Yesterday I got an update from the attorney that had been working with the possible birthmom who our agency thought was possibly emotionally scamming us. At first I could just see the first line of his e-mail: "She had a baby girl." With that line I became so angry, so mad that I hadn't allowed myself to trust my gut that she wasn't a scam artist, or mentally ill. Just someone who didn't want to follow every rule and guideline that our agency was trying to get her to adhere to. I was sure, after reading that one line, that we had made a mistake - a big one.
A few minutes later I was able to get back into my e-mail (stupid non-iphone makes life difficult for reading e-mails), and read the rest of the message: "she placed her with a prospective adoptive parent, and then took the baby back several days later." Wow. My first thoughts and feeling were of compassion and sadness for the potential adoptive parent (an also concern for the (birth)parents who I don't think would have made the decision without a lot of grief on their end), and then relief- sweet, sweet relief.
Here's a little list of why:
1) We were chosen! - legitimately. She really did want us, but she just wasn't ready to actually place a child for adoption, and since she resisted all attempts at helping her work through her options, or have counseling, she realized this very, very late. She said such nice things to us about our profile and photos... well, it had been a pretty tough blow to our egos to think that she was just making things up. Plus, she everything she had ever told us checked put (everything from her employer to her kids names and schools, down to her weight & height were verifiable due to the magic of internet snooping), and that was the one thing that always made me question the "scammer" diagnosis.
2) Our agency saved us again. Yes, the did tell us they were getting a scammer vibe from her, which we took as gospel, but besides that they said she simply wasn't acting like a person who is truly ready to place their baby for adoption. They wanted me to back off from insisting that she call them - she needed to make those calls herself, of her own accord, and she never did (other than one time to say that she was told she had to call). They were right. She wasn't ready,and in the end their instincts saved us a heck of a lot of heartache.
3) We were inconvenienced by her actions, but not devastated. If we had matched with her officially, we would have been out thousands of dollars. She wasn't asking for birthparent expenses, but we would have needed air fare, hotel, an attorney, another agency in her state, etc. etc. If we had gotten as far as the other potential adoptive parent did, and then she decided that adoption wasn't what she wanted to do - well, we would either have to stop for a year, or owe my parents a lot of money, neither of which I'm wanting to do.
4) Just simply relieved that we weren't hurt tremendously by her reclaiming the baby if we had gone forward with her. Emotionally, after what we had just endured with Olivia - well, I just don't think either of us would ever have recovered. It's always the right of the birthparent to decide against adoption, even at the last moment. But, our hope is that whoever we're matched with will get non-directive counseling, and have time to process all the emotions and realities of the situation and thus be prepared to make the decision that is best for them.
