In the scope of this blog, I am not exactly sure where to fit this topic. I feel like before moving forward in our journey, it would be a good time to try to explain what it is like to love a child not yet your own. So for this week’s Tuesday’s Trials series I am going to try to address this in a way that you can get a glimpse as to how I felt as a prospective adoptive mom.

The Matt Hammitt song “All of Me” in the video was actually written for his son who was born with a congenital heart defect. The first time I heard this though, I fell in love with it. It describes exactly how I felt as a prospective adoptive mom and the pledge I made in my heart to them.

I think this is truly one of those subjects that can be summed up with the saying “For those who understand, no explanation is needed. For those who do not understand, no explanation is possible.” It is really difficult to put it into words that one who has not been through adoption can understand.

Every child’s birth is miraculous and worthy of celebration. In the adoption world though, the child’s birth is enveloped in difficult emotions. On one side there is a biological family weighed down by grief, knowing the incredibly difficult choice that needs to be made. On the other, a prospective adoptive family that desperately wants to call this child their own, but knows the harsh reality is that it may end with heartbreak instead. When the final decision is made someone is going to be left deeply hurting.

At my core I knew all this, especially after the first expectant mom choose to parent. Despite this knowledge, the tears flowed down my cheeks when I saw both Turkey-Man and Little-Flower on the ultrasound monitor for the first time. As much as I wanted to place a barrier around my heart to protect it from the intensity of my love for them, I simply could not.

Hearing that song for the first time helped me realize something. Even though the potential for pain was immense, I wanted my children to be born into celebration. Every child deserves to feel unrestrained joy and love at their birth. Despite their status as my prospective child, I knew I wanted them to have all the love I held in my heart, uninhibited by the grief I may be left with.

This is what was right for me and our situation. Everyone comes into this territory of adoption from a different angle and what is right for one situation may not be for another.

For me, it felt right for my children’s births to be met with the powerful love that I felt for them. It felt right for me to give myself wholly to them. I felt they deserved “all of me” and that if need be I would pick up the pieces later if heartbreak was where it ended.

Each of their births were met with joyous tears and uninhibited adoration. The moment they were placed in my arms, my heart swelled with a love so powerful that it would go to the ends of the Earth for them. They were “worth every falling tear, worth facing any fear…worth all of me.” I loved them “recklessly”. And for that, I live with no regrets. They were worth it all!