The first time I saw Abi

I like this video because it shows the intense, immense emotions that adoptive couples feel when they first meet their child. I remember the emotions I felt when we first met Abi. The whole situation felt so unreal to me – I expected to wake up and find it was all a dream like I had done many times before.

Abi was born by C-section so we were not present. They brought her to the nursery right after her birth to be cleaned and checked. The nurse asked us if we were ready to meet our daughter and led us to the nursery, every step filled with excitement and years of hope. That was a very difficult walk because I wanted to run down the hallway and scoop Abi up and yet I had to hold back out of respect to the birth parents’ emotions and hospital protocol. Have you ever had to hold yourself back from something that has been a subject in every prayer for years and is finally almost yours? It is very difficult!

When I walked through the nursery door and rounded the corner, I was stunned into silence and awe. There under the warmer was a wiggly, healthy, chubby, beautiful baby girl. She was crying and she was real! It was all I could do to keep from bawling but I didn’t want to smear my vision of that very sacred event. It was love at first sight as I have never experienced! In that moment, she was mine!!!