The day before Mother's Day is a very special day at our house. It's the day we celebrate the women in our lives who have exemplified courage, faith, hope, selflessness, and LOVE by giving others the honor of raising their child. We have three of these women in our family: Megan's sister who placed a baby girl for adoption many years ago, our nieces first mother who lives in China, and of course, Katrina.
We feel so blessed that we had the opportunity to spend today with Katrina. We went to lunch and then just played for several hours until she had to go to work.
Today got me thinking about the Tummy Mummy of our next child. We're working on all the paperwork and other stuff to adopt again, so she's been on my mind and in my prayers a lot lately. It's truly hard to express in words how I feel the about the first mother(s) of my child(ren). In adoption circles people often discuss how open adoption can be very helpful in aiding birth mothers through the post-placement healing process. But I also think it's helpful to adoptive families as well. Sam and I are so grateful we get to share Cohen's life with Katrina. Cohen's adoption, especially placement day and the weeks after, were a very bittersweet time for us. We were so excited and grateful to have Cohen in our home, but our hearts hurt for Katrina. We knew she was missing him dearly. Being able to thank her directly was integral in enabling us to focus on the sweetness of the experience. At the time she didn't really know how open of a relationship she wanted post-placement, but we knew that at the very least we could email her to give thanks. That's something the other birth mothers in our lives haven't been able to have. We have no idea what our next child's birth mother will want in regards to openness, but at least she has a choice. And hopefully she'll know we celebrate her all year long, not just on this day.
