i made a video for “C” for our most recent package (to go along with the photos and the letter that we send each month) and i thought you might enjoy seeing it too. this is the first time i’ve posted a video of my own on my blog, so if it doesn’t work for you, please let me know and i’ll do some troubleshooting with J.
it was fun to make this movie! I used my iPhone for these videos, but i’d like to try the next one with our video camera to see if the quality is way better. maybe (and this is a big MAYBE) we’ll do it every month to show how he’s grown? That might help my video editing skills get better… It would work a little better if there were a second, non-baby person to hold the camera sometimes (i couldn’t really hold the camera while i was reading him a story, for instance). or maybe I just need to set up our gorillapod….. we’ll see if any more ever actually happen!
a few days ago, someone made a comment on my “a part apart” post that really got me thinking. for those of you who may have missed the comment, i’d like to re-post it here (note to “A”–I hope you don’t mind!):
“I feel the way you do…my (adopted) baby is 6 months old, and I don’t feel like he’s a part of my body. I was just feeling guilty about that last night. And I still have trouble saying “my son”, or “mommy”, or things like that in front of other people…like maybe they’ll think that’s not accurate?? I don’t know why I feel this way–it surprised me. I am adopted myself, and I never felt like I WASN’T my (adoptive) parents’ child…not once. I think it’s just a hard switch to make after waiting so long, wanting so much, and hurting so badly.”
I responded to her via e-mail with this:
“thank you. your perspective (especially as an adult adoptee) is wonderful for me to hear and I think your last sentence is absolutely right. It IS hard to flip that switch after so many years of feeling pain associated with words like babies and mommies and such. I still feel that pain associated with words like pregnancy and breastfeeding because even though I have a son now, I never got to (and likely never will) experience those things, so there’s still jealousy hanging heavy on those words. I find I have to practice saying “my son” and “mommy” at home a lot when I’m talking to my son or to my husband and while that helps to make it feel less odd in my ears, it still sometimes doesn’t feel quite TRUE yet.*”
I’ve been thinking about it ever since and still find it interesting that while words like “baby” and “family” don’t bother me at all now, I still have this teeny, interior cringe whenever I hear other words (“womb” is one that for some reason really gives me the heebie-jeebies). how interesting that becoming a mom through adoption can make some of those deep emotional wounds fade to just a dull ache or even disappear (most of the time) but other wounds are still raw. will they ever heal?
*I’d like to add that in some ways this reminds me of when I first got married after dating J for 6 years. It felt weird to say “my husband” for the first little while, but now (especially after 10 years of marriage (as of this Thursday!)) it feels as ordinary as water. I figure saying “my son” will lose its edge soon too.
this week i went back to work for two mornings. while i was there, i announced to the group of moms and dads and nannies that bring their kids to my library programs that I’d spent the last six weeks getting to know my newly adopted son. I passed around a brag book of photos and everyone oohed and ahhed over how cute he was and extended their heartfelt congratulations to me. I also had some wonderful and unexpectedly deep conversations with a few people about how adoption has touched their lives. One mother told me that she’d been adopted as an infant and then she went on to tell me how her adoptive father had died in a car accident when she was 18 months old and her mother didn’t re-marry until she was 13 years old and then her mother passed away when she was 20 (I think) and so now the only relative she has is her stepfather who never even legally adopted her, but whom she feels enormously close to. She told me that hearing my story (and she really only got the tiniest highlights!) made her heart swell and made her get all teary-eyed (which might also be due partially to the fact that she has a newborn with the exact same birthday as Baby Dude!). Another mother approached me, all excited, and said, “I heard you adopted your baby from Texas? We adopted our daughter from Texas too!” I had no idea this child was adopted and it was so nice to talk to another mother who has at times felt like they “slip under the radar” because their daughter looks enough like them that people assume she’s biologically theirs.
I sort of feel like I’ve just joined a secret club and now that I’m “in” all of the members are revealing themselves to me. i never seem to get tired of hearing other peoples’ adoption stories…. they’re all so different and yet ring so familiar at the same time. I wonder if there’s a secret handshake?
Saturday was my first day back at work. I only worked the morning and did my very popular monthly “Donuts with Dad” program. People weren’t expecting to see me back quite yet, so I had some very excited kids actually chanting my name they were so happy to see me. (I love my job.) When I was cleaning up after the program, one of my co-workers stopped to talk to me and we ended up getting into a more-than-superficial conversation about parenting and childcare. She has a young daughter (less than 2 years old, I think) who she takes to a daycare while she’s at work during the week when her husband is also at work, so this is all very current for her. She asked me if it was hard to be back at work. She asked me if it felt like I was missing a piece of my body. I thought about it for a minute and had to admit, that …. no, it didn’t. Was this because Baby Dude was at home happily sleeping next to J instead of in a daycare with “strangers”? Or is this an adoption thing? I mean, he wasn’t EVER “a part of my body” so do I feel less physically attached to him because I’ve only known him for 6 weeks and I’m still, in some ways, slowly allowing myself to believe in my deepest heart that he really is my son forever? Does he feel less like “part of my body” because I’m not constantly attached to him while nursing? Or is this just a difference in our personalities? I don’t regret not experiencing that sensation (who wants to be missing part of their body?) and I don’t feel particularly guilty about it, but I’m just curious.
probably about a year ago, i was in a local coffee shop and browsing their merchandise while waiting for my order to be filled and i saw these mugs and they made me cry because i wanted them so badly. I mean, they’re so cute, they have a children’s literary reference, they’re a nice shape, but i didn’t feel like i could get them since we weren’t yet mama and papa bears. the first time i saw them in a store since we’ve been back from texas, i knew that they were exactly what i wanted to spend some of my birthday money on. i love them. (and no, they don’t have a baby bear mug. baby bears don’t drink coffee, silly! but they do have a tempting melamine baby bear stripey cup….)
i also got this fantastically silky, soft, stretchy blanket (made from bamboo!) with a gift certificate to a local baby boutique from a lovely and generous friend. did i need yet another swaddling blanket? no. but is this one my new favorite? yes. i mean, look! he looks like a yummy little green bean!
and because i can’t resist this new cute little baby dude, here’s one more shot where he tells me what he thinks of green beans:
for those of you who have requested more photos, here’s a few. We’re really enjoying getting to know baby dude. my parents came up for a week and did tons of laundry and dish/bottle washing (thanks, mom!) and other projects around the house that sorely needed to be done and were likely to continue being ignored for the next little while (thanks, dad!) and i think they loved the chance to get to hold and love on baby dude.
we also now have an entire week of just mom at home under our belts while dad’s back at work and all of the relatives are gone and we’re figuring out the rhythms of our days and nights and learning to interpret his noises (and smells). we’re figuring out how to get around town together (we walked to the post office all wrapped up in the moby sling and figured out how to deliver a big box to the UPS store while also carrying a baby car seat) and just reveling in new parenthood.
favorite books so far:
Everywhere Babies by Susan Meyers and Marla Frazee–has beautiful rhythm, meaning and illustrations that portray so many different kinds of families! Plus, later when attention spans get shorter, we can just read the big words on the page and skip the smaller ones.
Haiku Baby by Betsy E. Snyder–I bought this one awhile back at Frugal Muse intending to gift it to someone probably, but the illustrations had me hooked and I decided to keep it. I’m so glad! I still love the illustrations and the little haikus on each page are a gentle read for little baby ears. My favorite is the one called “Flower:”
“In tickly-toe grass;
A buttercup offers up
Yellow nose kisses”
Snoozers by Sandra Boynton–this one came to us in a box of used books from a friend. I just assumed it was a collection of other Boynton favorites, but it’s not! It’s all original stuff and is hilarious. Each 2-page spread is a different “chapter” which might be nice for skipping around later in life and also has wonderful rhythm and humor (but then again, don’t all of her books? Isn’t that why we LOVE them?).
The funny thing is that at work, I generally am not all that fond of rhyming books (for the preschool set I often find them distracting, especially when the meter is off or when the author tries so hard to make the rhyme that it’s difficult to understand what they’re trying to say) and I steer clear of “gentle reads” preferring funny ones, but that’s because I’ve always believed that gentle reads are better for “lap-reading” than for storytimes. It’s nice to finally have the opportunity to appreciate them for their intended purpose! Baby Dude may not understand the humor in these books yet and he may not appreciate the pictures, but I know that he loves listening to the lilting rhythms and the sound of our voices. I love reading to this boy!
Does anyone remember way back when we were waiting for baby dude* to be born and I might have said something about feeling “covertly pregnant”? Like I could choose when and with whom I’d share the information and didn’t constantly have strangers asking me when I was due and what the gender was and what we were going to name it and OMG, You’re HUGE!? Yeah, well, maybe there’s a purpose to that part of pregnancy. It now feels VERY strange to suddenly be the focus of attention when I walk into stores with a teeny tiny baby in tow and have total strangers ooh and ahh over him and ask how old he is (and then frequently tell me how great I look). Sometimes it makes me feel like a fake–like I’m getting away with something. So far, I haven’t felt obligated to tell any of these people that he was adopted. I mean, it’s none of their business, really, and I don’t want to qualify our relationship in a way that some uneducated (in the adoption world) people may read as “second best.” Plus, it seems like an awkward segue (“He’s three weeks old. We adopted him!”). So instead, “Yes, he’s my son. Yes, he’s very new. And yes, thank you, I DO look great!”
*after my parents were here for a week, my mother mentioned something jokingly about “baby dude” and I looked at her blankly and she said, “well, that’s what you call him all the time.” I had no idea! But now that she’s pointed it out, I’ve realized that I DO call him that. huh. weird. wonder where I got that? Anyway, I’d been thinking about using some sort of nickname for him here on this blog, so we’ll try this one out for awhile and see if it sticks.
so, what’s it like to be a mom after so many years of yearning? Today, it sort of feels like when you live far away from family or loved ones and you miss them for so much of the year and you get so excited when you get to go visit them and you can’t wait to be there and you’re impatient for the whole trip (well, actually, you’re impatient during all of the preparation and packing for the trip too) and when you finally arrive there are hugs and kisses and smiles and joy that you’ve finally arrived and then suddenly, easily… you relax into the familiarity. it’s like you were never apart. Here are the same ol’ people in their same ol’ places living their wonderfully ordinary lives. They were here all along and now, having arrived after your long journey, the trip doesn’t seem like it was that long after all–just a few hours, really. Yes, it was a grueling trip and yes, there were very difficult parts (okay, that’s probably more true with the infertility journey than just driving across a few states, but stick with me here), but now, suddenly, you’re here, just where you’re supposed to be and the hardships of the process of getting here fade just a little bit behind your wide smile and a big-hearted feeling of contentment.
the last two weeks have been a whirlwind. We’d stayed in C’s hometown for a few days after the hospital stay just in case she wanted to visit with us and the baby and she had asked us to visit her that first Friday. We visited with her for about five hours that day. It was nice to see her with the baby after we’d been away for a few days, but we could tell that it was hard for her to say goodbye when we left. She told us that she wanted to see us one last time before we went back home, but didn’t want to spend time with us other than that–it was just too hard.
So, we went to San Antonio and spent time with my extended family there. They threw us a small family baby shower (with mini burgers, mini hot dogs, mini fish tacos and mini chicken fajitas, baby carrots, cherry tomatoes, potato salad made with baby potatoes and for dessert? mini brownies, mini strawberry shortcakes, and mini ice cream sandwiches— SO cute!!) and we spent the next few days sleeping in, being lazy, eating wonderful food (I love my aunties!) and just floating around in this bubble of time, figuring out how we function as a family of three.
We found out last Thursday that the Interstate Compact paperwork had gone through, so we headed out to “C’s” hometown on Friday for one last visit before heading home. Again, we spent at least five hours hanging out with her–we took her out for lunch and then went back to her place to talk some more. We got some good photos and a few videos of her holding him and we made some good memories that afternoon.
On Saturday, we began the long trek home. We stopped for a few hours in Oklahoma to visit the cousins there and to take a break from being in a car seat, then one last push up to Kansas where we stayed with J’s grandma. On Sunday, we took a day of rest in Kansas, visiting with the rest of J’s extended family, including a visit to Grandpa who is in a nursing home . He can’t really see or hear or communicate very well any more, but he did ask if he could hold Gabriel and I think he enjoyed being able to hold this little boy.
Monday, we geared up for one last push home. Gabriel is a great traveler at this point–pretty much sleeping the whole way. Somewhere in Iowa, his umbilical cord fell off (woo hoo, first milestone! hmmm…. is there an umbilical cord fairy?). We got home around 8:00 and tumbled out of the car, bringing in only the necessities at first (diaper bag, baby). Gabriel had finally gotten tired of being in the car, about 20 minutes away from home (how do kids DO that?) and needed to be fed and changed and allowed to wiggle around. When we got inside, we discovered that our dear friends had left us flowers, balloons, chocolate, yummy beverages, artwork from the kids, four mason jars of turkey chili and a pan of cornbread (which REALLY hit the spot!), milk, eggs and bread in our fridge and a treasure trove of frozen breastmilk in the freezer. We feel so very blessed! I wanted to soak it all in, but Gabriel was still rather unhappy, so I went upstairs and changed him on his changing table for the first time, then sat with him in the glider. And then it hit me. Here I was, in this glider, in this nursery where I’d sat so often these past few months, dreaming about holding a child in my arms and here he was. Tiny, squishy baby body, warming my heart, calming down along with the rocking of the chair and just as he stopped crying, the tears began to flow down my own face. We. are. home.
In honor of Gabriel James joining our family, I’ve put together a mix of music for you to enjoy. Some of it is new stuff, some of it’s old stuff. Some of it’s kids’ stuff, some isn’t especially for kids, but would still be appropriate for kids. Below, I’ve linked to websites where you can download either the single track (for under $1 each) or, if that’s not possible, you can at least preview the song and then choose to buy the whole album if you like it. In some cases, I’ve linked to the artist’s website if you click on their name, but a site to download the song if you click on the song title. If you live here in town, most of this music is also available at your public library if you’d like to take it for a test drive before committing to the whole album.
As the mix titles indicate, the first set of music is a little more upbeat. I’ve started the mix off just a little bit mellow in case you want to play this as your child is waking up–it’s a more gentle way to greet the day than if I’d begun with, say, track #7. The second mix set is more subdued and would be lovely to listen to during quiet times. I hope that you enjoy this music as much as I do and I hope that at least a few of these artists make their way into your regular music rotation!
*each of these artist’s websites contain entire songs that you can listen to for free (you can’t download them for free, but you can hear the whole song–or sometimes even the whole album–from their page)
We’re spending time relaxing with family in texas (yay! No more hotel!). Enjoy this music while we all wait!
After 3 years of infertility and 3 failed IVF cycles, we adopted a son in 2010. We're back now for round #2 of this exciting adventure. Follow along with the rough drafts and see where the story leads this time!
(photos by Christa Moreland)
