As Ben and I walked out of the restaurant, I was grinning from ear to ear. So much about that first meeting felt so completely right. It was like most of my fears were washed away – in one seemingly short encounter with a complete stranger (a complete stranger I already deeply cared for). It was finally starting to feel real. It was finally starting to feel really real – for the first time. We were going to finally be parents.
Now all we had to do was wait…10 more weeks. But 10 weeks feels like an eternity – and for most adoption processes – it is. Rebecca, our agency director, recommended that we maintain regular contact with Amelia, text her once a week to let her know we were thinking of her, and keep the lines of communication open. I was sure that it wasn’t going to be a huge problem. Amelia and I exchanged cell phone numbers and she asked if we could meet up again before the baby was born in June: She really wanted us to meet her mother, too. So we began, what felt like the longest wait of my life. It felt like I was an 7 year old on Christmas Eve over and over again – day after day. The anxiety and anticipation of what awaits – for a day that I felt like I could hardly wait for.
Part of me was excited – we are only 10 weeks away from being parents. The other part of me was terrified and anxious. 10 whole weeks was a whole lot of time for Amelia to change her mind. That’s a whole lot of time for her to fall in love with that baby in her belly. But with no other choice but to deal with our reality – we hunkered down for the long, excruciating 10-week wait.
Once a week, I would send Amelia a text with a little note, a funny picture, or something on twitter that made me think of her. She would respond within a day or so – sometimes with just a text. Other times she would send me a picture of her and her baby belly with the text, “She’ll be here soon!” Once she sent us a recording of the baby’s heartbeat from her doctors appointment. All signs pointed to being completely on track to complete the adoption. As the days passed our excitement grew.
Then, at some point mid-April she stopped responded to texts as quickly as she had been. She stopped sending cute responses. She went from communicative – to radio silence. I could see that she was reading my texts, but she wasn’t responding. Days would go by without so much as an “lol”. I started to lose my mind. Ben tried as much to reassure me that everything was going to be fine. He’d remind me of how Amelia must be feeling and how hard this must be for her. It was another rollercoaster that I would ride daily – checking my texts to see if she responded, checking her twitter to see what she was saying (she didn’t know we found her on twitter/facebook), looking to see if she posted anything on Facebook. It was nothing. Consistently, everyday – silence.
My fear launched into full-blown terror when the agency called one day. They called to ask if I had heard from Amelia – apparently she had also stopped responding to the social worker, the agency, and her birthmother liaison. I began to FREAK out. In an instant we went from hunky-doorey to sheer terror.
The freak out, however was momentary. The very next day, we discovered that Amelia and her mom were going to be in St. Louis that weekend – we were too. We had tickets to see a baseball game with some friends and Amelia and her mom were going shopping for Amelia’s birthday. We planned to have brunch on Sunday morning. Suddenly all my fears subsided. I exhaled.
On Sunday, May 3rd we met Amelia and her mom for brunch. We ate breakfast together. Talked about what Amelia was like growing up. Amelia opened up to us about her father’s battle with alcoholism. She shared with us that her and the birth father were no longer speaking. We finally discussed her wishes for the hospital on the day the baby is born. We gave her a birthday present. We sat there for hours at a little crepe shop with Amelia and her mom, staring at her big baby belly. Talking about what would happen in 4 short weeks. Amelia and her mother seemed warm and open – moreso than the first time. Her mother asked great questions about how we want to parent. She seem more than satisfied with our answers.
Ben and I walked away from that meeting, again, feeling really great about the encounter – and really optimistic about the whole process. We felt connected to Amelia again – we felt like she was going to go through with it.
Four days later on May 7th, I was amid packing up our company office to move to a new location. I had just gotten off a string of 3 phone interviews with graphic designer candidates, standing in the middle of the office surrounded by stacks of boxes, staff members, and utter chaos. I looked down and my phone to see a text from Ben that said,
“Call me ASAP.”
My husband doesn’t typically do that unless it is a legitimate emergency. I picked up the phone and called him immediately thinking the worst – like someone was in the hospital or someone had passed away. As it turned out – it was worse than that…
He answered the phone.
Me: Hey, what’s up?
Ben: Hey, Rebecca called me.
Me: Yeah, she called me too when I was on a phone interview.
Ben: Amelia backed out. She’s decided to parent.
Me: What (in shock and disbelief)?
Ben: She backed out.
Me: I’m coming home.
I hung up the phone. When I looked up from my phone, the staff had just begun to notice that something was up from my phone call. I threw my phone in my bag and said, “I have to go. Our birthmother just backed out.” and with no explanation, no time for anyone to react, and no time for hugs or sympathy, I just walked out. Nothing else mattered except getting home to Ben – right then, right away.
What I believe happened next was that I got in my car, drove home and ran into my husbands arms – but if I am being completely honest…
I have absolutely no idea what happened for the next 18 hours of my life.
In an instant my whole world came crashing into a ball of flames. A terrible fiery ball of flames. What I remember was feeling like a zombie – like a shell of a human walking around after getting it’s heart ripped out (I don’t actually know if zombie hearts are ripped out, but its how I felt).
I don’t know what it’s like to lose a child or to miscarry a baby. I imagine that it is unique painful in its own way – a way that I may never understand – but terribly painful nonetheless. What I do know is that from the time you are matched with a birthmother you begin to fall in love with the baby. A baby you’ve never felt, touched, met, heard, seen – but you fall in love anyway. You dream the same dreams as a pregnant mother who imagines holding her baby for the first time, looking into that baby’s eyes and knowing that her life has changed forever. You fall in love with a child you don’t know – who is growing inside someone you barely do. While that child is growing inside it’s birthmother – the child, your child, is growing in your heart.
The pain of losing that child is so incredibly devastating – and deeply real – it’s almost indescribable. It wouldn’t be fair for me to compare it to a miscarriage or a death of a child, but I have to believe that the pain is just as real. I was paralyzed by pain. It still haunts me, 8 months later. I still grieve the loss of that baby and I as I sit here writing this, the pain comes flooding back. In all honesty, its why there hasn’t been any new blogs in 4 months – because I knew how painful this blog would be to write – and I was avoiding it. The time following that call – and Amelia’s decision to parent was a dark black hole in my life filled with indescribable grief and sadness – but not anger. I do know that I never once have felt anger for Amelia’s decision. I’ve only ever felt the pain of loss.
Aside from that, I remember little from that day…
What I do remember is walking up the stairs to the second floor of our house – and instead of turning right toward our bedroom, I turned left to the nursery. I looked into the half-completed room with the crib sitting front and center.
I grabbed the doorknob and closed the door.
As the door latched closed I stood there, door closed, hand still on the knob staring at the closed door.
I stood there feeling like I just closed the door on ever being a parent.
I turned down the hall to our bedroom and at 3:30 p.m. on a Thursday, I crawled into bed. I crawled into bed with no plans to ever get out. While Amelia made the brave decision to parent her baby – I was left feeling like I might never have a baby to parent.
This is Our Fate 