Becoming Mom
Becoming Mom
I was “becoming mom” long before I had kids. You see, for me, becoming a mom didn’t just happen on a day or within nine months. It took many years and even more detours.
My husband and I met in college and married shortly after I graduated. We enjoyed our 20s traveling and adventuring believing that when we were ready, God would provide us with a family.
We walked years in the darkness of infertility, treatments, and surgeries still believing that God would provide the family that our hearts desired. When it became clear we would not be able to conceive, we happily shifted our hearts toward adoption. We didn’t care how God gave us a family, we just wanted a family.
Just not through foster care.
“God, please not foster care.”
So we met with agencies, attended trainings, filled out a ton of paperwork, and paid all our fees. Then, we waited. We waited for three years for a chance at having a child. But my faith never wavered. Even though the waiting was hard, I knew we were doing the right thing and that God would give us a family. I didn’t know it at the time but I was becoming a mom while I waited.
In a strange twist, we met a couple of foster children who, it seemed, needed a home. I immediately fell in love and relented. We began attending foster classes. We readied our home, endured another home study, got to know the children, and became licensed to foster. I was invested, these are my kids.
As often happens in the foster system, minds were changed, and the children went home. I was devastated. For the first time in the journey, my beliefs were challenged. These children were supposed to be mine. But, with gritted teeth I made the decision to stand firm. My heart was broken and everything around me was shaken but I would stand firm. God will provide my family.
I was becoming a mom.
We decided to put our foster license to use. It was so much harder than we ever could have imagined and yet we received so much joy. We loved and we cried. Celebrated birthdays and goings home. But with each child, we knew our role was not to be their forever parent. We received comfort in helping the children and their families reunify still believing that somehow God was going to bring us our family.
Around the holidays, we decided to take a break to be with family. And then, we received a phone call we could have never predicted. We had remained active with our adoption agency and kept in touch. I remember that even the caseworker sounded unsure when she told me: “A young mother has seen your picture and bio on our website and wants you to adopt her unborn baby.” Out of thousands, she picked us.
Suddenly, it all made sense. This is what I was waiting for.
This is my family.
We met the young mother and became very close. The last three months of her pregnancy I visited with her daily. She desired an open adoption and we grew increasingly more excited each day as we watched God mesh our families together.
Her birth plan included me being in the delivery room with her. We arrived the day before her induction with everything we needed to take a baby home.
The morning of her scheduled induction I spoke with her and she promised to let me know when they were ready. But all went silent. I received a message later that he had been born and was healthy. She promised to let me know when we could visit. Finally, less than 30 minutes before visiting hours would be over we were allowed to see him.
The tension in the hospital room that night was thick. We knew the mother’s family was questioning her decision. Her usual openness and friendliness was strained. We left that night feeling uncomfortable but trusting that everything would work out. God was giving us our family.
The next day, we tried to pass the time wandering shopping malls and walking trails. We received no communication.
On the third day, we received a visit from an agency caseworker. The woman had decided to parent. We loaded all the baby things back into the car and drove four hours home in almost complete silence.
I was broken. I was hurt. I was so lost.
I cried out to God. His answer was immediate: “I am God. I knew this would happen. This was never about the baby. It was about the mom.”
It was at that moment that I surrendered my dream of having a family to God. I vowed, “If it is my lot in life to raise and care for other people’s kids without ever having a family of my own, so be it.”
I was becoming a mom.
Less than a month later I received a notice from our foster caseworker about a sibling group of five needing a forever home. My exact words to my husband were, “They’re perfect.” We readied our home and our hearts for our “instant family.” People thought we were crazy. Another month later we met them and they moved in soon after. A year and a half later a judge declared us their forever parents.
God brought my family to me, just like he promised. But becoming a mom didn’t happen the day the judge declared our adoption. I was becoming a mom through the pain and hardships as well as the joy and connections I made. And still, even now, I’m becoming the mom I was meant to be.
Because becoming a mom isn’t a date, it’s a journey.
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