[stillwaiting]

Casey,

I can sympathize with you completely. Our first match was disastrous, the bmom had four children and was not married when she became pregnant with her fifth child. We were contacted as perspective adoptive parents and when she delivered we went to the hospital and she signed visitation rights to us. We held the baby, named him, fed him, burped him and loved him with all our hearts for two days. Then the bfather showed up at the hospital threatening to kill bmom if she placed the baby with us. The police were called to her room and it was a nightmare for her and us. We decided to leave the hospital and allow bmom to make her choice. Obviously, she choose to parent for fear bfather would hurt her or her other children.

It was the hardest thing my husband and I have ever been through. We really believed the baby was meant to be ours. We prayed and waited for a baby for sooo long but looking back on everything that occurred I truly believe that sweet baby was not meant to be ours. We pray for him and his bmom often and hope they are safe.

I don’t know why we are allowed to get so close and then have everything fall apart. That experience hurt more than anything I have ever been through. It is not the death of a child because the baby is still living and living in a dangerous environment. You can grieve the death of a child but this is hard to get our mind around.

I will tell you this, don’t let this experience stop you. Take time for yourself and try to process all that has happened and think of what you have learned from this. Adoption is a hard, emotional choice for everyone involved, the adoptive parents and the birth parents. However, in most cases it is a blessing beyond measure.

We have continued our adoption journey and we were able to adopt a handsome blue-eyed baby boy and we brought him home from the hospital the third day he was born. We have had him for almost five months. Our struggles are not over, as his bfather is contesting our adoption. So we just take each day as it comes and pray God’s will be done in our son’s life.

Best wishes to you and your husband.

Tina