Sweet Child O' Mine

I've heard the comment a few times now that "I don't know if I could adopt because I'm afraid the child wouldn't feel like mine." It's a valid fear. I used to feel the same way. When I first learned I couldn't have kids, I remember sobbing to my mom that I didn't want to adopt, I wanted my own kids. Adopted kids were different, in my naive, 17 year old mind.

Now I know that I was wrong, and I try to tell people that they are wrong too, that blood doesn't matter, how often times I forget that my children don't share my DNA and how those fears fly out the window the second you lay eyes on your child, YOUR child, but I think that unless someone themself adopts, they'll never fully understand how deeply you can fall for a child that isn't "yours." 

It wasn't instant with Cassidy. From the first moment I saw her, I thought she was breathtakingly beautiful and I wanted her, OH I wanted her, but I think I didn't let myself get my hopes up because when we met her we weren't even sure that she would get to come live with us. Only later that evening did we find out that her birth mom had made the decision to give Cassidy to us. We saw her a few more times before she came home for good, but even then I was cautious, even though everything was progressing smoothly. It wasn't until the day we went to pick her up. I remember it like it was yesterday. We had buckled her into her little seat to head home and we had just turned onto Circle Drive and I looked in the rear-view mirror and caught my breath, because I could see a little dark haired head back there. I remember looking at John with wide eyes and saying something like how I couldn't believe this was real, that we were taking her home and we wouldn't have to take her back. Something inside me took over and all of a sudden, she was my baby. It felt as normal as if we were driving home from the hospital with a tiny newborn that I had just birthed. 

It was different with Aviannah. We knew right from that very first phone call that she would be ours. Everything was very cut and dry that way. And it just about killed me, because all of a sudden, I had another baby, a very real and alive baby far away from me, and I wasn't there with her. I remember feeling in shock, like my brain had just gone through some sort of trauma, because one day I was a mother of one and the next I was a mother of two, yet I only had one of my babies with me. There really aren't words to describe it, but it was the same shift that took over when I looked at Cassidy the day we took her home. My heart literally felt broken and incomplete until we were there with Aviannah. I remember how the nurse scooped her up and put her in my arms and how in that moment, my heart was healed again, because we were together. Because she was my baby. 

I don't think I've ever shared this story, but it's my favorite from Aviannah's adoption and it brings tears to my eyes every time. When she was still in the hospital, the social worker would stop by frequently to ask how we were doing and just to chat. One day she was telling me about when they finally knew that we were coming. It took the birth mother awhile to choose a family, so everyone was very excited when she finally did. The social worker said that Aviannah was always very sleepy and they never saw her awake much. She had gone over to Avi's bed and Avi was sleeping and she whispered to her "Your mom and dad are coming for you!" As soon as those words left her mouth, Aviannah's eyes flew open. The social worker said she'd never seen her open her eyes so wide before. "It was like she knew what I said!" she told me. As I think back on it, I think she did know. Just as God was preparing our hearts for her, He was preparing her little heart for us. She was waiting for us, just as we were waiting for her.

I still often look at the girls and think "How did I get so lucky that you get to be mine?" I can't comprehend how even though they were born to somebody else, I get to be their mother. It reminds me of my favorite adoption quote: 
"A child born to another woman calls me Mommy. The magnitude of that tragedy and the depth of that privilege are not lost on me." 

I don't know what it feels like to be a mother to a child who grew inside of me and who shares my genes, but I can't imagine that I would feel any different towards that child then I do to my girls. They are, in every way, my children and I blessed to know them.