Adoption Chronicles- Volume 2: Take Two

The last adoption fell through in the middle of December.  On one hand, that might seem like an awful time for it to happen, right before Christmas.  But in our case, I found the timing to be quite helpful.  Christmas proved to be a wonderful distraction and there's something about the fresh start of a new year to help you put events like that behind you.
We decided that we had done absolutely everything we could do to make an adoption happen and the rest was entirely up to God.  Our job now was to resume life as we knew it and put thoughts of adoption out of our minds as much as possible until God gave us something new to think about.  With God's help, this task was miraculously done a lot easier than we ever could have imagined.  David and I joked from time to time that some day we would get a call from our social worker about being chosen and we would look at each other and say, "Oh yeah, we're still doing that, aren't we?"
And eventually that call came.  And yes, that was sort of our reaction.  Then the nerves and worries hit.  Can we really go through this again after what we just experienced just a few months ago?  What if it happens again?  How will we ever survive?
We took a step of faith and accepted the meeting with that birth mother.  And once again, the meeting went really well and we felt very good about the connection made there.  And once again, we were officially matched with that birth mother and our profiles became inactive.  And once again we had about eight weeks to prepare, get excited, nurture a new relationship with the
expectant mother, and try to tame our eager hearts, knowing from experience that there
are always risks when it comes to adoption.
We did things a little differently this time.  I vowed that I wouldn't buy anything ahead of time for this baby.  I just couldn't stand the thought of having to make returns again.  Friends loaned us clothes (since we were preparing for a boy this time), and I just kept reminding myself that we had far less when we brought Addison home and she turned out just fine.  I did have a day of weakness and I ordered the crib set and a couple of items for the nursery.  But I did not take them out of the package in case God forbid, they would have to be returned.  I desperately wanted to paint his room and I had more than enough time to do so, but I didn't.  I didn't want to have to repaint it later if things didn't end up working out.  So this was the game we played for about 8 weeks.  Balancing the heart's desire to nest and get excited with the head's desire to be smart and build walls of protection up.
And before we knew it, those eight weeks were behind us and we got the call that it was time to go to the hospital for the delivery of the baby that was meant to be ours.