One Year Later......

We are still waiting.

I took a break from writing as so much has happened to Eric and I in the last year that I did not know when, or if, I wanted to blog about them.  But this is our journey and every twist and turn will lead us to the child(ren) that are meant to be ours.

Last September we were approached by a young woman who was only 12 weeks pregnant, had 3 other children, an abusive boyfriend, and no family.  She said that she could not care for this child.  Being "baby crazy" of course we pursued this situation. The journey with this birthmom had highs and had lows but, despite our doubts and with our eyes wide open we steeled ourselves and saw it through to the end.  I knew that the lows were normal, that this is a HUGE decision for any young woman, and I needed to respect that. 

While patiently waiting for the first situation to come to fruition, for better or worse, we were approached, right around Christmas, by another young woman in our area who purportedly had made the decision to leave her baby with an appropriate State agency if she could not find a couple to adopt her by the due date of January 17th.  She was supposedly determined then to leave the hospital without her child and let the State take care of it.  After MUCH back and forth betwee Eric and I (remember, I am BABY CRAZY) we decided we could do it, or at the very least were not in a position to turn away any willing birthmother!  We always thought we would have twins anyhow so it would be no problem.  We got a lawyer for us, a lawyer for the BM and all was moving along.  The day arrived and the beautiful little girl was born.  We were told all was set, that tomorrow she is to be ours.  Needless to say, there was plenty to do, but we were all set, had done our shopping, built her nursery, but tomorrow came and the little girl was not to be a Manas.  We.Were.Crushed.  There was nothing we could do, we had to power on knowing we would still be welcoming a little one to our family in April.

April came and this is when Eric and I realized again that we would not be parenting the child that we were anticipating for the last 7 months.  The person we were trusting was actually a cold, calculating, heartless, ruthless, pathological liar, ultimately exhibiting sociopathic tendencies.  She took our money, repeatedly lied to us, on the phone and in person, and in the end we believe, and have actual evidence that she never really intended to give this child up for adoption.  Some may say I am mean, but if all the facts were laid out, you would feel the same way as me.  She did not owe us a child, but she led us on without ever intending to do so, took every penny she could, then cut off all contact before the baby was born.  No explanation.

When Eric and I decided to adopt from Ethiopia in June 2010, it was a decision that we both felt was the right way to grow our family.  We have many decisions to make and plan to not publish, for now, the decision on how the Manas family will grow but we will not let the events of the last year stop us from trying. It has not been easy but we are finally beginning to move past what has happened.  A week to ourselves on the beaches and cliffs of Jamaica helped too.

Eric is meant to be a father, I am meant to be a mother and I know this journey will lead us to the special little future Manas.  I plan to continue to write about the goings on in our life and journey and hope that soon we will be a family of 4 (of course we count Mabel as 1)!!

I love Eric and am proud to be on this journey with him.