We’re standing in a shop in a small town in Massachusetts when the phone rings. It’s the agency calling to let us know they got our profile box, and ask us if we’d be interested in a match. The birth mother is due any minute – on July 23, to be precise. Still, she sounds really fun and interesting, and shares a lot of our interests. In fact, she even shares some of Kat’s interests. Another horse lover! So what are waiting adoptive parents to do? We said yes – show her our profile. The family members with us we’re equally excited, and we all waited for the phone to ring!

We spent the rest of the day at cooking school whispering names to each other and trying to calm the butterflies in our stomachs. We didn’t hear another word. We went to bed, still exchanging names and getting excited.

When we first got the call, both of us were pretty thrown at the idea of becoming parents again over the weekend. As the day wore on, we thought, “Why not? How lucky are we?!” We heard nothing. By the next morning, we were starting to feel disappointed. She must’ve picked someone else, or didn’t like our profile as much as we thought she would. Still, it’s hard to let go. Maybe she’s just thinking it over or maybe she gave birth yesterday and set the profile books aside. Maybe she changed her mind. Maybe another family was just a better fit.

We know this game, and we know how impatient and scared we are in the situation. After all, we’d be jumping on a plane to fly across the country on a moments notice. I’ve mentioned before that, as this is not our first adoption, our response to it has been different. That is true up to a point. Still, when you get a call about a baby, you jump out of your skin every time.