She's Amazing...

This last month has been difficult.  If I am honest, its been the last two months.  My mind has not been in the present, rather focused on the future and wishing the days would pass much more quickly.  I feel bruised and battered as if returning from war.  I am left feeling hopeless.

This adoption process has been hard.  Incredibly hard.  Its been well over a year now that I have felt ready for a second child.  Since August 2009.  It took until April of this year to be finally approved for adoption.  Micah and I had really felt like we would have another child be the end of fall.  For me, fall will end in about 10 days, and we are no closer to have another child as we were back in April.  I have had friends become pregnant and have their child as I have waited and waited.  I have said more fervent, intense prayers then I have ever given.  Sometimes praying for hours at a time.  I have fasted with more conviction than I ever have in my 28 years, and still my arms are empty.  I have lost that feeling that there is a plan for our family.  Lost the feeling that there is a purpose to everything that happens.

I don't really like talking about how I am feeling.  Usually because most people say they understand or try and relate a similar situation they have been in, but quite frankly...no it is not the same.

As I lay crying on my bed, I called my dad who is always so positive.  He reminded me of my perfect little boy, and he is right.  Beckham is incredibly perfect.  He is an angel.  I know that he was meant for our family.  He is so much like his father.  I love spending every minute of my day devoted to him, and although we would LOVE LOVE LOVE another child, maybe he is meant to be our only one.  That is hard to grasp, but at least he is so incredibly amazing.

As I have been contemplating how perfect my little boy is, I cannot help but think of his birth mother, Lexie.  This month I have reflected back to when Beckham was born.  I cannot wait until Beckham is old enough for me to explain to Beckham just how much Lexie loved him.  She must have loved Beckham more than any other mother has ever loved her child, because she was willing to place him in my arms.  I know that Lexie would have been a fantastic mother, the best, but she wanted things for Beckham that she could not give him, namely a father.  I cannot imagine what Beckham's life would be like without a father.  I remember seeing Lexie in labor and knowing how scared she was.  I think she was more scared about the adoption then actually giving birth.  I am sure she questioned if she was going to be strong enough to place him with Micah and I.  It hurt both Micah and I to see her in that emotional pain and knowing we couldn't do much to take it away.  Lexie gave me so many gifts when Beckham was born.  One of which, I take for granted, and that is being at the hospital and still feeling like I was going to be a mother.  Every adoption is different.  And I would never in a hundred years expect to been there as much as I was.  It was Lexie's time, but she let me hold Beckham and oh and ah over him.  I am amazed at Lexie's family.  They were so incredibly supportive of Lexie.  I know that ALL of Lexie's siblings and nieces and nephews would have loved to have kept Beckham.  They loved Beckham too, but they supported Lexie in her decision to place Beckham with us.  They encouraged and loved her.  I am so thankful to them.

I always say this, but adoption really is about love.  The love the birth mother has for her child is of the purest form.   Beckham does not have one but two mothers that love and adore him.  How lucky is he?  And Beckham does not have just our family, but the whole Herrera family that love him.

As Thanksgiving fastly approaches there is one blessing that I will be most thankful for this year.  Lexie and her sacrifice.  I love her so completely and I am so grateful to her.  She deserves to have the most amazing life.  What she did was the most difficult thing, but through her courage I have a little boy.  A little boy that I can read to, teach, love, play with, travel with, tickle, hug, and kiss.

My deepest hope is that there is another birth mother out there for Micah and I.  Another woman that I can love.  Micah and I have all of this love to give to another birth mother and her child.  Honestly, I feel her out there...somewhere...and it scares me because what if I am wrong?  What if my intuition is wrong and my heart breaks all over again?  But something deep inside me tells me it is true.

Happy Thanksgiving.