My waiting is, of course, nothing compared to that of families with extended cases; I think daily about Cheri, and Erin, and Blair, and everyone else who has been in limbo for months, sometimes with no end in sight. I think about my friend Richard, who has been through not one but two complicated -- at times agonizing -- international adoptions. I think about how ignorant I was while he was in the midst of those adoptions, how, while I was properly outraged at some of the bureaucratic hurdles he faced, and while I had a vague sense of how hard it must all have been -- I didn't in my heart get it. I get it now.
For those who have never experienced at close hand the ups and downs of the adoptive process, I think one of the hardest things to grasp is how real, and how intense, and how early the connection is between parent and child. I think the analogy between the adoption journey and pregnancy can be a useful one; and just as people often fail to recognize the deep pain that can come with an early miscarriage, they may not understand the potential for loss that comes with every adoption. For some prospective parents, the bonding begins at the moment of referral: with a blurry photograph, a date of birth, a name. Others may fall in love on an early visit trip; with Guatemalan adoptions, this often happens when a baby is still a newborn. With domestic adoption, the process may begin even before the baby is born -- and with domestic adoption, a third of all birth mothers decide to keep their children: for the adoptive parent, the risk of loss is great indeed. (Loss is, of course, part of all adoptions, for all the members of the "adoption triad"; but at the moment I am writing specifically from the perspective of the a-mom.)
I have, in some ways, avoided the hard parts of adopting from Guatemala. The problem for me is not the waiting per se; I have no urgent need to return to my NYC life any time soon. Unlike most prospective gringaparents, I am spending these waiting months with my child, not anxiously without. But I am not at home here; I am living in limbo, and acutely aware of it. And for better and for worse, my choice -- to be a foster mother from very early on -- has upped the ante for me. I would never claim to love my child any more than any other parent; but to care for him 24/7, to see his smiles every morning, to watch him grow and learn every day, to feel his sleepy warm body next to me every night -- I am viscerally, painfully aware of what would be missing in my life without him.
The problem for me, and for every other waiting a-parent, is that the waiting comes with fear. The more waiting, the more fear. For many, fear that a child is growing and developing without them; fear that the older the child gets, the harder it will be, for everyone, when they finally do join their adoptive families. For all, the fear -- perhaps never voiced or even consciously examined -- that the child might never come home. Termination -- that which must not be named -- is very rare, but until we are through PGN, the possibility lurks. My anxiety surfaces in the middle of the night: I have never actually dreamed of losing Pablo -- instead, my nightmares feature severed limbs, gruesome ER scenes, family deaths, widespread catastrophe.
Right now, I feel fairly certain that I would not put myself through this process again, even if all goes smoothly from this point forward. Do not misunderstand: I do not for an instant regret where I am or how I have arrived here. I love every inch of my Pablito; I am his mother, and we are on this journey together. For that, I am grateful every day. And perhaps I am like the laboring woman who swears off babies forever during transition, only to reconsider once the contractions have faded into distant memory. But I have to laugh at those well-meaning folks who suggest that becoming a mom via adoption is easier than the more traditional route: I can come up with any number of adjectives for this process, but easy is most definitely not among them.
next up: cheerier times with Tia Kerry!
