Holding Him

First of all CONGRATULATIONS!!!! Your post just made me think about my first baby. It was a relatively easy delivery, I was happily married, my life was in order, I was a nurse and had tons of experience with little babies. AND STILL I couldn't believe I was going to be a mommy, it was very surreal. When it came time for discharge, I just couldn't believe that they would just hand me this baby and let me take her home. How did they know I was a good parent?? I have never done this before. It was just plain weird. So having placed or not, your feelings sound a lot like new mom feelings to me :) :) Oh and since I'm here I'll give the same advice I give all new mom's to be. And you can't stop me!!! :p Go out and buy ourself something new to wear for after the baby comes home. Not something fancy to go to a party in but still something you can feel pretty in. Try it on while your pregnant - you should be able to pull the bants up over your thighs but not (obviously) over your belly) with a stretchy waist and a top that goes over your lovely "maternal" boobs with a little room to spare. It's really nice to have something nice to wear that's new. Your old stuff won't fit for a while (or in my case....EVER :o ) and it's a little depressing parading around in sweats and maternity clothes that youre certainly tired of by now. Hang in there!! You're on the home stretch!!!!!!!! Martha

Hi Jenna! It can be very emotional having a baby post-placement. It is also the most wonderful feeling in the world when your child is placed in your arms and you are beginning the journey together as mother and child. I have had 3 children since the closed adoption placement of my daughter in 1983. I had a little of the irrational fear that lisaann57 had and wanted to get home as quickly as possible with my babies before someone could take them from me. I knew it was not a real worry but it took a long time and some counseling before I was really confident that these children were mine forever. I had a little bit of guilt with the birth of my 1st daughter post placement because it felt strange to think of raising a little girl after placing my oldest girl. I am sure its different in an open adoption like yours but I was never sure what happened to my oldest daughter and I hoped her aparents were giving her the same enormous love I felt for her and her for her siblings. I know you will be an awesome mother and you will find amazing joy in your new son. I bet that the first time you hold your son you will feel like for the first time in life everything makes sense. Kitti

I just got all weepy. (Which isn't uncommon for me at this point. Hormones!) Like you and Kitti both said, I also have that irrational fear that someone is going to take him away from me in the hospital. In fact, when I watch shows on Discovery Health, I get panicky when they take the baby away from the Mother to do the normal tests and what not. I'm calmed to know that others have felt this way. I have a feeling I'll be crying as they wheel me out... just like last time... but for different reasons. Or maybe the same? Hmm.Coco, thanks for writing that reply. It's nice to know I'm not alone in my feelings at the current time. I couldn't have said it better myself. I get so nervous sometimes. But on other days, I just want him to be here! (Healthy!) It's a weird mix of emotion, really.And Crayons, thanks for the reassurance that the MOM thing just falls into place. It's a good thing. Because I feel clueless at times. :)And MMC66... why is the home stretch SOOOOO LONG. lol :)

Hey Jenna, I was JUST thinking about you and wondering how you were! No advice, just can't wait for little Nicholas to be born! (Sounds like you'll have a lot to be thankful for on Thanksgiving Day!).

Jenna, I can't relate to the specific point of your post, but there is at least one thing we have in common: Awesome Husbands! Tell yours now that the whole part of the baby being away from your side for those few moments for the normal testing makes you nervous/panicy and I'm sure he'd be happy to "glue" himself onto the baby for those minutes so you know that at least Daddy has a close eye on him. It's SO good to see you! :D

Oh, he all ready knows that I want him to stay with Nicholas at all times. I will also be discussing with my nursing staff my "unique" situation and how I'd like him to be with me at all times possible, etc. I'm around. I'm just very quiet as of late. Which is weird, no?

Jenna, I don't know what your plans are for your son, but I even insisted on going down to have all my sons circumsized. At first they were like you can't go, but when I explained all that I have done medically with how sick my husband was and I wasn't the squimish type, they allowed me. My kids were with me all the time. Although I am not a birth mother, as an adoptee, I have always had a very irrational fear of losing my children, whether it be death, a stranger, courts, whatever. So when I had them they were with me at all times. I think it very wise, like having a birth plan, for the staff to know of your situation so they can be sensitive to your needs. Good luck!!! Carolyn

I remember consciously thinking about how wierd it was. My daughter (Caitlin - born after my son) would be mine and I so appreciated it more that time around. I treasured being the one to hold her most, and really had goosebumps that we were packing her stuff for US, to go to OUR home. Every difference was felt in a big way. Maia

Just, hugs to you!!!!!! :D I think about you all the time... :) You will be the greatest mommy to your baby! Prayers going your way!!!!

I think your freak out is perfecty normal...of course that is assuming that I am perfectly normal and that is a big strp to take..lol, but yeah, I can totally relate. Garin was born less than 4 years after Max. I knew before his conception that "the next one would be mine". I remember clearly warning his father..that if perchance a child was concieved..he could do what he wanted, but I was having that baby. It did come to pass exactly as I forwarned. I don't know if I was able to let the previous birth of Max impeed on my current feelings..I had an awful time with my, by then, husband. He was a bit too concerned that it was not a shared first experience for us both, that I had been there before. So, looking back, I can see how I spent so much time convincing him how glorious and and great it was going to be. He felt that the revious birth took away from the experience, but to me it made it all the more special. I do remember just sitting and thinking " mine, mine, mine" Becoming pregnant with my daughter was more feaky for me as she was the only child that I purposefully concieved. THAT felt terribly alien..actually deciding to get pregnant as I had spent oh so many years making sure I did not again. I did rejoice again in carrying her, but that was my surreal time. I felt tht I had no right to make that decision. And the last one, my other blued eyed boy..knowing he was the last, but being more in connection with how adoption continued to effect me...With him, I was able to allow myself to remember much of his oldest brother, that pregnancy, and feel what what lost. Maybe because he was a pleasant "surprise", not that we were really trying either way..to have or not have..but again, due to timing and circumstance, I felt we had no right having another baby. It brought back alot for me. I think that it is normal to have all kinds of conflicting emotions. And another birth can bring up many of the emotions that were present during the first, whether realized or unrealized. It's weird to see how people do process it differently. I now it has been documented and discussed that so many moms are almost over protective of later children, but for me it has always been the opposite. I have always been able to remove myself emotionally..not necessarily in a bad way, but probably beyond a normal way. Never had trouble letting my kids go to school, go to sleep overs, have the oldest kept weekends by his dad and his family, send the little ones, even as babies to grandmas..even my oldesty huge surgery...I could separate and break into a denial zone..not really feel. I think our brains, our bodies, do recall the separation and pain and do go into a weird protective mode. Plus, I think that it is normal for any almost mom to feel freaky about the impending ball of love coming in the near future. Rejoice when you can, enjoy, embrace..freak out when you must..just keep feeling what ever comes your way...and "mine, mine, mine" can really, really feel good. Wishing you a wonderful birth and a joyful start at this new chapter in your life.

I agree with what I have read, especially the feeling of surreal. I forgot who said it, but the feeling of wanting to get out of the hospital as soon as possible with my son because of some unexplainable fear. I wanted him close to me at all times. I just had this feeling that I never wanted to miss one moment. Because when I was in the hospital with my daughter I only had a couple of days with her, and I didn't sleep because I wanted to spend that time and burn it in my head. I wanted to remember everything, the smells, the noises she made, the gas smiles she gave, the sensation of finally holding her, and I knew I only had a short time. I felt the same urgency with my son, infact it took awhile for me to "realize" he wasn't going anywhere, he was home with me. Hope that makes sense. :confused:

Hon, you can request all his testing be done at bedside. And, one trick I learned with my last baby, request that YOU give baby his first bath. Turns out, technically hospital staff consider the vernix and amniotic fluid a bodily fluid. So, until baby is bathed, they will wear gloves and avoid touching baby as much as possible. For my first after placing, I agreed to let her go to the nursery for just ONE hour. Her Daddy stayed glued at her side for that hour and I was at the nurses' station demanding her return when 1 hour was up. Last time, I requested all testing at bedside and that we give her bath. We also got an early discharge from the hospital and were home within 6 hours from giving birth (it was a transported homebirth). Even when we changed rooms, I just wrapped her up in blankets, covered her so no one could see, touch or do anything and we rode in a wheelchair together to the post-partum room. What is it like to hold that first post-placement baby? Pure joy. I don't think I ever felt anything so amazing in my life. After months of being convinced I would lose her as punishment for not wanting my first, to finally hold her and realize that I was MOM was just amazing. I don't think I slept for 2 days after I got to gaze at her face. Nearly 7 years (and 4 more children) later, its still just as amazing. I don't think I take my motherhood for granted. I know what the pain of transferring that motherhood to someone else felt like, and I am proud that I have been blessed with my amazing kids now.

Jenna, Four years after I released my daughter to adoption, I married the birthfather. (I have to say I am still happily, well most days, married 23 years later.) For quite a few years after we were married I was convinced I didn't deserve any more children. It took some time but eventually I overcame those thought and after 5 years of marriage we got pregnant with our first. ( I have always been uncomfortable with that phrase...is she our first or our second...what do I say to people who ask if it's our first...it was hard). The closer it came to delivery the more nervous I got. I realized there were a lot of feeling about our first baby that I had not dealt with. That and the whole hormonal thing made me a basket case. The night I went in to deliver the nursing staff tried to put me in the same room I was in for the first delivery. I paniced. It was somewhat stupid as the whole ward had been remodeled and it looked nothing like it had but there was just no way I could go into that room. They were nice enough to give me the room next to it although I am sure they thought I was a nut case. Everything went well until a day or so post partum when they brought in the birth certificate and all that. It hit me just what I had not been allowed to do the first time. I just sat their holding my daughter and cried and cried. The nurses all came by and told me it all the hormonal stuff and I knew they were partly right but it was so much more. My doc came by (he had delivered my first and also worked with my dh) he told me probably the most important advice I got. He said to stop comparing experiences. The first happened in the dark ages of adoption and so much should have been done differently. So I shouldn't beat myself up over all that but just go forward and be the best mom I know how to be. The interesting side light is that he became my birthdaughter's med school instructor. He doesn't know the connection as we have never had the opportunity to tell him. So the long of it I guess is don't compare situations. Just move forward in this one. D.

I think that was really well said, I think I need to take that advice myself. Thank you for sharing that!

Oh another thing to expect...this one has nothing to do with previously releasing a child and I don't think it was just my hubby that acts like this. Baby is born, dad cuts cord, mom gets to hold baby for a little while, dad is "oh this is great, you both are great" and then it is time to go weigh baby and poof dad and baby are gone....he was completely engrossed with everything baby forget about mommy. If it wasn't for breast feeding and poopy diapers, I may never gotten to hold my kids again. I will secretly admit it is pretty cool to see a dad so totally in love with his daughters. He still is and they are all much older now. D.