paper poms, sent invitations. Bravely faced ghosts of last spring.
And then, all of a sudden: I had a toddler. His birthday was a beautiful celebration of this little life we have been SO blessed to parent. There was cake and presents and joy. While I was so sorry to see the official "baby" days pass, grieving the title of baby was nothing compared to the grieving I had done for the time with my actual baby.
As we head into toddlerhood, getting to watch my child explore this world with new experiences and new milestones, I find a new freedom from old scars. Each day brings a wonder of discovery as he barks back at dogs, watches bubbles, eats a marshmallow; I sense that when I look deep into those big brown eyes he sees me and knows who I am to him. The joy and fullness of these days are so contrasted against the uncertainty and fear of last year that it's hardly recognizable and the comparison is futile.
"We were not prepared for this," I blurted out to the director of our adoption agency.
"Yes. You're right. We did not prepare you for this possibility."
With the weather finally turning to spring this week, I open the windows, savor the walks outside and lingering daylight. I can't help but reminisce about where we all were last year. All of us. I was working full time as a social worker. Nathan was in the helping profession also. Tedy was a few weeks old and was the most beautiful newborn I've ever seen. And three times a week, I would get in my car, drive the hour to the family he was staying with and hold him. Hold him to my chest. Breathe in his baby sweetness. Cuddle his warm floppy little self. Try not to fall head over heals in love with him. But who was I kidding? I would find myself whisper with every exhale onto that fuzzy little head, "I love you, I love you, I love you."
But he wasn't mine. He wasn't my son, and in those months he might not have ever been. I lived with the reality of two worlds. We were just being considered to be his parents. Waiting as his birth parents wrestled through grief and emotions that I can't even imagine. Firming up decisions, making choices, and doing hard things. And while they wrestled, we waited. And visited. And three times a week, got in the car, turned the key and left our hearts in the arms of his foster mother.
After one tough goodbye I called Nathan in tears. He asked if maybe it wouldn't be easier to limit the visits and subsequently limit the goodbyes. I answered, "When we started this adoption process we decided that we weren't going to make our choices based on fear. So I can't let fear of stop me. What if he's our son and I totally miss his first few weeks of life because I'm afraid I might have my heart broken?" So that's what I said. And bravely visited a baby that might or not have been mine forever.
Yet there is a fierce wound left with any mother who can't be with her baby.
Ask any parent who has been separated for whatever reason: illness, hospitalization, adoption, incarceration, state foster system. No matter what the reason, if the choice to be away from your child is not yours....something cuts deep, and heals slow.
Through those two months, I was resilient and brave. Only after he was in our home for seven months and legally in our family forever did the grief hit. Once the adoption was final, the holidays were celebrated and put away, and the days freed up, did my heart and head have the stability and freedom to understand and unpack our loss. I looked at friend's newborns with envy, poured over Tedy's pictures with tears.
Through two months of Iowa winter, I held my sweet baby in my arms and yet cried over the months I lost with him. What a rare sadness to be filled with joy at the sweet life I held in my arms and yet grieve over the days, weeks, and months I couldn't be there. What a sad math to calculate with every milestone. "Eight months with us, ten months in this world."
As his birthday grew closer, I was excited to celebrate his life with friends and family yet felt a deep dread of the anniversary of hard days. Would I be consumed with "where were we a year ago?" type thoughts? Would the tough times of last spring loom heavy over this year?
So I hand made cake bunting, crafted banners and tissue paper poms, sent invitations. Bravely faced ghosts of last spring.
And then, all of a sudden: I had a toddler. His birthday was a beautiful celebration of this little life we have been SO blessed to parent. There was cake and presents and joy. While I was so sorry to see the official "baby" days pass, grieving the title of baby was nothing compared to the grieving I had done for the time with my actual baby.
As we head into toddlerhood, getting to watch my child explore this world with new experiences and new milestones, I find a new freedom from old scars. Each day brings a wonder of discovery as he barks back at dogs, watches bubbles, eats a marshmallow; I sense that when I look deep into those big brown eyes he sees me and knows who I am to him. The joy and fullness of these days are so contrasted against the uncertainty and fear of last year that it's hardly recognizable and the comparison is futile.
While grief over those first two months may ebb now to flow over again in the future, I can only hope to face these years of parenthood with the same bravery I mustered during those first months. That fear won't drive our decisions and even with the risk of broken hearts we find the freedom to breathe deep and with every exhale whisper, "I love you I love you I love you."
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