Maine trip

I'm not sure what to write to describe out latest trip to Maine. Things didn't turn out as expected and we are left feeling hurt, disappointed, sad, angry, and a variety of other emotions that I haven't even put into words yet.

We got a call at about 1:45 PM Saturday (6/19) from Brian, the birth-father, telling us that Kimberly had had contractions all night and morning. After conversing with the doctors, they decided to call in the weekend crew to have the C-section that day. He said the Operating Room would be available at 2 PM and it would take about an hour. He asked us to come.

We panicked. We scrambled. We ditched all other plans. We were out of there by 6 PM, which included packing, packing, packing (Boy cloths, girl clothes, Benjamin's clothes and toys and other forms of entertainment packing our clothes), changing our cell phone plan, stopping the mail and paper, Joseph going to the office to turn in a time sheet and get the company laptop to work while away, and our sister-in-law bringing the minivan to us from the farm. We threw everything into the van in some haphazard fashion. (It's amazing what you can get done in 4 hours.)

We expected to get a call a little after 3 PM to tell us whether to bring the boy clothes box or the girl clothes box, but we did not get any such call. Brian had called from home, and was for good reason no longer home. We went anyway. A few hours later, while driving somewhere east of Albany, we decided call the hospital. We actually got hold of Kimberly, and she gave us the news: it's a boy, 8 lbs 15 oz, and
healthy. We were glad to hear it had not been a false alarm, because by then we were 150 miles from home. There had been a delay at the hospital because of some other emergency, and Brian had called our home phone instead of our cell phone. She said "tell Joseph happy father's day."

A kind friend in our ward reserved a room for us in Amesbury, MA, north of Boston, with his frequent-traveler points. We didn't get there until after midnight, and weren't asleep until 2. We were dragging the next morning, but continued onward and arrived in Rockland, Maine in the afternoon. It's hard to entertain a 2-year-old in a hospital nursery, so Joseph took a lot of walks with Ben in the hall while Diane and Kim conversed and admired the baby. Benjamin and Joseph also took a trip to the beach, just down the hill past the sign that said access to shore at own risk. Beaches in Maine are rocky, not sandy, so Benjamin threw rocks into the bay.

When we got back to the room, a lawyer was there with paperwork to give us shared power of attorney for the baby. Kimberly signed it, then went home - yes, home. She hadn't slept much the night before, and wanted to get away from it. The next morning she called and said that she had gone to the hospital at 4 AM, and asked that we not come to the hospital before noon. Uh oh. She wanted to have some family time with the baby and her daughter.

At 11:40 the phone rang. Kimberly told us she had changed her mind and wants to raise the child. We were devastated. We talked to the social worker from LDS Family Services and she advised us there was nothing to do except make sure the hospital revocation was in force so that we weren't responsible for the hospital bills.

We stopped by the hospital to say goodbye. Joseph was gracious and told her thanks for considering us. She said if it was any consolation that she would choose us if she were going to place the baby. (I've never been a fan of the consolation prize)
We needed to leave Maine --We made it to Worcester, MA that night, swam in the pool, slept in, swam in the pool again, and made it home by 4 PM yesterday. The whole experience was barely 72 hours, but seemed like a month.

I don't know how to describe the feeling that is left over, but I do believe in the atonement and that Christ can heal our hearts. Strangely enough even with the grief we somehow feel better off. We are however left wondering about The Plan. For us, it's a different course than we imagined over the last 5 weeks. We wonder what will become of this child and hope that Ben might get to be a big brother someday. He was so cute with the little guy.




Originally I wasn't going to post these, but I had a change of heart. Isn't Ben a cutie?