Birth Mothers
True love for your child is knowing what is best for them and giving it to them, no matter the sacrifice to you. I heard that somewhere – on TV, or in a book maybe. I didn’t ever think I could love someone that much – so much that I would do anything for them, sacrifice my pain for their happiness. Until I became pregnant.
It was a one-night stand, not something I am proud to admit. When I found out I was pregnant, I told the father, and he said he would be there for whatever I decided. I didn’t know what I wanted. I was living with my parents still, in a job I didn’t like, only 21 years old. I didn’t want to be a mother like this. I believe in a two-parent home, with stability – emotional stability and financial stability. I made an appointment for an abortion, but canceled a day or two prior, feeling that this was a living being inside me who deserved more than to be suctioned into a bio-hazard bag.
Shortly after that I decided on adoption. It seemed natural to me. I am very black-and-white in my thinking, and I believe that helped with my choice. I made a list of why to parent, and why not to. I started working with a local adoption agency about four months into my pregnancy, and by eight months I had a family picked out.
Throughout this process, the father showed his true colors. He was not a man of his word, and he was simply selfish. As of 2005 in Alberta, the birth father has equal rights to the child. He basically vetoed his rights throughout the pregnancy by disappearing from his house, his job, etc. But, when it came to the birth, and time to sign the consent, he did cause some drama because he was having second thoughts. This twenty-four-hour tension reinforced how much I wanted my little girl to grow up with the family I had chosen for her.
It was difficult to be pregnant and working in retail. Strangers would ask me questions, normal to them, but awkward to me. “Do you have your nursery done?” “Is the father excited?” “Do you have names picked out?” My answers were one-word, and often lies. Yes, I have the nursery done, when really I sometimes long to pick out baby items in the children’s store and dream of my child’s room. Yes, the father is excited, when really the thought of him makes me sick. No, I don’t have names picked out, because the one I have chosen for her may not be hers. I felt bad for lying, but howcould I tell them something so delicate? I might cry, they might be upset, and it would be inappropriate and awkward.
Finally, I gave birth to my beautiful baby girl. During my hospital stay I had my daughter stay in my room, as I wanted to care for her during the few days I was there. I wanted to change her diaper and bottle-feed her and hold her while I could. My family was worried this would sway my decision against adoption, but it only reinforced to me that I was making the right decision for both of us. My sisters and parents spent time with us, saying hello to my child, and good-bye. My parents actually spent the entire three days with me, as I was scared to be alone, not knowing how to parent. When I visited my daughter’s new family to place my child with them, it felt natural. It also felt as though a weight had been lifted off my shoulders.
They did keep the name I had given her as her middle name, which is so important to me. It is a part of her. And I believe she will feel all the more love, knowing how special her name is, that it came from both her birth mom and her parents.
I did not expect the roller coaster of emotions to come. I knew there would be grief, but I just had no idea. The first few weeks were traumatic. I would cry randomly, waking in the middle of the night even, to sob, while my father rubbed my back until I fell asleep. The emotional pain felt so physical. I literally felt empty. Empty arms. Empty belly. Empty heart. I wanted her back with me so bad. My mother told me, “This is when you need to think with your head, not your heart, to really know what is best for the both of you.” I did do counseling afterwards, with a psychiatrist and a therapist, which I would strongly recommend for anyone facing this challenge. I needed help dealing with the grief in all its stages: jealousy, anger, sadness, etc.
Time did heal the wounds. I could go out in public without having a panic-attack, go back to work, hang out with my friends, and basically move forward with my life. I was able to go back to school, get a career, and I have recently moved out of my parent’s house. I’m growing up, and growing into an adult life. It is sometimes hard to see my sisters having children and being in a part of their lives, where I am not. But playing with my nieces and nephews also shows me how thankful I am that I chose adoption. That I am not ready for those responsibilities, I am not ready to be a parent. Not then, and still not now.
I had chosen an open adoption, which I am so grateful for. I had a few visits during the first year, and one on her second birthday. I love seeing her. Knowing she is in a safe, happy, loving home. Knowing she is healthy. I do talk on the phone every few months with her parents, and they send pictures. Some people believe that an open adoption is confusing, and selfish, but I think not. She will know who I am, that she was loved, and there will be no confusion. Her parents are honest with her, as with her adopted brother, about where they came from and why. There are no secrets. She even has a photo album I gave her of pictures of my life, who I am. I send them pictures to add to it every year. As time goes on we plan on one or two visits per year. And still cards, pictures, and phone calls, every few months, and on special days. When she is older, it will be what she wants, visits or not.
When colleagues or new friends ask, “Do you have kids?” I say no. Because in honesty, I had a child, but I do not have one. As I get to know them, if they feel safe, I might tell them. It is something so sacred and delicate to me, it is hard to share. If I don’t get the response I want (I’m still not sure what that is) I am hurt and embarrassed. It is hard for a lot of people to understand. People without knowledge, or experience, in the area often assume it doesn’t hurt, because it was my choice. In the beginning of my loss, even I would question why I was upset about it. Of course, I do feel that I will be honest with my future husband, and my children, as it is part of my life, and therefore part of theirs.
Adoptive Parents
Eric and I were married in the fall of 2001. Five years, two rounds of IVF, and one miscarriage later, when it was still just the two of us, we decided to move ahead with the adoption process in the hopes of expanding our family. We filled out lots of paperwork, met with social workers and doctors, and were approved to be adoptive parents in the fall of 2006. Several months passed without any news.
Then, in January of 2007, we received a phone call from our adoption agency. There was a birth mom who wanted to meet with us! So, on a very cold evening in early February we went to the agency and met with Maria and her dad, Karl. Maria was only 16 at the time, and her mom had passed away the previous year, so she really was not in a position to care for her baby boy, due in the beginning of June. After talking with her, we prayed about it and felt that God was calling us to stand by and encourage her, as well as possibly adopt this baby.
Maria asked me to be her birth coach, so we went to birthing classes together! Eric and I made several visits over the next few months as we waited for the baby to arrive on the scene. We chose a name together with Maria. We readied the nursery and all we would need to bring baby home. However, while the father of Maria’s baby did not want the responsibility of caring for a child, he also did not want the baby to be put up for adoption. He was a teenager as well, still in school, and wanted his mother or Maria to care for the baby. We weren’t sure if he would show up in court to fight the adoption, but we still felt God’s hand in the situation and we wanted to continue to be a part of Maria’s life.
The big weekend finally arrived! At 40 weeks, Maria was induced. Twenty-six hours later, through an emergency C-section, baby boy Caden made his way into the world. He was beautiful! All the nurses on the baby floor assured us that he really was the most handsome baby there…and we believed it! We spent five days at the hospital, helping Maria as she recovered from her C-section, and spending time getting to know this beautiful, amazing little boy that we hoped would one day be our own!
We brought Caden home from the hospital and spent the day with him before bringing him to his foster parents’ home. They would be taking care of him until everything was official. We kicked things into overdrive, making sure that we had everything we needed to bring this baby home. In the meantime, Caden was staying with a great foster family! They loved him and took great care of him.
Several months later, we finally had the court hearing. Caden’s birth father did protest the adoption, to the point that several times Maria was ready to give up and give in. However, when we went to the court hearing, the judge ruled that Caden’s birth father had “failed to assume significant parental responsibility” in parenting Caden and so involuntarily terminated his rights. We finished in the courtroom just after 5 pm and then headed to the foster parents home to pick up Caden. We had a placement ceremony there, where Maria symbolically gave Caden to us.
That was over two years ago now. Caden continues to grow and learn – about himself, his surroundings, and his family. We have an open relationship with Maria, and we live fairly close to each other, so we get to see her throughout the year. We send pictures, Caden’s artwork, and letters to her on a regular basis, as well as birthday and Mother’s Day cards to her. In every way that counts, Maria has become family to us. She made an amazingly difficult sacrifice in allowing us to raise her child, and we are thankful every day for her, and for the opportunity that we have been given to be parents.
We may have waited much longer than we originally planned to start our family, but this little boy was definitely worth that wait!! We love our family of three and can’t wait to hopefully add another child to our lives through adoption sometime soon!
“We prayed for this child and the Lord has granted us what we asked of Him.”
~ 1 Samuel 1:27
Featured
The future can seem overwhelming when you first find out you are pregnant, especially if you also have to struggle with the hard decision between adoption and parenting.There is so much to do to prepare for the birth of your child, so many factors to consider. Take a deep breath, and let us walk with you through each step as you make your decision and plan for your baby’s birth.
Birth Mothers
I started dating my boyfriend when I was fifteen years old. When I turned sixteen, I was pregnant. Some people say they didn”t know they were pregnant or they couldn”t tell, but I knew the moment it happened. I was terrified. I mean I was only sixteen, and what sixteen-year-old wouldn”t be scared? At first I kept telling myself I probably just had a stomach flu. I was too scared to take a pregnancy test so I never did. I told my boyfriend as soon as I figured I was. He was scared too.
My whole life I always said that if I ever became pregnant it was my own fault and I would not get an abortion. The truth is, the moment I knew that I was pregnant, abortion was the first thing to pop in my head. I was just so scared. I talked to my boyfriend about it and he told me that I shouldn”t do it and reminded me of my convictions.
I prayed and cried almost every day. I was miserable and scared. I had morning sickness for three months. I secretly hoped that if God did not want me to have this baby, I would have a miscarriage. One month went by, then two, then four, and I was still pregnant. I was small the whole time, but by the fifth month I could feel the baby moving inside me. It was so weird, and it finally became real to me. I had another life inside of me and was living for another person.
I knew that I could never keep him, though. I loved my baby so much already, and I knew I needed to give him the best life I could. I knew a sixteen-year-old “child” could never raise a baby the way it needed to be raised. My boyfriend really wanted to keep our baby, but I talked to him and he realized he couldn”t raise a baby any more than I could.
Finally, six months rolled around and my mom finally noticed and asked me what was up. I broke down and told her. She was furious. She yelled at me called me stupid and even went as far as to say “now you can”t even get an abortion.” It crushed me. My dad came in and hugged me and told me he would support me in any decision I wanted to make. I told him adoption and he just said “Okay.” My boyfriend”s family and my family all supported me, but I still didn”t want anyone else to know, so for the remainder of my pregnancy I stayed home.
I found what I thought was the perfect family through a Christian adoption center, but two weeks before my due date they informed me that the family didn”t want to adopt anymore. I was devastated. I didn”t like any of the other families and I didn”t know what to do. I prayed and prayed that God would show me the way and let His will be done. Then, when a social worker showed me the profile of another family, I knew deep down that was the right family for my baby.
Two days before my due date I gave birth to a 6lb 11oz 21in baby boy. I instantly fell in love with him. I always knew he was a boy, and I loved him before I met him. I couldn”t hand him over to his new parents, so I left the hospital empty handed and let my mom give him to them. The new parents urged me to have an open adoption because they loved me, too, and wanted me to be a part of his life. I agreed. I signed the papers and the next day we hung out all day. It made me happy to see this family love my baby as much as I do. I knew he belonged to them.
Now his family and I have a great relationship. I still see them and they send me lots of pictures. I love their three daughters and get along with them really well. I know this was a win, win, win situation: I live a good life, my baby has two parents to love him and support him, and his family got the baby they wanted so badly. My boyfriend and I are still together, going on three years, and every day I thank God for the blessinghe has given us and the new family we have gained. I believe that our baby was the best mistake I ever made, and his adoption was the best decision I ever made.
Brittany
Birth Mothers
I was eighteen, a newly single mom. I had no job, no home of my own, and I was pregnant for the second time. A second child was nowhere in my plans. I was struggling to take care of my first – how could I also care for another child? We moved into an apartment with a roommate early on in my pregnancy. I had no idea what I was going to do.
I told my mom I was pregnant, and we talked about my choices. I told her abortion had briefly crossed my mind, but I couldn”t do that. She agreed. Then my mom mentioned that our long time family friends wanted to adopt a baby. They had two sons, and they very much wanted a daughter. We had known the family since I was about two. We had stayed in contact sporadically through the years, but it had been some time since we last talked to them. Even though I very much wanted to ask them to adopt my baby, I felt weird about calling them up out of the blue with such a huge proposal. From that time on, though, it was my heart”s desire that they would somehow adopt my baby.
I didn’t know much about adoption at that point. A girl in my high school who was pregnant at the same time I was pregnant with my first child had shared with me that she and her boyfriend were going to release their baby through an adoption. I opened a phone book and made some calls. I ended up choosing an agency that promoted open adoptions. Through the summer, I met several times with a gal from the agency. She explained the process so I would know just how everything would happen.
Toward the end of summer, it was time to start the selection process. I received three large binders filled with pictures of each prospective adopted family along with one-page autobiographies they had written about themselves. From these hundreds of short autobiographies, I was to choose three families. A first, second and third choice. I would meet one family at a time, then choose my child”s family. The task was overwhelming. I had just a couple weeks to pour over them, and really I kept thinking of our family friends…
I did finally make a choice, but the night before I was to meet with the gal from the adoption agency I flipped through the pages of those notebooks one last time. I still wasn”t sure about the families: they looked nice, they all had the values I was looking for, and, yeah, out of all the families I had to choose from, they were it. I closed the books. It was getting late.
I was surprised when my mom called just a short time after I had made peace with my choices. She told me she had just come home from dinner with the family that had been on my heart for so many months. She told me that she and my dad had shared with the family that I was planning to release my child for adoption. Our friends went home to talk about it, then called my parents to tell them that, if I would let them, they would like to adopt my baby. Tears streamed down my face as my mom spoke. For me that moment was a miracle. They didn’t know tomorrow was the big meeting day, the day I was to choose my baby”s family. They didn’t know that God had just answered my prayer.
So, my baby had a family. We spent the next few months working out the details and getting to know each other in these new roles we would play in each others’ lives. There would be an agreement about what kind of contact we would expect from one another. I had to decide how open I wanted to be. They had to decide how open they wanted to be.
I knew the family really wanted a daughter. One day before we knew if I was having a boy or a girl, I asked Della (the mother) if she would still want to adopt my baby if I was having a boy. I was worried. Della answered that she wanted to adopt my child nomatter what. I was relieved, but I so wanted my baby to be a daughter for them.
On Christmas Eve, I was in Florence celebrating with family. We were up late that night preparing the house for Christmas morning. Just at midnight, I had a contraction. Ten minutes later, I had another contraction. Ten minutes later, another. We quickly got on the road to make the 60 mile trip back to Eugene. The trip was slow going, but we made it in time to get to the hospital. My baby’s family was at the hospital, and Della was in the room with my mom and me when our daughter was born at 7:30 Christmas morning.
After meeting their new daughter, the family left me alone with the baby. We were together until the next day. Then it was time to sign papers. I was surprised to read that there was a six month trial period before the adoption was final. I didn’t remember talking about that. That was a scary moment, but the adoption agent reassured me that it was very unlikely that there would be any problems. I signed the papers believing that all would work out and my daughter would grow up in a loving home.
After signing the papers, we all went out to the parking lot together. My mom and I got into the car together. My baby’s family stood together with their new daughter as we drove away. That was a hard moment – I still cry when I think about it. I knew it was the right choice, but it hurt deeply. Joy and pain twisted together in my gut until I could hardly breathe.
I was able to visit my daughter for the first time in her new home a few days later. That visit was a blessing, as all our visits have been. My heart is filled with joy each time I think of my daughter and her life.
