3 Months Old!!!

Wow i can't believe 3 months has already passed. It has been amazing to watch her grow. I must say there is absolutely nothing better than a baby smiling at you, it's the best.
She is doing great. She has been sleeping through the night since she was 9 weeks old, and when i say sleeping i mean atleast 9 hours..the other night it was 13 hours...i am waiting, just waiting for this to change, it seems to good to be true! We're enjoying it though :) She's "talking" alot, smiling all the time and i think i heard the start of a giggle today. She has no interest in rolling over yet. When we do 'tummy time' she either cries or eats her hand...which is probably her favorite thing right now. She LOVES to eat her hand..she usually uses the other hand to push it in further!lol
We're totally in love, it's been the best 3 months of our lives. She is a blessing. We think about Ashley all the time and hope she knows how she changed our lives.

Here is a little video of Bella's first 3 months, enjoy!

From My First 3 Months

Just hanging out

more videos on www.youtube.com under Bella Donsky

She is growing so quickly and I feel like as much as I am trying to remember everything..i won't! So hopefully I'll post more, if not for anything else but to have something we can look back on. Hope you enjoy it too :)

2 Months Old!!!

WOW, time totally flys by! We went to the Dr's yesterday, she now weighs 12 lbs 8oz, and is 23inches long...Dr said she is doing awesome! She had her shots, that wasn't very fun, but it honestly was not half as bad as everyone made it out to be. She wasn't happy about it, but she had stopped crying before we left the parking lot and was a sleep 2 seconds later!
Here she is just before her shots!!

Reality Sinking In

I am sitting here making a picture dvd for Bella's shower this weekend at the lake, of course the music is Somewhere Over the Rainbow...and I'm crying :)
Looking at the pictures from the hospital it all feels so surreal, so long ago not 7 weeks ago. I am still so amazed she is here. The other morning I was in the kitchen and I heard her make a noise, it's not that I forgot that I had a baby but every once in a while it catches me off guard and I just smile. She's here and we are so blessed to have her...I can't believe how lucky we are.

Bella's 1st time at the lake!

We went to the lake this weekend with Bella for the first time, it was awesome! So much fun. She said she loved it :) We went down to the village with Mike, Kristin, Dan and Colin for the Balloon Fest..it was alot of fun..awesome weather!

Happy Anniversary!!!!

Today is our 5th anniversary and the best gift i could (n)ever have imagined is we are taking our daughter to the lake for the first time! I am seriously so excited! Plus we haven't been there in forever, or so it seems. Tomorrow we're going to the Adirondack Balloon Festival, should be awesome!

Here are some new pics, Enjoy!! I'll have ALOT more after this weekend!

Bella's First Bath and Meeting her Aunties!

Our Baby Shower!

Bella and I had our baby shower yesterday and it was AWESOME. Nothing different from any other baby shower, we all agree there is nothing overly exciting about any type of shower but for me it was one more thing to help convince me of the reality that i DO have a baby now. Even though I see her and hold her every day it's still hard to believe at times.
When Jamie and I were still in NC i told him how I pictured driving home with Bella for the first time and "It's a Girl" balloons would be hanging out in front of our house, in my mind that's what happens when people come home from the hospital for the first time with their baby. Does it really happen? I don't know but it does in the movies, lol. Anyway no balloons when we came home, of course not, Jamie was with me and our families do not live close by, no biggie. So the day of the shower I go to get my hair cut, i'm driving home, turn down my street and I can see beautiful shiny balloons swaying outside my house. Seriously the smile on my face was so huge, I could have cried (first of many times that day!).




















About 20 minutes later I'm in my room changing Bella when out of the corner of my eye I see my shiny pink balloons float away!!! haha..I was sooo upset I yelled "my balloons are flying away!"...the next thing I see is Jamie getting in the car. About 15 minutes later he comes home with new It's a Girl balloons. I'm not sure he knows how much that meant to me, I know it seems so simple, it's usually the smallest details that are so important and for me that was huge.

The shower was great. The weather was awesome. I had a great time seeing everyone and them meeting Bella for the first time. I have waited and dreamed of this day for so long and honestly it was a bonus having Bella there vs being pregnant, I absolutely loved it. We received so many awesome gifts, two won the Tear Jerker Award! lol

My Aunt Annie knew I wanted to remember this whole journey so she printed my blog and made it into a book...YUP, tear jerker! I absolutely love it!

How she found this, i have no idea. Mel, this is so awesome!!

Night Time Creatures

i'm holding a crazed little monster in my arms and have 2 little fur balls circling my ankles like sharks...it's 445 and it's feeding time

09/01/08 HOME SWEET HOME

Wow, we're home with our daughter, totally amazing..and unreal. Actually it's quite real as i sit here trying to type one handed!lol
Our drive home yesterday was very uneventful, we got home about 10pm. Today we unpacked and did some errands. Jamie has to go back to work tomorrow, so i'm on my own. We wish his "paternity leave" could start now and we could all just hang out at home together but it's been long enough and he needs to go back. You would actually think after spending almost 2.5 straight weeks together we'd be sick of each other but thankfully we're not!!

I know I owe so many phone calls, I'm so sorry. When we were down in NC there was always so much going on. And like I said today was just us trying to get back to normal and get food in the house :)

Time for bed...Miss Bella's favorite time of day is 2am-4am...straight :)

Going Home Tomorrow!!

We're packed and ready, we leave tomorrow morning..whenever Bella tells us it's time, lol, which should be around 7:30am. We can't wait to get there!

We were supposed to leave today after we had lunch with A and her mom, but we were exhausted and learned that traveling with an infant is not so easy...our 1.5 hr drive back to Raleigh was almost 2.5! Not complaining :) So once we got back here we decided to stay put for the night.

Lunch was really nice, it was so nice to see them again. We had a great time just chit chatting abuot normal stuff and talking alot about Bella. They both held her for quite a while..she started crying at one point when A was holding her, A said
"time to go back to mommy"..I could have cried. This had to be very hard for them because they do not know when they will see her again, but I know they were sooo excited to go to lunch today. They are very happy with the whole situation and wished us well for our next adoption...i can't imagine it another adoption situation could compare to this one...i really don't have words other than it was amazing.

We heard from my family that everyone at the lake is excited to meet Bella and we can't wait to bring her up to meet everyone!!!!!!!!!!!! Hope everyone had a great labor day weekend! I think of all of you at the casino when I am up in the middle of the night!

08/29/08 Free To Go Home!!!

We got the call yesterday that we're allowed to go home! We are sooo happy about that! We're at a friends house now, we left the hotel yesterday. Tomorrow we're going to go to lunch with A and her mom...that will be interesting. A seems to be doing well, we've talked on email a little. I would think it would be hard to see Bella, but we wanted the choice to be hers. So after lunch we'll be on our way! We should be home Sunday morning. We can't wait. Living out of a suit case has been tough..but all worth it :)

Oh! Tuesday night I went with my parents to get pictures of Bella developed so they could bring them to the lake. We're driving down the road, 3 lane road, we're on the inside lane when we see the cars next to us start to stop and a crossing guard step out in front of them waving my dad to stop...he had to slam on the breaks because she truly came out of nowhere...so he slams on the breaks and a second later BAM!! Yup, we were hit..pretty good too. All of us were pretty sore...i was in the back no seat belt and bounced pretty good. It sucked for my parents they were already to go home. So in the end their car got towed..the nearest Audi dealership was 119 miles away! They had to get a rental car to drive back to NY and now in a couple of weeks they have to fly down and get the car when it's fixed. How much does that suck?? I felt so bad. We were happy though that no one was really hurt and that Bella was not in the car! Makes me a little nervous for our big drive home!lol

Pictures

Bella's Story

Ok, so this is how it all happened...it's pretty long, but I want to remember every detail so I can tell her about her first days.

Wednesday at 6pm is the time I talked A each week..so this past Wed I call at 6..no answer, i call at 6:15..no answer...honestly freaking out. So we went to the movies with Jess and Andy to see Tropical Thunder, about 30 minutes into the movie we get a call from an NC area code I run out of the theatre and it's A's mom. She was in the hospital!!!!! She had taken a nap after her Dr's appt and when she woke up her water had broke.
So we run back in grab Jess and Andy and we head back to their house to pack the car. We are literally in and out in about 10 minutes! As we're driving down the highway we see the signs for "Fayetteville", I can't explain the feeling as we realized we were finally in the town where our daughter would be born. We got to the hospital in about an hour and a half...it was sooo surreal pulling up to it knowing this was it!!
We found our way to labor and delivery looking back it all feels like a dream. When we got there the nurses directed us to her room...it was so weird, for some reason i was expecting them to take us down and introduce us! LOL...i wanted to explain to the nurses that we had never met A and her mom. So we walk down knock on the door and A's mom answers the door, she hugs us and the next 48 hrs are like a blur :)
We sat and talked with A and her mom, they are both so awesome. We are soo happy we got to know them. We arrived at the hospital about 10:30, they told us that if she didn't go into labor on her own by 3am the Dr was going to induce her. The nurse told us that active labor wouldn't really kick in till noonish the next day. We stayed for about 2 hrs and then headed to the hotel to try and sleep.
We woke up the next day around 8 showered and got ready to wait. I called A, her mom said nothing was going on she'd been induced, had an epidural and was now sleeping. She said she'd call us when something started. I was going crazy and exhausted so i decided to lay back down. Next thing I hear is Jamie on the phone saying "so she might have a c section at noon?" I look at the clock..it's 11:15. OMG my daughter is almost here!!! I FLEW out of bed, lol.

We grab lunch for us and A's mom, head back to the hospital. Mind you, we only met them the night before so this is all still totally weird! We have lunch hang out and wait for the Dr. He finally comes around 12:30, we're sent out of the room while he examines her. He comes out in the hall a couple of minutes later and tells us that it's been long enough, the baby is not progressing down because A's bones are to small and that it is time to go get her!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We go down to the waiting room to wait, this was the longest hour EVER!! We're trying to read but it was impossible. Finally A's mom comes in and says "Congratulations mom and dad, she's beautiful". We all just started hugging and crying...while we are so happy, her heart is breaking, but she was so supportive and honestly happy for us. She took us to the nursery to see Isabella, unbelievable is the only thoughts running through my head...was this really for real? She was so adorable, and so big compared to the other babies!!lol

We stared at her for probably over an hour through the glass, we weren't allowed to see her yet. The nurse said it would be a while so we should go eat. We left the hospital to eat and check on Sadie, I just kept saying to Jamie I need to hold her, this doesn't feel real. When we got back to the hospital Isabella was not in the nursery, so we walked down to A's room, and there she is cuddled up in A's arms...tough, sooo tough. After a bit I finally got to hold her, she was so cute and so small, it was awesome. We stayed for a while, Jamie held her for a while too and then we felt we should give them so time. We went to the hotel had dinner with our parents and then headed to bed. Just as I was getting in bed Jamie asked if I wanted to go say goodnight to Bella, SURE!....so we hopped in the car and drove to the hospital. A had given me a hospital bracelet so we could see the baby whenever we wanted, which was so nice of her. When we got there we asked the nurse for her and we were told she was sleeping in her mothers room for the night...OUCH. The nurse asked who we were...OUCH. So we went home.

Friday was a long day. We brought A breakfast and hung out with her and Bella till the attorney arrived. When she got there she had Jamie and I sign all our stuff and then we were asked to wait in the waiting room while they went over everything with A and she signed the consent. That was around 2:30, at 3:30 I started walking around to see if i could find out anything...a nurse had just left her room so I started interrogating her about what was going on in the room, haha..she said there was paper every where and alot going on. Finally the lawyer came out to tell us that some of the paperwork that should have been done prior had not been and it would be a little longer but A HAD signed the consent!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We were Isabella's MOM AND DAD!!

Finally about 4:30 the lawyer came to get us and we headed to the court house with her to file everything. Nothing is ever that easy and something was missing so a portion of it could not be filed but the part that says we're her parents was filed and that's all that mattered! Honestly I was so exhausted at this point, i am standing my head laying down on the counter in the county clerks office...i was so done, sleep deprived and emotionally spent.

That night we took all the grandparents to the hospital to meet their new grand daughter....they were all soo excited. A and her mom came to meet them..that VERY emotional, but everyone agreed they were happy they got to meet eachother. We left around 9 and did not sneak back that night..i couldn't handle that again and since it was her last night with Bella, I had no doubt she would be in her room again. So we attempted to get some sleep.

Saturday we were at the hospital with breakfast by 7:30...A looked like she had been crying. We had a really good talk, she shared alot and asked alot of questions. Her biggest fear is that we will not stay in touch, that she will not know about all Isabella's firsts and that Bella will never know how much she loved her. She said she had no doubt we would be wonderful parents. I talked to her mom alot too..this wasn't easy for her either, she said she had to be strong for her daughter. By noon everyone was hungry so we went to get lunch for them and gave them some time alone with Bella. When we came back we were told that they were both discharged and we could take her home. HOLY CRAP!

Since A had to be wheeled out and Bella had to be wheeled out the nurse said A should hold her on the way out of the hospital. Again, tough, I'm her mom now..but I understood and I honestly did want her to have every second possible. So she was transported out while her mom and I walked behind talking and crying. Jamie met us out front with the car. So many tears, I can't even explain how hard this was. We were so happy and they were so sad. We all hugged and finally said goodbye. The moment we had been waiting for was here...she was in her car seat in our car and we were driving away from the hospital...with our daughter. There are no words to explain what we were feeling, how happy, how unbelievably happy we were.
We got to the hotel and were greeted by the grandparents and little miss Sadie waiting outside for us.
She was "home" and it was awesome!

8/23/08 Home from the Hospital

Hi
Everything is great! We came home from the hospital today, Bella is doing awesome. I know I owe a birth story it's just been non stop since she was born...dr's, nurses, lawyers, courts and lots of emotional moments with A and her mom. They are amazing, the whole experience has been amazing. I promise to update soon, I'm just pooped now and headed to bed! :)

Isabella Lily

7lbs 8oz
22in
Born 1:35pm via c section

Exhausted, HAPPY and headed out to dinner with our parents. We'll post more pics later!!!!!!

8/21/08 Baby Girls Birthday

She's coming today!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So yesterday A was supposed to have a Dr's appt, she told me to call her at our normal time..6pm. So I call at 6 anxious to see how things went...no answer. So I call 15 minutes later and again no answer! I'm starting to go a little crazy for the first time. Jess and Andy make us dinner and the 4 of us head to the movies. Defintely needed a distraction. About 30 minutes into the movie A's mom calls and says they are at the hospital!!!!!!
A took a nap after the Dr's appt, when she woke up her water broke. So we ran out of the movies back to their house we all packed the car in about 2 seconds and we were off.
Arriving at the hospital was just the craziest thing! We couldn't believe we were actually there. We went in and went up to L&D, it was so weird...we told the nurses who we were looking for and they told us what room to go to...I wanted to ask them to introduce us or something...i don't think they realized we have never met A and her mom before!!
So we went down and knocked on the door her mom answered and I just gave her a hug. It was so awesome to finally be there! A looks just like her picture..freckles and brown hair :) We hung out with them for a little while and just chit chatted. She was feeling fine at that point, no contractions. We were told if she didn't start on her own she would be induced at 3am. We were all tired so we left around 12 to get some sleep. When we were leaving A's mom started to cry a little and said she was so happy we came into their lives. Aweseome. I can't even explain her, there is just something about her that I am drawn too, she's an amazing woman. A was great too, very easy to talk to and joke around with, she seems confident about all this. Her school starts on Monday so she was already talking about when she would go back. It's actually perfect timing, she can start her new life.

Midnight...arriving at the hotel


UPDATE 9:30 am: She was induced and has since had an epidural, now she is resting. Her mom will call when things start moving along and we'll head back over.

08/20/08 *#*^$%...haha

We're doing good although there is still no sign of little baby girl! A had a Dr's appt this morning haven't heard anything so I assume that nothing major was decided. I have my regular Wed call with her tonight so hopefully she has something interesting to tell me!!!!!!!!!!!!
Jamie is out mountain biking with Andy, I'm gonna read for a bit and then we're headed to the pool. SOOOO happy we're not at home we'd be cleaning cleaning and recleaning!



Jamie and Andy at the pool!

i'll post later after i call her..

08/19/08 No Action

Still nothing! Yesterday came and went with not so much as one contraction. Yesterday morning was tough...took everything we had not to go crazy. We spent the afternoon at the pool with Andy and then we all went to Keith and Steph's new house for dinner. It's like a Pittsford High School reunion down here! We're both happy we're here with friends and not stuck in a hotel in the middle of nowhere..it's really helping. What would help more would be if the phone would ring!! haha


We saw Pineapple Express the other day and today we're going to see Tropical Thunder...keeping busy :)

08/18/08 GOING NUTS!!!!!!!!!

Today is D day and no calls....ughhhhh

Happy Birthday Mark!!

08/17/08 Nothing Going On

We got here Friday night, it wasn't a bad drive at all...although i can't really say that since i read the whole time and Jamie drove! Yesterday we hung out with our friends and had a great day, kind of felt like a vacation...today a little more anxious. I talked to A this afternoon and she feels "fine"... :( No contractions, no nothing. Tomorrow is her actual due date so I guess we just keep waiting.

sigh..

...and We're Off!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Still no baby action, but we're headed to NC this morning! WOO HOO!!
Wow, we can't believe it's here! The thought of leaving today as a family of 3 (Sadie!) and coming home as a family of 4 is just amazing!!
Gotta go :)

Will keep you posted!

08/13/08 Same ol Same ol

Just had my weekly call with A...only she was asleep! haha, so i talked to her mom. She said they had a long day. She had her weekly Dr's appt today and nothing is going on! She feels fine, no contractions or anything yet, just very tired. And the wait continues...

They sent us a congratulations "It's A Girl" card this week with the actual u/s print out. So sweet!

We're all packed and ready. We are leaving Friday morning to head down to NC and continue the wait there. We'll be staying with friends 2 hrs away from her...so much better than 10hrs away!

Today i finished registering and got gifts for her and her mom. No clue what I will do tomorrow to keep myself busy!!!! We've got the paint for her room, so maybe i'll do that. No rush though since the furniture will not be in until end of October at the earliest! Good thing we ordered it ahead of time...it's going to take 12-14 weeks to come in. She'll (we'll) be ready for her to sleep in a crib by then..i think :) Goodbye sleep...

I can not believe this journey is almost over...and then the real fun begins!!!!!

08/08/08 Due Date Changed

Based on her most recent ultra sound they have changed the due date from Friday Aug 22 to Monday August 18!!!! The baby is measuring 6lbs 8oz give or take a pound. Head down and ready to go!

I just talked to A's mom and she had a possible contraction on Wed night. She only had one, but it seems things are getting started! There is a full moon on the 17th (i believe) so you never know! Her mom was so cute she said Jamie and I feel like family to her now. It's been so wonderful getting to know them, I can't imagine doing this any other way.

Jamie and I have decided to drive down to NC next Friday. We're so worried if we stay here we will miss her birth so we'd rather be down there hanging around. That's in one week...OMG! haha We're so ready!

08/07/08 A Sneak Peak

Here she is!! (Mark, hows that for an update?? :)

Getting close now, but not much going on. I talked to A yesterday, she had another Dr's appt but nothing to report. She believes her due date is Aug 18th, the Dr is now saying Aug 21st...either way, not to far away! She has a friend who just had a baby boy and didn't have much for him so we decided to pack up all the little blue clothes that we had and sent them to her, she said her friend was so happy. Glad they could do something other than sit in the attic! That was Jamies idea and it was pefect :)

Any bets on when she is will come?? I've been saying Aug 16th for a while...we'll see!

Off to the Dr's now..all the stress has made me sick!

07/29/08 Going nuts...

Ok, I am not the most patient person and I very much like to be in control of things..and right now I feel like I have no control over anything. Our birthmother said she would call me yesterday and still to this point has not...so i pretty much have no nails left, my hair will be next :) Jamie had sent her an email last night just chit chatting and she just wrote back, thank GOD! She said her Dr appt on Monday was fine and she has an ultra sound tomorrow. She asked that we call her tomorrow night. So happy she asked me to call her, it's so much easier than staring at the phone waiting for her to call me. It's so like dating, you don't want to stalk the person and turn them off...

Speaking of phone calls, I called Tina last night to calm me down and she told me she had just jumped off the phone with her sister because I was calling. She said every time I call her she thinks it is "THE" call, haha...I never thought about that. Every time one of my friends/family is pregnant and they call towards the end I think it is the call too. She made me feel pregnant, THANKS TINA!!!!!!!!!!!!!

07/25/08 The Countdown!

4 WEEKS left!!!!! HOLY CRAP!!
Just wanted to share that :)

Headed to the lake soon, can not wait to get there. I've only been there once since October..that's so unreal. This is the last weekend jamie and i will be up together. I'll be back next weekend for Heathers bachelorette pary..but that's it. Very strange summer but totally worth it!

07/22/08 Prison

Jamie and I were watching a show last night called "Locked Up Abroad", really interesting show. On this episode this girl gets busted for trying to smuggle heroin and she gets sent to jail. She believes it will be a short stay and just can not comprehend what is happening. Someone from the US Embassy comes to check on her once a month, but there is nothing he can do to help her. She finally starts to accept the life she has, she starts talking with the other women, creating friendships and learning from them. Then one day after 4 1/2 yrs she gets a letter from a Congressman who said he heard about her and is trying to get her released. She can't believe this is real but she finally has hope. Shortly there after she is released from prison. As she is leaving the prison, all the women are so excited for her, they're all hugging and crying, one of them is getting out and gets to move on with her life.
So why am I telling you this? Because after watching that episode i turned to Jamie and said "This might not translate right, but i feel like I've been in prison for the last couple of years." He knew exactly what I meant. Don't get me wrong it's not as dramatic as that, but i defintely feel like i've been sort of locked up, life on hold, running into a wall over and over again and not getting anywhere. I have belonged to a website called Fertility Friend for almost 5 years now. First i started in the "TTC" (trying to concieve) section, then I moved onto "Medical Assistance", then a short stay (i relate this to being paroled in the "July Mommies" group, then to the "Loss" boards and final stop at the "Adoption" boards. I've met so many women who are going through similar (and not simlar) situations. And when one gets her baby, whether it be delivering her biological baby or being handed her adopted baby, everyone cheers because they understand you've finally been "released". Released from the pain of wanting what you can't have. Released from wondering "is this my month". It's very painful. Knowing our baby is coming fills us with so much hope. It's almost our turn.
I always say "I'm fine" when people ask, and I am, however there is still a very good chance I will not deliver a baby that I have grown and nurtured within me and that pain doesn't go away. I lost a baby and that was the hardest thing to go through, waiting for the due date to come and go was so long. I thought all the sadness would go away once i got through that day, but then i realized it's not just the loss of our baby it's the loss of a dream of having our children. And that's not easy to deal with, that doesn't just go away. I've said before i have hope that it might happen one day but i can't spend every day thinking about it, i'll go nuts but after so many years and so much medical intervetion...i don't know what will happen.

I thank God that adoption exists and we can have what we want while helping someone else. It's an amazing thing one we are both so unbelievably thankful for.

I know some might wonder why I write this blog, why i share my private thoughts. It might seem strange. I don't do it for pity, i've never asked for that, I do it so people understand.

07/20/08 Picture Perfect

So a very funny thing happened while we were out shopping yesterday...we were in a store looking at furniture. I saw the furniture we wanted and I grabbed a catalog, as I am looking at it I glance over and see a stack of them, the picture on the cover gets my attention. At first I think it's a really cute picture, and then the most bizarre surreal feeling comes over me as I start to realize what I am looking at. I'm a bit confused and think I could be making this up, I turn to Jamie with a total look of shock and say "Is this my picture?". I am honestly thinking he is going to tell me I'm nuts, lol, but the look on his face said it all. We were staring at a picture of Jerry and Doreen's daughter Parker that I had taken last summer while camping!

You can not even begin to imagine the shock I am feeling at seeing my picture on the front cover of a catalog. It was insane!! Part of me was mad because no one asked my permission to use it, but the other part was truly soooo excited!!
The funny thing is is that had I not had the miscarriage we would have already bought the furniture and would have NEVER even known this exsited. It is the 2008 Pali baby furniture catalog, I found the 2007 one this morning from the last time we'd been shopping and there was a different baby on the front.
I post my pictures on a website for amateur photographers, people critique your photos and sometimes they do ask to use some, but that is the key you do need persmission to use someones photo, especially if it is of a person.
So not sure where to go from here, fortunately we are working with a lawyer right now so I'll see if she has any advice. I can't imagine anything will really come of it, but you never know. Jerry says if we get a million dollars we're all buying the Kaps house :)
This is the link to my photo
http://www.sxc.hu/browse.phtml?f=view&id=838168

07/20/08 Yesterday

Yesterday was the day we were supposed to meet our son. Yesterday ended the longest 9months of our entire lives.

It started a little rough. For a while we weren't sure what we were going to do on July 19th, going away was always a huge possiblity. However, since A's due date is so soon we figured a good way to spend the day would be preparing for our little girl. It was a good day. A few tears but we are happy to know the future looks bright.

We got a lot done yesterday from wash clothes to furniture, we're starting to feel pretty prepared. We spent today emptying out what will be her room and moving everything into the new office. Hung lots of my pictures, which is always fun!

Right now we're just waiting to call A and her mom for our weekly call. Hopefully she's not feeling anything in the way of contractions, it's still a little early!

07/18/08 Getting to know our Birthmother

It's HOT!!!!!!!!!!!! just had to get that out :)

I talked to A last night for 2 hours! That is about 1hr 55 minutes longer than I have ever talked to her before, mostly her mom does the talking. It was so great. We talked about so much from the baby, to delivery, her friends, family, the future, how she felt when she found out she was pregnant..on and on it was amazing. Oh listen to this, when she first found out she really wasn't considering an abortion just trying to figure out all her options, so she called a clinic and they told her if she brought her student id they would give her a $50 DISCOUNT! Are you kidding me?? She even said she was shocked and felt like they were promoting teens getting pregnant. Ridiculous.
Anyway, she's a wonderful person. She shared her concerns with me about us not staying in contact (letters & pictures), she said she just has to have faith that we will keep our word. I told her Jamie and I worry to that she will change her mind, but again we just have to have faith.
This is funny...she told me she is worried this baby girl will turn into a cheerleader since we live in the suburbs...haha and Jamie told her how he played golf the other day, and that made her even more worried. I totally had to laugh and tell her not to worry about the cheerleader thing!
What else...ohh, this is sweet...her dad gave her a disney blanket when she was little with baby minnie and baby mickey on it, she said it was her favorite...and she is packing it up to send home with us to give to the baby..i almost cried. She also said she is going to keep a journal of her life so when the baby is older maybe one day she'll want to read it and understand why she chose adoption and all the things about her life since. I think it's awesome. We have no problem with them meeting when she is older, it's completely her choice...honestly, I hope she does want to meet her because to me she seems like such an amazing person.
One of her friends is pregnant and does not have anything for the baby and due any day. Our birthmother says she doesn't agree with her keeping the baby since they have no way to ($$) to raise it but she feels bad her friend has nothing, so she went to the Thrift store and her bought her some baby clothes. Remember our BM is 15, and dealing with her own emotions and yet she is worried about her friend. She says she worries about everything and everyone (hmm, this baby might take after my dad!!)
I love that we chose to do private adoption vs using an agency it's so much more personal. I wish we lived closer so we could have met already but we've talked on the phone and email so much that I feel like I am getting to know her a little. It will be interesting to see in 15 years if our daughter reminds us of her.

Her mother has said this many times but she said it yesterday
"i'm the birthmother, ya'll are her mom and dad." *tear*

07/16/08 When will she "legally" be ours?

Since the baby is coming from NC we have chosen to go by their laws, which are:

Once the baby is born and the birthmother signs consent (giving us physical custody) she has 7 days to change her mind for any reason whatsoever, and we must give her back :( HOWEVER, after those 7 days have expired, then that's it...she's ours. There is no legal recourse for the BM at that point.

The part that takes a while "finalization" has nothing to do with the BM. That is NC deeming we are fit parents. We will have about 2 visits from social workers to make sure everything is ok, if so they tell the courts and then the courts say she's ours. I believe that is around 60 days.

We have to stay in NC for upto 2 weeks after her birth, so pretty much when we come home the waiting, wondering and worrying are all over!! I honestly can't believe that moment is not that far away. 5 WEEKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

07/16/08 So proud!

haha...i just put together my very first baby stroller, all by myself! I'm sure Jamie is very relieved he won't have to do it!

So a little update: we talked to the birthmother and her mom on Sunday, everything is going along really well. It's funny I have talked to A (birthmother) a couple of times now, but only briefly, she doesn't say too much...well i guess atleast to me, Jamie had her on the phone for 45 minutes! He talked to her about the fact that she has friends that are pregnant, they are keeping them, he was curious what they thought about her placing for adoption. She said they all say to keep the baby, but she tells them there is a nice couple in NY that will provide her with all the things that she can not. I thought that was pretty comforting to hear that she feels that way.
I talked mostly to the mom who told me that they want both of us in the delivery room!! I was shocked. I was not going to bring that up, but she said A is the birthmother and we are her mom and dad, we should be there for her birth. WOW.
Honestly, A and her mom have been sooo wonderful, I really didn't know what to expect going into all of this, but at this point we couldn't be happier. :)

View Album

Get your own

07/08/07 Bye Bye Rec Room

Sad news, they just tore down the Rec Room at the lake : ( So many good memories there!
We had a great weekend at the lake, the weather was gorgeous! I hung some of my pictures up in the Casino and Soda Fountain. Hopefully they sell, you never know but I did get a lot of nice feeback which was great!

Nothing new to report right now, the birthmothers next Dr's appt is Monday, she will be almost 35 weeks, so hopefully things are progressing nicely. Many people have asked if I will be in the delivery room, not sure. That conversation has yet to come up and I'm going to let her bring it up if she wants. She is only 15 and I'm sure her mother will be with her and it will be VERY emotional...not sure if it's my place.

So this is what happens when the baby arrives:
When she goes into labor they will call Jamie and I, we will hop in the car and head to NC. It's a 10 hour drive, which isn't too bad. Any time after the baby is born the birthmother can sign consent, basically saying we're the legal guardians ( or something like that). Once she does that and the baby is ready to leave the hospital, we take her home...or to our hotel in NC. If you are adopting a baby out of state you have to stay about a week. Then we come home! I have to double check with our lawyer I'm not sure if it's 60-90 days or 6 months (i've read both and every state is different) till the finalization, which means she is 100% ours. If the birthmother changes her mind after signing the consent but before finalization it goes to court and the judge decides who the best fit parents are. Hopefully none of that happens.

Nothing else really going on.

Congratulations to Mike & Kim, hope you are enjoying Hawaii. The wedding was awesome!
Congratulations to Kristin and Dan on the arrival of Collin!

07/02/08 OH! A couple of things...

PLEASE don't say to us now that we are adopting we will get pregnant (although I'm sure it will be said, and don't feel bad!). Honestly, we know it happens and it happens alot, but you only hear of the times that it happens. How many couples adopt and never do get pregnant? You don't hear about those stories.
Maybe we will, maybe we won't but we don't want to think about that right now. We just want to be excited about THIS baby. This baby is just as important to us as any other that may come in the future.

While we (and our families) are so excited about this baby girl, please understand that we are also, soooo scared. As I said before there is always a chance that the birth mother may change her mind. I honestly don't think she will, but it's there, so we hesitate to get to excited. Yet at the same time, we're happy to finally have something to smile about!!

Thanks!! : )

07/02/08 A view from the other side

So I made my way to Babies R Us today. We have not been there since we first registered a couple of months ago. It was a little weird. When we were there registering last time there was another couple next to us who was adopting. I remembering wondering what it was like to do all the "prep" work without that big ol belly, like how real did it feel to them that they were going to be parents? I guess now I know. Life is funny like that. The first time we saw Juno was when I was pregnant. We both pretty much bawled through the whole thing, we were both thinking "that was almost us"....the 2nd time we saw it, it was us. It doesn't sound very funny, but you have to laugh with life at times in order to survive it.

So there I am walking around BRU without my big ol belly, desperately trying to avoid the little boys section, somethings just don't get easier with time. I did find a really cute outfit for the baby that, of course, I just had to buy. When I went to check out at the register the guys handed me a gift receipt, I so wanted to explain to him that although I didn't look it, i was technically pregnant and this was for my baby...but I didn't need to, because I knew who it was for.

Someone asked me if I wished I had never been pregnant and had the loss, from my heart I said no. I always wanted to be pregnant, to experience my right as a woman, and I did. I honestly wouldn't change that, it was a lifetime experience. And there is something to be said for being able to talk and share with other women about pregnancy. I don't feel left out of that, I got to do it. Would i wish a different outcome, SURE! But i don't regret it. Now that I have had that, it's even more clear to me that the most important this is just having a family, not HOW I have that family.

You know, when you start trying to have a baby and you realize there might be some trouble conceiving you start to thinking about the importance of having your "own" baby. You start to worry that you will never see your eyes or your spouses eyes in that baby, or wonder if you will ever see either of your smiles. It's tough...reallllly tough. But as your start going through fertility treatments and the disappointments your priorities change, at least they did for us. We started to realize the only thing that was important was having a baby, a family.

Recently I was with a woman who found out some terrible news regarding her and her husbands chance of having their "own" (pc: biological baby) baby. It's so awful to have to go through this, I can not even begin to explain. I felt so sad for them. As she was talking about never seeing his eyes in their child, those around us kept looking at me to make sure I was ok. Much to my surprise I was. I know where she is coming from, I have been there....but now I'm here, we're here and we're finally going to have our family, and for us that is all that matters.

6/24/08 Desperately Seeking Baby

So the short version of how we got here is many years of trying on our own to have a baby and 2 years working with a fertilty dr. It's been a very long road. After 4 rounds of Invitro we finally got our miracle. We lost our baby boy at almost 5 months, no reason why. Not sure how we survived, people have been telling us all along how strong we are...i guess that's how it looks from the outside, for us it's felt more like survival. My Dr still believes we have a very good chance of getting pregnant again whether on our own or through another IVF, but at this point my body needs a break! I'm glad he has faith in us though. For me the idea of becoming pregnant again is a terrifying thought. The fear would defintely out way any joy. Until I'm able to look at it differently we'll hold off on that. The Dr's believe I have "bad eggs", but we have found a few good ones along the way so you just never know!



We have talked about adoption on and off through the years. Two weeks before I lost the baby I told Jamie we should adopt...he looked at my pregnant belly and thought I was nuts. My thought was it took us so long to get here why not adopt our next one. Little did we know we would be revisiting that conversation so soon.



The day we came home from the Dr's after finding out there was no longer a heart beat we started talking about adoption. To some that probably sounds strange, but for us that's how we dealt with things. Each failed IVF we jumped back in for the next one, we KNOW we want a family and putting things off wasn't going to get us there any faster. Just because we started the adoption process so quickly did not mean we were not devastated, because we were. I know many women have miscarriages, but how many go through 4 IVF's only to those their miracle. Nothing was fair about it, we talked, we cried...and still do, it's not easy. But for us having a "plan" helped keep things in perspective. Everyone handles things their own way.



So we did alot of research and decided to do Domestic Private Adoption. Which means we use a lawyer and do the legwork ourselves. We started advertising on June 1st in newspapers in TX, KS, NY, PA, and WA. We got lots of crazy phone calls and a couple of potential calls.



One morning at 7:30 a woman called me from NC (she found our ad online) and told me her 15 year old daughter was pregnant and due in August. I had been a sleep...i woke right up when i heard August! We have been talking for a couple of weeks and they have chosen us to be the parents. It is a baby girl and she is due August 22. 8 WEEKS! OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!



So now we "wait, worry and wonder". Even though she has chosen us there is nothing to say she will not change her mind and that is soooo scary. Her and her mother sound very sure, so we try to take comfort in that. They are both very sweet and I have really enjoyed talking to them.



It's crazy to think in 8 "short" weeks, as Jamie puts it, we'll finally have our family. We will finally meet the baby we have been talking about and dreaming about. We will finally be able to close this chapter...we can not wait. Many more weeks of holding our breath, crossing fingers and saying prayers...
We're ready, hopefully our dream is coming true.