I started this post in November.
I came soooooo close to finishing it.
But inevitably I got called away or booted off the computer or horribly
distracted by something else. So this
week I finally decided to finish it. For some reason I felt the need to add
this disclaimer and make a big deal about it. Maybe because I start the post by
saying that it’s Adoption Month. Please
know that I know that it’s no longer Adoption Month. To most people, at least… in my world, it’s
always adoption month :) Happy reading!
-Back on some cold (I’m assuming) and lazy (because I spent hours typing this
and not cleaning the house or playing with Libby) afternoon in
early-mid-November-
It’s National Adoption Month, for anyone that didn’t know :) There are
beautiful pictures and quotes and stories flying around social media, and I especially
appreciate those of you who have gone out of your way to send them directly my
way. This morning I watched some really
touching stories on the Today Show. I’ve been so caught up in mothering lately
that I haven’t really spent much time in thought about ADOPTION. About the actual process that brought us to
where we are today.
As my blog is a direct reflection of my (often scattered) thoughts,
it’s been quite a while since I wrote actual “adoption” post. I’ve written lots about Libby and her unique
challenges and general two year old problems.
And the joys. Of course the joys
:) But in honor of adoption month, and
the many of you who are in the process, considering the process, or are curious
about the process, I’d like to go back there for the first time in a long time.
Generally my approach to blog writing is to wait until something is
welling up in my heart, to the point that it’s about to burst and I feel I HAVE
to write or I’m going to explode. That’s
why I seem to publish in “spurts.” Some
days (months) I’m just not feeling it. I’m just living life and my focus is
almost entirely on the day-to-day. During
these times I might get a bit of a whim, and jot down some notes for a future entry. But I have to be in a pretty hardcore MOOD to
actually write and publish an entire post.
So if I look back and see the last time I felt THIS strongly compelled
to share my feelings about infertility, it was Mommies-at-Heart written for Mother’s Day. That’s a long time
ago! Which must mean that my heart, in that regard, has been pretty
peaceful. Content. Maybe I’ve finally let go.
When something is bothering me, or I’m in the midst of a trial, it is
my constant prayer that God would give me an answer or help me to let it
go. When He does grant that peace, it
doesn’t come overnight. It comes in
little waves, as the hurt and anxiety lessen bit by bit. Eventually I stop feeling that desperate need
to let go. I know I’m still not 100%
healed, but I’m on the road, and I clear some space in my head for other
things. I can go a couple days without
thinking about what had once been constantly on my mind. Then a week.
One day I realize I haven’t thought about it for a month or two months,
and finally, I can’t specifically remember the last time I about it. And that’s when I know… I’ve let go.
Built into the essays and many steps of our adoption process was the
requirement that we had “grieved” our infertility. I get why they “require” that. They want people who are serious about
adoption. They want people who WANT to
adopt. At the very least, they want you
to put some serious thought into whether or not you have moved on from the
dreams that have haunted you for years.
We thought we had. We mostly
had. We wrote some pretty words and
convinced ourselves and our social worker and pretty much everyone else who
needed convincing that we had moved on.
But knowing you need to move on, and telling yourself that you have
moved on, doesn’t always mean that you’ve actually, FULLY done it. At times, the old feelings of jealousy and
despair crept back to the surface. Now they carried an extra sting, more bitter
than ever because I had been so certain I was over it.
Baby-naming was one of the things that would bring out the ugly. In the final months of a close friend or
family member’s pregnancy, I would start to get a taaaaaaaaaaad (that’s a large
tad, which means “medium amount,” but flows more nicely than “medium amount”)
territorial about baby names. I could
handle the pregnancy itself with just a touch of wistfulness. And I was a Baby Shower Rock Star. I had become a PRO at handling the awkward
moments and personal questions. But baby
names… ooooh. Watch out. Not that I ever
bothered to TELL anyone “Here are the names that Tim and I have had picked out
for our first children since before we were married. Are they on your list? Would you consider
saving them for us? It would mean a lot after all we’ve been through.” No, that
would have been the rational, decent thing to do. Instead, I would just keep all this baby-name
anxiety and near-rage bottled up inside, sweating it out each time a new little
one (whose parents were close enough acquaintances that double-naming would be
awkward) came into the world. I guarded
those names FIERCELY as friend after cousin after sibling after friend
continued to pass me up and crank out kid after kid.
These are names that represent years and years of dreaming about my own
pregnancy. These were to be our first
children. Sitting in a church pew the
spring before I was married, I nearly jumped out of my seat when “Jackson
James” popped into my head. We had been
thinking about names for months and this one was PERFECT. I reveled in my cleverness for a few more
seconds and then gave myself a silent yet stern talking-to about focusing on
the sermon. After all, this WAS the
first time Tim, a first-year seminary student, had preached in church. Later that day, I told him (not the part
about losing focus during his sermon) and he loved it, too. We never wavered in the years to come. We dreamed of Jackson, a little blond boy
with green eyes, mischevious yet strong and silent. “Jack, Jax, or JJ” - I hadn’t decided.
Our little girl’s name took a little longer. It was settled sometime during the first year
of our married life, but I waffled a few times over the years to other pretty
names like Sadie and Nataly (I loved it with a “y”) and a few others I can’t
recall so they couldn’t have been that great.
But we always came back to Kiera Leigh.
Eventually we settled for good, and only waffled on the spelling. Tim was all gung-ho about “Kira,” something
about Star Trek. Don’t ask me. I entertained “Kyra” for about a day and then
realized it would probably be the most easily mispronounced version of the name. I loved how “Keira” looked on paper, but was
concerned about breaking the “i before e” rule… especially since our surname
follows the rule. So Kiera it was. A little girl with brown eyes and pigtails
helping me in the kitchen, who loves to read, write, and sing and has a big
heart for puppy dogs. “Kiki,” for as
long as she’d allow it.
I know I’m not the only one. At
some point, most every mom dreams out her kid’s entire life before the little
monster ever has a chance to live it. Once Real Life happens, some moms (and
dads) are better at adjusting that plan than others. When it comes to adoption, The Plan goes out
the window by force. You surrender all
genetic control. You agree that someone
else will be your child’s first “Mommy.” Someone else will feel the kicks and
hear the first cries. Someone you don’t
even know yet will be a part of your life forever, in a degree yet to be
determined, in an ever-changing relationship that will sometimes hurt and
sometimes heal - for everyone involved.
There was nearly a year between the last time I filled out an adoption
form or wrote an essay about how I had grieved our infertility, and the first
day I held my daughter and kissed her sweet little forehead. In an instant my thoughts flipped from “how
will I love her as my own?” to “how could I NOT love her as my own?” and “how
did I ever live without her?” I got so caught up in LOVE and mothering and baby
showers and forging relationships with her birth family, that I had not a
moment to even realize that I WASN’T thinking about loss and grief and people using
“my” baby names.
Fast-forward a year and a half to November 2013. I’m relaxing on the couch with a third cup of
coffee because Libby decided to sleep until 11:00. After watching live adoption finalizations
out on the Today Show plaza, I enjoyed a quiet house and an hour’s worth of very
pensive dishwashing. It HIT me. That moment when you can’t specifically
remember the last time you thought about that thing that used to hurt you so
much. Wow, it had been AGES since I’d
felt jealous or cried myself to sleep over the whole thing. And it wasn’t because I was too busy, or too
tired. It was because I had let go. It HAD to be.
Because the week before, when my cousin had told me her baby boy, due in
December, would be named Jackson, I did not freak out in the slightest. What I felt for her was 100% joy and pride
and 0% possessiveness over the name. Jackson
(with a middle name of Lee, by the way, isn’t that the craziest?) would be
hers, ALL hers. I was so relieved and excited that finally that dreaded moment
had come, and yet I was feeling nothing but pure happiness for her. Somewhere
in all the mess and madness and magnificence of the last 18 months of Libby,
God has allowed me to let. it. go.
This post was a long time coming.
It is a farewell to Jackson and Kiera, the fantasy of our first children
that we clung to, the shining hope that brought us through many bitter
years. They served us well. They made us happy. They helped us dream at a time when our
dreams were all but stamped out. But
they are no longer our first children.
And it seems wrong to “save” the names for our future children,
biological or adopted. It’s like we’re
pinning these huge expectations on them that go all the way back to our
earliest years of marriage, when we were totally different people. And it seems wrong to Jackson and Kiera. They did a beautiful job and I will always
love them for who they were. And who
they weren’t.
And it would be very, very wrong to Libby… almost like she wasn’t our
first choice. Oh, sweet girl, you are
through and through my first choice, because you are GOD’S choice for my
life. And besides, wasn’t there also a
story about the name Elizabeth?...
Tim and I dated for three full years before we got engaged, and it was
another 20 months until we were married.
We had a lot of time together to plan our “future” before life actually
became “our future.” But I KNOW it was long before we were even engaged, long
before Jackson James popped into my head at the most inappropriate of times,
long before Kiera Leigh had the spelling of her name finalized, that this most
precious little exchange occurred:
“I really like the name Elizabeth… you know, for a girl someday. It’s cute.
She’ll probably be cute like you.”
“You’re silly. I’m not
cute. Hmmmmm… Elizabeth…
Maybe. I’ll think about it.”
