How is that possible?
Wasn't I just pregnant with her sister? Didn't we just have a benefit to raise money for the adoption costs? Didn't we just get the call that we were picked? Wasn't she just born? Didn't the courts just declare her "ours"? Didn't she just learn to crawl? Didn't she just learn to walk?
Where does the time go?
Our story is different than most. We will never sit around a campfire and tell our daughter about the night she was born. (Although does anyone do that?). We will never tuck her in at night and tell her how we knew she was going to be born with a head full of hair because I had heartburn my whole pregnancy or how her daddy and I looked at ultrasound pictures and knew her name right away.
The fact of the matter is, we did not know she was born until we got a text from our social worker.
But that does not make her birth story any less special.
Stories are told from different perspectives. Miranda is lucky enough to get lots of different stories. The perks of open adoption are that she will hear the stories from us and she will also hear them from the woman who gave birth to her. It's kind of like getting her cake and eating it, too.
I do not like to share. I like my stuff to be mine. So what in the world made me think I could share my daughter with someone else?
Well, the fact that another woman picked us to raise the child she made is what finally taught me how to share. For on Tuesday morning, she will also wake up and know that her daughter is 2.
I am Miranda's mother. There is no doubt in my mind. When she yells "Mama" in the middle of a store (which she does more and more!), it's me that she wants to see. It's me that changes her and bathes her and feeds her and drives her and plays with her and loves her and is in awe of her every day.
Yesterday, we spent the day with M. At first Miranda did not remember her, but then she warmed up to her. Physically, I do not see any resemblance to the woman who gave her life. What I do see, though, is an incredibly strong woman who put the needs of a child before her own.
I feel threatened by M sometimes. I feel in competition with her also. It's those moments that I need Gary to help me snap out of it. Or I need to remind myself that I am in fact her mother and that is a role I was somehow always meant to play.
I asked Gary recently if he regretted all the fertility treatments and time and energy we put into trying to get pregnant after Allie died. His response? Not one bit, as it led us on the path to get Miranda and she was the child we were meant to have and raise and love.
And love we do. So very much.
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