(I tried to post this several times before going out of town last week. It is now working.)
Well, if you missed us on Facebook, you’ve got a lot of catching up to do.
We drove down to Florida on Sunday, May 17th. We had the privilege of staying with some of our very best friends, David & Kerry & kids, while in Florida for the week.
On Sunday evening, we met our birthmother and a representative from our adoption agency for dinner. We had great conversation. The birthmother likes to talk and she really opened up about some of her past without any prompting from us. The visit seemed to go really well. The baby’s delivery was a c-section scheduled for Monday around 7:30am.
On Monday, we spent time with David & Kerry’s family just waiting for a picture or call. Around lunchtime we found out the c-section had been delayed because of other emergency deliveries. By the end of the day, all we had heard was that the baby was born and healthy. That was it. No pictures, no stats. It was a little frustrating but we were scheduled to visit the following day, so we tried to wait patiently. We were about to meet up with Joy’s aunt and uncle for dinner and that was such a blessing.
On Tuesday, Chad’s parents came over from Lakeland to the Orlando area to hang out with us. We didn’t know what time we would be going to the hospital and didn’t know if the kids would be allowed to visit, so the help of Chad’s parents was super valuable to us. We spent much of the day at the outlet malls and the Bass Pro Shop trying to keep the kids and ourselves distracted. We finally got a photo around 2 pm and the stats and were told we could head to the hospital. At the hospital, Chad’s parents stayed with the kids in the waiting area while we went up to the birthmother’s hospital room with a representative from our agency. The birthmom was friendly and very talkative, but also a little loopy from pain medication. She let me (Joy) hold the baby. She was less than 6 lbs. and only 17 inches long! So tiny. I got to hold her for about 5 minutes before the nurse came to take the baby to the nursery for vital checks and to check her for withdrawals. The birthmother had been on methadone and this can affect the baby. Methadone is a legal controlled substance to help drug addicts wean off of addictive substances. Chad never did get to hold the baby. After an hour or so spent with the birthmother without the baby, I asked if the kids could come up and see the baby. She thought that might be overwhelming but agreed to let the kids peek through the nursery window at the baby since she was still in the nursery. She said we could all come back tomorrow. At this point, the birthmother’s mom came by but wouldn’t stay in the room while we were there. So, we left and went to get the kids and Chad’s parents to go see the baby through the nursery window. By the time we all got back upstairs, the baby had been taken back to the hospital room. Our agency worker asked the birthmother to just bring the baby out real quick and the kids and grandparents got to oh and ah over her. The birthmom was very gracious and proud.
On Wednesday, we waited for word of when we could go visit. By lunch time we hadn’t heard anything, so our agency worked to get more info. We found out at the baby had started experiencing withdrawals during the night and both baby and birthmom had had a miserable night. She asked us NOT to visit on Wednesday. We were still okay with that if we could just make it to Thursday. She was scheduled to sign adoption consents on Thursday at 10:30am. It was such a blessing to hang out with friends to distract us all Wednesday!
On Thursday, we got to the hospital around 11am and our caseworker and the attorney were waiting downstairs for us. We knew something was up. We found out the birthmother had been discharged and had left the hospital before signing. The baby was still in the nursery because of the withdrawals. Our agency was sending the birthmother counselor to the birthmom’s home to find out what was going on. We hung around that end of town for a few hours to see if the birthmom would still sign.
The agency finally got in touch with the birthmom on Friday. She apologized but said she had a lot of guilt because of the baby having withdrawals and she couldn’t sign the consents. The agency also found out that her mom was encouraging her to parent.
SO, at this point, she has decided to parent her baby. We have no idea how this will turn out because she already has 3 kids in foster care. Please pray that baby girl will grow strong and healthy and that Jesus will transform this brithmom’s life.
HOW ARE WE DOING?
We are doing okay. We are very disappointed that this match did not work out. We are frustrated that Chad took off a week of work with no resulting adoption match. We also spent extra money and time updating our homestudy the past few weeks for this adoption because it would expire before this adoption would have been finalized. We experience feelings of doubt…should we continue pursuing adoption or not.
This failed match is a little different than the past two. #1-We didn’t have any chance for bonding with this baby. We barely got to see her. #2-We have been down this road before and the pain is familiar, but not as devastating. While we’ve been down this road before, we also have seen God work in an amazing way to bring our sweet O into our family.
At this point, we are waiting expectantly. We have one homestudy visit this week and then our homestudy will be current for one more year. So, we might as well finish updating it. We will see what God wants to do.
Thanks for all your prayer support and love!