It's funny how many people feel it's their duty to remind me of all my "options" after they find out I can't have kids. Honestly, the second they find out I had a hysterectomy at 25, they inevitably feel an overwhelming need to remind me about all the orphaned children that are in desperate need for a loving family. Like I don't already know that. That dreaded sentence "you can always adopt" is one of my most hated sentences. I understand that people mean well, but if they thought for half a second before they let that sentence come out of their mouths, they would realize how incredibly insensitive it is.
Lets not even get into the fact that the questions "so, do you guys have kids yet?" is none of anyone's business, nor is the answer to the question "why not?" when we tell them that we don't.
I wish people could understand that when a woman has a hysterectomy, she's not mourning the loss of never being able to RAISE a child as much as she's mourning the loss of never being able to HAVE a child. Of carrying her and her husbands flesh and blood beneath her heart, feeling it grow and move, and respond to her voice and her touch and her favorite foods. She's mourning the loss of looking up at the ultrasound and finding out if it's a boy or a girl, and hearing it's heartbeat for the first time. She's mourning the loss of never being kept up at night because her baby is too active, or waking up her husband at 2am to go get her pickles and mayo because she just can't sleep until she eats them... together. She's mourning the embarrassing games she would have got to play at her baby shower. She's mourning the over asked question from strangers of "when are you do?" and she's mourning shopping in the maternity section. She's mourning being able to talk with her girlfriends, her aunts, her mother about all things pregnancy. She's mourning being able to decide between a home birth or a hospital birth, epidural or natural. She's mourning being able to see her baby almost immediately after it's born and maybe even having her baby layed on her chest within seconds. She's mourning the option to breast feed. She mourning everything so many woman take for granted.
And yes, adoption is a wonderful and beautiful thing. And for some families its the right thing. But not for all of us. Adoption is something that I personally never felt 100% comfortable with. Even before my hysterectomy became such a reality, it's something that I never felt would be right for me. Of course, as our future has become so shaken, it's something that we both are seriously trying to think about as it's very real to us that adoption is our only choice if we want to become parents. But when someone tells me "you can just adopt" it's incredibly upsetting. And then to tell me about all the children who need homes, as if it's our job to save them all now, and if we decide it's not right for us, we're horrible people... sometimes I just want to look at them and say "if you feel so strongly about it, why don't you adopt instead of having that baby that's in your belly." I know that sounds harsh, but it's true. It not the infertile/sterile couples job to save the children that the women who could get pregnant decided to not care for. It's not our job to pick up the peaces of others who couldn't get their act together. My heart breaks for all the children who don't have loving families and I honestly would love to have my heart open to the adoption option, and to feel that it's 110% right for us. But I don't feel that way. Not right now. Maybe in time, as I get further away
from Aug 12, 2010 I hope that we both will feel it's something we can do - love anothers' child as our own. But I can't force myself to feel something I don't. And that doesn't make us horrible people, and it doesn't' make our pain from what we lost any less.
On top of all that... right now, adoption isn't an option for us for a million reasons. So someone telling us that it's a great option, just brings up a myriad of other feelings of hopelessness. Because even if we did both know without a doubt it's the right option for us, it's not possible right now. It's not even close to being possible right now. And like I've said before, who would pick us anyways? Adoption isn't cut and dry, and its not as easy as just making a decision to adopt, and you miraculously become a family of 3. They drill you before you even become an option for a birth mother. You have to answer thousands of questions. You have to save thousands of dollars. You have to under go home study checks and background checks and create a whole profile convincing someone who is under a ton of emotional stress and pressure why you are the perfect parents to pick.
Adoption means becoming a mother to a baby that already has a mother. I've watched several families over the past few years as they've undertaken the journey of adoption. I've become shocked at how intertwined the birthmother stays in their lives. One family sends Mothers Day cards to their birth mother. I couldn't do that. I don't want to share my motherhood. It got stolen from me, I want it all to myself. Maybe thats selfish, but why should I have to share that when it wasn't my choice to have it taken from me to begin with?
One thing my husband and I are 100% in agreeance on is that if we did adopt, our baby will ALWAYS know it's adopted. They will always know as much as we do about the process we went through, and the information we have on their birth mother and her family. And while I will never waiver on our decision for this, it terrifies me too. What if they don't feel like a member of our family? What if they always feel misplaced? I've found myself trying to find ways that will connect our babies to our family more so than I would have if they were our genetically... names that include as many family names as possible, baby clothes & items from when we were babies, special traditions, etc. It can make a woman crazy, honestly. What if our baby never feels our love for them, and feels the need to find their birth mother at some point in their lives? While I would want our child to feel completely comfortable and supported in that decision, it would do nothing short of break my heart to know we weren't enough for them.
I guess what I really just wish people could understand and see before making comments about something so tender, is that it's not as easy as just deciding to adopt. It's not as easy as just replacing one experience with another. It's a huge decision, not an automatic one. You can't simply switch one thing out for another.
