The story behind our Christmas blessing

Okay, I'm finally feeling a little in control of things around me and have a few minutes to sit down and share the story of our Christmas blessing - Gilbert.  Last May we received a phone call that we had not been expecting asking us if we would be interested in being an adoptive home for a little baby - 6 months old at the time.  He is a sibling of our other kids, and had been in foster care since he was born.  Of course my immediate reaction was yes, with a lot of nervousness afterward.  I mean, my hands are full with the kids I have and I am 45 (44 at the time) which is a little old to be raising a baby.  But I also knew that he belonged in our family.  I have felt for a long time that our family was not complete, and knew that he was the answer to a lot of prayers. Of course there were a lot of complications.  We were just the back up plan - the first plan was reunification with the birth mother, so that is what CPS was working towards.  We didn't have our certification at the time and had to start the whole home study process again - which a nerve wracking thing.  I hate feeling like I am being judged on the type of parent that I am, and feeling like I have to prove that I am a good enough parent to raise someone else's kids - especially someone who doesn't think that raising kids is very important in her life.  We did make it through and got certified to adopt.  The plan continued to be reunification - and things were up and down with the birth mom.  She was trying (at least they said she was), and was doing her visits (but not steadily like she was supposed to).  There was a court hearing in July and we thought things would be over then - but the judge decided to give her 3 more months to try and straighten up her life.  So we were back to waiting and hoping that all would work out.  They decided that they wanted us to start making visits with Gilbert so that we could begin an attachment with him in case things went towards adoption at the Oct court.  LaMont and I started visits, our first visits were at the foster home - which was very intimidating because the foster parents wanted to keep him themselves.  They were very attached to him and didn't want to give him up.  The visits went well and Gilbert was comfortable with us.  Each time we left it was like having your heart ripped out - just wondering if it was all worth it, if it would all work out in the end.  Well, in Oct. my heart did get ripped out, we were told that we didn't need to make any more visits because the birth mom had straightened out her life and they were going to start the reunification process.  I couldn't figure out why we were put through all of this and what in the world I was supposed to learn.  The hardest part was telling the kids.  They hadn't met him yet, but were attached to him just from the pictures and what we would tell them about him.  My little girls don't know that  he is their birth sibling, but my older kids knew, so that also raised a whole lot of emotions and questions since she was getting him back.  I finally came to a conclusion that it was okay, that there were things that I had learned about my kids from the process, and that maybe it was just an experience that we needed to go through.  I was still an emotional basketcase and now I realize that I hadn't really accepted it like I thought I did.

Last Tuesday we were busily packing for our Christmas trip to Disneyland.  We were going to take the kids out of school early and head out.  I had been emotional again and just couldn't figure it out. I told LaMont I didn't know why I felt the way I did, I just felt like a wreck and felt like crying all the time.  He stopped what he was doing, looked at me and asked me - "Why, what's going to happen?".  Little did I know.  At 11:15 LaMont left to go and check the older kids out of school.  I was finishing up packing when the phone rang.  It was the Social worker.  She asked if we were still interested in being a permanent placement for Gilbert.  I felt like the floor gave way underneath me and I couldn't hardly speak.  I couldn't believe it.  A situation had arose and Gilbert had to be removed from his mothers custody again.  The judge will still have the final decision in February, but as far as CPS is concerned they are recommending a sibling placement with our family.  Of course we said yes.  I called LaMont who was at Wal-Mart picking up sub sandwiches for the trip, and asked him if he would like a baby for Christmas.  We got the kids all home and called them in for a family meeting - there we told them we had something better than Disneyland for Christmas and told them about Gilbert.  There were many tears and hugs.  We decided to go ahead and take our trip and take him with us.  So our oldest 4 kids headed straight to California and we took the girls to Sierra Vista to pick up our little Christmas blessing before heading on the 9 hour trip to Disneyland.

We had a wild time at Disneyland, but it was such a blessing to have that time to bond with Gilbert without anyone else around and without other obligations.  He has already become very attached to me, which of course I don't mind at all.  He is a precious little boy, who makes us all laugh, and loves to cuddle when he isn't running full speed ahead.  He is 13 months old, and a great blessing in our lives already.