Ben, Jen and some Cacti

       I just want to start out by saying that my baby is so cute. Obvious, but true.

       I had the WONDERFUL opportunity of driving 24 hours to Arizona earlier this month. Honestly, I could've taken an airplane, but I leave that for the sane people to do. But don't worry--it all worked out. My boss was kind enough to not deny my request to have 5 days off of work, so five hours before we set off, I scrambled to pack up all my stuff.

       Day one: six a.m. is really early. But guess who I got to see 3 1/2 hours later... MY BABY!!! Oh my goodness, I freaking love that kid. His mom, Ann, was so kind to let us make our first pit stop at her home. So my dad and I walked in and there, sitting up on the floor with 10 toys around him, was beautiful Ben. Even thought it was only for forty minutes, it was so amazing to sit around with Ann, Derek and of course, baby. We watched him roll around and heard him laugh every time the dog barked.
       The best thing I saw was Ben's reaction when Derek came home. One of the benefits of choosing adoption was that Ben would have a father, a dad who loved and cared for him. So when Derek came home from work to visit with us, Ben's face lit up and he started flailing his little arms and legs, and cooing until Derek came and tackled/kissed him. My heart was SO full. I looked at Derek and said, "Wow. He really, really loves you." Like, what more could I ask for.
       He's seven months old now, so I brought him some baby food as a gift. Seems like a little thing, but I like supporting them being Ben's parents for me; formula is a little too expensive, so in the past I've brought diapers, clothes, and now jarred food. Ann knows me so well, how I miss Ben the most right before and after I visit him, so the next day she sent me a picture of Ben eating the food I brought for him. I honestly couldn't have asked for better parents for my child. Oh, and one more thing; Derek was telling me how sometimes when he goes to the store with Ben, and people comment about how cute my baby is, they say that Ben looks just like Derek... and Derek just looks at them and says thanks. It's hilarious to me because Ben looks more and more like Andrew and me: my dark brown eyes, his smile, etc. That was one of the things I apologized for when I first met them in Logan a year ago (I did not think it has been that long) that I was sorry he wouldn't look like them. Luckily, Derek just lets it roll off.
     
 Driving my dad's old, wide and long Impala is terrifying. I think I drove for at least four hours the first day, and that was way too much. You know how passing trucks while going 75 mph on the freeway is scary? Imagine your car taking up the entire width of a lane, the big semi taking up the entire width of his lane, oh and it's windy. Let's just say that dad didn't like my driving.

       Day two: more driving. 11 more hours to be precise. At least this time it was more scenic, like Zion and Bryce Canyon scenic. So gorgeous to see it in person. From the road. From miles away. But still pretty. Anyone driving from SLC to PHX, I recommend highway 89. More scary driving from me later, we finally made it to Mesa around dinner time. Air conditioning is amazing. Getting sick from change of altitude and temperature--not so amazing.

       Day three-five: basically wedding planning day for the Jen! Not only am I the photographer of weddings (see www.photographyrebeccaann.blogspot.com ) I get to be the florist too! By some sheer luck, the only non potted orchids in the store were the perfect color for the wedding. Jen's old roommate, Becca, came down to Mesa to be a part of the wedding and us three had tons of fun over the two days. We found this AMAZING park to take their bridals at, which was mostly just a lot of laughing. Then we went at ate the juiciest burger I've ever had at Zinburger in Gilbert, and niece Evelyn was there! She was such fun over the weekend.
       Then, JEN GOT MARRIED! It was so beautiful, and her husband is the BEST. I've been so lucky with brother-in-laws. Nick is so wonderful to Jen, and to me and Ev.
        On Saturday, we went to the Mesa, Arizona temple. It is so much prettier in real life. Church is kind of an iffy thing for me right now, but I have a special place for temples in my heart; so much respect for what happens inside them, and they have such a beautiful design and architecture. ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejf9a70qgl8 )

       I also want to add, I'm obsessed with cacti. The last time I was here, I couldn't find a good time to take a picture with one. But the temple had like a whole forest of cacti and I took some pretty pictures.

Her Birth Story and My Heartache

       As we all know, this blog started with the longest post known to man about my pregnancy and delivery of sweet baby Ben. The whole point was for it to be therapeutic, to write out all my feelings instead of holding them in and bursting. It was not important who read it or how many views the page got, (although that was fascinating.) I sent the link to that post to a couple dozen people I thought would care about me enough to want to know this big event in my life; turns out it spread farther than I thought it would (a good and bad thing, because of people's desire to teach lessons by judging you.) Turns out I know amazing people that truly love and care about me, people I didn't even think noticed me. It's always fun to have people come up to me and tell me they've read my blog and support me.

       For my birthday, Ann sent me a card and her nine-page birth story of the day Ben was born, and the next day when I placed him into their care for eternity. Andrew and I took turns reading each page, but eventually I just made him read because I was balling my eyes out. Hearing how it all played out from point of view just brought back the absolute agony of the experience. I've been working so hard to only see the positive parts of the adoption, like how healthy, chubby, cute and happy he is. But this story just killed me; it was like I hadn't made any progress on my mental health.

       Apparently, a would-be birthmother fell through on their adoption a couple years ago, so Ann had a really hard time trusting me throughout our entire experience because she thought I would bail on her just like this other woman had. She talked about having to wait so long in the waiting room, about how she wished she could have been a bigger part of his birth and hospital time. By the end of reading this story, I felt like the worst birthmother ever because of how much she wished she could have experienced that I prevented, in one way or another. Granted, she got my baby so it's not like she's complaining, but still. It's one of those things where we were both trying to respect each other and ended up both feeling off about how things were happening.


       Another thing that has been breaking me recently and for the last year is when other girls my age get pregnant. Some keep their baby (a win), some get to keep their baby and marry their man (a definite win.) And here I am, losing everything and everyone that actually matters to me. Yeah, I know life isn't fair. But life freaking sucks. One of my friends, a year younger than me who had her baby a month after me, just got married. Someone else I know is getting married soon because she got pregnant. It is agonizing. I envy them. Everyone is telling me to be happy, but that depends on things that I can't control. I can't make him marry me even though that would make me happy. I can't make him let me have another baby (even though I totally did ask.) I know what I want. I know that I can't have what I want. And yet I'm expected to watch other people live my dream while I sit by and watch.

Six Month Mark

       I cannot believe that Ben is already six months old! When I was pregnant, each week went by so fast; every day since placement has been so long. I can remember everything like it was just yesterday, and if I begin to forget, I have my journal to help all the memories flood back.

       The desire to see Ben is strong, and sometimes completely overwhelming. My heart aches every day because this huge part of me is so far away from my love and my protection. His parents are so good about sending me pictures when I request them, and telling me cute stories about him and how he is developing. Apparently, instead of napping, he rolls around in his crib. He always looks so, incredibly happy.

       I've had a job now for three months, plus some big photography experiences; I thought I would be busy enough to keep my mind off of missing sweet baby. Looks like no matter what, he'll always be there in the back of my head with all these "what if...?" questions circling around him. It's truly agonizing. The pain has not dissipated in the slightest.

 

Ben's birthfather's parents bought him some toys, and they
turned out to be Ben's favorite.

The Visit

         Despite all the drama that occurred leading up to visiting Ben for the second time since placement, our visit was INCREDIBLE! Boyfriend and I drove the three and a half hours to see the baby and his parents on a Thursday I had off from work. His momma was busy helping a friend do crafts, so we got to play with Ben all by ourselves for a little while. Let me just say one thing- Ben has an amazing smile and it was on display all day. He has started cooing and screeching, but his little voice was raspy from crying so much during previous days. But for me, he was just so happy all the time. I like to think that maybe somewhere in him he knows it's me, but I don't know how his little brain and instincts work.
         After playing, we ate at Olive Garden, where Ben refused to go to sleep but still was happy, then went back home and played some more. I have this internal battle between taking a lot of pictures so I can remember, or living in the moment and hoping I remember. Usually I fail at both, but luckily this time Ann took a few pictures of us so I could just play. Eventually, baby B fell asleep and we got to hold him while he was sleeping, until boyfriend's ginormous, muscled arms got tired from holding Ben's big head. So we set him on some pillows and just watching him sleep; because when you hardly get to see your child, watching him sleep is pretty close to the best thing ever. But he woke up no more than 10 minutes later and just smiled. Constantly. He would switch between looking at Ann, boyfriend and me and just smile at each of us before moving on to the next. My heart! I have decided that that is happiness.

         Another visit I was able to take was to Arizona to see my gorgeous sister! After arriving, we roadtripped to Six Flags in SoCal. The drive was six hours of loud music, dirt-tornado things in the dry farmland, lots of talking and laughing. The theme park was incredible. The roller coasters were way longer and better than anything we have here in Washington. There was one called the X2 where I was screaming the whole time, just because I actually thought we were going to die. It was pretty amazing though. We did the water park the next day where I caught some air in one of the tube slides (the toilet bowl kind) and totally bruised my right bum, then we did the roller coasters again the next day. And of course we went shopping at the massive outlet mall on the way home.
        It was so great to be able to see her again after a year apart, plus I got to meet here amazing boyfriend. This was another trip where I was just too busy having fun to take pictures. But I won't forget so all is well.

Adoption

So many questions have been circling in my mind for the past months. And I finally think I narrowed it down to three questions. I put these questions on my Facebook account to try to get some answers; I later took it down to avoid more scrutiny.

1: Why is adoption seen so negatively?

As my friend Sarah said, “People are afraid of what they don’t know.” What people don’t understand is how adoption is pretty much the only way for everything to work out for everybody involved in the end. Most of the opinions that were shared with me came from the perspective of the adopted child: not knowing why they were given away, not understanding their genetics, feeling like a mistake, weren’t good enough for their bio-parents, or being left in the dark for too long about being adopted. That’s great and all, but it’s very closed minded. You see, these types of comments would only come from a child in a closed adoption, meaning absolutely no contact or share of information after the day of placement until the child turns 18. That’s not really how it works anymore. In adoptions now a day, the birthmother can choose how open she wants the adoption: closed, semi-open (information is shared via email, may visit once but as a “family friend”), or open. Most women choose open, so the child is much more informed about how they came to be where they are and there are less hard feelings. There’s less anger when all your question are, or can easily be answered. If Ben ever had a question about why I placed him for adoption, he could easily call me.

 

               Adoption isn’t a bad thing; it’s difficult and overwhelming, but it’s not a bad thing. 

“There are times when the adoption process is exhausting and painful and makes you want to scream. But, I am told, so does childbirth” –Scott Simon

               But what I don’t understand is that the scrutiny comes from adults to the expectant mother with disgusting questions: “Why aren’t you keeping it?” “Do you even know who the father is?” and especially, “I’ll still be friends with you.”

2: Why is adoption hardly considered when a woman is choosing what to do in an unexpected pregnancy?

In my opinion, it’s because we are an ignorant people that no matter how many resources are out there for us to become informed, we choose to only listen to the popular or expected route. I was one of those people at first, thinking “Well duh I’m not going to kill my baby, so obviously I’m going to parent.” Ignorant little me got a wakeup call when that wasn’t really a plausible option for me anymore. So I used my resources and now we have our little happily ever after. One of my favorite things I’ve learned from this journey is that somewhere out there, a woman regrets aborting her baby. But can you find me a woman who regrets bringing their child into this world? We all hear stories of dramatic labors where the mother’s life and her unborn baby’s life is at risk, and the woman tells her husband to save the child before saving her. *Cue relentless weeping*

Adoption information pamphlets should be a thing, at doctor’s offices, in health class, at abortion clinics. Adoption information should be everywhere. There is absolutely no harm in being informed, but there is terrible harm (and death) in being uninformed.

The average woman will live 81.2 years, or 974.4 months. Pregnancy lasts 9 months. Labor lasts one day, let's say. To keep your pregnancy and birth your child, it will have taken up .09% of your life. Placing your child with a couple who yearns for a child will make 100% of their lives. Because when you get to that point of desperation, it becomes your only want, even a necessity. Yes, non-medicated labor hurts, but I forgot the pain the second they put Ben on my stomach. It's so worth it. 

3: Why is it considered a “mother’s worst nightmare” if her daughter becomes pregnant out of wedlock?

               Oh. The. Horror. An innocent, cute, squishy baby. I mean let’s just ignore the blessings and happiness a child is and will bring to your life. Let’s ignore the knowledge, and maturity the mother will gain. Let’s ignore the blessing the mother could give to another couple who can’t have children through adoption.

               I asked my mother this question. Do you know what her worst nightmare is for me? Getting kidnapped, assaulted, becoming paralyzed, and DYING. Nowhere on that list was getting pregnant. Yes she was a little shocked, but my pregnancy wasn’t even a bad thing, much less a worst nightmare.

Just Biological

Ann, Derek and baby Ben, who isn't a fan of bright sunlight

I know that counts for a lot, because without that there would be no Ben. But now it’s official.

This past memorial weekend, Ben was sealed to his adoptive parents in the Los Angeles temple. This was a big deal for me. When I first looked into adoption, it was definitely a necessity that the parents were temple worthy so that they could be sealed together. The adoption process went pretty quickly, only taking two months where others can take much, much longer. He is officially all theirs now.

Proud daddy at Ben's baby blessing

 But pretty much, Ben is the cutest thing ever. He’s a little over three months old now, he has the biggest head ever, and therefore an invisible neck. And they were able to record his first laugh! Derek is such an amazing dad and has been looking forward to making Ben laugh since before he was even born. I am SO excited to hear it in person though. I know that eventually, children laugh at practically everything unless they’re crying, but it’s so much sweeter because it’ll be such a rare opportunity for me.

Hopefully, at the end of June, they’ll be traveling here as part of a new agreement that I can see Ben four times a year. I am so excited: because I get to see him again (duh), because my best friend can see him for the first time (she was angry that he “decided” to be born the day after she went back to school), and because my dad even agreed to meeting Ben and his parents, which if you know him and our relationship, is a HUGE step forward.

While I was working the other day, I saw another girl my age very pregnant. And I admit it still pulls my heartstrings. I don’t have to wonder if she’ll parent, because it’s pretty obvious to me that most everyone I see will parent. I’m that rare .00001%. But honestly, good for her. Motherhood is wonderful, and no one ever regrets having their baby so she’ll figure it out.

If on mobile: https://www.dropbox.com/s/cxgnk5lkf96veck/Bens%201st%20laugh.mp4?dl=0

I would love to be and advocate for adoption, to go around and inform girls and women of their options when they find themselves in an unexpected pregnancy. I just want people to know that their bodies can handle so much more than they think, that no one regrets having their baby, and that there are so many couples out there that are unable to have their own children but would pay anything to raise yours. Becoming informed, even if you don’t choose adoption, will change your perspective of parenthood and also the miracle that is our bodies. 

Strong, sturdy legs

Where is his neck?

Am I Asking Too Much?

Coming up with an adoption plan is the hardest thing ever besides going through with adoption. There are so many fragile feelings to consider. I want to see him all the time, but he doesn't want to, and I don't want to make the parents feel like I'm barging into their lives, but he's my baby, but he's their baby, and what if Ben doesn't like me? So confusing. And we're all walking on eggshells wondering if what we're doing is okay or if it's offending the other party. Sometimes I wish I could be the blunt person I once was in order to get my point across, but sometimes letting all your guards down like that means you're setting yourself up to get hurt.

So am I asking too much by saying I want to see my son at least four times a year? I personally think no. After all it is only a three and a half hour drive. After all he is my son. But since my ability to see him depends on other people driving (boyfriend or baby's parents) I have to think of their wants and willingness. Driving six hours in one day is very long, especially after an emotionally taxing visit. So the idea of asking them to drive here or asking boyfriend to drive me there seemed like I was being a nuisance.

But then I read another birthmother's blog. For the six weeks she was on maternity leave, she was able to visit with her baby for a full day every week. After these six weeks, she went on to see her baby for a full day every month, and that has continued for the last eight months.
Then a woman that I met at my birthmother's meetings placed her baby for adoption a week after me, and even though the family lives in Utah, she went down to see her, and will soon be moving back to Utah to be able to visit her monthly.

I've never been truly envious before. Everyone is making me feel like four times a year is just way too much to see Ben. "You don't need to see him." "You placed him for adoption, just let them live their life now." "Move on." "He's part of their family now. He's their son." "You can have more kids later."

Thanks guys. It's not like I have emotions.

The one time that I got to visit Ben was for a whopping five hours. All the mothers/women/people-with-feelings out there, just imagine that for me, being able to see your only child for five hours, and the next time you'll get to see him is in the indefinite future. But then also imagine watching everyone else get to see their babies way more. Watch women that don't fully appreciate the gift of motherhood ignore their child's love and attention.

I don't mean to complain, I just wish that I could see Ben more. I want to feel like he's mine in some way. I want to know him. Or at least recognize him.

Hug your little ones a little tighter for me. And cherish their drawings and messy fingers and messy everything. Because I crave that like nothing else.