Eli's Biological Rendezvous

My jump into adoption consultation was inspired by my recent visit to Oakland, Calif. when I took my son to reunite with his birthparents for the first time since he was born. I signed a contact agreement with his birthparents before he was born allowing them a few visits during his youth and this past October, they were ready to meet him. I wasn't nervous about the visit, I was actually dreading it and feeling obligated, more than anything, to follow through on my promise. I think the love and endearment that struck all of us took everyone by surprise, and watching Eli with his birthparents, I had never been more certain that I was giving him the greatest gift adoption had to offer.

Eli's birthparents, Angela and Roy, came to our hotel to meet us. I had a few minutes to sit down with them and talk before Eli woke up from his nap. Angela's eyes welled with tears as she thanked me for bringing him and apologized for not being financially stable enough to see him earlier. I watched as she opened her purse and pulled out a slightly wrinkled sheet of white paper with two tiny stamped footprints on it and my mind flashed back to Eli's little hospital cart when he was born. I remembered the nurses making the footprints and taping them to the side of his bed. I remembered sending them with Angela when she left the hospital after watching her cry only two big tears as she kissed him goodbye, not knowing when she would see him again. I wanted her to have something from him, of him, because I would have him everyday. "I want you to have this," she said, passing it to me. "It belongs with you. When he asks about how he was born, you should have it." I touched the little footprints, memories flooding in, and shook my head. "When he starts asking, I want him to ask you," I said. "I want him to come to you and I want you to be able to show him what you have from that day."

We took Eli to a nearby park so that Angela and Roy could spend some quality time with him. Eli seemed at ease with them, happy to have their undivided attention and some devoted playmates for the next hour. I tried to stay on the outskirts of the park so as not to hover and to give them some time without my interference. I watched as Roy carried Eli on his shoulders, as Angela pushed him on the tire swing, and saw, from the outside, the striking love and resemblance woven between the three of them. My heart broke. It was like watching what could've been if Angela and Roy had known better circumstances. I couldn't imagine seeing your son, bonding with him and becoming attached, only to say goodbye at the end of the day and send him home with someone else. If I was Angela, I don't think I could've faced a day like that. It would've been easier to keep my distance and not know the pain of having to say goodbye yet again. These two strong, brave people were facing the worst kind of hurt, a deep-rooted suffering, but were choosing to take away the love and joy of the moment.

I thought back to my own childhood, having been adopted myself. I wondered everyday what my birthparents were like and how I might be similar to them. I was just a young girl when I started thinking about whether or not I looked like my birthparents. I wondered if we had things in common, liked the same things. Which is not to say that I ever resented being adopted or felt angry towards my parents. The whole beginning to my story simply remained a mystery ... the details of my birth, the people involved, the sequence of events, the emotions that everyone felt. So much of my past, of my history, was locked away in some stranger's mind, in some stranger's memory; a stranger who could be anyone I passed on the street, or someone living in another country that I may never meet. I thought of my sweet little Eli and how he would ask one day and have all the same questions, except I would be able to give him the answers. When he started wondering, Angela and Roy would be there to tell him the story, to tell him they loved him so much, they wanted something better than they were ever capable of giving him. Eli would grow up seeing me hug his birthparents. He would see the love and respect between us, the bond he had forever created between two sets of strangers, the gift we had given each other that would last our lifetime. I was so happy, at that moment, that Angela and Roy had given my son his history so he wouldn't grow up thinking he was a mystery. The power of what I felt was so overwhelming, I couldn't help but tear up and feel utterly grateful to Angela and Roy for choosing me to be their son's mother.