Dear Birthmother,
Thank you for giving me a gift that no one else could. Thank you for taking care of my precious baby for the time he was growing in your womb. Thank you for making me a mother by selflessly handing over your child into the arms of a stranger. I will never forget the day we walked side by side out of the hospital and you placed the baby you carried for so long into our car to go home with me. You didn’t know me well, but you trusted me with a precious gift. I will forever love and honor you for your strength, your courage, your love for Zachariah.
I have always had the heart to adopt even before our infertility struggles and the loss of our first two children. I had in my mind a sweet blonde girl from Russia. Friends today still laugh at how determined I was to adopt a child from Russia “just because” I wanted too. About 2 years before our adoption journey begun…I was boarding a flight in Atlanta when my cousin thrust a book into my hands and said “here’s something for you to read on the plane” The book Dear Birthmother literally changed my life and began my adoption journey even though I didn’t realize it at the time. First let me say, that I could not read the book on the plane because I was literally sobbing after just reading the first chapter of this book. The first chapter outlines the 4 myths of birthmothers.
Myth 1 “The birthmother obviously doesn’t care about her child or she wouldn’t have given him away.”
Myth 2 “Secrecy in every phase of the adoption process is necessary to protect all parties”
Myth 3 “Both the birthmother and birthfather will forget about their unwanted child”
Myth 4 “If the adoptee really loved his adoptive family, he would not have to search for his birthparents”
Reading this book and analyzing these myth’s really changed my heart about open adoption in particular and literally paved the pathway of my heart to be able to have the type of relationship I have today with Zachariah’s birthmother.
It has been my JOY to have a relationship with Zachariah’s birthmother..and her family.
If you are contemplating open adoption, I urge you to read this book and seek God’s will as you read. Before I read this book, I was so closed minded to any other type of adoption other than the one I had my mind set on. God used this book to prepare me for the great blessing He had in store for me!
In closing, I realize that I am using the words I and me. I am not blogging about how God worked in my husband’s heart and mind because that is His story to tell. It wasn’t until about 6 weeks before Zachariah was born that God revealed to us that we both had the same heart…..finally:)
