Chapter 6: Our Daughter

My younger brother had his first daughter around Memorial Day of 2012. Of course, they got pregnant on their wedding night. Isn’t that how its supposed to work? For once, I wasn’t jealous or angry. I was excited! I am an aunt, that’s like a step down from motherhood, but the closest to it I had ever been. I get to be in this child’s life forever and help shape her. And bonus: buy her annoying toys that will further annoy my brother. She was a few states away, but I had all the intention of loving the crap out of her no matter the distance. 

Maybe I was getting less jaded with other pregnancies, this is good. A step in the right direction. But then that summer another friend announced her pregnancy. “We weren’t even sure we wanted kids and then it just happened!” After four years of infertility I was getting slightly better at hiding my despair and irritation. Or so I thought. A mutual friend called me after the big announcement and asked if I was ok. I burst into tears. Not ok. We took a summer vacation with them to Napa. Every drink she didn’t take or hike she didn’t risk was a direct kick to my uterus. 

Personal observation: I am not cured of jealousy or anger. 

Dammit. 

I had been talking to my uterus as if it was a living breathing thing for some time now. It was intentionally keeping me from my dreams for years now. It was the enemy. We had a hate/hate relationship. It gave me nasty cramps on a regular basis and never provided what it was intended to provide. It was a stowaway in my body, not paying rent or even cooking me dinner. I considered having it removed for the sole purpose of removing my monthly reminder that I am not a normal female with normal female parts. I might as well be androgynous with a pretty face.

In September of 2012, we were approved to adopt. We were “paper pregnant.” We could get a child at any moment or we could be waiting for years. Our agency would call us anytime they showed our “profile book.” This is the book I spent all summer creating that told an expectant mother how perfect my husband and I would be to parent their child. I had pictures of our dogs, our vacations, and our home. Looking back at it now, it showed off our wealth. Not that we are rich, but looking back that’s what I see.  I’m not sure how I feel about that. I just wanted a child so badly. I didn’t lie. I also didn’t say I was about to file for divorce eight months ago. Honestly, relationships are hard. I don’t know a single perfect relationship. So yeah, we are imperfect people, but I’m mostly going to tell you the perfect parts because I want you to pick me to be your baby’s mama. 

We took that time building our profile book and getting all of our adoption training as a first step in controlling our future. Up until this point, we had no control. We were slaves of our infertility. Now we had control -- it was refreshing. We could actually do something, we could take positive steps at becoming parents! We bonded over the ridiculousness of the paperwork and the questions of the agency. We spent hours and hours on our profile book together. We were finally together. We were excited for our future. 

Halloween of 2012 we got the call. 

Well, I didn’t answer my phone because I was in one of those funks and had my phone on silent. My husband had to ping me on Google chat to tell me to answer my damn phone! 

“Your daughter is waiting for you at the hospital!” - social worker

Immediate tears. It’s happening! Today I become a mother! 

She said a bunch of other things as well which I later found out included the infants six to eight week pre-maturity, addiction to cocaine, and lack of prenatal care as well as many other unknowns. I didn’t care though. God chose this child for us. (Yes, now I am a fan of God. Now that the miracle is happening we can be friends again.)

The baby was born in our hometown so we didn’t have to go far to get to her. I drove to my husband’s office. I really should not have driven, I was a mess. I got to his office and we embraced and cried together. On our way to the hospital we discussed baby names and tried to remember all the things the social worker said about our sweet baby girl. We arrived at the hospital and met the birth mother. She hadn’t yet seen the baby, and had no plans to. She just wanted to get home to her older son so she could go trick or treating with him. We didn’t get to know her much at all, but I suppose there would be time for that in the coming days, weeks, months, and years. We were open to love both her and her child, no matter what. 

We spent the afternoon and evening in the NICU getting to know this tiny human through a plexiglass baby cage. I promised her I would help her get better. I would take care of her every need for the rest of her life. I wasn’t worried about her struggles, I was just grateful for her existence. I would do anything in my power to give her the best life possible. This little girl filled my heart with joy without doing one single thing but existing. The nurses were so excited to see a baby with such a hard start go to such a caring family. We were just grateful to finally BE a family. We were prepared to spend the next 6-8 weeks in the NICU with our new daughter - whatever it takes. We will be with her. 

Often we wondered how long it would take to fall in love with a child through adoption. My husband was very worried about this in particular. How will they even know I’m their dad? Will they call me “adoptive dad” or “Justin” or just “Dad”?

I can tell you, without a hint of doubt, that I loved that child the MOMENT I saw her. Each moment after that was deeper love. The way Justin looked at her was clear that he felt it too. He instantly felt like “Dad.” I instantly felt like “Mom.” She didn’t have our eye color or our skin color, but she was ours, there was no question. My mind was making plans for her. What will she be like? Will she be able to dance? Will she have any disabilities? Ultimately it didn’t matter, I would love her no matter what. 

I spoke with the nurses about setting up a place for me to sleep. They looked at me confused. Nurses: “Parents don’t usually sleep here.” 

Me: “Well we need to bond with her as soon as possible. I’ll feed her and change her, just show me what to do. Eventually though, I will need to sleep.” 

The nurses did their best to oblige my requests to do everything, but even after a few hours of keeping up, I was pretty tired. We decided to sleep at home that night and start again the next day to see about getting a room to sleep in. 

The next morning we got up early and headed back to the hospital to be with our daughter. Soon after we arrived at the hospital, we got a call from the agency. The mother was reconsidering her decision. My heart sank. I asked if I could speak with her, maybe I could help her understand what open adoption is. Maybe I could convince her. Our adoption agency caseworker was busy in meetings all day and couldn’t be bothered. Though she did call to check in occasionally. So, we ended up meeting with the entire birth family. One of the staff nurses joined us as a representative of the baby. The agency sent a case worker for the birth family. We had a meeting with the birth mother, her son, her father, and her grandmother. 

The instant they came in the room I knew it wasn’t my job to convince her of anything. This was her child. Regardless of where her life is, she gets to decide where that child goes. After about 10 minutes of very uncomfortable conversation about absolutely nothing, she said she had signed papers to give custody to her grandmother the night before and wanted to see her baby for the first time. She had never intended to place for adoption. She hoped this would give her time to get clean and be able to parent children. She was homeless that night. She couldn’t be near her children since her baby was born addicted. She chose homelessness over giving her child to us. We were devastated. The nurses, despite needing to remain impartial were visibly shaken as well and tried to console us but we just needed to get out of there...they took us out the back door of the NICU. 

We spent many days and nights trying to figure out why the agency even called us on this situation. She clearly didn’t understand adoption. She was afraid of her kids going into foster care. I’m sure that’s what they told her, if you choose adoption, your kids won’t go into foster care. So she used her choice of adoption to buy her time to keep her children. What mother wouldn’t do this? Of course you would fight for your children. You would fight for your own heart.

The heartbreak of this situation was as if I had miscarried or as if I had given birth to a stillborn. The emotional pain was as bad or worse than labor pain, not that I would ever know. She was in my arms, then she wasn’t. She didn’t die. She lives on to this day (hopefully). The truth is she was never mine. She was never ours. For whatever reason we were placed in her life to be a momentary placeholder. Or maybe she was placed in our lives to be a momentary placeholder. 

You may be thinking, what a selfish woman, not placing her baby to a healthy rich family. At the time, I was thinking the same thing. How could she not choose us over poverty? But the truth is, how could a mother give her child to anyone? Who says children in low income homes aren’t happy? Who says they aren’t safe? It takes incredible strength or dire circumstances to even want to place a child for adoption. To choose to be apart from your child has got to be the most heart wrenching decision a woman could make. So no, she wasn’t being selfish. She was being human. I respect her for even considering adoption. 

Something incredible happened that weekend. Justin and I cried together. We had never done this. In our six years together we had never cried together. We left town immediately. We holed up in a hotel in the mountains and wept and held each other for two days. We had a common loss. It wasn’t just MY loss, it was his too. Through this experience of equal loss, we came together. We were a couple again. It was no longer him against me. It was US. We became “We” again. That beautiful baby girl, ours momentarily, brought us together in a way we couldn’t do on our own. 

We drove home to boxes of baby stuff we had been collecting since becoming “paper pregnant.” Ironically, the crib and changing table had come in the mail that weekend as well. We took all the boxes to the nursery room and started setting it up. We spent hours putting the crib together and building the changing table. The room was ready. We were ready. This may not have been our child, but this child brought us together in a way nothing else could. We knew we would become a mom and dad sooner or later. 

It took me a very long time to see this for what it was. I’m talking years. Hindsight, therapy, and time. 

Although I write as though all was right with the world at this moment in time, it wasn’t. We spent Thanksgiving of that year at my brother’s home. They had a new baby that I just wanted to cuddle and heal my wounds with her sweet baby smell. We arrived and listened to my parents name off all the parts of my niece that matched my brother and sister in law. 

‘She has your eyes, his nose, your chin.’ Our child would never have these things. Our child may not even have the same skin color. We were ok with this we thought, but hearing all the comparisons were hard. Will my family love our child if they don’t have our eyes, our nose, and our chin? 

My brother and his wife were less willing to pass their first born around, so I was empty handed yet again. My heart was broken and being told “no” to holding my niece for more than a few minutes was like a dagger into an already weeping wound. It’s not their fault that I couldn’t have children. I put it on them though. I made them be the guilty ones for not allowing me to love on their child as much as I wanted too. 

I left their home with more wounds than I had come with. I created distance where I needed closeness. I’m back at pushing my loved ones away. I thought by fixing my marriage, I had fixed all of my relationships and all of myself. I was wrong. I had a long way to go. 

Why does this have to be so hard? Why do I want to be a mother so badly? How do I make this desire go away?

Even with the heartache, Justin and I were together as one. We didn’t get divorced this year as I suspected we would. We came together in an epic journey to create a family. Some people just take a roll in the sack to build their families, we have chosen (and been forced) to take the deepest darkest canyon possible to build our family. We will not be deterred. I just hope we make it out the other side without losing all of our family, our friends, or our marriage in the process.