grief
December 20, 2014 I learned about a sweet little love that was due in May. This baby had several siblings, three of which had been adopted by an amazing family that I quickly grew to love. We were matched right away with this baby's birth mother which resulted in months and months of planning, preparing, dreaming and loving this sweet little baby love that would be joining our family in just a few months. Fast forward to June 5, 2015, a day I will never, but wish I could forget. The day that we learned that we had been scammed out of thousands of dollars while our birth mom basically sold her baby girl to the highest bidder. Devastation doesn't even describe the impact of her choices that day. Not only did we lose our sweet little love that we had been planning months for, but her siblings, the family that we had been planning on having an open adoption with, also lost out on being apart of her life.
Alya was working that Saturday, and the kids and I were about to head out the door for a friends birthday party when I noticed that I had missed a call from our lawyer. I got excited because the baby was already over her due date and our lawyer usually just texts me, so I thought that maybe this was it! When I called our lawyer back she said that was she was about to tell me was something that I needed to be sitting down to hear. Instant dread seeped into the pit of my stomach. I remember slowly sitting down onto my daughter's bed while the kids ran around playing, confused why we were now not leaving for the birthday party. Our lawyer told me about what had happened and I just started sobbing. Josiah, my tender-hearted four year old kept coming up to me and asking what was wrong and why I was crying. I said, "I think we lost our baby buddy." He kept asking why and what happened to it and why couldn't we have it anymore. I wish I could have had an answer ...
I wish that my children didn't have to witness me learning that we had lost our baby. I wish that they didn't have to see their mommy grieving the loss of what could have, what should have been. But one thing that I have always viewed as important is to be honest with my children in an age appropriate way. Our kids had been a part of the dreaming and loving of a new sibling from almost day one of being matched. Josiah especially was so excited about becoming a new big brother and talked about it daily. I think that it is important for my kids to see that it is okay to grieve. That sadness is a normal reaction and that tears are okay to express that emotion. And that talking through those emotions is important.
The days, weeks and months after that traumatic day were far from what I had planned for our summer to look like. I did my best to drag myself out of bed each day to care for my two kids. I tried to still follow through with fun summer plans for the kids. But to be honest I felt like my soul had died. I don't really know how I survived the summer ... honestly it was probably because of the prayers of all our family and friends. Each day I kept going, kept living through my children but all the joy had been stolen.
People would say, "Well that wasn't the baby God had planned for you. He has a better one coming soon". I may or may not have said several four letter words in my mind towards those people as I read their comments. Here's the thing ... I get that that baby wasn't the baby that God intended for us to have ... I mean obviously, or we would have it! But that doesn't take away the intense GRIEF that remained. That baby was alive, it was loved, it was dreamed about by OUR family. She was ours for those few months ... and that dream of her will always remain in my heart. Losing her was like a death. The way that we lost her added on another level of trauma.
Now we have Micah ... and I am so deeply in love with this itty bitty baby boy. But I want to be honest with all of you ... Micah doesn't replace our other baby. What happened to us was awful. It was something that crushed everything inside of me. You don't just get over something like that. Ask any mom who has had a miscarriage, or lost a child far too young, or a fostermom who loves with every ounce of her being only to say goodbye to her kids. I still grieve for that baby that we lost, Micah isn't going to replace her spot in my heart. For whatever reasons God felt like she was supposed to go to that other family. I pray every day that she is as loved as much by them as she is by us. Micah most likely would have had gone into fostercare ... so maybe God knew that he would need us more.
Now that Micah is here, I have become aware to how much loss Josiah really did experience when we lost our baby girl. Micah was a surprise to all of us, but especially the kids. We didn't tell them about him coming this time until we knew 100% that he was going to be ours. He kept thanking me over and over again for letting him have his baby brother. He kept saying how long he had waited for him. We have had Micah for 8 days now ... and every.single.day when Josiah hears Micah cry he will say, "It's okay baby Micah, don't cry. We will keep you forever and ever. Sing to him mommy. Sing, Micah we will love you and keep you forever and ever. You won't go away. You are apart of our family forever." I just stare at him and think, he gets it. His heart loved our other little baby just as much as mine did. He has been waiting for a long long time, just like me for our little love to finally come home and be apart of our family forever and ever.
We are over the moon in love with Micah Burke. And we will continue to love the sweet little girl that we lost at the beginning of the summer. I am a momma to many many littles ... some of them I have the joy of raising in my home, while the others live elsewhere. But I will always, always have a mother's love for them. God may have had a different plan on where they may live, but he always intended for me to love and pray for them. Their lives, no matter how long we knew of them will always be woven into the heart of our family.
