surreal

this morning, on the last full day of our self-directed “adoption decision retreat,” i was a bit worried to realize that despite all of our discussions about adopting and my understanding that this IS the direction we’re heading in and my knowledge that this is really the best path for us right now… despite all of that, there is still a part of me that appears out of the corner of my eye sometimes that feels that this is all very surreal. as though it’s happening to someone else. not me. i’ve been worrying about that for a few days (weeks?) actually, but i’ve just today decided to acknowledge this strange sensation. as i sat boldly next to this thought, i bounced little balls of fear off of it–am i in denial? will these thoughts make me a bad adoptive parent? will i reject my adopted child because i haven’t dealt with this little demon of a thought yet? then i sat next to it quietly for a moment. just breathing. not throwing anything at it. and in that quiet space i realized that perhaps i’m being too hard on myself. MAYBE the reason this feels surreal is that for the past 34 years of my life, i’ve had this vague idea of the list of events that my life would include and up until the last month or two, adoption wasn’t on that list. If the story of my life really was written out as a rough draft, it’s as though this whole motherhood chunk of my future which was sketched out in pencil has just been ripped out of the notebook, crumpled up and thrown somewhere near a garbage can and i’m starting with a clean page. and perhaps the reason that i feel like this is happening to “someone else” is that it’s not happening to the person i’ve always pictured in my future. i am becoming “someone else.” granted, I know that I will still be me. I will still love music. I will still enjoy rhubarb pie. I will still need to have creative outlets in a variety of mediums. I will still be a mom. (wow, it’s weird to write that. i’m really struggling not to type qualifiers like “someday” and “the Lord willing” after that statement…sigh. infertility SUCKS.) But my children will not look the way that i’ve imagined all these years. And I’ll have to fight battles I’ve never imagined would be my own (or my children’s). And there will be new (possibly major) characters in this story (birthparents and maybe even their extended families) that I’ll have to include one way or another. I’m writing a whole new rough draft and the blank pages ahead of me are intimidating and thrilling and just a little bit scary all at the same time. Isn’t that the way all new adventures begin? This IS the new future of me. I just need a little bit of time to get to know this new future me a bit better so that I can fit into her skin. She seems like a brave person. I think I’ll like her.