For approximately 90 minutes today, I was the mother of a 3 day old baby boy. I got the call around 10:15 that the birthmother’s choice of parents weren’t ICWA compliant, and we were the choice of the Cherokee Nation to be in compliance with ICWA (Indian Child Welfare Act, that requires Native American children be placed in Native American homes, which we fit because John happens to be 3/32 Choctaw). The catch was that we had to accept placement TODAY, and get a lawyer and temporary custody TODAY. We kicked into crisis mode and started to work on everything we needed; called a lawyer friend, went to go buy clothes and crib sheets and such to get us through the first few days. Around 11:45, we got another call, from our caseworker. The baby was “no longer eligible for placement.” We don’t know why.

I had no expectation, no way of anticipating, how much it would hurt for this to fall through. I never laid eyes on him. I don’t know how big or little he is. All I know is that he was born February 2^nd. And yet, in those 90 minutes, as I made phone calls, as I picked up the house, as we hurried to go buy essentials before we hurried out of town to go pick him up, I was falling deeply in love with him without realizing it.

We had just gotten into line when the call came; we turned around, and all the things we’d chosen in joyful anticipation, we now returned to the shelves quietly. As I put things back, my heart grew heavier and heavier, but the tears didn’t come for a while yet. They’ve come now… and it helps, some.

I’ve prayed for the parents who are taking him home, I’ve prayed for him, and I’ve thanked God for the birthmother who chose life for her son, both in carrying him to term and in deciding to find a good home for him. But it still hurts… and I’m surprised. Because… well, he wasn’t really ever my son… but for 90 minutes, for those 90 minutes, I was looking forward to taking him in my arms, to cradling him close. I was ok with the fact that we didn’t have a carrier for him; it meant I got to hold him more. We’re going to my sister’s next week; I was going to be able to share him with her, my nieces & nephews would meet their new cousin. I was building his life in those 90 minutes, and I didn’t realize how much I had invested myself into him.

I’m an all or nothin’ kinda girl. I don’t really know how to hold back. It’s why I can’t see how to be a foster parent… I can’t hold part of me back so I don’t get hurt. For 90 minutes today, a baby boy in Kingfisher, Oklahoma, was getting all of me. We’ll never know each other for who we were to each other today, but for 90 minutes today, he was my son, and I was his mother, and I gave him my all.

And when the next call comes, I’ll do it all over again. And again. And again. They deserve no less, and I can give no other way. But oh, how surprising it was to find it hurts as much as it does. That’s the way it is with love… love deeply, freely, and the wounds go deep… but living any other way is no life at all.

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