Today marks one year ago that we received our referral of Miss Addison. I remember the exact place I sat and the exact look and tone of voice my husband used when he came sweeping into my bedroom and over to my computer (of course!) to tell me we got our referral.

I wish I could say my response was unrequited joy, like his. It wasn’t. It was doubt, skepticism, cautious pessimism even. Enough had gone wrong at that point that I knew not to really get my hopes up.

Our agency had called Tony’s cell phone, of all places, and left a message saying that they had a baby girl for us, she was born 4/28/2007 which made her 9 weeks old. They said they would send over photos and medicals and, until I saw those precious documents, I knew not to get my hopes up. I knew nothing about her that night, other than her birthday.

Can I tell you what a long wait it was until the next morning when we finally got the medicals? Yes, just the medicals, no photos. No face to put with the birthday, the weight, the location of our daughter. Becuase, oops, the facilitator forgot to attach them! Forgot. To. Attach. The. Photos. Seriousy? Just our luck.

Don’t they understand the ART of delivering the perfect referral?!? haha.

We got the medicals at 11:30 am and the pictures at 9pm on July 7, the day after our referral phone call. I think that was the longest 9.5 hours of my life, second only to the night before when we knew we had a referral but didn’t HAVE the referral.

I wish I had one of those truly wonderful referral stories. I’m jealous of those who adopt from China for that reason alone - they can be really READY for their referral, it is a big deal, it isn’t just a “Hey, we have a baby and we’ll send you info as we get around to it” voicemail.

But however we got it, WE GOT IT!!!!!!! To me, this is MY birth story. Regardless, it came how it came. And that is the day we became parents.

This is what I posted on the day after referral day: A Mother’s Story

Then:

Now:

This entry was posted on Friday, July 6th, 2007 at 6:17 pm and is filed under Adoption, Holidays & Vacations, Milestones, Photos & Videos. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.