Hellobee

I haven’t posted in a little while, but life has been a little crazy. My last post about our journey to have child #2 was about us working with a new RE to help get Mr. Piñata’s hormones into more normal ranges, and that we were hoping this would improve his semen analysis enough to try a few IUIs. Back in October we re-tested Mr. Piñata’s hormones and they came back better! But, his semen analysis was the worst we’ve ever seen. So needless to say, we were very discouraged and didn’t feel like IUIs were a good option at all. And financially and emotionally IVF is just not the best choice for us right now.

So, we decided we wanted to update our home study to adopt child #2! We’re not giving up on biological children forever, but we also always knew we would want to adopt again in the future, so we decided to go ahead and renew our home study.  We didn’t really tell anyone or make any official announcements because we wanted to wait until we were officially on the wait list. We thought that would be more exciting news than “Hey everyone, we’re starting to fill out a bunch of paperwork.” So, in December we started the process by getting our fingerprints sent off to the FBI and after Christmas I started updating our profile, getting a lot of paperwork together, and getting excited!

Much to our surprise, our social worker called last week and asked if we felt our profile was ready enough to show to an expectant mother! Even though our home study wasn’t entirely ready yet, she knew we would be approved within a month or so and thought it would be a situation we’d be interested in. I was so excited at the chance! She told me that the expectant mother was healthy, due in April and that she has had a healthy pregnancy. This expectant mother was also 1/2 Hispanic and 1/2 Caucasian while the birth father was Caucasian. This wasn’t exactly the situation we were looking for in terms of race because Little Piñata is over 1/2 African American and we were hoping for a sibling that would look similar to him. But, we have also decided to be open to any other races as well. However, the biggest news was that this expectant mother is due with TWINS!!

This made me SO excited! For a couple that thought we might never become parents, we could potentially have 3 kids under 2 years old! But, at the same time it was pretty overwhelming to think about. Mr. Piñata was especially concerned about twins and how overwhelmed I would be taking care of a very active toddler along with two newborns. Of course we would be sharing the parenting responsibility, but with him working all day, he knew I would take the majority of the stress. We also were concerned that Little Piñata might not get the time and attention we would want to give him if there were two (instead of one) more children in our family.

So, we thought, prayed and talked a lot about the situation. Although there were definite positives, like the fact that they were boy/girl twins, the birthmother is healthy and that we would be able to adopt TWO babies and just pay one placement fee, helping us get to our 3 or 4 kid family(which is a big deal because adoption is expensive!), we definitely had our concerns. Our biggest concern was that since the babies would be 3/4 Caucasian that they would end up looking quite a bit like us and that Little Piñata would feel like he didn’t look like the rest of his family as he grew up. But, were these concerns enough to say no to the opportunity?

And of course, we were only at the point of deciding if we were going to show her our profile to consider us. We weren’t agreeing to a match or placement where we had already been chosen. So, it seemed like something we should certainly at least be open to, right? And if we were to be chosen, then we could then still be able to decide whether or not it was a good fit for us. Although we knew if it did come to that point our emotions would be so high, it would be pretty impossible to walk away.

We felt like we won the lottery with our adoption situation with Little Piñata and how perfect it was, so there’s a big part of us that feels like it’s impossible that we will come across such a good situation in the future and we may just have to lower our expectation of the “perfect match.” So, despite all of the positives of the situation, our hesitations were still there. We wondered what the “right” choice was for us. Was God leading us in just one of these directions? Were we meant to be these babies’ parents?

We prayed and talked. Then we talked and talked some more! We only had 36 hours to make our decision, so there was a lot of back and forth of us feeling 100% convinced that we should show our profile and then moments when it seemed like a terrifying prospect! Even though we still had to go through all the motions of our days, it was constantly on our mind as we wondered what to do. Our biggest thought was knowing that the most important thing was what was best for those babies. Was it possible that out of the profiles shown to her that we would be the best situation for them?

In the final hours we decided that even with the feelings of excitement, that there was quite a bit hesitation for us. We didn’t feel like we should give a definite “no,” but also felt like those babies deserved the chance to be brought home by parents that were 100% excited about the idea of twins and that weren’t as hesitant as we were. We told our social worker that we weren’t comfortable presenting our profile to the expectant mother that day. But, that if she didn’t find a connection with any of the families that she saw that we would want her to see our profile. After making this decision I cried on and off the rest of the day. I had already begun daydreaming of the chaos that we might welcome into our home and I was surprised at how sad I felt at the loss of this opportunity. There were also moments of dread where I felt like we had made the “wrong” decision.

But, as the days pass I feel more at peace with what we decided. Even though I don’t think there was necessarily a “right” or “wrong” decision, I feel like we made the right decision for us at this time. She will most undoubtedly find the right family for her twins out of the profiles that she has seen. So, we’re not anticipating that she will see our profile. But, even now there are moments I really, really want her to. Moments where I still daydream about fitting 3 cars seats in the back of the car and figuring out how to hold and feed two newborns at once. And I still feel sad at times. At the same time I do feel confident that those twins will have the parents that they are meant to. They will be so loved and cherished by whichever parents the expectant mother chooses. And honestly, I’m very excited for them! What a blessing those parents will have!

We will never know what “might have been” had we shown our profile, but I have to let go of that. Mr. Piñata told me that sometimes it’s not the “yeses” that we make in our lives that show the most faith, but the times when we have to trust that we’re making the best decision to not pursue an opportunity, even if there are a whole lot of “what ifs.” It was a very, very difficult decision to make for us, but as we move forward we are choosing to be excited for what life has in store for us. We’re hoping and praying that the “right” situation for us does present itself and that we when we bring home our next child (or even children), we will be confident that everything fell into place along the way just as it should have. We know it might be a long wait, but we know it will be worth it when we welcome that child into our home and when Little Piñata has a little sibling. And for now, I have to get back to getting all that official paperwork together. And we hope and pray there will be exciting news to share in the not-too-distant future.