The Waiting Game

Hello Friends and Family,

It’s been a hot minute since I’ve been on here. For those who follow me on social media you may have seen a few updates where I mentioned how hard this adoption process has been lately. It’s been a crazy rollercoaster ride of emotions dashed with many tears and I had needed a bit of time to process some of that before sharing it in writing with all of you.

In the last blog, I mentioned having our first expectant mother profile shown to us and then her choosing another family. The thing is, we had been waiting almost 5 months to be presented with our first mother. That was unusual per our specific adoption agency but it was due to our adoption agency having an influx of mothers and babies that didn’t match our home study profile (the list of decisions you make on what baby you feel comfortable with adopting into your home).

That 5 months was what I had on paper dreaded the most when thinking about the domestic adoption process, just the waiting and not knowing at all when your baby would be arriving. I thought I wasn’t going to be able to handle it in the slightest. My therapist even, God bless him, when he was interviewed for our home study paperwork (yes, this is something that happens, if you’ve ever had any sort of therapy, your therapist gets contacted and basically has to fill out information on your mental health and readiness to adopt) had said that that his only concern for me was being able to deal with the waiting of the adoption process. He said he felt I could do it as I relied on God but that it could be difficult for me. That part was so true when I first read it in our home study I felt like I had gotten punched in the gut. He was right. I’m not a waiter by nature. I’m not a patient person when it comes to my life and the goals and dreams I have set for myself.

He happened to also be correct about who would be able to help me through it. Those 5 months of waiting, with no updates, no expectant mothers, no baby to take home, turned out to be the most peaceful season of waiting I’ve ever had. Nerves would creep up, doubt would sometimes rear their head but it’s as if every time that happened God just lovingly placed his hand on my shoulder and reassured me it was going to alright. So 5 months in, I found myself surprised and proud that I was actually doing the thing I hadn’t been sure I could do it all.

Then, we were out of the blue sent our first expectant mother profile and we instantly fell in love with this expectant mother and her baby. James and I weren’t together the first time we read about her but we both separately admitted to just crying while reading over her profile. She is an amazing woman and an incredible mother to the baby she was giving up via adoption. Within 24 hours of us falling in love and envisioning our baby that dream was shut down abruptly when she chose another family. We trusted that God knew what he was doing, that that particular baby was not meant to be ours. It didn’t stop the hurt, the feeling of rejection and even the wondering about what might have been. And from that point on what had been the easiest thing, to wait, all of a sudden became the hardest thing.

The past month or so has been a difficult one, filled with lots of tears, lots of wondering where our baby is, lots of rearranging the expectations I had for the timelines of their arrival in our family. It’s involved lots of prayer and laying all of my feelings out before God. It’s involved lots of tearful talks with James (who has been stellar and steady, as he always is.) It’s involved making plans for our near future that I wanted to put off because we were supposed to have our baby already.

Then to top it all off, we were presented with another expectant mother profile this week. It was an expectant mother completely different in many ways from the first and instead of falling in love instantly we honestly found ourselves filled with lots of questions and concerns. We still wanted the very best family for this expectant mother and baby. They are utterly deserving of that but we wrestled with if it could be us. Ultimately, we decided we could not give this mother and baby what they needed and our heart that had just stopped hurting from the first rejection, broke in a completely different way at having to say no to being presented as an option to this mother.

I told James the other day “this may be the hardest thing I’ve done in my adult life.” Our hearts feel raw and a bit weary. Waiting feels long these days. We’re coming up on a year anniversary from when we started this process officially with our agency. And yet, today, I can honestly say I still have hope. I do believe our baby is out there and that we can be the right family for a mother making the toughest decision of her life. I know that waiting is not in vain, it never is, because God is in the waiting.

To our friends, family, co-workers, church, neighbors and community. Thank you for being with us. Your love, presence, prayers, food drop offs, wisdom and encouragement has provided us with more hope than you could imagine.

Cheers to the waiting,

Molly