Corbin's Story:: Placement Day

Gregg and I arrived at the hospital early in the afternoon and spent the whole day with M and K.  I will always cherish our time together that day.  We laughed, took walks together, ate lunch from Arby's, and just plain got to know each other better.  

We wanted to make sure M and K had as much time in the hospital with Corbin and never wanted to overstep our boundaries.  I mentioned this to M a few times and her reply was, "I love you guys and love when you are here."  We are so lucky.

Since M had Corbin C-section, they stayed in the hospital longer than usual.  They really wanted M to stay one more night, but she was done with hospitals and convinced her Doctor to let her go home  a night early.  The first thing she told us that day was, "we all get to go home tonight!"

M's caseworker came to have everyone sign papers so Corbin could be released to Gregg and I.  I'll never forget his face when he entered the hospital room and saw how comfortable we all were with each other. I was playing angry birds with K (M's son), while M had gone for a walk and Gregg and K (Corbin's birth dad) had gone to get something out of the car together.  It was a look of, "this is not something I see very often."  If you didn't know our story you would have guessed we were all close family.  Which is exactly how we like it.  He later mentioned how lucky we were to have M and how our situation was very rare for a placement day.  We agreed.  She is so good to us as is her family.  We are so blessed to have them in our lives.  

After everyone else had left and M and K had their "fancy" hospital dinner, the nurses started discharging us.  It was such a different experience from Emme's placement day.  We have all come so far since then.  There is a trust between us now that was only a hope when Emme was born.  We only knew each other for two weeks back then and now we have three years under our belt.  This time around our goodbyes were thankful and tearful, but very calm and relaxed.  Gregg expressed his love to them and we all got emotional.  M told us how much she loved us and was so happy she could add to our family.  She said watching Emme with Corbin made everything worth it.  We hugged, shared another laugh and M and K left while we waited for a nurse to become available to escort us out.  It was beautiful and peaceful. We will forever be grateful to our children's families.  We truly love them so much. 

Corbin waiting to leave the hospital.

Corbin's Story::The Second Day

Corbin's second day of life was filled with lots of visitors.  It was a very memorable day because we were able to have all four siblings together.  It was crazy having us all crammed in a little hospital room, but we loved it.  

Gregg taking a turn feeding Corbin.

Corbin getting snuggles from his big brother.

Love from K's mom.

M was adopted and this is her biological sister.  Her boys look so much like Emme.  We love it.

So fun to watch these three together.  Emme and her sister B are only a year apart.  In true toddlerhood, Emme had just stolen her baby and was about to poke her in the eye.  

M with all of her children.  K and Emme are so much alike.  They were not keen on picture taking.

Papa (M's dad) with Corbin.

I love this picture of Emme saying goodbye to M's mom.

Gregg captured this photo without me knowing. I will forever cherish it!

The Phone Call

Life was about to get busy. We were really focused on Em and were having a lot of evaluations and appointments for her. Almost every day I didn't work we had some type of appointment.  Plus, she demanded our full attention at all times.  Gregg was excepted into an amazing MBA program which we felt very blessed about, but I knew I would be alone most days from sunup to sundown.  Scary thought.

Let's just say at this point I was content with our one child. Not because I didn't want more kids, but because I felt so overwhelmed.  We were just starting to get professional help with Em and didn't know she had ADHD.  Plus, we were drained after countless infertility tries and going back and forth with starting the adoption process again. We decided to put our next child on the back burner.  With Gregg going back to school and Em needing a lot of attention it seemed like the best decision.  I really felt like we had a boy coming, but after trying so hard to get him here I told The Lord I did my part and the rest was up to him.  (Never worked for me before)  

Out the blue, a week before Easter, I saw Em's birth aunt's phone number appear on my phone screen.  I always get excited to talk to Em's birth family so I quickly answered.  She shared with us that M (Mem's birthmom) was pregnant again and wondered our feelings about her placing the baby with us again. I was both caught off guard and yet wasn't. It was like I was waiting for a phone call like this. Not necessarily from M, but from someone.  It just made it even better that it was about M!  I told J (M's sister) that we would love to adopt again. I knew Gregg would too so I didn't even have to talk to him. J told me to expect a phone call from M soon so we could talk about it.  After we hung up I text Gregg to come home soon because I had BIG BIG news. He had no clue what I was talking about. :)  I couldn't hold it in any longer.  I called him and shared what had just happened. He was shocked, excited, and down right speechless. Meanwhile, M's number popped up on my screen so I hung up with Gregg and answered her phone call. 

M confirmed what J had told me. She told me she was unexpectedly pregnant again and had no idea what to do. Her mom mentioned that we wanted to adopt another baby (we told her mom last time we saw them we were starting the adoption process again) and immediately a peace came over her. She knew that was exactly what she wanted to do and her family was happy with her decision as well. She thanked us for raising Em like we have and giving her the opportunities we have.  That totally made my year.  To get a compliment like that from the woman who chose us to parent her child was so amazing.

The next week was so exciting.  We had amazing news and wanted to shout it from the roof tops.  We were like the character from SNL that couldn't keep a secret and had to run through windows to keep her mouth shut.

With Easter being that weekend, we found candy binkis that we slipped pieces of paper in that said, "you're going to have a new cousin October 15, 2013."  Then we put that into a big egg and wrote all of our nieces and nephews names on the outside.  Gregg's family was completely caught off guard and there were many tears of joy.  With my family, we did an Easter egg hunt and the kids knew not to open the egg with their name on it until we were all together.  Once they opened it my family started to question who was pregnant.  I think I was the last on their mind!  Finally, the accusation came to me and I explained that I was not pregnant, but that Em would be getting a biological sibling.  They were ecstatic and we had some more tears.  Gregg and I were so happy that we got to surprise everyone in a fun way.  We never thought we would be able to so we loved every minute of it!

Sorry the lighting is so bad!

I can't even express how truly blessed we are to have an open relationship with M and her family.  If we didn't, it would be very likely we would not have crossed M's mind.  Because she has been a part of our lives, she has been able to see Em grow and know she made the right decision for her.  Plus, she knows we keep our promises because we have with Em.  If we didn't have visits with M's family, her mom would never have a clue we wanted to adopt or have more children at all and wouldn't have been so quick to tell M our plans.  We are so thankful for the angel M has been in our lives!