Official

Tomorrow it becomes official.  I stand before a judge, side by side with Daddy, and promise to love and care for you for the rest of my life.  You get a new birth certificate that says I’m your mommy, and a social security number that will make my life so much easier when filing next year’s taxes.  It will be the first “Redfield Family Day” of many more to come.   I don’t know how we’ll celebrate February 28 in future years, but for tomorrow it will probably include lots of singing and dancing and picture-taking and tears of joy.  And a celebratory latte.  Or glass of wine.  Or both.  Yes, tomorrow is a big, beautiful deal.  Tomorrow, your adoption is finalized.  Legal, permanent, indisputable.  It’s the day that every adoptive family dreams about during the all the darker days of the process. 

But for today, I need you to know that I love you so, so much without any of that.  I don’t need a birth certificate with my name on it for my love for you to be official.  I don’t need to promise a judge that I will give you all you need… my heart made that promise the moment I first laid eyes on you.   You have been officially mine for months now, and I have loved every minute of it.

That’s not to say it happened overnight.  Our love has grown over these months together.  And with it, although a little more slowly, the feeling of “officiality.”

I loved you the moment I first heard of you last April.  I loved you as the sweet, helpless baby with a beautiful name and a beautiful story, waiting for your forever family.  But everyone loves a baby.  Everyone loves a beautiful adoption story.  My love for you wasn’t anything special, and it didn’t mean you were mine yet.

Two weeks later things got a little more serious.  We were chosen to be your parents!  My love for you grew and grew as I let my guard down a little and began to imagine an actual life with you.  I went shopping for dresses and headbands and, for the first time in my life, I said “no” to a gift receipt.  The saleslady thought I was crazy as I grinned from ear to ear and my eyes started to well up.  But that little moment was a gift from the Lord and a gift from you that I will never forget.  And I loved you for it.  I paid for the poufy pink dress: it was mine.  But you weren’t mine yet. 
 

The dress that made me cry in Target :)

I met you on Memorial Day.  I was shaking the first moment I held you.  We took “The Picture” of the greatest of moment of my life.  I am trying so hard not to cry, it looks like I am mad.  You’re frowning, too, but you’ve just woken up from a nap and been handed to a stranger.  You probably ARE mad.  I took notes about your schedule and your favorites and every little detail I could possibly soak up.  I signed a piece of paper that made me a guardian, free to take you home and begin my life with you, free to use my last name when visiting doctors, adding you to our insurance, and sending out Christmas cards.  I held you close to me and smelled that sweet baby smell and loved more than I ever knew my heart could love.  But you still didn’t know me at all, and I didn’t know you.  You really weren’t mine.

The first time I held you

Our first three months at home were an endless parade of family visits and doctor appointments.  Sometimes it was all just a little too much for you, and you learned to snuggle in close to me and bury your face in my neck, a little deeper with each passing day.  Your life had been turned upside down, but you were slowly learning that this Mommy would always be there for you.  Meanwhile, this Mommy learned how to function on half the hours of sleep, showers, and workouts that my previous life had so easily accommodated.  It was all a lot for me to take, too, but I learned that watching you sleep could take my breath away and make it all better.  I whispered to you how much I loved you and how I would take care of you for as long as “they” would let me.  You still weren’t “mine” to make promises of forever.  I still feared that somehow it was all too perfect, and someday you would be taken away from me.

In September, little moments began to “feel” official.  You had been home with us for three months.  We had seen highs and lows, triumphs and firsts and utter, mind-numbing frustration.  It felt official when “poop” shot to the top my list of Frequent Conversation Topics.  It felt official when doctors that didn’t know my name called me “Mom.” “How are you doing, Mom?” “Take a seat here, Mom.”  It felt official when I stopped blow-drying my hair EVER.  1) because the extra time it took to get you in a coat, mittens, hat, boots, and then mittens again did not allow me time to dry my hair.  2) because you needed my blow-dryer for the full-body “spa treatment” you love after every bath, and I was sick of always carrying it up and down the stairs, so I started leaving it upstairs in your bathroom. 
 

Happy girl because you're about to get your "spa treatment"!

At some point in the late fall or early winter, I dropped you off at daycare and realized, walking back to my car, that I no longer felt like I was “borrowing” someone else’s life, lucky enough to live in it for a short time.  This was actually my life.  You WOULD BE a permanent part of it.  This was forever.  It felt official - all of it, not just passing moments.  And the most beautiful thing happened along with that: a guard went down that I hadn’t even realized was still up.  You were NOT going to be taken away from me, and I was free to love you with all my heart.  You WERE mine.

Life made you mine.  Time made you mine.  Love made you mine.

God made you mine.

All this time that you were not “officially” mine, a beautiful thing was happening.  God was making you to FEEL like mine more and more each day.  So now when I think about making it “official” tomorrow, it’s not a doubtful, scary, “no-turning-back-now” kind of day.  Instead it’s a celebrating, totally perfect, “of-course-this-is-the-next-step” kind of day.  It’s a lot like the day I married your Daddy.  I walked down the aisle confident and full of love, just like I will walk into the courtroom tomorrow.  I signed the marriage certificate as a mere formality, so I could change my name, and tomorrow I will do the same for you.  You don’t marry someone or finalize an adoption to “make” yourself love them.  You do it because you already love them so much, your heart is about to burst.
 

Sleep tight tonight, precious girl.  Tomorrow you will become mine.  You’ll hear strange voices and cameras clicking and you’ll feel tears on Mommy’s cheeks.  People will call you “Elizabeth” a whole bunch of times instead of “Libby.” A lot will be different and strange tomorrow.  But don’t worry, Pumpkin.   I will love you just as much as I do today.  You will feel my face with your hands and pull my hair and we’ll keep practicing “Mommy kisses, Libby kisses” over and over again. 

It will just be “official.”