The elephant in the room - what everyone wants to know but most people won't ask us

About a year ago, my friend Kim was telling me about a friend of hers who was in Florida, waiting for her adopted child to be born. Ryan and I were in the process and knew that we would be adopting from Florida so I was interested in how it was going for this family. I remember saying to Kim, "Oh I could never do that - be there to see the baby be born, and fall in love with this child, knowing that the birthmom could still change her mind." In theory, it seemed like a much better idea to wait at home until we didn't have to hold our breath, wondering if everything would go through. Well, guess what we are about to do in a little over a week?! :)

So, in case you were wondering and didn't want to ask us - the answer is yes. A birthmother has the right to change her mind and decide she is going to parent her baby instead of placing them for adoption. Different provinces and states have different laws about how long she has and in Florida, the birthmother cannot sign the consent to waive parental rights for at least 48 hours. So we are traveling to Florida in order to be present for our baby's birth, knowing that her birthmother could very well change her mind and we could leave with empty arms and broken hearts. You may all think we are out of our minds, and you may even be right, but here's the thing. We are already head over heels in love with this baby, whom we have neither seen nor held. (Ryan read through this and reminded me that we have in fact seen the ultrasound picture of her.) She has not been moving around inside of me as our other children did, but that doesn't mean that God has not given us a deep love for her as He did for Evan, Grace and Rachel before they were born. We have been praying for this baby and her birthmother, since before we even knew about her. We have been preparing our home over the last weeks, but we have also been preparing our hearts to welcome this little miracle home. And even if we had decided to stay at home and wait until the consents were signed, we would still be empty armed and broken hearted if Aubree changed her mind. But, we would have missed out on an opportunity to be with our little girl in the first moments of her life. We think that being able to tell our daughter that we were there to hold her and kiss her on the day of her birth is worth every moment of anxiety! So we'll hold our breath and step out in faith, trusting that all things work together for the good of those who love the Lord.