This post is an addition to my last post entitled “Hook Me Up To Some Electrodes, I’m ready for adoption…”
Our second adoption was night and day different from our first adoption when it came to the birthfathers. In our first adoption, he did nothing but cause trouble. He paid no attention at all to the baby that was about to be born all through the pregnancy, and then after we’d had the baby in our home for a month, he decided to cause a ruckus. We later found out that the ruckus began after his mom found out that he’d fathered a child. Anyway, when our second adoption rolled around, Caleb, the birthfather, did want to be part of things. Let me just say that Caleb is awesome. He loves us and we love him. He supports us all the way. Plus, he plays the guitar- that’s always a bonus.
Caleb doesn’t live anywhere near us, but when we found ourselves actually going to the city where he lives a few hundred miles away, we called him up. He asked if it would be all right if he invited some family, and we were more than cool with that. So we showed up at his place…
At some point in the long car ride, we’d given some sort of sticky treat to our little boy. We thought he’d eaten all of it, but after I got him out of his car seat we realized he’d only eaten part of it. The majority of it had dropped between his legs and had been stuck to his backside for the last few hours. It transferred from there to my shirt and smeared everywhere on my front when I pulled him out of his car seat. Caleb came outside to greet us when we pulled up and we walked into his house, me with my yellow shirt that had sticky sticky smeared all over the front of it. We didn’t expect what we found inside. We had assumed that “family” meant his parents, but there was hardly room for us to sit down. Grandma, Grandpa, Great-Grandma, aunts and uncles and and and… Yeah, lots of people. The many people lined both sides of the living room as we walked into the house. I felt like we should have put forth a greater effort to have a nice float for our parade, or at least have some candy (like the candy on my shirt) to throw to the crowd.
They made us feel like celebrities on the red carpet. It was fun and surprisingly comfortable. Our little baby girl got passed around a lot, and so did our toddler little boy. It was fun to see them enjoy our entire family, not just the little girl that Caleb had placed up for adoption. In fact, when they gave us a gift for our little girl, they gave one also for our little boy. After a few hours, and after Caleb and I jammed a few songs together on his guitars, we were on our way. The most important thing, I think, that I got out of the visit was how emotionally involved Caleb’s family was. All of Brianna’s family (our first adoption) was clear on the other side of the country, so we didn’t get to see their reactions first-hand. Extended birth families need to heal too. After all, this baby girl was their first grandchild. It clearly wasn’t easy for them, of course, but they love us and that was clear in how they treated us.
“We didn’t think we’d ever get to meet her,” Caleb’s mom told us.
“We told you we’d be happy to let you see her,” we replied.
“I know,” she said, “but we didn’t really believe you.”
We’ve been able to see Caleb’s family twice now (and Caleb a few more times than that), now that our little girl is coming up on 5 months. Just like with watching the birthmoms heal, it’s very healing for us to help the rest of the families heal.
