Welcome to The Egg Drop Post, where I write about life with my wife, Nadia, and the joys of motherhood.
After three years of trying to get pregnant, three months ago, I became a mom through the miracle of domestic adoption.
This week will be an exciting one. I promise the first Egg Drop Post give away, surveys, interviews, and much, much more.
I am looking forward to reconnecting with many of you and meeting many more.
One of the all time highlights of my BlogHer’10 experience was meeting Pam Spaulding of Pam’s House Blend. I have admired her work for many years. I visit her site several times a day for updates on the state of LGBT America from a progressive point of view. Pam is an African-American lesbian who is really rocking the blogosphere. And I’m one of many people who think the world of her.
As stated on her website, she launched Pam’s House Blend in July 2004 as a personal response to the anti-gay state of the political landscape. Her website now averages 120,000 visitors a month (you go girl!).
Pam’s House Blend is ranked in the top 50 progressive political blogs. Michael Rogers, editor and publisher of gay blog PageOneQ.com: “Pam is certainly the most important lesbian blogger in America. She’s a lesbian in a gay blogging world that is overwhelmingly gay men. She’s a blogger as a woman in an overwhelmingly male-dominated world and she’s of color and the internet is so skewed to the privileged.” So what is not to love?
She has provided commentary on CNN during the 2008 presidential election cycle, and contributed to and participated in a gazillion progressive political forums. Let’s face it, she is seriously impressive.
Anyway, I knew that she was going to be at the conference but since I had never been, I didn’t know what to expect. I didn’t know if I would get the chance to meet her. I mean before the conference began I asked myslef: would all of the speakers be cordoned off in an exclusive green room? or would they be separated from the blogosphere minions, like me, by a velvet rope?
Imagine my surprise when I ran into Pam Spaulding exiting the exhibit hall. I am not exactly shy, so I ran up to her and said, “OMIGOD, I am one of your biggest fans! I go to your website several time a day.” And then I thought to myself, “okay, that was stupdi, Eva. Here we go…”
But she turned out to be one of the nicest, sweetest, most down to earth people that I have ever met. She was warm and supportive. When I told her about my infertility, my blog, and my adopted son, she encouraged me to keep blogging to tell my story. She said that I had an important perspective, as a lesbian, to share with the world.
“You think so?” I said in the midst of about 2400 other bloggers who also consider their stories important.
“Yes,” she replied.
And that ‘yes’, really made my day!
I told her that I wrote anonymously and that I was nervous about showing my face on my blog and she encouraged me to take my time but that it would be valuable if I could be more visible. So she empowered me to take a picture with her to post on my site. And if you see any additional pictures of me on this site, it’s thanks to Pam (thanks, Pam!)
I also asked her what strategies she used to build her site in such a competitive environment and she gave me some tips, encouragement, and an wonderful opportunity.
She encouraged me to create a diary on her site in which I would write about infertility and adoption from a lesbian perspective and boy do I have lot of material, starting with some of my experiences with wacky doctors ,my crazy insurance fights, and some never disclosed adoption teachable moments. She said she would promote it (fist pumps!) So I have been reflecting on my experience , and thinking about what fresh stories I want to tell about my life as a lesiban infertile and adoptive mom. That series will start soon, so stay tuned.
At any rate, I just wanted to reiterate something that I’ve been saying for a long time about this community. The blogosphere, with all of his drawbacks, is a great place. For example, I’ve cried over the life stories of people that I’ve never met; shared information about the intimate details of my reproductive organs that I would never even share with members of my own family; and I’ve found my “voice”– something that I struggled to find for many years.
It also provides opportunities to meet incredible people. It is always a thrill to meet a blogger, particuarly, one whose blog you’ve followed for years, who really exceeds your in real life expectations; and that was certainly the case for me when I met Pam Spaulding.
I had a great time at BlogHer ‘10. What struck me the most is how much I don’t know about blogging.
I learned that I don’t have any “influence” and that in order to get it I need to understand many, many technical things. For example, do you know the difference between internal, inbound, outbound links? Or how to leverage SEO optimization, stat counters, and RSS feed? Lastly, do you know anything about google juice? Well, I think I do but just don’t ask me to explain it.
One of the things that I really learned was that I’m not sure I’m ready for prime time. There are some serious mommy bloggers who really know how to work the crowd and I’m not sure I will ever be up to speed.
Oh well!
Anyhoo, the swag was awesome, I got new and improved weebles wobblers, a playdoh kit, and, of course, the ubiquitous water bottle, which never goes out of style in NYC heat!
I must say one of the highlights of the conference was meeting other bloggers from the Adoption, Loss, Infertility community.
I was a little nervous to meet the fabulous, Mel, from Stirrup Queens who brought us all together last Friday, but she was awesome in person. And I also to meet Calliope, of IVP fame, from Creating Motherhood! Yippee!
I had fun such lovelies as Dora from My Preconceived Notion, Briar from Unwellness, and Kir from, Kir’s Corner.
And, last but not least, I met a fellow adoptive mom, Lori from Weebles Webblog, who is featured in this month’s Parenting Magazine as one of the Must Read Moms; you go girl!
Lunch was such a gratifying, wonderful experience I can’t wait to do it again next year. In San Diego?
Later that day, I met one of my blogosphere idols and I was so moved by that interaction I will devote an entire post to that meeting later this week, along with photos.
All in all, BlogHer ‘10 was a great experience; just don’t quiz me on anything.
The past three years have been whole heartedly devoted to trying to concieve but in addition to fantacizing about becoming a mom, I also secretly fantacized about becoming a mommy blogger. I always thought it would be really cool to join the ranks of many of you and to write about the trials and tribulations involved in being a mom.
When Baby Jaycame into our lives he made so many of my dreams come true like providing unconditional love, helping me to relive moments of my childhood, and allowing me to connect with my mom in unimaginable ways. But he also opened up the door to mommy blogging.
And I can’t thank him enough.
Recently, I emailed the good ladies at BlogHer to inquire about my network status. Since I joined the BlogHer network three years ago, I have been in the infertility category, which means that my headlines are broadcast to other infertility bloggers. I was really nervous because I thought I would have to reapply to the network to be considered under another category. Here’s what I wrote.
<<Hi, I am Eva from the Egg Drop Post. I have been writing under the infertility category but I would like to be moved to the parenting category now that I have a son. Do I need to reapply? Please advise. Thank you.>>
Thankfully, here is how they responded…
<<I’m an editor with the BlogHer Publishing Network. Thanks for getting in touch! Actually I apologize that we haven’t done this ourselves already, we try to remember to email folks and invite them to switch when their blog / life changes, and we just dropped the ball on this one. We’ll be happy to get you moved to parenting. It might take a couple of days, but you should see the headlines under your ad change and then you’ll know it done.>>
Whew! The response was perfect.
I’m a mommy blogger and I’m attending BlogHer ‘10. Today was the first day of the conference and it was great. I met a lot of wonderful bloggers that I’ve been following for years, got lots of swag (aka free goodies) and I can’t wait to go back tomorrow.
Soon, I will write a complete update about BlogHer ‘10 and my life with Baby Jay!
Fortnately, we didn’t hear from the birth mom yesterday so Baby Jay is officially ours! We are thrilled! The finalization process will actually take several months but for all practical purposes he is ours.
Finally, the Happy Dance for me!
When I was trying to get pregnant, I was always waiting. Waiting to start a cycle, waiting to trigger my ovulation, for insemination, waiting to do a pregnancy test, waiting for the doctor to call with lab results. It was excruciating and one of the things that I liked about getting off of the trying to conceive train (TTC) train was the fact that I wouldn’t have to do any of that crap any more.
So then, I started the adoption process and I started another wait. Instead of waiting for my body to do something, I was often waiting on someone else. First and foremost was the paper wait. i spent a lot ot time waiting for paper to be sent, filled out, filed, and approved.
Then, I launched my ad campaign and started waiting for the phone to ring! Every day, I would wait by the phone and that was a different shade of hell. It was more externalized, less personalized, and gave me a little distance from the voices in my head that beat me up when I’m under stress, but I still heard voices.
This is never going to work. You are never going to be a mom. You’ve made another mistake.
Luckily, after three years, we finally turned a corner.
Okay, now that we have our precious Baby Jay, I feel like I am running the last leg of a marathon. I am almost there, tired, and out of breathe, but I see the finish line.
Jay’s birth mom has until Friday to change her mind. After Friday, in the court’s mind, she would have relinquished any of her rights to Baby Jay and we will be free to more towards adoption finalization. Friday, June 18th, represents a crossing over of sorts for me and it makes this wait all the more difficult.
This time, I have the baby. I know his smile, his smell, his likes and dislikes. I am no longer living in the realm of fantasy. This is real. Jay is my son. When I hold him in my arms, when I am burping him, for example, it couldn’t be more real. I know his cries: hungry, gassy, and tired. It would be beyond words devastating if Baby Jay’s birth mom were to call before Friday. Even though it hasn’t even been a month since I met him, I can’t even imagine my life without him. Nadia is counting down the days and has been since we brought him home. I am not and I’m not quite sure why.
I have been thinking, Friday will come and go and he will be ours. But as Friday nears, I keep thinking about what his birth mom could be going through. What is she thinking? How is she feeling? Has she thought about picking up the phone? She has our 1-800# and my email; I gave them to her. She could call me or the agency at any time. Does she have regrets? Or is she is fiendishly trying to put the whole thing behind her and move on with her life?
I guess I will never know. But what I do know is that whatever she thinks and doesn’t think, I will forever be in her debt because she gave me a perfect gift; she gave me this moment. I am Jay’s mom. The is what I have been waiting for: the here and the now with my son.
Since we brought Baby Jay home on Thursday, my days have been filled with feedings, burbings and diaper changing! Even our cat, Remi, has been completely captivatated by the little on as you can see from this photo
Nadia and I are loving every minute of it.
He is scrumptious!
Unfortunately, I can’t post any identifying photos for at least 30 days. His birth mom has until Friday, June 18th to change her mind. After that time, we work with the agency to finalize the adoption.
I’ll write more when I can.
Where to start?
We met the birth mom, Martine, yesterday and the most beautiful baby boy in the world. She was incredibly sweet, poised and loving. When we walked into the hospital room, she gave us both big hugs!
We picked up the baby a few minutes later and he is an absolute dream. I could have stayed there all afternoon just looking at him. What a site! I didn’t want to let him go.
The night before Nadia and I had a little tiff over the baby’s name because I didn’t want to be presumptuous and pick out a name before Martine surrendered him to us. Nadia, on the other hand, thought that it would be important for our bonding to pick out a name. So we did, though I was a little pissy about it.
And I’m so glad we did.
Martine let us name the baby for the official birth certificate. From now on, I will call him Baby Jay! We gave him a first and last name. Martine will get the official birth certificate with his first and second names as well as her last name and then we will have a new one reissued in 3 to 6 months with our last names.
How exciting!
We asked Martine how she was feeling. She looked great for someone who had just had a c-section 2 days ago. I had some pictures to show her of our family and she showed me a picture of her three year old daughter, who is absolutely gorgeous!
She asked us if we felt we were ready for this and we kind of stammered through that answer.
Nadia said, “Well, um, we wanted to be parents for many years but…”
Martine, ” Well, I hope I am not causing too much trouble…”
”Not at all, ” I piped in, “we are very excited! We just have a lot to learn.”
And she smiled warmly.
If all goes well today, we will bring him home later this afternoon. I can’t believe it!
In preparation for the arrival of our little miracle, I compiled a list of your suggestions and we visited Tar.get last night. When we got to the baby section, I thought my head would explode(!) so we just bought the basics. There is a lot to learn. Especially for me. I’ve fantasized about being a mom for several years, but I’ve had no ‘real time’ to plan. Needless to say, it’s all overwhelming yet very welcome!
THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR ALL OF YOUR HELP!
