Baby A's Story

It's been a rough week.

The good news is that I was looking forward to getting to finally share our referral story, and I can do that now. However, this one won't be our baby. Instead, I can look forward to telling our second referral story--hopefully not too far down the road.

On April 16th, around 7:20 am we got THE CALL from our case worker--we had a referral of a baby girl! Baby A could be ours. Age: 3 months, with an actual known birthday (rare in Ethiopia). I woke Shannon up and we looked at her little pictures. She had a big round head with a curlicue on top, and we started calling her Cabbage Patch Baby. Her medicals were a bit off, and we were waiting for a 3rd blood test. Still, she looked healthy and happy and we watched her turn 4 months, and then 5 months. I was following her development in What to Expect the 1st Year.

A few weeks ago, Shannon had some serious concerns about how Baby A came to be at the orphanage. We had very little information, but our agency assured us that what we had was all they had, and that before she entered the care center the government agency had reviewed her case. We wrote an email requesting more information, and voicing our concerns. We sent it off and were waiting for a reply, hopeful our questions would be answered.

Two nights ago we received another call. It was something we had feared in the back of our minds: Baby A's mother returned to take her home. Although we had heard of this happening, it was still shocking. Evidently it happens about 5% of the time. Now we know.

It was a sad night. I really thought I would be her Mama. BUT, she already has a mama, and her mama wants her. That's the bottom line. What if we had taken her too soon? We're glad she's getting one-on-one attention. I bet her mama is thrilled to see that big smile. How can we be sad about that? Really, we can't.

Today, I think we’re okay. We'll think about her for the rest of our lives, and hope and pray she has a wonderful life. But I don't feel the loss that I expected to feel. Somehow we know this is right, and there's comfort in that. I truly believe that Shannon's concerns a few weeks ago were placed there deliberately to prepare us for this. It's either that, or believe in the strangest of strange coincidences. We know better.