Written on May 20, 2014

Written on May 20, 2014

It’s her little squeals and three consecutive coughs before a full-on cry. It’s how she purses her lips when she’s just waking up or refusing more of her bottle.

It’s her tiny little head and tiny little hands and tiny little toes. It’s when she looks into my eyes and I see deeper than the deepest ocean. I see this little being and she will grow and flourish and we will spend our lives together, and I still can’t believe she’s my daughter. We’ll learn and we’ll grow and we’ll experience. She’ll learn as I learn. We’ll learn together.

And it’s crazy. The cycle is crazy. I am happy and sleep-deprived. Exhausted. Happy but exhausted. Like any new mother. And I get sad seeing pictures of my friends’ newborns on Facebook or email, because I know we can’t do that yet. I know our journey is different.

We can’t send out the birth announcement whenever we want. We can’t email photos. Our journey, our story is different. Adoption is different.

And here I am, a mom. And I love my precious time with her. It’s all so delicate. She’s so delicate.

It was always Adele.

Written on May 12, 2014

Written on May 12, 2014

If I’m going to be honest it’s a little scary having this precious tiny creature in your arms, with you at all times during the day, and knowing you have to protect her for the rest of her life, and knowing you want to protect her for the rest of her life, and wanting nothing more in the entire universe than to protect her for the rest of her life.

A few thoughts while I have the time, before the baby starts crying again:

Walking with the baby on my chest while doing lunges gets her to stop crying. She needs to eat every two hours, like me.

I know I’m a mom because I’ve been hands-deep in Adele’s poop and I didn’t care. And I don’t care that she screams in my ears and claws at my chest and grabs my necklace. And every time I pick her up I fall more in love.

The first time she opened her eyes at me I cried because I was overcome by her beauty.

I have to type this with one finger and one hand because I’m holding Adele.

She holds her pacifier by herself.

I can’t believe I’m a mom. The words don’t come today, but they will soon.

I am adjusting now to the greatest gift and blessing. I am adjusting.

My words need to form.

Just so everyone is clear on where we are in the process: we are in the 30-day window, which ends May 31, where the birth mom can still choose to parent, thus taking away our guardianship that she signed consent for on May 1.

Then we have a few months to get through the court system (6-9 months is what the agency told us), and after we complete that part of the process, Adele will legally be ours and she will legally have our last name.

An announcement can be made after the 30 days, so on May 31. Photos (online) can be shared after she is legally ours, so not for another 6-9 months or whenever we can get through the court system. Print photos may be shared, though.

It’s all so confusing and there are so many rules, and it’s hard to continuously explain ourselves or why Adele isn’t “legally ours” yet even though she’s living with us or why we can’t email or text photos. It’s exhausting. Each adoption agency and each state has its own adoption rules and laws. We knew this going in, but it doesn’t make it any easier. Please just bear with us as we bear with ourselves during this process. We’ll get through it, but it’s not an easy one.

Trust me, there’s nothing I want more than to share with the world our beautiful daughter, the best thing that’s ever happened to us, one of G-d’s biggest and best blessings for us. But we must be patient. We signed onto this going in. We knew adoption would be patchy and rough and emotional and draining and stressful and long. But we will power through.

All the while we love Adele and we are setting up her beautiful pink and lamb nursery. And all the while we are bonding and she is growing and thriving and getting more beautiful each day.

All the while I try not to think about this current 30-day window. I try to think of the future, our future with Adele. I try not to dwell on the process, and instead revel in this new glory. This new motherhood. This new love I can’t explain. This new everything. This new life. This new reason for living.

Adoption, yes is one tough cookie. I am one tough cookie. Sean is one tough cookie. He is handling all this with such grace and dignity. He doesn’t tire or get annoyed from explaining over and over again our process. He just loves Adele with his whole being.

She is our daughter and she is our life.

I had no idea this would happen so fast. Or that I would learn so fast how to care for a newborn. As my heart grows each day I know I will find the words. Until then, let these blog posts be choppy and chaotic. Because that’s how things are right now. We are a house with a newborn. We are bustling and buying and crazy and sleep-deprived. Our “past lives” have gone out the window. We are adjusting our sails for this amazing, beautiful, wonderful, sudden blessing.

We are adjusting our sails in this choppy water. And we are doing just fine. Damn fine, actually.

Damn fine.

Written on May 11, 2014

Written on May 11, 2014

We brought Adele Chaya home with us on April 28. She was born at 8:30 a.m. on April 26, and as you can imagine it's been a whirlwind since then! I haven't had two seconds to write so this will be fast. Between the sleepless nights and Feedings and diaper changes I have somehow learned to become a mother. Sean and I love Adele too much to put into words. Our love for her grows each day.

This is my first Mother's Day but we cannot yet share the news. I have thousands upon thousands of pictures of Adele starting from the day we left the hospital with her. We are in the 30-day period where the birth mom can still change her mind so we haven't told the masses the news, but we have told our entire families and the majority of our friends. It still hurts to not be able to share with the world the biggest and best blessing of our lives: our beautiful Adele. She is growing and thriving and beautiful and more precious than I could ever have imagined.

I am counting the days until May 31 when the 30 day period is over, and then will be waiting for the next big hurdle which is getting through the courts in 6-9 months. And then and then and then she will legally be ours and I can post the thousands of pictures.

Until then I am stirring.

Packages arrive every day from our friends and families. Cookies and flowers and clothes for Adele and our new diaper bag. And all the formula and the diapers and the wipes. I'm learning and I'm loving every second with her. This is the hardest and best thing I've ever done.

I learned real fast how to be a mom. We're still so much in the middle of all this. The nursery is under construction. Adele is our love and our joy. We have visitors almost every day and a meal train. And it's so overwhelming and it's too much to put into words. These past two weeks have been an emotional roller coaster. We are getting through and managing. I'll never be able to explain. Not now, not ever.

Somehow, some way I became a mom. I learned how to change a diaper. I learned how to change 5,000 diapers. I learned how to change 5,000 with poop on my hands. I learned how to make a bottle in record speed with a crying baby. And I look into her eyes and I love and I love and I love and I love and I love and I love. She is our whole world. 

All of a sudden there was Adele. All of a sudden, in two weeks notice, with no baby clothes and no crib and no nursery and no wipes we became parents. All of a sudden there was Adele.

While Adele is napping and Sean is mowing the lawn I want to take a few more seconds to get out some thoughts and emotions. It's been hard not having time to write, especially since writing is how I deal with what I'm going through and how I express myself.

There's been lots of crying of happy tears since we brought her home, and lots of stress knowing we are snack in the middle of the 30 day period when the birth mom can change her mind. Not that we believe she will, but fear is fear and it is still there. Meanwhile we love her and prepare her pink and lamb nursery and I look forward to picking out her clothes each day. And when she sleeps on my chest it is the best feeling in the world. And I still can't believe I'm a mom.

I know these blog posts are unorganized and jumbled but so are my thoughts. I feel so rushed and so stunted all at once. Like we are frozen in this 30 day period and the hurdles that await after the 30 days, yet life is bustling as we prepare our home for a new life, a new life that is our daughter.

All around us our families and friends are visiting and sending Adele things and sending wishes and calling and FaceTime 'ing. And all around us life as we know it has changed. I am taking 8 weeks off work. All around us everything is upside down. There's so much to do in the nursery, so much to prepare.

Timothy

Her little fingers curl around my side as I rock her in the glider. It’s raining outside and probably near 2:30 a.m. but Adele is very much awake and not hungry at all.

So I decide to read her The Little Lamb, the story about Timothy. And as I open the book all of the memories of the story come flooding back: how cute Timothy looked as a baby lamb who needed to be fed with a bottle; and how he grew into a large, fluffy lamb when Emmy took good care of him. And when Timothy got spooked at the birthday party wearing his new purple leash, and tried to run away, I was scared for him. And when he got too big to keep at home with Emmy’s family, I held back tears. She had taken such good care of Timothy. Now he was big and strong and needed to be back in the pasture with the other lambs. 20 lambs on Wetherbee Farm. And all those feelings I felt as a little girl, when it was time to let Timothy, go came rushing back. And all of a sudden I was back in my childhood. And I was sad for Emmy but also happy Timothy was healthy enough to be on his own.

There is something to be said about a girl caring for a weak little lamb until he is big and strong and healthy. It remains a mystery to me, today even at age 29, why that story touched me so deeply as a little girl and why it continues to make me cry even now. And reading it to Adele? Am I really a mother now? Am I really, all of a sudden, reading my daughter my favorite story growing up? How did this happen so fast?

I know she will learn to love Timothy as much as I do. And she will learn to love Emmy as much as I do, and most of all admire her for caring for Timothy when he needed her.

And she will look at the pictures of Timothy and want to laugh and cry all at the same time because he is so cute and it’s hard not to just fall in love.

Adele grabs my clothes when I hold her now, and my engagement ring when I feed her. Her little hands curl around my body. She is making sounds that are not crying sounds, and yesterday when Sean picked her up in the morning and told her she looked so nice in her new outfit for the day she smiled so big I burst into laughter.

Maybe it’s sleep deprivation. Maybe it’s my throbbing back. Maybe it’s utter exhaustion. But the story of Timothy made me cry early this morning, with Adele in the crease of my arm, just looking at me. I believe she knew that story still made me emotional. And I will hold nothing back when she gets older and I read her that story and I cry. (Because I’ll never be able to read it without crying.) She can see what the story means to me, Mom.  She can see Timothy still makes Mom, a grown woman, cry. And it’s OK to cry over Timothy, for a little sadness, but mostly happiness.

Because there is something to be said about a girl caring for a weak little lamb until he is big and strong and healthy.

I call this #mommymornings (her bottle, my coffee)

Written on April 25, 2014

Written on April 25, 2014

A letter to my friends: I am so, so sorry. You may or may not notice I’ve been withdrawn. It isn’t like me to not call or text or email or Facebook or Instagram incessantly. But it’s so hard to talk with all of you and make plans when I can’t tell you what’s going on or what I’m going through, or potentially have to cancel said plans at the last minute.

So if we’re due for a lunch date, and I know I am with so many of you, I am sorry for not initiating. I am sorry for the less communication. I just don’t know how to be right now. I’ve never had to keep such a big secret from you for so long. Sorry for being withdrawn. Please, please, please forgive me. I promise it won’t be this way forever. I just need to figure out what’s happening and then I can tell you.

I’m in the midst of a major life transition. I am hanging by a thread. I’m in a pot of boiling water. It’s not personal. I just don’t know how to BE right now. I’m sorry.

Please understand, and I know you will, because you’re my friends. Please be patient, and I know you are, because you’re my friends. Day 12. 

Written on April 24, 2014

Written on April 24, 2014

Birth mom is 4 cm dilated. We’ve known for 11 days.

What do you do when you can’t do anything? You look up random people’s baby registries to make sure you haven’t missed any essentials. PaciGrip? Ah, yes, I had forgotten that.

“Smith” and “Miller.” Those are the two last names I typed in when searching for random registries. I make notes, I make documents, I make lists.

The documents for after she comes and after she’s a she and after she’s ours have grown, just like these embargoed blog posts. 11 days worth of blog posts. Documents upon documents of to-be-added registry items for a baby girl. These documents, these blog posts are this boiling pot. A huge loaf of bread in the oven. Add in any other metaphor that means something about to burst. Blog posts, to-be-added items are boiling over, runneth over. Nothing to do with them but keep adding to them. Keep adding registry items. Keep writing these blog posts. Still no voice. No key to the door.

No voice to shout. No key to the door of this potential future world with potential future baby.

Just documents and words and Amazon links. Just plans I can’t yet make. Phone calls I can’t yet make. Items I can’t yet add. Posts I can’t yet publish. A baby I can’t yet hold. A feeling I have yet to feel. An emotion I have yet to experience. 4 cm. 11 days. The word “WAIT,” in all caps, in big, bold letters in a big pot of boiling water.

And we don’t even know what lies ahead. We don’t know how things will go in the hospital or even how long baby will be in the hospital.

I can’t even begin to process this process.

Just boiling water.

Written on April 23, 2014

Written on April 23, 2014

Two words: going crazy.

Envisioning the nursery now: pale pink, white and lambs. Lambs are the theme. It just came to me. First and foremost, I love lambs and have always loved lambs. They are soft and cute and gentle. As a little girl I found great comfort in my lamb stuffed animals and read about lambs. I loved a book about a lamb named Timothy who lived with a family (a little girl primarily) until he got too big (much like Clifford) and ate all of the flowers in the garden. I cried and cried and cried when Timothy couldn’t live with the family anymore.

Just like all meaningful things in my life, this theme presented in my mind without reserve, doubt or hesitation. Like “Pink and Pearls” for my name of my blog, like pink and black for my wedding colors, like pink roses and pearls for my wedding theme, my baby’s nursery is going to be lambs.

I told Dr. Kelly my angst at selecting only unisex items (albeit cute ducks and bears) for the baby registry, and she suggested I make an alternate registry, for after the baby comes and is actually ours, with all the girl stuff I want. She told me she didn’t know her daughter was going to be a girl until two weeks before she was born so she made two registries. Each had the same regular items like car seats and diaper pails, but one had girl stuff and one had boy stuff. The thought of that is too overwhelming for me, so instead I have a document (or 50,000) of links to items I will include in our registry once the baby comes, she’s a girl and she’s ours. (It’s not really 50,000) So I have the links and their accompanying product descriptions (and colors choices and sizes if applicable) ready to go, but nothing will be added until it’s time. It’s all the strawberry rompers you can dream of. Oh, and the polka dots and party dresses. (Yes, they make party dresses for 0-3 months.) And bathing suits and sun hats and jammies and gingham and flowers. She needs a party dress for Julie’s birthday party. She needs a sun hat for the pool. She needs 5 million rompers because she’s my daughter.

I canceled my trip to Florida last night. I was supposed to leave tomorrow morning, and be there for four days, for Lauri’s bachelorette. I of course explained the situation to Lauri but told her not to tell anyone since we haven’t shared the news yet. Naturally she was overcome with joy and understood my last-minute cancellation, though it is devastating for me to miss this trip. I had been looking forward to this weekend for like six months. But the thought of being late for or possibly missing the birth of my daughter is something I can’t even fathom. Whether she comes tomorrow or in one week, I can’t risk being late or missing it. There’s never any guarantee I can hop on a plane from Florida and get to Philadelphia in time if I need to. I can’t bear the thought of not being there. So the decision is made.

And having my friends not know what’s going on is eating me up inside. I want to tell everyone but we’ve been instructed not to, since things could still fall through. Especially my best friends: I want them to know. I feel like since this past weekend I have been able to gather more of my thoughts, prepare more emotionally and even get some things taken care of at work in preparation. And now at this point I’ve cancelled my trip, packed an overnight bag, we’ve bought the items we were told to buy for the birth mother in the hospital, and we just wait.

Pins and needles.

I have a list in my mind of things I need to do when she comes and she’s ours. Add the strawberry rompers to the baby registry. Tell our friends. Invite the mothers, invite the brothers, the sisters. Tell work. Set up a doctor’s appointment for when she needs her next round of shots. Start putting together the nursery. Put my lamb stuffed animals in the nursery. (Yes, I still have them) Make sure both cars have car seats and bases. Be prepared to buy new and different bottles with different nipples in case she doesn’t like the ones we’ve chosen. Be prepared to buy new and different diapers and new and different baby wipes. A diaper bag. A pink baby wrap, for me to carry her in, because she’s a girl. Oh, those strawberry rompers.

Take a million pictures but tell everyone nothing can be posted on the internet until the adoption is finalized. The name. The birth announcement. Research things to do with babies in Dublin. Figure out if she can leave the country before the adoption is finalized. (For Dublin in August, of course.)It’s amazing how on April 13 I couldn’t have been more terrified, more unprepared, more shocked, more overwhelmed. A mere 10 days later I am completely and utterly and overwhelmingly ready. 10 days later and I’m all of a sudden prepared to drop everything to be a mom. 10 days later and here I am, with my to-do list that can’t even be started yet. A to-do list in my mind. Tentative items to add to the registry. Strawberry rompers and a lamb nursery. How did this happen in 10 days?10 days later and I want nothing more than for this baby to come, for this baby to be healthy, for this baby to become our daughter. For the health and reassurance of our birth mother. To get the baby home safely and begin what will be the most now-incomprehensible hours and weeks and years of our lives.

In my mind I’m already a mom, despite all the rules of adoption telling me not to feel that way just quite yet. I’m holding this big secret from 99 percent of the people in my life. I’m walking around doing things all the while there’s this alternate potentially future life in which I have this baby girl and she has strawberry rompers and a lamb themed nursery and she has a name. This world that doesn’t exist yet, or even isn’t close to existing. A world in which I have no idea how to enter. It’s the wanting to scream, shout, laugh, cry but having no voice.

It’s the wanting to be in this world that I’ve created in my mind, yet not knowing how.Not having the key. Not even having the door.

It’s just the idea. This beautiful baby, inside of another woman, who has no idea the life and love we have planned for her. The reality is this can’t go on forever. This baby eventually will be born. A decision will eventually be made. No matter what decision is made, our lives will inevitably move forward and another chapter will inevitably begin.10 days ago I said this time is too short. This is not enough notice. Not enough time. To prepare. Physically, mentally, emotionally. The words that came to mind were “daunting” and “panic.”

Now that seems silly. This 10 days has been long enough. Too long, actually. Too long.

In the past 10 days I’ve somehow managed to make this my new normal (something I’m good at), and now the waiting is literally eating at me. In a new-normal way, of course.

Now there’s only one word that comes to mind, and that is her name.