Our foster baby was at the hospital. My new daughter was ten days old. But we wouldn’t be able to take her home quite yet.
To protect the privacy of our child, her birth mother, and the system itself, I cannot share everything about our daughter or her situation. But due to some of her history and her premature birth our daughter had to stay in the NICU for ten more days before we could bring her home. So for ten days my wife and I drove an hour and a half (each way) across Los Angeles to visit her in the hospital. Little did we know that the work of driving across town to see our daughter was just warming us up for the many doctor visits, high risk exams, and child psychology meetings that were soon to come. I’m not sure how many of you saw the traffic jam dance scene in LA LA LAND but I can tell you, it wasn’t like that at all.
Then
Eventually we were able to bring our new baby girl home. The nurses and hospital staff in the NICU all stood up to clap and cheer when we left. Our journey started with a standing ovation. We got home with the smallest little baby I had ever seen.
The fun was only beginning.
For those of you who don’t know how the government works, let me fill you in. The government likes to make laws to protect people. And when those don’t work it makes more laws. And so on and so forth for two-hundred plus years. Some of these laws are good and some are not. But unfortunately the government rarely goes back and erases old laws when they make new better ones. So we are left with a jumble of rules and regulations and paperwork that could be streamlined, but never is. Enter the Foster Care system. Created to protect children whose parents couldn’t or wouldn’t do that job themselves.
So the government provides endless doctors and psychologists and professionals to check and double-check the kids in the system. Which is good. But it also makes for a lot of work for people like us, who are also trying to help the children but who also have day jobs. But we persevere because we love our child.
Multiple appointments and dozens of examinations later we’ve learned our daughter is super smart and very advanced. But not in the “my child is very advanced” way that EVERY parent who has ever had a child has said. In an actual, “our child has been tested and scores off the charts every time” way. Yay!
Now
Now she says “dada.”
In fact, it’s her favorite word. She yells it. She chants it. She screams it.
This little girl has never had any parents except us. And she loves to say, “dada dada dada.”
We have a little game we like to play where she says, “hey dad,” and I say, “yeah babes?” and she says, “hey dad,” and I say, “yeah babes?” and she says, “hey dad,” and I say, “yeah babes?”…This goes on for a while. She thinks it’s hilarious. The only thing she thinks is funnier is the word “momma.”
Then
At this time one year ago we were in Africa. We had just lost our foster son to the system. We were devastated and wondering what the plan was for our future.
Now
Now we have a brilliant child, who is so cute we get stopped every time we go to the grocery story, and who loves her parents and smiles more than any baby I have ever seen. And very soon our lives are going to change dramatically. Again.
To be continued…
