My Girls

We have been through a lot, we know that.  But we really felt like this year, was going to be our year.  I'm not sure what it was...maybe getting over the fear of adoption again.  Maybe realizing that we have tried every way till Sunday to get pregnant, and just nothing seemed to be working.  But we weren't letting that get us down.  Sure, there were days when I felt hopeless, and that we would never have our family.  In fact, the past few months I had really started thinking about not having kids at all.  The walls around my heart were turning into cement, and I was starting to think that maybe nothing could get through them.  It was actually a scarier feeling to me than the desperation of infertility.

About a month ago, our adoption agency posted a birth mother situation on their website.  This is how they operate, you have a password and you can see what situations are coming up.  Since we signed on with this agency in October, we called on a few situations (to see if we wanted our profile presented) and nothing felt "right."  We never had our profile presented.  But we kept checking the site.  One morning in February after Kevin left for work I padded to my office to get to work.  I looked at the site that morning and saw it.  I had to read it a few times because I wasn't sure it was true.  I mean, twins?  For adoption?  Female twins for adoption?  I had a Charlotte York moment from Sex and the City when her hubby brought home the picture of the little Chinese baby they were going to adopt.  After failed attempts at pregnancy and a failed adoption, Charlotte looked at that photo and said, "that's our baby!!!"  When I saw that posting, I said out loud, alone in my office, "those are our babies!"  I immediately called to get the details and make sure it was a situation in which we wanted to be presented.  Kevin came home that night, and asked if I saw the website...I replied yes, and I had already called on it.

A few days later we were in the mix to get our profile shown to the birth mom.  Our case manager at the agency said they were getting calls like crazy from everywhere...people who weren't even registered at the agency wanted to get their profile shown.  So I felt like maybe this might not happen.  I pulled out a copy of our profile and looked it over again.  I wanted to see it through the eyes of a birth mother.  Reading it, I felt pretty good about "us." 

A week went by and we heard nothing from the agency.  Really, we had kind of put it out of our minds.  My walls had gotten pretty thick, so it wasn't that hard.  But after a week, I thought maybe the agency just hadn't gotten around to telling us, so I called to check in.  She said that the birth mom was still deciding but we were still in the mix.  I took that to mean that she had already said no to some.  So I waited patiently. 

A few days later, on March 1st, after carrying my phone around like it was my oxygen I left my phone downstairs and went upstairs to nap in bed with my pup.  It was the end of the work day, so I was just resting until I needed to get up and make dinner.  I heard the phone ring and looked at the clock.  5:41.  I knew it was the agency because this was generally the time they called around.  I ran downstairs in my nap haze, my heart beating...hard.  I grabbed the phone and saw the Utah number, but missed the called.  UGH!  I waited for my voicemail and the agency had called and said to call them back.  That was it.  I called back got her voicemail and just sat down and waited.  Within minutes my phone was ringing again, and I clicked it on. 
"Hi Joelle?"
"Oh, hello, yes (so nonchalent I am)!  This is Joelle! (Screaming probably)"
"Well, you better go shopping because you have twins coming in a few weeks!!"
"NO WAY!!!! (i said no *effing* way when Kevin asked me to marry him, so this was appropriate) ARE YOU SERIOUS!?!"
"Yep, she picked you and she's getting induced on March 17th"

After some more details I hung up and called every number I have for Kevin and he wasn't answering any of them.  I decided to just take the dog for her walk and let the information sink in.  It was surreal.  I felt tingly all over...really?  We finally were getting our twins?  But also in that instant I made myself put those walls back up.  She could always change her mind.

Kevin pulled into the driveway just as Bailey and I got back and I just threw the news out at him like a baseball.  His face went from normal to complete and utter shock...it was pretty great :) 

As for next steps, there weren't many.  The BM had no desire to have a conversation with us.  She didn't want to have dinner the night before the delivery, something the agency likes to do.  We heard it was because she didn't want to jinx anything, she liked us, and didn't want to not like us.  She is a little bit older, and so much more mature than our last "situation."  It felt different immediately.

We booked our flights for March 16th to be in Utah for the March 17th delivery.  I spoke to our agency that day and gave them our flight information, and she was trying to get me excited, but really, I was just too scared.  Twin girls has pretty much always been my dream team.  I was not dealing well with the anxiety in those 2 weeks before the birth.  Add to that that we told NO ONE except parents that we were going to Utah.  I didn't even tell my parents it was twins!

So the night of March 15th we thought we were all set when I get a text from the agency saying the BM is going to the hospital with contractions.  I just knew she was going to have those babies that night because if your carrying twins and already at 38 weeks, they aren't sending you home to wait to get induced 2 days later.  This threw me into another panic, because I know from first hand experience, adoptions can go wrong if the birth is a little different than expected.  Last time, the baby boy we were supposed to get got sick, and I'm 99% sure this is what made the BM change her mind.  I just felt if we weren't there, she might think we didn't care or something. (When you're in the thick of it, it sounds rational).

Got another text that she was having a c-section because the heart rates were all over the place.  Now I wasn't worried about the adoption, but the babies.  Well the babies turned out just fine...healthy, happy, and big!

We bumped our flight up to the first flight out on March 16th and starting a grueling day of travel and no sleep from the night before.  After a 5 hour flight, we landed in Utah and were greeted by our case manager.  She took us straight to the hospital and said the babies were doing well, that the BM had seen them once just like she planned, and she wanted us to stay in the hospital with them.  Things were sounded pretty good, and I breathed a sigh of relief, just a little one though.  We got to the hospital and went straight into the nursery...and I saw the most beautiful baby girls I have ever laid eyes on.  One was bigger, 6 lbs 13 oz, and Baby B was 6 lbs 2 oz.  Our case manager picked up Baby A, and plopped her right into Kevin's arms with a bottle.  I went for Baby B and just stared at her.  It's a surreal moment, one we will never forget, but still strange because they are not yet OUR babies.  I had shared the names with our case manager beforehand and she said, ok, who's who?  Kevin and I looked at each other and I said Baby A is Kendall, while Kevin nodded.  We knew.  Baby B was of coure Reese.  The nurse wrote the names above their heads in pink writing and I felt my heart catch. 

We spent the night in the hospital with the babies, just as if I'd given birth and after a little while, we started to think I did!  The told us that we were going to do all the paperwork the morning of March 17th.  I felt pretty calm actually.  After a pretty sleepless night and finally putting the babies in the nursery so we could actually see the paperwork I started to lose my mind again.  The case manager came in, and starting showing us all the paperwork (kind of like buying a house).  She said we would sign after the birth mother signed...she'd get a text when she signed the actual reliquishment paper...the big one.  Her phone kept beeping and I jumped every time.  No, not them.  Not them again.  Another beep, and she looked down and looked back and said, "she signed. They're yours."  All those walls, all those fears, all those sad days came out all at once.  I just cried.  They were OURS.  In Utah once the BM signs, it's done.  After I found the tissues and I dried my eyes, Kevin dried his, and the case manager dried hers, we then hit the paperwork and started signing our lives away.  It felt so so so good.  I couldn't wait to call my mom. 

So, without further ado...my daughters!

Kendall Grace & Reese Alexa Brower

We are so blessed, and so in love.  And we feel like the luckiest people on earth to raise these beautiful girls.