Saying Goodbye and Then Taking Her Home

Monday morning came, and we heard there was a good chance the baby would be discharged from the hospital on this day. We never really contemplated driving home. We made the commitment that we would stay in Kentucky until we either went home with this baby or knew she had been discharged. We loved her fiercely since January when we said yes to adopting her, and leaving her with so much unknown in the air wasn’t an option for us.

So, we got up to the hospital early Monday morning. We literally sat in the waiting room all day with no new information. We did learn that it would actually be Tuesday when the baby would be discharged, but we still decided to stay up there as long as we could. Being close to her made us pray for her more and felt like we were with her, even though we weren’t looking at her or holding her.

The attorney and workers on this baby’s case would update us periodically, but nothing was hopeful for us having her. But we knew we had been put in her life for a reason, so we continued to pray for her future, even if it wasn’t with us.

Our sweet friends, Jason and Andrea Isaacs came up and prayed for us in the waiting room. Even though we were still holding out hope to have this girl as ours, we were facing the reality of that not likely happening. We started to feel like maybe we were in Kentucky to love on the birth family and to be Jesus to them even when we were hurting.

We just kept praying for the future of this baby, and surrendering more than ever—continuing to fight for her but trusting that ultimately God was fighting for her and for us–whatever that meant.

So, we went home Monday night more hopeless than ever, but also more at peace as we were face to face with trusting God’s sovereignty even if it was not for this baby to join our family like we had been planning for the last 9 months.

At this point Josh and I had decided that we would not pursue any action to try and force this adoption to happen. We signed up to adopt because we were asked to by the birth mother. We could not get okay with this being anything other than a loving birth mom choosing to give this child to a family she already trusts so much. We were battling what was best for the baby, trusting God’s sovereignty, and wanting to support the birth mother in her decision—whatever that might be.

Even though we felt like the best place for the baby to be was with us- who were we to decide that? We just kept praying for God’s will–we did not want to be a part of forcing anything to happen. Our relationship with the birth mother is incredibly important to us, and we were unwilling to get involved in anything other than this incredible woman choosing to send this little girl with us.

So, Tuesday rolled around and we went up to the hospital to see the baby for what we thought was the final time as she was being discharged. We were allowed to go into the nursery to see this sweet baby girl. We got there right as she was in the middle of being discharged. We held her, fed her, loved on her, and prayed for her.

As we were saying our goodbyes, my phone received a text message. It was from the birth mother. She said that she had continued to think really hard about what was best for the baby, and she wanted us to adopt her.

At first, I wasn’t sure if this was for real. After all, we thought these were our last moments with her, and then I just got a text message saying otherwise. The workers at the hospital told us to hold tight and wait until they heard from the attorney to see what was really going on.

We got up to the hospital around 11:30, and we waited until 5 pm when we got the official word from the attorney in Kentucky. The birth mother went by the attorney’s office and signed the adoption paperwork. This baby was officially ours.

We could not believe it. We thought it was over. We had completely surrendered this child into God’s hands, which was the safest place for her to be, and then he entrusted her back to us—wow, talk about humbling, and pressure 🙂 Obviously, she is still in His hands, but it was clear He had entrusted her to us as her parents on this earth.

We didn’t have anything up at the hospital with us. Every other time we had visited the hospital, we had baby outfits, diapers, hats, carseat, etc..but on this Tuesday, we had no reason to believe we would come home with her. Everything was at the house with our parents in Kentucky.

We thought about calling them to tell them to bring the carseat, but then as we contemplated more, we decided we wanted to try and surprise them. Because we needed to give them another heart attack, clearly:)

We had Genevieve’s carseat in our car, and after reading the safety instructions on it, we learned that it could fit a baby down to 5 pounds, and this baby was 5 pounds, 4 ounces when they weighed her last at the hospital. Score!!!! We had a chance of completely surprising our parents and didn’t need the infant carrier carseat.

As all the paperwork was processed, they called for a wheelchair. They said they needed to wheel me out to our car in a wheel chair. I could not wrap my head around this. Just days before I had been wheeled out of a hospital with a baby I birthed, and now I was about to be wheeled out of the hospital with our youngest daughter who had grown in my heart for 9 months right along with her sister who was growing in my body.

Wow, God you are just incredible.

So, there I was, being wheeled out of the hospital with a baby we thought we were saying goodbye to. Instead, she was given to us for forever–until we give her away to her husband. Gosh, I can’t even go there!!!

As we strapped her in the carseat, we were pretty silent on the way home. We of course were ecstatic, but we were hurting for the birth family, hurting for everyone involved, and just recovering from the emotional trauma we had all been through.

As we pulled up to our Kentucky house, my heart was beating a million beats a minute. Our parents thought we were about to come in and update them on what happened with this sweet girl today, and instead we were walking in with our youngest daughter. I was scared, anxious, nervous, overwhelmed with every emotion.

As we walked in through the back door to the kitchen, they were all sitting at the dining room table. They all said hey, and when we turned the corner with our sweet baby, the sobbing began.

They couldn’t believe it. We still couldn’t believe it. She is ours. More to come about the following days, but here is a sweet photo of our youngest baby girl, Lydia Joyce Taylor. She is perfection in every way.

Humbled and honored to be entrusted with these three innocent precious girls,

Aly