I was pregnant for 517 days.
Paper pregnant that is.
I didn’t have the anticipation that most new moms have while they wait for those two telling lines to show up. Instead, my anticipation came from hovering over my phone waiting and waiting for our foster care worker to give us ‘the call.’
On August 9th, that call finally came and within an hour you were in my arms.
Despite the circumstances of you being placed in our home, you had nothing but big smiles for your dad and me. Something felt different about you, but I couldn’t put my finger on it at the time. Now that I look back, I think my heart knew you were meant to be mine forever.
For 517 days, I did everything in my power to keep you safe while still attempting to bridge you with your biological family. The foster mom in me wanted your forever to be with your biological parents but the mom in me kept telling me you needed to stay.
After months of working a reunification plan, we all started to wonder if reunifying was still an option. The day finally came where your biological parents made a decision about you. For you. Your bios loved you so much, that they gave you to us, even though it was the hardest decision they ever made. You didn’t lose two parents that day. Instead, you gained two more.
On January 8th, 2019 at 9:00 a.m. you became ours after 517 days, 12,408 hours, 744,480 minutes of love, labor, and tears.
