Re-live and Reflect

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Lately i have been having a very difficult time with life in general. This whole year has been kind of a wreck. I am lucky enough to work an incredible job, have started my non profit, and have children and a husband who are understanding. Those things, those are all fantastic. But this year, has come with great challenge.

Because of my challenging year I have sought therapy again, just once a week to air out my feelings, get feedback, and to remember that this adoption journey...is a journey. Life...is ever changing. There are ebbs and there are flows. It will never always be perfect and it will never always be wonderful.

I was so blessed and lucky to have a counselor that I finally love and adore. She is AMAZEBALLS. Any who, one of the things she asked me to do was to re-write my feelings on placement. Reason being she knows writing is cathartic for me and I enjoy it, and she thinks that i may need to just go through those feelings once again 7.5 years later. So below is my placement story. this is going to be raw, unfiltered, and vulnerable. This is me as clear as you will get it.

When I chose to place, it did not come easy. I knew it was what my mother and my bishop wanted me to do, but was it what I wanted to do. After much thought, research, prayer, and discussion with myself, i decided it was what i felt was best. My baby belonged in a different family and that was a hard pill to swallow. I had always loved kids, I had always wanted to be a mother, but now was not my time.

There were several reasons I did choose adoption. Most if not all are too personal and for me too discuss with Josie, but they were real legitimate reasons.

I chose the couple and I remember feeling it throughout my whole body, that this was her mom and this was her dad and those adorable chubby faced, dimpled kids, they were her brothers. I KNEW IT. I KNOW IT.

Now i am ready to talk about it.
The hospital.
placement.
grieving afterwards.
it was dark. it was difficult. and i know very strongly what it feels like to break your heart.

I woke up early on August 20, 2008 ready to be induced. I was oddly excited. Alyson played a mash up (because mash ups were all the rage), of Let's Get Ready To Rumble. We danced. But while we danced i felt it. Sheer panic. Panic in my heart, that the time had finally come. I wanted time to stand still, and at moments, it felt like it did.

We drove to my mom's hotel in town, it was the hotel behind the 7-11 on 400 North. We went to the continental breakfast and I ate. I knew I wasn't supposed to, but my mom who had 6 kids before, told me to go for it and just eat light. I was glad. As we sat through breakfast i vaguely remember joking about certain things unrelated and related to child birth, but in my heart i remember feeling that panic. the panic of the unknown. the panic of the fact that i was about to give birth and i was only just barely nineteen years old. panic realizing that i had just spent the last 9 months as a vessel for a child {{who the hell had that idea? I was so irresponsible. I mean damn, i think i ate sooooooo much crap. }}

We all got in the car and drove over to Logan Regional. I walked up to those huge glass sliding doors and Alyson, my mom, and I rode the elevator to the second floor. They walked us into the room. They had me undress into a hospital gown, and my mom took a picture, it was my last picture of me pregnant with Josie.

I climbed into bed, they hooked me up to all the monitors, started my IV, and it began. the labor process began. Honestly, no matter how hard i try i don't remember a lot between that and the birth. I remember Aly sitting in the bed with me a lot watching movies with me. She was so diligent to make sure i was taken care of. I remember my mom spending her time there with me. I *think* I remember Josie's parents coming to visit me. I remember my bio dad and my step dad being there intermittently in the room (but who wants to be around all that madness anyways lol). Finally, it was time to start pushing.

Originally I had wanted her parents in there, but the pushing itself took hours...not minutes..hours. the actual pushing. Aly and my mom held my legs as i pushed, part of me didn't care to try very hard because part of me didn't want her here yet. I was shaking, i needed oxygen, i was crying, i threw up. My doctor threatened me with a c-section so i finally got my shit together yelled at the doctor to "get her out of me", and she came out. At 11:18 pm. My body literally had no ounce of energy left in it, her and my family stood in the hallway, and a her cries were heard. I don't remember what her cries sounded like. I wish now i was more coherent so i could retain that memory. I remember I had to get 56 stitches. The doctors and nurses were cleaning everything up and they pushed the little bassinet over to the door so everyone could see.

One thing I do remember very clearly, is laying on that hospital bed, my body recovering from the traumatic birth experience. My eyes could barely open and I could hardly move. I remember seeing her mom and dad stand next to my bedside holding that perfect little girl. I remember seeing the love in their eyes for her. the love for me. and feeling the love of God above permeate that room. There was love.

The next day was also a blur. I regret that I had so many people come to visit. I wish I had taken more time for me to just enjoy being her mom. But I am that kind of person, i didn't want anyone to feel shorted. I had family, friends, etc all come and love on her. She was a busy newborn. I am glad all that happened, but I wish so badly i would've taken more time for just me and my Josie. more time to just hold her and love on her. to talk to her. to smell her. to feel her chubby thighs. to look into her pretty eyes. I needed that time, and I did not give that time to myself.

Even thought i didn't give myself that time, I know she knew she was loved. She had to have been able to feel that love throughout her entire body. She was so fresh from heaven above, she knew how loved, wanted, and cared for she was. 

Then her brothers came to meet her. Her brothers are very important in my adoption story. The minute I chose to place with them, they were my brothers. They are my little brothers and nobody NOBODY ever mess with them. They mean the world to me and I love them endlessly. At one point while they were there to visit, we had a silly altercation. 

K&L walked in to meet their baby sister that they had waited for. Enter mean nurse. She says *think grumpy old witch voice from one of those scary old kid shows* "Only siblings are allowed in here." 

Me *in my shocked but, immaboutta get grumpy, voice, " they are her siblings" Then we continued the altercation where she accused me of being too young to have them, we explained adoption and i tried to not throat punch her. And in they came to finally meet their baby sister without the stupid wench in our way. 

This was their sister. I felt it in my heart. from the minute those smiles started and those dimples emerged, this was their sister. They loved her instantly. And my heart stopped. I think it was at this moment i realized just how much this was really going to hurt and just how much this really needed to happen. My heart didn't want to say good bye to that happiness, that feeling of being her mom, that feeling of showing everyone MY cute baby, my perfect daughter. 

She was now their sister, their daughter, and my birth daughter. 

And then i saw this: 

This was her daughter. I chose her to be her mother. Josie was meant for her all along. This is her baby. This is the baby they had prayed for. She was going to stay up late feeding her, comforting her, and singing to her. She was going to teach her how to be a young woman, how to learn for herself, how to trust her gut, and how to love others. Josie was meant for B. I know that as this moment happened, angels were wrapped around me and God was simultaneously hurting desperately and smiling joyfully. I now understood what an oxy-moron was. It was bitter of all the bitter. It was the nastiest damn dark chocolate I have ever tasted. But it was also sweet pure joy, not to be matched by any other. 

These two moments above were the "beginning of the end for me"

To Be Continued.