Eric and Heather are an adoptive couple who are sharing their experiences in a series of guest posts about what it’s like to go through the adoption process with LDS Family Services. Eric and Heather hope that by sharing their experiences others will feel the same peace and support they have received and gain a better understanding of how the adoption process works.
It’s been over a year since last post and a lot has happened. The agency asked us to continue sharing our adoption journey in steps and for a couple of different reasons, we've had to wait a while to share our whole story. The following is our experiences and how we felt as we waited to meet our birth mom.
We were
approved in April of 2011 and were so excited to finally be up online but we
had no idea the roller coaster ride we were about to face. That same day we were approved, Eric and I
went out to dinner to celebrate. I was
so excited and we both couldn’t stop smiling and thinking about how we were one
step closer to starting the family we had been dreaming about for years. While excited, I felt a bit nervous because I
kept feeling like something was about to change very quickly. I told Eric about my feelings and while he
was curious about those thoughts, he also knows me very well and knows that I
tend to become anxious very easily.
When we got home,
there was a message blinking on their answering machine. Before we listened to it, I said, “Eric, that’s
Judy.” (Judy was our caseworker). He
laughed and said, “Heather, we’re pretty awesome but not THAT awesome.” (This
is totally Eric’s personality). Judy had
asked us if we would be willing to bring over a couple of our paper profiles
for two birth mothers who would be delivering in the next day or so. Of course we were so excited so we focused
more on pulling all our stuff together instead of asking more questions. Somewhere throughout the process, we
misunderstood how it all works. We had
no idea how “up and down” things could be.
We sure figured that out quickly, though.
We waited
for a while to see if we would hear anything from these two birth moms and when
nothing happened, I was so discouraged.
I felt like we had just been shown to two birth mothers and they didn’t
even like us. I immediately told Eric
that something was wrong with our profile and that we had to change it up. Our amazing caseworker kind of laughed at us
and told us that we’ll have lots of birth families look at us before we are
chosen and not to fret about it. (Easier
said than done, right?)
Throughout
the next few weeks I went and peeked at our profile and the statistics a lot. (Just for the record, I have a love/hate
relationship with being able to see those stats). I noticed that our profile was no longer up
but didn’t know why. I e-mailed Judy and
she informed me of how the whole thing works.
We learned that you can be put on hold by another case worker or a birth
mother and she can keep it that way for up to three weeks. We learned there are “soft holds” and “firm
holds.” Of course we got excited and then bummed when our profile was put back
on. This happened a few times throughout
the process. It was always discouraging when
it would go back up.
A few weeks later, I had this distinct
feeling to check our e-mail. I thought
that was kind of interesting because I check my personal e-mail regularly and
thought that we had forwarded our adoption e-mail to that one. I logged on to see that we had been e-mailed
several days prior by a birth mom. I
wanted to kick myself for not checking earlier because what kind of hopeful
adoptive couple doesn’t e-mail a birth mother back right away?! To make a long
story short, we e-mailed her several times, grew to absolutely love and adore
her and then the e-mails stopped. I was heartbroken.
It turns out that our caseworkers had
been in touch and we finally heard from our caseworker that she had gone with
another couple. Judy e-mailed us
saying, “I got an e-mail from *** He told
me that she has chosen another couple from out of state. Sorry about that. It
is how these things are. The bright spot is that she has found the right family
for the child she is carrying and some day, the same thing will happen for you.”
Obviously we
had many mixed emotions. I am so
grateful for Eric because he said, “I am sure that couple is ecstatic right now
and I am so happy for them. One day,
that will be us.” He has such an
optimistic attitude and can be genuinely happy for someone else, even if we are
a bit envious.
In June, we
got an e-mail from another birth mom wanting to get to know us better. I was
pretty excited to hear from her. She was
a young, sweet teenage girl who had been with her boyfriend for a while and they
had found out they were pregnant. She
explained that they both knew that they couldn’t provide the home that this child
needed and they felt really good about adoption and that both of their families
were being very supportive. We exchanged a few e-mails and then we went several
days without hearing from her.
At this
point, I was ready to just throw in the towel.
Eric and I didn’t know much about the process and had never heard of
anyone having these same experiences.
(We now know differently and realize that ours were minimal compared to
what so many others have endured).
The same week
we stopped getting the e-mails, we got a phone call from our caseworker. She said that there was a birth mother who
wanted to meet us. She told us a bit about
her and her background and asked if we would be willing to meet that following
day. We agreed but I was very hesitant
and didn’t feel like it was going to go anywhere. This particular situation was definitely
considered an “at risk adoption.” She wasn’t due for a few months but we were
told that even if she chose us, we wouldn’t know if it was actually going to go
through until the day of placement given the situation with the birth
father. With every adoption, of course
there are those risks and you won’t know until it’s finalized but this
situation was very tricky and because of that, we are still not able to share
all the details. Despite all of this, Eric
felt really good about the whole thing.
He told me he felt like this was it, which is so not like him. I’m usually the one who is super excited and
he’s cautiously optimistic. We had had
so many experiences feeling like we were getting closer, only to have it not
work out, so I was scared and to be honest, a bit pessimistic. I was so very wrong. I had no idea that the next day would change
my life forever.
Stay tuned
to hear about us meeting our son’s birth mom for the first time, his birth
story and placement and our open adoption.
If you'd like to hear more about each phase in the adoption process, click below to hear more about Eric and Heather's experiences.
http://www.laytonfsa.blogspot.com/p/follow-one-couples-adoptive-journey.html
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