Sunday, October 26, 2008

Getting Claire

I wanted to share a bit about our experience getting Claire.

Claire was born on Monday night about 5:00pm and at that point we all we knew was that she had been born and that she was 8 lbs 2 oz.

The 48 hours of waiting that we had to do until we got her was very hard. The first day, Tuesday, I worked, so time went fairly quickly and we were sort of waiting all day to hear more news. It wasnt until about 8pm that the social worker called and said that she knew that she had a full head of hair and was 19 1/2 inches, and that she was jaundiced a bit and under the lights, but other than that she didnt know anything else.

I was so annoyed at that point! I suppose that is normal, but I really had wanted apgar scores, and to hear HOW she was doing and what sort of frame of mind the mother was in and all that sort of more "intuative" stuff. I was also irritated that we had to wait until 8 that night to hear anything. But I got over myself and went to bed and slept great! SUCH a God thing and because people were praying for us that we all got good sleep!


The next day was Wednesday and we were sort of waiting around to hear when the baby would be released and if the mom was going to sign and all that good stuff. It looked like it was leaning for a Thursday morning discharge. E went to work, the girl went to school and I went to the mall. I did, after all, need a new outfit! Actually I was just looking for something to do to burn time. I didnt even want to be with people. Im not sure why I was so cranky, im sure it had something to do with the level of anxiety I was feeling

I got a fun outfit and then hit the grocery and did some errands etc... and got back about 2pm. I was so irritated because we were waiting and waiting and waiting and there was NO NEWS coming our way. I had seriously been doing very well with all the tenativeness of the whole process but that Wednesday I hit the wall.

I cried and was just over it all. Holly, having worked in the adoption agency at one point had such good words for me. She said to just remember that regardless of the information that I did or didnt recieve, that that baby would be ours in a number of hours, be it 6 hours or 48 hours. It was very wise information. After a good meltdown, the girl got home from school all chippy and happy. She loves school and this is a blessing. At 4pm I decided a shower was just the ticket and was just getting out when my cell phone rang and it was our social worker.

"The mom is signing at 5:30pm TONITE and everyone is being discharged. You need to get to the hospital ASAP!"

As ready as we were, we werent ready at all! First I called E. Then I enlisted Holly to make some other phone calls and put the girl on helping her pack the diaper bag and I quickly dried my hair and put on make-up etc! ( gotta look good!!)

Holly got subway for us and Kaitlin went to volleyball practice. My inlaws were driving in from Ocala and E was on his way home. As soon as he arrived and we had dinner off we went to start the drive to the hospital. Talk about sitting on pins and needles!! It was surrreal and we kept saying to ourselves.."Is this really going to happen?!?" What was so crazy was the fact that we had an empty baby seat in the car and in a few short hours it would be full...of BABY!!

Okay...this is getting long. To be continuted tomorrow.

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