RECENT STORIES

Sobriety checkpoints aid in curbing drunk driving ( Col. James Wolfinbarger, CSP )
Exploring: Summer fun tips for fathers and kids ( Be There for Your Kids )
50 Years of serving you is worth celebrating ( Jean Ray )
Coyote activity to increase with new pups ( City of Centennial )
Shriners Hospital for Children: A proud tradition ( Allen Duey )

share a story | more postings »

YourHub.com \\ Centennial \\ Stories \\ Sound Off \\ General Sound Off

It's the little things

e-mail to a friend | print this | link to this

Contributed by: Jared Keller on 9/10/2007

We've adopted once already, and are deep into the process of adopting our next child. Our first adoption - through which The Wife and I were blessed with The Girl - was completed here in Colorado. Our little girl's birth mother was a native of northern Colorado, and the entire process - from our selection as the adoptive parents, to The Girl's birth, and finally, to that deliriously happy moment when a Douglas County judge finalized the adoption - took place within a relatively short drive of our home.

With this one though, we'll find ourselves halfway around the world, surrounded by folks who don't speak our language, and dependent on the instructions and experience of others. We've got so much to think about - from the bureaucratic nightmare of adopting a child from another country (China, in this case...), to the traditional changes that attend the arrival of any new child (rearranging rooms, dealing with a potentially jealous sibling, etc.) - that from time to time, we're struck by something truly mundane, and reminded once more of the truly bittersweet nature of this thing called adoption.

My daughter - the one who sleeps across the hall from me, who I first held about three minutes after she emerged from the womb, and who holds me wrapped around her little finger - grew in our hearts. She has not a trace of either my own genetic material, or that of my wife. This doesn't matter a whit. She's my daughter as surely as if she'd come from my wife's womb, and I will go to my grave assured that, from the instant this universe came into being, God planned our family for her, and her for this family. If I had it to do all over again...if I had the chance to go back, and choose the method through which our family would grow, I'd still choose my little girl, and adoption. There is no force strong enough to sever my attachment and love for this child, and The Wife and I await - impatiently, I might add - the arrival of our next child via the crazy, glorious, frustrating, staggeringly beautiful miracle of adoption.

In our passion for our little girl, and our anticipation over the next arrival, however, we're sometimes blindsided by the routine.

We always knew we'd adopt, The Wife and I. The only question was "when". Like most young couples, we assumed we'd have kids "of our own", and then adopt - you know...as a supplement. Things didn't work out that way, of course, and we're richer for it. We have an impossibly wonderful little four year-old, and wouldn't want anyone else to take her place. What's tough, though, is when we're once more reminded - by an innocent comment about how lucky we are not to have to worry about potty training anymore, or a pregnant friend's trepidation over the sleepless nights to come - of what we'll never have. We mourn our loss of what most folks tend, well, to take for granted. In The Girl, we've likely had our one and only experience raising a newborn.

The tiny, seemingly meaningless (or even negative) aspects of pregnancies, new babies, and the like tend to hit us like a ton of bricks. How does one respond? It's hard to smile or laugh when your heart is in your throat. It's tough to agree that you're lucky not to have to worry about losing sleep when you'd give a kidney or two just to have the chance to be awoken by a newborn's cry one more time.

The routine gets to you in ways you never see coming. The fleeting sensory memory of the smell of your baby's hair, or the sounds that she made when she slept...those are the cuts that bleed at the moments when you're least prepared to find yourself simultaneously thrilled for what's to come, and mourning what you know you'll never have again.

It's the little things.

[Report this as objectionable content.]

SUBMIT COMMENT

Rate the above story

Talk Back : submit comments to the story

*Note: you need to log-in to add a comment or rating.

Thank you! Your comment has been updated.

CONTRIBUTOR INFORMATION

Jared Keller

Littleton

Jared Keller has posted 470 stories and 66 comments since joining on 12/1/2005. Jared Keller 's average story rating is 4.86.

view profile » view other postings from Jared Keller »

SAVE AND SHARE THIS STORY

STORY RSS FEEDS

All stories

All stories in Centennial

All stories by Jared Keller

WANT TO WRITE FOR YOURHUB.COM?

Want to see the stories you write and the photos you shoot featured in the YourHub.com Thursday print section available all over the Front Range and with home subscriptions of the The Denver Post? All you have to do is register, then post a story or column, start a blog or tell everyone what events are happening in town. We will print the best stories, columns, event listings, photos and blog entries in our print sections.

Loading Ad