Security

We met up with the birthfathers family on Saturday for coffee. We met his nana for the first time and she is lovely! We had a really good time and it was fun finding out that the birthfather (J) also pointed at things with his fore finger when he was a baby just like My Small Man does. I store stuff like that in my memory banks and want to record it ** so My Small Man can read about it.

It has taken me a while to feel secure in this whole adoption scenario (not with My Small Man but coping with the adoption process). The process was incredibly hard and emotional for us (read about it in my infertility blog under adoption) and even the day before My Small Man came home we were unsure whether this would go ahead.

Quick explanation of adoption in NZ (for my US bloggie friends):

Here it's all about the birth mum and the preference is that the birth mum keep the baby and go on the domestic purposes benefit. The social agency's and the justice system do not favour adoption and between 16 and 25 adoptions happen per year in Auckland (city of 1 1/4 million people).

The birth mum is encouraged to nurse the baby and keep the baby with her for the mandatory 12 day stand down after birth. The baby can only be placed on the 12th day after birth with the adoptive family.

The baby can be placed with foster families but the birth mum and birth dad must have contact with the baby in the 12 days.

Contact between the adoptive family and birth families is kept to a minimum so the birth mum does not form an emotional connection with the adoptive families. Social workers are in attendance at all meetings.

So in our case where the birth mum and birth dad were very sure, had chosen us and desperately wanted to know My Small Man would be ok with us, this was torture. Being young, they also fought (with one another, not us) and in the couple of days before My Small Man came home lawyers were involved and there were threats about not signing....

So anyway, the night My Small Man came home, I wanted to crawl into a small hole with him and My Big Man and stay there for a loooong time! The connection with My Small Man was instant and I wanted to run away as our brand new small family and just process and absorb.

But as the nature of our adoption was very open we couldn't do this and needed to help the birth mum and birth dad come to terms with what had just happened. In retrospect we needed a longer period of alone time and should have specified it. We tried for some alone time but it didn't really work.

Anyhoo!

I am only just starting to feel like I have my feet on the ground with this. I no longer feel a rising sense of panic at hearing from the social workers and birth families. This is good as the birth families are wonderful people and were only trying to come to terms with this huge change and decision.

So it's good right now and I think will get better with time. We are learning to feel like we can say what we need and the birth families are responding so well to our boundaries and requests. We had a great time on Sat and feel like we are truly connecting with all the different people in My Small Man's life!

Thank you God!

**I saw a fabulous Life Book called My Story that I think would be amazing for any child, especially an adopted one. We are fortunate enough to have an incredible Christian organisation in NZ called Parents Inc and they distribute this book. Its wonderfully illustrated with all sorts of stuff even a page for your family motto and comes with a box for "treasures". I want one!!!