There are some real upsides to adoption too. It doesn't always feel like it, but getting through the home study and learning all the new things that we have learned, have not only allowed us to come to terms with some things, but also to actively embrace them.
The thing is, for adopters like us - people who have come to adoption through infertility - there is a lot of grieving to overcome before you can properly move on. That may sound a little over-dramatic, but it's true.
First of all you have to learn to grieve for the life that you'll never have - and like other forms of grief you go through stages with it. For a long time I felt incredibly angry that this choice has been taken away from me. It just didn't seem fair! But you have to work your way through it, because without accepting your infertility, you're never going to be able to progress.
It's really not easy being infertile. It's a long and lonely road. And the choices and the lifestyle that many people take forgranted, is simply never going to feature for you. And because it is the "norm" for people to have families, then the question is always one of the first you are asked when meeting anyone new - "Do you have any children?"
Ten years ago that question was easier to answer, but having been through the mill with trying to become a family, that question is now loaded and extremely potent. So is the answer - "No, I don't have children"
Ten years ago, that was just words. Now, it is a statement slashed across my heart, like a pick through ice.
I digress, however, as always.
Adoption cures some of these problems. The family life that we want - we can still have. We will still get to do all of those things that we've always wanted to - see our child in school plays, go on family holidays, read bedtime stories to Mozza, pass on learning and knowledge... we still get to do all of that, thanks to our adoption story - but there are some things that we will never have!..
Grieving for our unborn child was hard for me and the Lam, because we struggled to believe that we were a statistic. Even after all the prodding and poking, blood tests, sperm counts, invasive procedures, x-rays and appointments proved that we were just not going to conceive, we still didn't really believe it. And when you still cling onto hope like that, well you're never going to get past it. But we did grieve - we did come to an acceptance. And after all the crap that we went through with the emotional, clinical and difficult IVF journey we went on, we did finally accept that we were never going to have a baby. So we had to grieve.
But when we grieved, we had to grieve specifics - we had to force ourselves to talk and think about things that were really difficult for us. Those conversations were so hard - talking about how we were never going to leave a legacy - that there wouldn't be a family tree beyond us. That the family line ends here - ends with us. Then talking about more emotive parts - that we will never know what our baby could look like. That we will never know if he/she would be blonde like me, or dark like The Lam. We will never know what parts of our genetic coding could be bestowed on a little person that we made together.
Those conversations were sad.
Then there's a different kind of grief - for me, really. A sadness that I won't ever experience being pregnant, or giving birth. Feeling a life grow inside me. Will never have the stories that my Mum told me about her cravings and silly pregnancy nuances. I will never have that, and it's just not fair. And even now, even after all this time, it's still quite hard to hear about other people having babies. Even though I can be happy for them - it's still tinged with an aching sadness for me and the Lam. It is very difficult for me to be around pregnant women - because even though I know and have accepted my fate, I will never really be OK with it.
Then there are other things that we have had to learn to be accepting of. When Mozza comes, Mozza will come with a name. We will never get to name our baby. That was really tough for me. Like most little girls, I had the names. sex and quantity of my children all mapped out. That the names changed on a monthly basis was irrelevant. As a child, it was just the way - one day I would be a mum, and inherent to that process was that I would get to name my baby.
And now I can't - and I still find that really hard. What if I hate the name? I might! There are names that I hate. It's just another stumbling block, but it is one that will always be there.
Another issue is the babyness. We came to terms a long time ago with the fact that we are never going to have a tiny baby - but I ache for this. I want to hold a newborn in my arms. I want all of the firsts - the first feed, the first sleep, the first cry, the first everything - and these firsts aren't going to be with us. Of course, Mozza will have lots of firsts with us - we know that - but there are some moments that we'll never have and can never get back. We probably won't even get first Christmas or first birthday. And for sure we won't get first smile. Or first Mummy or first Daddy. Another process we worked through.
But then - the epiphany. Working through all of the above was tough - and we felt very sorry for ourselves on more than one occasion. But then we came through it - we reached the point where all of the above actually stopped mattering quite as much.
To start with, adoption was about fulfilling our needs as parents - but then we realised that adoption is about fulfilling the needs of our child BY becoming their parents. It's not about us - it's about Mozza. And the day we realised that, was the day that we realised we were ready to be parents.
The fact is, everything that we've worked through is true and miserable and hard. No, we won't have what we always thought we would - we won't have a child that is our physical hybrid (!) and we won't have any memories of Mozza's first few months, and we do miss out on all of those things that I've whined about.
But we DO get Mozza. We DO get our baby, and our family.
And more than that, we get to make a difference. We get to take this child, this beautiful, innocent child, and we get to build a whole family together. We get to be Mozza's Mummy and Daddy and we get the joy that Mozza coming into our lives will bring. We get the elation of meeting Mozza for the first time. We get the amazement of engineering a bonding process. We get the thrill of Mozza's Adoption Day in court - and we get to tell our baby one day, when they're a little bit bigger, that we picked them. Out of all the babies in the world, we get to choose Mozza.
Because when you're matched in the adoption process, you are selected out of a huge bunch of people as the best possible parents. And then you get to look at this little baby's portfolio and say "Yes - that's Mozza"
The saying "You can choose your friends but not your family" doesn't apply. We choose Mozza. And we will know when Mozza has arrived, because even though Mozza's journey to us is on a different road to most other babies, we will know for sure that Mozza is ours.
So, it's true - we miss out on alot. But we gain far more than we lose. We get to make a difference to a child who needs us, and Mozza gets to fulfil a lifelong dream for us. We both get to fill a void - how many people can really say that?
We know how lucky we are.
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