Birth/Adoption Story-long

ryannat · December 2009

Wow, I can not believe it has already been five days since our beautiful baby girl was born. I am sitting here right now looking at my sweet baby girl thinking back over the last week of events.

On Monday, December 21st Madelyn's BM E went to the doctor for a check up and they told her to come back again in a week on Dec. 28th because she was not showing any signs of being in labor and they may have to induce her the next week.

On Tuesday night, I couldn't sleep all night and had a bad stomachache and kept thinking about E. I went to work early on Wednesday morning and stopped on the way to pick up some pastries for my co-workers because it was my last day of work and I wanted to thank all of them. As we were sitting around chatting about E and how I couldn't sleep all night, I heard a beep on my phone telling me there was a voicemail. For some reason the phone didn't ring, but went straight to voicemail. The voicemail was from E saying her water had just broke and she was going to the hospital, it was 8:30am. I couldn't believe it, I was so excited and so were all of my co-workers. I called E right back and told her we would get ready and head over to the hospital, but it would take us a couple of hours to get there. We live about two hours from the hospital E was going to and I still had to run home from work, tell our neighbors to watch our dog and pack up the car. I called my DH and he said to pick him up at his office on my way to the hospital instead of him running home from work. I loaded up the car with I think 5 bags, my overnight bag, my DH's overnight bag, a bag for Madelyn, a camera bag, a computer bag, a bag full of paperwork, & our gift for E. I actually had no idea what to take so I kept throwing things in, the car looked like we were going on a two week vacation.

Once I was headed out of the house to pick up my DH at work, I got another call from E asking where we where. It was now about 9:30am. She was waiting for her sister in law to pick her up to go to the hospital. I told her we were on our way and would try and get there as soon as possible. She had asked for me to be in the delivery room with her so I wanted to get there to support her in any way possible. I picked my DH up from work and we headed out. E called about 10:30am to say that she had arrived at the hospital and was going to try as hard as she could to wait to have the baby till we got there. She is so sweet, I couldn't believe she was thinking about us. We were thinking about her and wanted her to be comfortable and cared for.

We arrived at the hospital about 11:30am parked the car and made our way through the maze of the hospital to Labor and Delivery. It took forever to get checked in at labor and delivery and we made our way down the hallway. When we got to the door of E's room we heard a baby crying. My first thought was that we had the wrong room, then I thought maybe she was sharing a room with another women. We knocked on the door and went in and were that we had just missed it. I couldn't believe it, our beautiful baby girl couldn't wait any longer. The nurse was cleaning her off and I took one look at Madelyn and started to cry. E's SIL was standing next to me and we gave each other a big hug. She was born at 11:52am, Wednesday, December 23rd. She weighed 7 lbs 4.8 oz and was 19" long. I went over and gave E a big hug and apologized for not making it in time. I was happy that her SIL and one of her good friends was there to give her the support she needed.

E was amazing she said we should hold Madelyn and get to know her, it was love at first sight. She has the long fingers and toes that we could see on her sonogram. I was given a wrist band and told that we could visit Madelyn in E's room or in the nursery where and when E wanted us to and when she felt comfortable.

E was moved to another room in the hospital and we went with her. The hospitals social worker also went with us to the other room. While E and the social worker talked we waited in the waiting area to be called back into the room. We were so lucky, E wanted us to be in her room with her and Madelyn. E had my DH and I do all of the feedings and diaper changes. We took some pictures, talked all day and watched tv together.

My DH and I went to a hotel the night of Madelyn's birth. I couldn't sleep all night because I kept thinking about her and how happy I was to have her in our lives. We got up early the next morning and headed back to the hospital. E was waiting for us and wanted us to feed Madelyn. E had Madelyn to to the nursery for the nights so she could get some sleep. We spent the morning in E's room and took some more pictures of E and Madelyn. E was given the okay for discharge, so she called her social worker to let her know. Around 11:00am E's social worker came over and asked us to leave for a while so they could do the paperwork. We went down the waiting area and couldn't believe that we would be taking Madelyn home soon. After all of the paperwork was done we went back to E's room. She called her friend to come and pick her up. When her friend arrived we left them alone for awhile so E could spend some time with Madelyn. As E was getting ready to leave we thanked her and gave her a heart necklace and told her she would always been in our heart. When E left she gave Madelyn a kiss on her forehead and told her she loved her.

After E left the nurse took Madelyn down to the transitional nursery, they wanted her to stay in the hospital for 48 hours before they released her. We went down to the nursery and fed her and just sat looking and her and loving her. I got tears in my eyes the first time I heard my DH say "Hi Madelyn, I'm your Daddy", I made everything real. We were told that Madelyn would be released from the hospital around 10:00am on Christmas day. We spent the afternoon at the hospital in the nursery with Madelyn. We decided instead of spending the night in a hotel again we would drive home for the night and come back the next morning to pick up our daughter.

We woke up early on Christmas morning, just like young children excited to see what Santa has left for them. We were getting the best Christmas gift ever, a baby! We got back in the car and drove back to the hospital. We sat in the private nursing room with Madelyn and waited for the Director of our adoption agency to come and sign the release paperwork. She arrived about 10:30am and signed all of the releases and hospital paperwork. We were then on our way home with our sweet baby girl. It was the best Christmas ever, we are truly blessed.