here's the story, part 2

thursday, march 10, 2011

i woke up after a relatively restful night's sleep and immediately began to pray for everyone involved- M, S, the interim care mother, and us. during my prayer i suddenly grasped the enormity of the situation and it really started to sink in and i completely dissolved into body racking sobs of thankfulness. i laid there praising God for His faithfulness, asking Him to forgive my lack of trust and honestly brokenhearted for M and S. i was so thankful for this gift they were going to entrust us with, but i was so burdened for them at the same time... it was the strangest and most powerful combination of emotions i have ever experienced.

at 830 we called mark, our adoption worker, and told him that, yes, we were going to go pick up our son and he told us to head on over the office to sign all of our paperwork so we could get to the tri-cities by 12. i called christie who had agreed to go with us to take pictures of our first encounter with carter and told her what time to be at the house and we were out the door to bethany. mark went over many things with us and had us sign so many papers and going over all the legal responsibilities, et cetera, et cetera... it felt like 5 hours, but in reality it only took bout 1 1/2.

we left bethany's office and headed home to pick up christie and get the carseat loaded. the drive there was a blur of excitement, anticipation and angst. when we finally arrived at the bethany office in johnson city i felt as though i was about to throw up, i was so nervous. i kept thinking, what if this is one of those ugly newborns? (be honest, you know there have been times you have seen a newborn and thought, you aren't quite finished... not all babies are cute). we met julie and she told us that hope, the interim care mother, was in the next room with him so we walked in...

"thank goodness he isn't an ugly baby!" that was my honest to goodness first reaction when i saw him. you are lying to yourself and everyone else if you honestly believe that all babies are beautiful- miracles, yes, beautiful, no. so for the sake of honesty there you go. after that we talked with hope and christie was taking pictures for us and we loaded up and went to the pediatrician for his discharge visit. the whole thing was surreal. dreamy. not at all what i expected it to be, yet so perfect at the same time.

i remember as we were leaving tri cities and headed back to knoxville feeling like something would fall apart and they would realize that they were just handing over this beautiful, precious baby boy to us and sending us on our merry little way. at that moment all the trainings, meetings, interviews, etc we had done with the bethany staff didn't even register with me and i just kept thinking- is this real? are we just babysitting this baby?

when we got home we were so excited for everyone who had prayed him to us to come over and witness God's faithfulness and provision so we had a crazy night and lots of company and carter behaved like a champ. the first few weeks were such a whirlwind of company and travel that by the time we were finally home in april i realized almost an entire month of my leave had gone by.

so the past two months have just been glorious. i will not apologize for my lack of blogging as i am trying to soak in every single second with him before i return to work on friday/doom's day/ day of death/ whatever. i can't believe how absolutely quick you can fall in love with a child and be willing to fight or die for him. i can't believe that after years of heartache, pains, and questions we finally got our answer. and he is a smiley, happy, bouncing baby boy. God is good, all the time.