The question...

When you adopt a child, you know there will come a day when that child will know that they were not born from your body.  You have no idea how or when that day will come, and what questions will be asked that cause you to reveal that information to your child.

From the beginning of our adoption journey, we knew that we would be open with our child about the story of how he came into our family.  And since there is obviously a slight racial difference, we knew it would never be a secret that he was adopted.  But as the years passed, and I have been asked probably 100 times if he is adopted by perfect strangers, he has never noticed or cared that he looks different than the rest of us.

We talk about babies, and when he was a baby, and when the girls were babies...and probably 9 months ago he discovered a picture in my bedroom of me VERY pregnant with A.  We talked about Mommy's big belly, and that baby A was growing inside Mommy's belly.  And for a while he would go to my room, look at the picture, and get this cheesy grin on his face, like he knew a secret.  It was very cute!!  But he hasn't looked at that picture in months...

Yesterday, R was playing Play-Doh at the kitchen table while I was fixing his dinner.  Concentrating on his work, he asked "Mommy, when I was a baby, did I grow in your tummy?"  And there it was...the moment I knew would come...and somehow wasn't ready for...

I walked over to the table and explained to him that he didn't grow in my tummy.  He grew in another Mommy's tummy, and she loved him so much that she wanted the very best for him, and she wanted him to not only have a Mommy, but a great Daddy that could teach him how to grow into a good man.  So she let her baby come to be part of our family.  I told him that God brought that Mommy to us, and brought him into our family in a different way than having him grow in my tummy.

He continued playing with his Play-Doh, not even noticing the tears in my eyes.  Seeing that he was done with the conversation, and that was enough information for him at that moment, I went back to preparing his dinner.  A few minutes later he looked up at me with those big brown eyes and said "I love you, Mommy."   And my heart melted!!  What a story we have in this little guy!!  And so much more story to tell him in the future!  It truly is a God story!!

While I was shocked at the moment that he asked his question, I can't wait for more questions from him as he becomes more aware.  We have such a story to tell him.  He was loved from the beginning...by the woman who carried him for 9 months...and then by us the moment we met him...and he is loved still...by the woman who carried him for 9 months, by us, and pretty much everyone else he meets!!

This is the moment I fell in love with this little guy.  This is the first time we met him, after knowing he had been born, but was in the NICU...with no other information...for 24 hours.  Having biological children, I had no idea how I would feel holding a baby in my arms for the first time, knowing he was mine, but without that bond of carrying him for 9 months and delivering him.  I could not have loved him more at that moment...overwhelming love and wanting to protect and comfort him...it was amazing!