Category Archives: Heart Padding

Doubt Emotions Excitement Heart Padding Mom Ache

Tug-of-war

July 30, 2012 – 5:45 am

Ever since we found out the baby is a boy, chose a name and met the baby’s parents- my heart has been filling right up. Each day this past week has been better than the last, and it’s been months since I’ve been able to say that. I’m not sure I’ve ever lied so much about how I’m doing so it’s been really nice to at least feel like an honest person.

There was no nodding-and-smiling, for lack of knowing how to actually respond to people comparing this waiting to “every pregnancy” because I never had to explain myself. Friday was so awesome my face could have exploded y’all. And just when I thought it couldn’t get any better, I had a letter from the baby’s mom and an ultrasound picture waiting in my mail box.

Our. very. first. picture.

After I stared at his little face for what felt like an hour. I sent it to the hub’s phone.

Then, to my parents…Then, to two of my best friends…Then, to Chris’ parents.

Then, it went on our fridge.

Several hours later…I realized how very very wrong I was. It hit me like a ton of bricks.

This sweet boy, isn’t ours yet. And we’ve been acting like he is.

We’ve shared more details with a handful of our close friends than we intended, because we needed people to talk to. And I can’t undo that. But, I’m not sure I want to. But, I feel like I should want to. Selfishly, there have been days when I needed to see a friend look back at me and really see how scary this is and not just take my word for it. Selfishly. And then, I want to celebrate with those friends when we have good news because holy-geeze we’ve been so down-in-the-dumps or freaked-out waiting on one tiny piece of information that it’s necessary to put them out of their misery too.

So is it better to say nothing? To deal with this alone because it’s someone else’s private life involved? Probably.

Because their privacy trumps my needs.

And so I’m sick to my stomach. Because I don’t know what the right thing is. All I can do is be honest, handle my emotions a little better and start over tomorrow.

So, I will continue preparing for him,  calling him by the name we’ve chosen and writing him letters. But, I’ve repositioned my heart this weekend and acknowledged that he isn’t our son yet. We hope he will be. But at this moment, he belongs to someone else.

 

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Adoption Process Adoption Support Emotions Excitement Heart Padding Mom Ache

This Thing That Happens When You’re Waiting

May 1, 2012 – 2:03 am

There’s this thing that happens when you cross the line from filling out paper work to being a waiting parent in adoption. There’s no word for it (unless you’ve invented one- please do tell). It’s just a thing that happens. To your heart.

And I’ve avoided this. I think I’m avoiding it now, maybe. Stuffing it. Because it feels stupid. And at the very same time it feels very real.

Our adoption is ultimately about our someday child and what is best and good for him or her. It is about lovingly and willingly providing a home and a family for a child who will grow up into an adult and function as a part of society. Maybe get a degree and start a family.

But, it is also about us. I can’t deny that at this moment my arms feel terribly empty. That I am sad.

And I am so thankful- so so thankful for the people in our life. Because, you have been loving and understanding. You’ve helped us raise money and read our blog and prayed for us. You’ve given sacrificially. And we’ve sat together dumbfounded at your support. It seems like almost every evening, I have a thank you note to write to someone who has loved us more than we deserve.

So know that I am thankful. But, tonight I’m also sad. After chatting with a few girlfriends this evening, I walked by our “extra room” a few times- avoiding it. The lump in my throat was already there and I knew if I opened the door, I’d wilt.

But I did. And I did.

I inhaled and surveyed what few things we have ready for our baby; a white dresser adorned with baby shoes (given generously by friends whose children have outgrown them), a few baby books (our Christmas present this year from my aunt Pam), a few stuffed animals (all mine from childhood except for the little sheep that Chris bought when we were in Africa this summer) and the little side-snap tee-shirts by gerber (from my mom). My exhale left in sobs.

Unwrapping a few baby blankets, the tears pooled. And as they fell- the little hooded duck towel, white and trimmed in orange, made me smile.

I cozied myself in the rocking chair and opened one of our baby books- Let’s Play In The Snow. The tears dried as I read through, imagining the late-night giggles we’ll have reading through this book with our little one. And as I neared the heart-wrenching you-belong-to-me-and-are-my-favorite-thing-in-the-world ending that we can all count on in children’s books, my eyes warmed with tears again.

I know I’m not lacking anything at this moment by not being a mother. I know Chris and I are wonderful- just the two of us. We’re happy, in-love, never bored together and enjoy our life. But, there’s something about waiting. It’s just this thing that happens.

His high-school saxaphone sits beside the changing table, dust-covered, and I’m reminded of where we’ve come from. We were two decently messed up kids when we met. Our marriage almost fell apart less than 24 months of it’s birth. Yet, here we are and only by the grace of God in our lives.

It will be through that same grace and mercy that the Lord brings us a baby to love. Until then, my heart will ache and I’ll find a way to be patient, pursuing the One who created us both. The One who saved our marriage and is knitting our sweet spectacular child together.

Thank you for walking through this with us.

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Adoption Process Adoption Support Anxiety Doubt Emotions Excitement Faith Fear Heart Padding Joy Mom Ache Resources

Empowered to Connect Conference | Day One

February 18, 2012 – 5:49 am

Truly, I tell you. I feel like my heart has been split open- all its contents laid out on the ground.

As day one of the Empowered to Connect conference came to a close, we zombie-walked to the car feeling raw and tired.

(Right now, I’m questioning if I’m brave enough to write this post in its entirety for you all to read. Honestly, I’m not sure that I can. I have even deleted and retyped that last sentence about five times.)

I have been waiting to hear Dr. Karen Purvis speak since Chris and I missed her at the Together For Adoption Conference a couple of years back. We’ve been anxiously awaiting this day since September. We were thirty minutes early. In Dallas morning traffic. (I know, we shocked ourselves too) We took full advantage of this new arriving-somewhere-early-experience and strolled leisurely into the building sipping our coffee. I must have stepped into some kind of waiting-adoptive-parent-vortex the moment my boots crossed the threshold because the very second my body was in that building the tears came.

Y’all.

We weren’t even at the registration table. Seriously? I thought.

Every time I saw Dr. Purvis, I wanted to hurdle the auditorium chairs, wrap my arms around her neck, kiss her cheek and bawl like a baby out of admiration and gratitude.

Dr. Karen Purvis doesn’t know who the heck I am. But, she’s changing my life. Our life. She also happens to have my dream job and is spectacular at it. Through Dr. Purvis, God is putting together some major pieces in mine and Chris’ life, answering our cries (very specifically) and laying a tremendous foundation for our future children that we are overwhelmed with gratitude to receive.

“It’s human being at it’s most sacred” -Dr. Karen Purvis on the connected environment

But. This has been a long hard day. Honestly, my concern for what other people think of me is the thing that kept me from coming completely unraveled at this conference today. I wiped the tears away, attempting to leave the eyeshadow, mascara and powder untouched and wondered if everyone in the room was doing the same thing I was.

Are we all breathing slow deep breaths, quickly wiping tears and swallowing the lumps in our throats to avoid lookin’ a hot mess and snotting all over one another?

I’m sure the ones with children already in their homes had to feel like falling apart at the seams. I’m sure.

I apologize if this doesn’t make sense to you. I have plans to come back and more fully explain the things we’re learning. In the meantime, here’s a few bullet points from the day:

  • When you {remove the violence}, organic (child/brain) development will begin.
  • When a child feels {safe and connected} they are able to use their words. When they don’t feel safe and connected they are not able to use their words (this has been physiologically proven).
  • There are two stages that MUST be reached/attained before a child can successfully self-regulate their emotions and behaviors. (1) Parent provides external regulation (meaning the child IS NOT responsible and SHOULD NOT be held responsible for regulating their emotions). This means if your child needs something, even if it is to be held, you say ‘yes’. (2) The parent and child co-regulate the child’s emotions and behaviors.
  • The “trajectory” of mental illness begins when a child’s needs are not met the first few years of life.
  • Enter: TBRI or Trust Based Relational Intervention. TBRI involves the mind (correcting), body (empowering) and soul (connecting) and if you are not connecting to your child- NO intervention matters. Nothing will work or help your child until you are connecting with them.

The last two hours of the day, we moved into “Adopting From The Inside Out”. And this was kind-of the beginning of the end for me today.

Making sense of your past and being realistic about the future, you can be freed to be fully present in each and every moment to help your children heal and become all that God has created them to be. -I don’t remember who said this and I didn’t write it down.

They discussed how very important it is to look back at your big and little traumas. Not to dwell. To address it (no, like, for real). Stare it in the face. Make sense of it.

You cannot lead your child to a place of healing if you do not know the way yourself. – Karen Purvis

We discussed the attachment dance between parents and their children, discovering a little bit about where we might fall in our parenting styles (Authoritarian, Neglectful, Permissive or Authoritative). After Dr. Purvis covered the four successful skills to relationships (things we need to be able to model that then become the goals for our children) she ended with some videos of some activities she did with some girls living in residential treatment for self mutilation.

Oh their scars. And my heart officially cracked open and spilled out.

Then, we zombie-walked to the car.

More soon…

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Adoption Process Anxiety Decisions Emotions Facts Fear Heart Padding Uncategorized

We Didn’t Dare Say It Out Loud

February 1, 2012 – 6:15 am

When we first began this journey, I thought very little about our child’s birth parents.

Immediately upon entering the “adoption world” of websites, books, conferences and conversations we were confronted with the question of having an open adoption or not. I don’t think that I had really given this relationship any deep thought. In the beginning, I guess I had imagined our child appearing out of thin air like a gift from God or finding a perfectly bundled baby in a basket on our porch.

When I did think about it, I felt threatened by our some-day birth parents. I didn’t even know who these people would be yet and I was already afraid of them. But we didn’t dare say that out loud. So, when people would ask us about birth parents we always responded indifferently with something along the lines “Yeah, we’re not sure how we’ll handle that yet.” or on our really holy days “Yes, we’re praying about that.”

I just didn’t want to say the words. That I wanted our children all to myself. That I couldn’t imagine seeing our child’s birth mother hold our baby in her arms when we were the parents. That they have given their child up  and now he or she is mine, all mine.

That. We. Are. Just. Too. Selfish. That we don’t even want to consider the options and research what might be best for our child.

Ugh. My stomach is churning just writing that.

The reality was that I had a lot of fears that I didn’t want to admit to and so did Chris.

If our child’s first mom is too close, she may decide I’m not a good mother

…and regret her decision

…or try to control how we parent

Our child may love her more.

She may try to get her child back.

She may hurt our child to punish us (if she isn’t able to get the baby back).

These were just a few of our {very real} fears.

I’m sure by now, you can see where this is going; We’re over it. Those fears, while very common, are almost all myths. The fears that aren’t myths are highly unlikely scenarios.

I know what some of you are thinking. You’re thinking “highly unlikely” = possible. Yes, it’s true that the scenarios above that are highly unlikely are, therefor, possible. In fact, I know a family who has experience with one of these scenarios. But, every child (adopted or not) is at risk for the highly unlikely but possible scenarios of life. And every parent worries about these highly unlikely possibilities and accepts them as part of parenthood. In other words, you’re probably not going to decide not to have children out of fear they could be kidnapped or terminally ill. (I said probably) So, these mostly-mythical-but-sometimes-possible thoughts regarding a relationship between a first mom or dad and their child are reasonable fears that adoptive parents accept as part of the deal. This was my most recent realization, thanks to the book Dear Birthmother.

But, in the last couple of years I had a much more in depth realization based in personal experience that has really helped me piece all of this together. That realization came in the form of my own family- the one I always knew and the one I finally met six years ago.

Read We Didn’t Dare Say It Out Loud Part II here.

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Heart Padding Mom Ache Paperwork

Mom Ache and Extra Heart Padding

July 30, 2011 – 10:34 pm

I’ve been working on our adoption paperwork.

And now, I fully understand why I was avoiding it.

I’ve heard adoptive mom’s say how painful and gut wrenching the process was. I’ve heard them say it was the most difficult thing they’ve ever been through. I’ve heard them say that adopting is like ripping your heart out, tossing it in a blender, forgetting the lid,  hitting the chop button, and watching it splatter the walls.

Okay- no one used those words, but they might as well have.

I decided that I would not let that happen to me. I was going to learn from their stories and I would walk into our adoption process:

     expecting to lose a child or two we thought would be ours, along the way.

     ready for the insecurity to set in.

     knowing that it was going to be a very long process. (In fact, I gave myself extra heart padding by telling myself it would be at least two years)

 My unconscious conclusion was: therefor it won’t hurt like that. I just didn’t get it. As much as I like to be the person who “totally gets what you’re saying” all the time, I just really didn’t. How could I, really?

I was trying to protect myself by not making it a priority. (Yeah, my math here is atrocious).

It was so much easier to grab that “mom ache” I had, by the face, and cram her back down into the pit of my stomach when I wasn’t answering a million questions about parenting. Now, I realize that I have to allow the aching mom part of me to live and breath and walk around. She has to go to work every day, go to the store, come home, have a glass of wine with her husband, write this blog, fill out that paperwork, and find a way to sleep at night.

Because that mom ache is what gets babies who need homes, into them.

Adoption

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