The Wonder of Letting In
Seven days after the weight of losing Sam, and the realization that Sam and George would no longer be part of my future, fate came knocking.
Adam and I were on a pre-planned family vacation. I was still processing my grief, and in the quiet moments, I’d slip away to feel it. My body was present, but my mind and spirit were not.
I was numb.
When we’d return to our hotel room, Adam and I would acknowledge that life was different; that it would be different. And without directly saying it, we each had our own thoughts about what that could mean. Do we travel for an undefined amount of time since we both work remotely? Do we rent out our home and live in another country for a while? Do we adopt another dog? What comes next?
My world felt both infinitely smaller and somehow larger at the same time. And what came next felt overwhelming and confusing. Before we could even return home to have the "what's next" conversation, we got an email while browsing in a convenience store in Costa Rica. In short, it said, ...there’s a baby, and the birth mom has chosen you. If you accept, the baby will arrive the first week of May...
I remember looking at Adam and whispering, “This is crazy? Like—it’s crazy, right?”
We agreed to table the conversation until we returned home that weekend since we were with family and weren't confident in a decision. For the next several days, we gave each other space to think about it before coming together on a decision.
When we returned home, we immediately called the center that emailed us and asked all of the questions. We wanted to know more about birth mom and why she was choosing adoption. With every piece of the story, we felt more tugged in the direction that this was our child. The center's final words to us was, "if you're moving forward, you need to get an attorney asap". We both looked at each other and knew we were proceeding with the adoption.
Adoption had always been part of the conversation for us, from our very first date. We didn’t know if or how it would ever come to fruition, but we knew this much: if we became parents, adoption would be our first choice.
And yet, for a long time, parenthood itself felt distant.
As the years passed, we built a life we loved. We traveled often, said yes to last-minute plans, and leaned fully into the freedom we had. Many of our friends knew we weren’t sure if we even wanted children and part of that uncertainty came from me. I struggled with the idea of giving up the life we had created, but there was also more beneath the surface. I had experienced a few health scares and was navigating care with multiple specialists. I was afraid of what pregnancy could do to my body, and even more so, what it might do to my mental health. By the time we began seriously considering parenthood, it started to feel like we had missed our window.
I was also never someone who felt a strong pull toward the traditional path to parenthood. That truth sometimes made me feel like an outsider in conversations with friends, especially when the journey to motherhood was described in ways I couldn’t fully relate to.
Still, that didn’t mean I didn’t want to be a parent. It simply meant that my vision of how I might become one looked different. And in many ways, it clarified what had always been true for us: adoption wasn’t a backup plan, it was the path that felt most aligned to from the very beginning.
That belief in adoption only deepened during my years as a teacher. I saw firsthand how many children move through the foster care system without ever finding a permanent home. There were moments I felt a pull to do more, to offer something beyond the classroom. While adoption wasn’t a viable option for me at the time, I gave what I could: consistency, care, and a safe place to land. Even now, some of those students, grown into adults, still reach out and call me “mom.” That role, in many ways, had already begun to shape me.
Still, as our marriage progressed, the question of whether we would become parents lingered in the background. We would bring it up, then quickly set it aside, choosing instead to keep living the life we loved. But time has a way of making quiet questions louder. Thirty turned into thirty-four, then thirty-five, and eventually the conversations became unavoidable. Would we or wouldn’t we?
With adoption feeling financially and logistically out of reach, and the pressure of time weighing heavily, we reached a decision, at least, for a season. We chose to let go of the idea of parenthood. We embraced the life in front of us, pouring into our roles as aunt and uncle and finding genuine joy there.
We lived that way, happily, for about a year.
Until one day, I brought it up again.
What if?
Around that same time, Adam reconnected with an old friend. In the middle of catching up, the topic of kids came up. Adam shared that we didn’t have any, but that we had always been open to adoption. His friend mentioned a connection to a planning center that occasionally matched birth mothers with prospective parents, and Adam took down the information.
When he told me about it, we agreed to reach out. There was no grand expectation behind it, just a quiet openness. We connected with the center’s director over email, sent a letter and a few photos, and within days, she shared a potential match. We allowed ourselves to consider it, carefully, but the birth mother ultimately did not choose us.
We took it as an answer.
At that point, Adam and I agreed that if we were ever meant to be parents, the universe would have to make it abundantly clear. We simply weren’t going to actively pursue it. So we went back to our lives, including checking off one of our biggest bucket-list destinations: Antarctica.
And then, a little over a year and a half after that initial conversation, we got an email from the center.
We’d been picked.
The following month and a half was a blur. Unlike some adoptions, we didn’t have months, we had weeks. Weeks to prepare a space for our baby. Weeks to complete the documents required by the state. Weeks to begin shifting our hearts from grief to joy. Or maybe just settle with both. And because we weren't going the traditional route of using an adoption agency, the risk was higher (we couldn't demand a lot), it was less formal, but it was far more affordable.
Once we secured our incredible attorney and sent our retainer, we began sharing the news with our family and closest friends. I expected pushback, questions, maybe even people calling us crazy. Instead, we were met with joy, excitement, and many happy tears. Despite how quickly everything was moving, and how far along the birth mom was, we still didn’t know the baby’s sex.
Then, during a casual call with the center’s director, she accidentally said “she,” and my heart dropped. A girl.
Suddenly, all my irrational fears came rushing to the surface. Am I meant to be a girl mom? I don’t have the softness. My familial female relationships throughout life have been complicated, so I didn’t feel equipped. I didn’t feel ready. Admittedly, I cried, not from sadness, but from fear. Fear of the unknown. Fear of failing this little girl as a mom.
And then one night, I woke up with a single thought: Or maybe, this is my chance. My chance to break generational patterns. To heal old wounds. To show up for her in the ways I always wished someone would have shown up for me.
The fear began to slip away. And in its place, a quiet, growing excitement.
We were having a girl.
We celebrated with friends and family who came from all over to welcome this new, exciting, and very quick transition for us. We're still blown away by the amount of love and support we have received through this journey. We were able to share her name with loved ones and truly, everyone's excitement allowed us to feel even more excited. We always wanted a village and we really did have one.
We’ve been parents now for a whole year, and our world has infinitely changed for the better. I’m amazed at how quickly our hearts and minds have shifted. What was once about us is now entirely about her. She is the unexpected in every incredible way. Despite some of the challenges we faced (due to not going the traditional route of adoption), our daughter was born healthy and is growing quickly. For us, adoption was always our first choice and we are forever grateful that all roads led us here.
I still grieve Sam and George every day. I find myself looking for them in the quiet hours of the night when everyone is asleep. Her middle name is deeply special to us, it was chosen so Sam and George could live on through her. I truly believe they sent her to us to help heal our hearts, and I can’t wait to tell her all about them one day.
There are photos of Sam and George throughout our home, including in her nursery, and I’m often brought to tears when she sits and quietly stares at them.
Life has a way of breaking us open just wide enough to let something new in. In the depths of grief, I couldn’t have imagined what was waiting on the other side, but now I see how love makes room. The timing of it all, losing Sam and George, then receiving the call about our daughter just days later, felt impossibly tender and strangely perfect. It was as if their final act of love was making space for hers to begin.
Sam and George were my whole world for so long, and losing them left me undone. But in their absence, they gave us one final gift: the space to welcome someone new. Our daughter didn’t replace them, she carries them with her. And because of them, I am the kind of mother I hope she’ll always feel safe coming home to.
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