Getting Claire III

To contiune...

After we had talked with the aunt for a bit we chatted with our social worker and with the birth mother's social worker about what would come next. She said to be prepared becasue it would be very emotional.

Then the birth mother's social worker gently knocked on the door and went into the room and motioned for us to follow her. I could feel my face was so flushed and I was very emotional. The birth mother was sitting on the bed cradleling Claire and kissing her and sobbing. It was an absolutely broken hearted cry. Ive never heard anything like it.

I went over to the bed and put my arms around the birth mother and kissed her cheek and smoothed her hair and just squeezed her while she was sobbing. I whispered in her ear that we would always love this baby and always tell her how courageous her mother was. I smoothed back her hair and whispered to her...."thank you..." and she opened her arms and placed the baby in mine.

It was an absolute sacred moment.

I took sweet Claire and was torn because here in my arms was my dream and yet, this dream was causing someone else so much pain. I wanted to revel in this gorgeous child in my arms, but also wanted to throw them around her birth mother to love and comfort her and ease her sadness. Everyone in the room was silent and stood still. Then the social worker looked at men nodded and quietly said"Go...." and she pointed to the door.

And we left the room.

E and I were both crying and I was cradling Claire to me as we walked out into the hallway. We both looked at our social worker and said, "What do we do now...?" because literally someone just gave you a child?! I mean seriously, what do you do next! She smiled at us and said, "You go home...."

We walked to the elevator and I said to her, "Why do i feel like a thief?" and E echoed with, "Yeah, I feel horribly guilty, like we have stolen this baby." Our social worker stopped us and said, "I know it feels that way...that is common for families who are presented with their baby from the birth mother. However, you need to remember that she GAVE you this child. You did not take it. And she picked you....just you all...to have her. The guilty feeling needs to stop before you walk out of this hospital. Now is the time for joy!"

How well said was that??

So, we fed the baby before heading for home. On the way we chatted to my mom and talked to each other and we decided that she was definately NOT a Meredith Claire...which had been our name that we had pretty much settled on. So we tossed around some other names and ended up with Paige Elizabeth! How pretty is that! I loved it. We called home to tell girl and E's parents that we were close and the girl asked what her name was.

P: "Her name is Paige Elizabeth!!"

Total Silence. Then...

TG: "EWwwwwwwwwwwww!!! YUCK!"

Such a strong reaction we howled about it and said we could talk about it more when we got home.

It was close to 9pm when we pulled into the driveway and just as we walked up to the front door it was flung open wide by the girl. She gasped the biggest gasp with these huge eyes which was followed by a huge, long, "AWwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!!! LOOK AT HER!!!" THAT made me cry all over again!

The rest of the evening was spent fawning over the baby girl who was quiet and chill. The girl's face will forever be engrained into my mind as one of the happiest days of her life. Her look of joy was incomprarable to anything that Ive seen on her before.

The name issue came up again, and the girl said, "What about just Claire....dont you like just Claire?" And we did. And so it became her name!

E's parents left, the girl was shuttled off to bed and E went to sleep...I had the night shift for feeding and Claire was squeeking for a bottle. I settled her on the sofa with me and finally got her all to myself to look her over. I checked out her tiny toes and fingers and ears and just was laughing at her crazy dark hair. She had that total newborn little face and body.
It was then...in those silent moments, in the darkness, listening to her coo, that she really became mine.

Claire was home!