Tuesday 21 January 2014

Adoption Journey: The Day Our Lives Forever Changed

It's Friday October 11. The weekend of Thanksgiving, and this weekend we would have more to be thankful for than any other. We were told Thursday when we went in to sign a bunch more paperwork that she was due to be discharged around 9:30 and we could expect her and her worker at our house after that. Here's how our day went down...

The crack of stupid: I woke up (if you could call it "waking" since I hardly slept a wink) I tried reading, and pacing, and doing more laundry. I cleaned the bathroom (again). I paced some more, tried watching a movie. Stood in front of the fridge unsure if I'd be able to keep any food down.

8am: Jason finally woke up, and we both sat around anxious.

9am: We still hadn't heard anything from any of the workers and I'm finding it extremely hard to be patient. I email the placement worker asking if she'd heard anything, if we have time to go into town to do the few things we have to do.

9:15am: Heard back that there was a delay with the court order so she wasn't going to be discharged now until noon. (ACK as if time wasn't going slow enough. As if I wasn't nervous or anxious enough, now we get to prolong our suffering for three more hours!)

10am - 12pm: We finally head into town to do errands. We had to pick up Jason's contacts, and exchange the diaper bag we had and pick up a few other things. But we basically just wondered around the mall and Wal-Mart killing time, trying to keep our mind off what was going to happen in a few hours.

12:30pm: We get back home. Still no word from any of the workers.

1pm: The photographer showed up. The awesome Stephanie Gascho from First Moments photography. She does some amazing birthing photography, so tasteful and well done. 

2:45pm - 4pm: The worker finally shows up with the most beautiful, tiny little baby girl and my heart exploded. Jason was out playing with the dog, trying to distract himself. I called to him and my voice cracked like a pubescent boy. I got her out of the car seat and handed her off to Jason. 



Neither of us cried - surprisingly - although I came close a couple times if I looked too long at Jason. Gah, there's just something about a man holding a baby, the mixture of strength and vulnerability just make them seem so much more manly.

Then we had to actually focus - on something other than the baby. Man, that was hard. Her worker went over more paperwork. Gave us info on withdrawal (because there was a chance of that) we had to go over what the access schedule would be like (since the birth family is entitled to "x" amount per week). 





There were a few things we had to sign. But after all that waiting, and nerves, and talking we were finally left alone with our brand new baby. Who naturally, had taken a massive crap while the grown ups were talking.



 Ok seriously!? Can we all just take a moment to appreciate the pure awesomeness that is this picture. I thought I knew joy when we were approved, and then again when we heard about her and we said yes. But neither of those moments even come close to what I feel when I see Jason looking at our baby girl like this. And he looks at her a lot like this. Be jealous ladies.


Then we brought Kai in to meet her. We never really had any doubts about Kai being alright with her. She's an awesome, laid back, super friendly dog. But, she had never met a brand new baby before, so we still wanted to play it safe...and slow. I'm so happy the photographer was still there to capture Kai's first meeting, because it's just too cute.


It was love at first sight for Kai too. We're all pretty smitten, and Jason is fully aware that he is going to be screwed in the future. The first time she says, "Daddy" he's going to be down for the count.

4pm - 7pm: We made the rounds visiting my grandparents and a couple friends. Naturally they were all taken with how beautiful and calm and alert she was.

7:30pm - 9pm: My mum and sister, and Jason's parents came over to finally meet her, and bring some cute little gifts...and most importantly food, because I hadn't been able to eat up until then.


This was the greatest day of our lives. The day we became parents. Sure we're going to experience a lot of ups and down during this foster-to-adopt process but we're more than ready to jump on the roller-coaster if it means we get to be the forever home for this beautiful, perfect little girl.

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