The Meeting...

We had gotten "the call", we had been chosen, and a date had been set to meet the birth mother just a week later. Things were moving fast since the baby was due in two short months. The time between being matched and a baby being born is usually filled with a bunch of waiting. Most people, from what I have been told, are matched earlier in pregnancies. We did not have much time to get things done.

We spent that week praying a lot and not really saying much to each other. It was hard to take it all in. We went over the paper work we had on meeting birth mothers. It talks about what to expect, things to say or ask, things not to say or ask. I ordered a baby book, all of a sudden feeling unprepared for a child. We planned our trip as we were going to stay over night with some family. We packed. Finally the day came to leave. The drive was long, nerve wracking, and uneventful. Staying with family was nice because it took our minds off things for awhile. We enjoyed a great meal and a lot of laughs. But when we finally went to bed neither of us slept. In the dark I whispered to Donny that I thought I was going to throw up. My nerves were out of control. Donny pulled me close and prayed over us, prayed for the baby, prayed for the birth mother. What a sweet man I am blessed with. I woke up multiple times through out the night and would pray until I fell back asleep. I prayed for peace for us and the birth mother over and over and over. I asked God repeatedly to help me to trust Him and to help me calm down.

When morning finally came we quietly got ready. I was so concerned with how I looked that I even blow dried my hair and put eye shadow on! If there was ever a time in my life that a first impression counted, this was it! In an attempt to stay calm we headed to Starbucks with a couple of the fam to catch up on life a little more. Again, a nice distraction from the growing knot in my stomach. And then the time came to say goodbye to family and head to the local agency branch to meet the birth mother.

Thankfully, the agency was so easy to find and we got there a little early. The social worker took us to a little room and talked with us a little bit then excused herself and shut the door behind her. There we were in a windowless room with the door shut. It felt a little bit like we were in trouble and about to be punished or something. Donny and I made small talk and he kept telling me to stop fidgeting, like I could help it. I was so nervous and had coffee in me on top of that.

And all of a sudden the door opened and in she came. My first thought, "O my gosh she's beautiful! Score! Baby is going to be cute!" ;) We all sat with the social worker and talked for an hour and a half, maybe two hours. It was so awesome! I can't say much about what we talked about but I can say that we were all so comfortable with each other, it was like catching up with an old friend. I even told her that I was so nervous last night that I thought I was going to barf. She said she felt the same way and we shared a laugh. We found out she was having a boy and she brought us ultra sound photos if we wanted them. Um.... YES!!!! How sweet of her to think of us. I was near tears because I had been praying for ultra sound photos for years. I had never told anyone because I thought it might be a little selfish. Shouldn't I have just been happy to be matched? What a gracious God we serve to even answer our little prayers. And did He ever! She gave us like 8-10 pics. I will treasure them forever!

I can't say enough positive things about that first meeting. We could see God's hand in it and see years of prayers answered in this match as we talked and talked. When we left the office we just walked in silence to the car and then sat there looking at the ultra sound pics. Of course, I started crying. We were just speechless. In celebration, after calling the family of course, we hit up an Ikea and did some serious damage. We spent the drive home talking about how to spell his name, when to tell the family the baby was a boy, what we thought he was going to look like, our fears, etc. It was so surreal. This thing we had been waiting so long for was finally happening and we, all of a sudden, did not know what to do or think. It felt like we were dreaming and, as cheesy as it sounds, I prayed to God we would never wake up. :)