Tomorrow
There just aren't words to say how I feel. I've fancied myself a decent writer, but these days are different. The emotions and thoughts are indescribable. Language is insufficient.I've been a mother for over a year and a half. I've been a foster mother to a total of 5 children. I've been Cookie's mother for 14 1/2 months.
It won't all be different tomorrow. I won't be suddenly and completely changed.
The changes have all been slow. Each of the 400 +/- days we've spent with Cookie we've grown into our roles with her. Each time the social worker visited, each time a month went by with no word from her Biomom, each time a new development brought us closer to this point, we became her parents just a little bit more.
There have been many nights that I held her as she slept and thought to myself "I can't love this little girl any more than I do RIGHT NOW." Of course, I've thought that most every night, and every night I feel more love for her, and more awareness of myself as mother.
Some parents who have adopted from foster care talk about how they discovered after adoption that there was a piece of their hearts that they had kept guarded - a bit of themselves that they had held back. I don't know if that is there for us. I sense it may be.
A lot of that disappeared this summer when Biomom left treatment and went missing, never to be found. I knew it was the beginning of the end.
I'm thinking about J. (Biomom) today and hoping she is alive. I still hope there is life for her, and that somewhere there is healing. If she is ever found, she will go to jail. But in jail, she can be free of drugs. I just wish she could know that this child she neglected and filled with drugs to the point that no normal baby could have survived - is walking, talking miracle. I wish that alone were sufficient to change anyone's life for the better.
I wish she could know that Cookie is running, climbing, eating Chinese food with great gusto, and playing with such joy. I wish she could see her climb up onto her rocking horse all by herself, put the right shaped blocks into the holes in her shape sorter, or hear her read "Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear" out loud (in only a way that mommy and daddy can understand, of course).
It's a great day today. Tomorrow will be great, too.
I wish all of you could meet this little girl who's stolen our hearts (and our wallets). :)
posted by No Longer In Crisis @ 3/01/2007 10:06:00 AM
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