Friday, August 14, 2009 4:34 AM
If you follow me on Twitter, read my blog, or have me on Live Messenger, you know that over the last few months I’ve had bouts of reflection, thoughtfulness, and philosophical rambling. Many of you have pinged me asking if everything was ok and I wanted to thank everybody who voiced concern, whether it was a tweet, an im conversation, an email, or breakfast in a Vancouver restaurant that I’m pretty sure was a front for a secret police command center.
I couldn’t share with you what was on my heart then: the emotions, the stresses, the hope, the anticipation…I tried to reach out during a very private time through glimpses and once again my community of friends supported me even though I couldn’t tell you the whole story.
But now I can.
We all have goals in life…aspirations that we work towards, destinations that we fix our sites on and set out for. For some achieving those goals comes easy while others strain and struggle. Perseverance, commitment, hope, faith, and fortitude become the valued commodities in life for us, all the while realizing that we really have no control over so many facets of our lives. It’s a perilous place to be, balancing ourselves so we don’t fall into a pit of despair, anger, and self pity, while still not allowing ourselves to fall onto the side of hope for fear that its a false one. The only seemingly safe place to be is on that beam, balancing…continually swaying from one side to the next but keeping yourself from falling in to either one.
For my wife and I, that’s what the better part of a decade has been like. Almost three years ago, after numerous other years of journeying towards one destination, we changed to a different road and a new course when we created a file with the local private adoption agency. And then we waited.
This past May, through a friend of a family member, we were introduced to the woman who would become our birth mother. On July 21st the phone rang at 1:20 AM and our birth mother informed us that a beautiful baby girl had been born. She was placed with us two days later.
Today is day 22, one of the many milestones in the adoption process and not the last. Over the last 21 days I’ve experienced something that no words I could type can express. Entering my new role, that of being a dad, has been beyond anything I could dream of. The depth of love one feels for their child is something unbelievably profound.
Our journey isn’t over. There’s still official legal proceedings that need to be arranged and other loose ends to tie up. In a very real way, this is just the beginning of another chapter in our lives…and one filled with new characters. Through the openness that we have in our adoption we’ve been exposed to an entirely new group of people that we know call family and that we look forward to getting to know better.
This process has spurred me on to be a vocal advocate for adoption and help demystify the process surrounding it. I’ve started a new blog called Fellowship of the Fathers that you can follow if you’re interested in adoption, parenting, and fatherhood related topics.
As for our little girl: her name is Sadie, she’s beautiful, very strong, and in excellent health. She’s already watched her first football game (Montreal Alouettes of course), already has her first I’m a PC shirt (thank you Microsoft eStore…but c’mon guys, you gotta get more kids stuff!), and no matter what my wife tells you, she will be Princess Leia for Halloween this year. So without further ado…
Sadie.HelloWorld();
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