Happy Birth Mother's Day Katie

What can I say
Where are the words
To share the love we feel

This little boy
Our pride and joy
Our love for him is real

That sweet sweet smile
The crazy shrills
He makes our life so full

He came to us by other means
He found our hearts and whispered hope
And peace to his special mom

She held him close
And kissed his head
Then lovingly she said

"Take care of him
I love him so
Be sure he always knows."

She placed him in our loving arms
And helped us with our dreams
She gave us hope and love and joy, she gave us everything.

To love, To hold
To watch him grow
We share it all with her.

To see him growing
To watch him learn
The wonderment he brings.

Happy Mother's Day

I posted this on Roman's blog for Mother's Day but decided that I wanted to repost it here as well.

Once there were two women who never knew each other.

Two different lives shaped to make you one.

One became your guiding star, the other became your sun.

The first one gave you life, and the second taught you to live it.
The first gave you a need for love. The second was there to give it.

One gave you a nationality. The other gave you a name.
One gave you a talent. The other gave you aim.

One gave you emotions. The other calmed your fears.
One saw your first sweet smile. The other dried your tears.

One sought for you a home that she could not provide.
The other prayed for a child and her hope was not denied.
And now you ask me, through your tears,
the age-old question unanswered through the years.

Heredity or environment, which are you a product of?
Neither, my darling. Neither. Just two different kinds of Love.

© Author Unknown

Found

As I said LDS family Services encourages adoptive couples to find their birthmother. In our case she found us. After that first e-mail we didn't hear back from Katie for another 2 weeks, and when we did she was going through some really hard things, but we started e-mailing. It felt like we were old friends. It was so easy to e-mail with Katie, but so scary at the same time. I told Spencer so many times that no matter what happened I wanted to support her because she was such an amazing person.

About a month later (March 30, 2007) Katie sent us the cutest e-card, I had to check the date on the calender to make sure it wasn't some cruel April Fools joke. She told us that she had been praying and she knew that he was supposed to be part of our family.

She was 28 weeks pregnant at that point, and we continuted to e-mailed regularly. I still had the fear in the back of my mind that it wasn't going to happen. I think she knew how scared I was because where we should have been the ones reassuring her that everything was going to be okay, she was reassuring us.

Katie was coming to Utah a few weeks later to see her niece be blessed, so we were able to meet her. It actually worked out perfectly. We were leaving for California (to See Spencer's family and meet up with his brother that we were going to Hawaii with) then Hawaii just 2 days after she was here, if it had been the next weekend we would have missed each other. We met at PF Chang in Provo for dinner. I was so scared what if we didn't recognize each other, what if she didn't like us? What if she decided she was wrong? Fortunately we recognized her right off, we hd no problems talking, it was like seeing an old friend. The waiter was so funny, he had no idea what he was asking when he asked if we were there for a special occasion, we said "Sort of" he asked "A birthday?" Katie said "Yes, there will be a birthday" We all laughed and he walked off a little confused. We sat and talked and showed each other pictures and laughed, and just had such a fun, easy time. We went outside after we were done eating dinner so that we could visit a little more and who should walk past but Katie's Dad, Step-mom, Brother, and Grandma. So we were able to meet them and Katie's dad took a picture of the three of us together. (Well 4 if you count the bump.)

We decided that we were going to be a little mean when we told our families that we were expecting a baby again. We waited until we were getting on the plane to go to California and just as we were boarding the plane we sent out a mass text message to all of Spencer's family with an ultrasound picture and it said under the bottom "It's a boy." We didn't even get a chance to turn off our cell phones before they started ringing. We got on the plane and had so many missed calls and text messages when we finally got to California.

The 3 months from when we found out that she had chosen us until he was born was so scary. I was constantly worried that we were going to get to the end again and have her decide that she just couldn't do it. (I wouldn't blame her either, he is one adorable little boy.)

June finally came and Katie had things set up for a scheduled induction, she was going to be induced on June 25 (Which was a Monday), but didn't make it, she called 5 days earlier to say her water had broken. She lived a state away, Spencer and I were both at work, we didn't have bags packed, heck I didn't even have a car at work. I had carpooled to work that day, thankfully my friend Ilein had just happened to stop by the office to drop off a baby gift. She was also pregnant, due the same day. She was nice enough to take me home, I was on the phone the entire time. We somehow made it home, packed bags, tickets, hotel, rental car booked, and to the airport in about 2 1/2 hours. We were to the hospital 800 someodd miles away within about 5 1/2 hours from the time we got the call that her water had broken, and I was able to be in the room when Roman was born.

Dreaming a new Dream

As I mentioned every girl has their fairytale life they dream of. Those dreams don't usually include infertility, because of that they usually don't include adoption either. Adoption was never a bad thing to us, I actually had a good outlook on adoption, and it was something that I thought very highly of people who did adopt. I just had to adjust my dream of my family. I had always looked at pictures of me and Spencer as we were kids wondering what our kids would look like.

I had actually started thinking about adoption before we were even married. When Spencer was on his mission I had a dear friend, I remember the day I talked to her. It was her 20 birthday and I called to wish her a happy birthday. As we were talking she told me that she was pregnant and that she had decided that she was going to place the baby for adoption. I was in basically the same position that she was, unmarried, living with my parents, but I wished that there was some way that I could adopt her baby. I knew that it wasn't right, and I am sure that he is in the family that he is supposed to be in, but it really opened my eyes to the possibility.

After my first round of fertility treatments, I was ready to just move on to adoption. Spencer wasn't sure it was the right thing yet, so we kept trying. For him it was a much slower acceptance that adoption was the right choice for our family. He had a few very personal experiences that bore witness to him that this was the right thing for us.

Like I mentioned in the last post, it required much prayer and tears to get us to the point that we finally contacted LDS Family Services. I was so scared that I was going to be judged, I already felt like such a failure because we were "giving up" that I didn't want anyone else to make me feel like I was a failure. Everyone at LDS Family Services were so great. They were so welcoming and made us feel like this was an exciting adventure, and it was. They light the fire under us.

We had all sorts of paperwork to do, interviews, we even had to have friends write letters to say that we were okay people. We were required to take 6 education classes, this was the greatest thing that they could have done in the process to become approved. The classes were nothing like I expected. During these classes we were able to meet other couples who were on the same journey that we were. It helped me to realize I wasn't alone in this. They had a birthmother panel where we were able to meet birthmothers and see that they were not they steriotypical teenage girls. They were smart, fun, some older, some younger, and they all had one thing in common, they had all placed a baby for adoption.

Then they had the adoptive couple panel where they had 4 couples talk about the journey that they had taken and their adoption stories. There was a couple that had waited just over 3 yaers and I remember thinking "That is so sad, I can't even imagine. I think I would go crazy if I had to wait that long."