Posts Tagged ‘Birthfather’

The man who bought me my hot chocolate, his name was Russ and he is a flight student in the Navy. I know this now because I saw him in Circle K, and I smiled and said hello and thanked him for his generous gift. We talked for a few minutes and then we both had to head off to our perspective jobs. Russ makes me feel conflicted. He is handsome and generous, someone that in another time and a place I would love to go on a date with and I would be hopeful that a relationship would form, but can you date while you’re pregnant? I’m not sure, but as he hasn’t asked me out yet, I suppose that’s putting the cart before the horse.

With Rob back in town, Mary and I setup a phone call between us and Beth and John. I wanted to do it while he was still out of town, but he surprised me and said that he would like to be there. In an effort to show that I was willing to be accommodating I drove out to his house on the day of the call and they called us there.

It was a strange feeling, that feeling that this house that had been OUR house, was not mine anymore. It seemed a little surreal to be there as a visitor, but I was excited to talk to Beth and John so when the phone rang on schedule at 6:00 I could hardly keep myself from answering the phone like a breathless teenager.

“Hello?” I said, and for a split second I was filled with terror, what if this was Emily?

“Hello, is this Joy?” a woman’s voice said from the other end.

“Yes, yes it is!” I said excitedly.

“This is Beth,” the voice said.

“And John,” a male voice chimed in.

“This is Rob, the birthfather, I’m here too.” Rob said from the phone in the bedroom.

It is very hard for me to explain the connection that I felt to Beth and John from that very first phone call, but I felt an immediate connection. I felt a current of excitement between the three of us immediately. Beth and John started to ask questions about how I was feeling, what my likes and dislikes were now that I was pregnant. I told them about my recent cravings for Crab Rangoon, how during the really ferocious bouts of “morning” sickness my coworkers were bringing me french fries since they seemed to stay down better. I got a sense that Beth and John were happy that I had people in my corner. I told them about feeling the baby, and I could tell they were as excited as I was! I asked about what they do for a living, what preparations they had made, and without me asking they told me about the journey that brought them to adoption.

Rob stayed quiet during the first excited exchanges and then he cleared his throat and said “I have some questions I would like to ask.”

Hmmm, this was news to me.

“What religion are you people?” Rob said.

“We’re Catholic,” John said.

“I guess that’s okay, I wouldn’t want to give my baby to a Satanist or anything” He said.

Nervous laughter erupted from me, and I could tell it sounded off, but frankly, this was as unexpected to me as it probably was to Beth and John.

“I’m Mormon, so Religion is very important to me.” Rob announced.

In truth, Rob was raised Seventh Day Adventist and in college became LDS when he met his wife, well now ex-wife. He was a non-practicing LDS, early on in our relationship I had helped him burn his garments and other things that he was not allowed to wear because of his current Church status. I was a Christian Mutt, raised Episcopal, went to a Catholic School, and attending a Methodist Church – never during the course of our relationship was religion ever an issue – I was shocked to hear it was an issue today.

Rob asked more questions about their educational backgrounds, their relationship, and their family medical history. At this point the Rob was asking questions and John was answering them and I felt like a tub of cold water had been thrown on me. I knew about their education backgrounds and their relationship, all of the questions that Rob asked were in their profile. I also though asking about their medical histories was kind of funny because that was really something we brought to the table more than the adoptive parents.

Finally, Rob seemed out of questions and there was a pause.

“Would you like to exchange email addresses?” Beth asked softly.

“No thanks, have a good evening,” Rob said and hung up.

“I would!” I said at the same time, and then repeated it after Rob hung up, “I would really like that Beth.”

So we exchanged email addresses and said our good-byes. I hung up the phone feeling happy and hopeful.

I left Rob’s house that night a few minutes later. I had nothing to say about his interrogation, because I tried to remind myself that what we needed to feel confident in our decision was different and as long as he felt comfortable and at ease with our decision, it should ultimately make the whole process easier on all parties involved and who was I to say what should be important to him in this process?

“What does this one say?” Rob asked, standing in the master bathroom near the sink with his back to me.

“It’s positive, like the last two, so can we put an end to the farce – clearly I’m pregnant.” I said as I handed him the third pregnancy test I had taken for him in the last half hour, making my way to go sit down on the bed.

In the bedroom I contemplated the bed, the bed that had been our bed and I decided to make my way to the living room instead. I sat down on the sofa and found that I couldn’t get comfortable, every fiber of my being reminded me that this wasn’t my home anymore, I didn’t want to be there. He had followed me into the living room and sat down in his recliner but was eyeing me warily. The was silence between us, not the companionable silence that comes with intimacy a new uneasy silence.

I could feel tears threatening to fill my eyes. This had been my home, and he had been my love, were we really reduced to this? He distrusted me so much that I had been asked to take not one, but THREE pregnancy tests. We could hardly hold a civilized discussion.

I had called Rob no less than a dozen times before he finally answered, realizing I was not going to stop calling until I got to talk to him. I explained the situation calmly and concisely – I was pregnant and I planned on placing the baby for adoption, I was only calling him because he had to sign paperwork as well. (Frankly, I didn’t really want to have this conversation over the phone but my concern was that I would never get him face to face with a cryptic “we need to talk” message.)

“Emily is going to be very unhappy about this,” he said putting an end to the akward silence.

It was the wrong thing to say, like striking a match to kindling, my sadness flared into anger with that one statement.

“Your new girlfriend’s happiness is really the least of my concerns right now,” I said as I rose to my feet and started for the door.

“Hey wait,” he said as he jumped to his feet and gently grabbed my arm, “I’m sorry it was the first thing that came to my mind.”

“How lucky for me that when I tell you I’m pregnant, her happiness is the first thing that comes to your mind,” I said bitterly, this was not going the way I had planned.

“Look, sit back down, let’s talk about this,” he said.

I sat back down, even less comfortably, on the edge of the sofa. I was ready to bolt for the door in case things took a turn for the worst.

“You know that I won’t be paying you any child support, right?” He blurted out.

The only good thing about Rob’s statement is that I was so shocked, I couldn’t make a break for it. He knocked the wind out of me.

“What?” I asked

“I won’t be paying you any child support if you change your mind and decide to keep the baby.”

I thought I was angry before, when he brought up Emily, but now I was irate.

“First and foremost, IF I decided to keep the baby, you are legally obligated to help support YOUR child, no matter what your intentions are,”

“I will leave the country before I pay you a dime in child support,” he interrupted me.

My eyes narrowed but I continued on as though I had not been interrupted “and secondly, conversations like this are exactly why I think it would be better if we placed the baby for adoption. We can’t hold a civilized conversation, let alone co-parent a child.”

I was on my feet and out the door before he could respond. I made it as far as the front porch when a wave of nausea crashed over me and I bent over and threw up in the bushes and that was where he found me.

Sitting on the front porch in the afternoon sun, after I had thrown up on the zinnas, we had a much calmer discussion. Maybe he had realized I wasn’t the enemy, this wasn’t a ploy to trap him, I had an adoption plan and really and truly if I could’ve not involved him, I wouldn’t have. Maybe seeing me in a weakened state brought out some of the tender feelings that he still had for me, somewhere underneath all the drama. Perhaps it was just that the porch was a safer, more neutral location, but calmly and civilly we discussed “our” adoption plan. (I was a little disgruntled that he was suddenly acting like he had been responsible in making the adoption plan, but as long as it got his signature on the dotted line I wasn’t going to split hairs.)

I calmly and rationally explained my search for an adoption attorney, what Mary had said when she talked to me, and where things would go from here.

“So what do you need from me?” he asked in a tentative voice, and I felt more relaxed.

We discussed and debated and in the end we agreed to three things -

First and foremost, he was not going to discuss the pregnancy at work. We lived in a small town, at the heart of which is a miltary base where Rob worked. Someday, his job would take him out of this town and I didn’t forever want to be known as the girl he got pregnant. I had already learned that gossip spread like wildfire across the base.

Second, Rob did not want to tell his parents. They lived out of State and were all ready out of sorts with him, because earlier this year he had relinquished parental rights to his daughter from his first marriage. His daughter was not quite six months when he and his wife had divorced and now that his ex-wife was getting married and the little girl was two, he felt like it was the right thing to do. (I had noticed that after he relinquished his rights his relationship with his ex-wife improved and even the way he felt about his daughter seemed to change for the better.) He didn’t think that they could survive losing another grandchild. I had only met his Father and liked him alot, but since they were no longer part of my family, I agreed to whatever was best for Rob.

Finally, Rob said he was going to cancel Emily’s two week visit. I did not ask him to this concession, but I was relieved when he made the offer. He was adamant that I was going to need a strong support network to get me through my pregnancy and he wanted to make himself available to me at any time of the day or night. He told me stories about the day his ex-wife woke up and couldn’t stand raw chicken and he had been forced to remove all of it from the house while she was sick in the bathroom.

For all the hurt and ugliness that this meeting started with, it ended on a note that I felt was hopeful. Rob and I were united in one thing – we wanted what was best for the baby. I was certain as long as we could keep our focus on the baby everything else would just fall into place.

When I was a teenager if you had asked me where I would be in my mid-twenties, I would’ve told you that I expected to have my college degree and perhaps I would be pursuing a law degree.  I expected that I would be dating a fabulous supportive man and we would probably be well on our way to white picket fence and 2.5 children.

I did not think I would be a college drop out, having fled my home and my last relationship like a refugee leaving my homeland. I didn’t expect that I would be living in an apartment with a sofa, TV, and little else in the way of furniture, but that’s exactly where I am, sitting here in the mostly empty apartment. How did I get here?

My relationship with Rob had moved fast, shortly after meeting we were living together, and our life settled down into a fun and easy schedule. We lived a little way outside of town and so in the evenings we enjoyed long walks on the quiet on the street and on the weekend we picked our way through trails that lead to an area that might grow up to be a subdivision some day, but for now it was wooded with winding trails. We went to the movies, dinners with friends, had long sleepy Sundays watching movies and lazing around the house.

Things changed slowly, I could feel Rob pulling away from me and at first I wasn’t sure why. I thought he was wrestling with his own demons, and I just tried to gently be there so when he was ready to let me in, he’d know I was there. His job took him out of town for one weekend a month, and when he came back I lapped up all of the stories that he shared and asked questions but it never occurred to me to dig too deeply.

Emily, I heard him talk about her a few times, she was a friend of a friend so she seemed to be around when he was on these weekend trips away but I didn’t think much of it, well not in the beginning. It was when her name started popping up on the caller id on a regular basis that I realized that she must be more than merely “a friend of a friend.” I also noticed that when Rob was on the phone with her and I walked into the room, he would stop talking.

It was the day that Rob met me in town for dinner and so we were both driving home in separate cars that I was forced to confront the ugly truth. I called to check messages on the answering machine from my cell phone, and Emily left a message telling Rob how she couldn’t wait to see him that weekend and she hoped that soon he would be “free” and my face burned when I realized that she meant free from me.

I didn’t angrily confront him, in fact I continued to pretend that I was still the same trusting and loving woman I had always been but I was moved out in less than a week. My Mom helped me find an apartment and with two friends with large trucks, I was moved out on a Saturday afternoon. Rob came back to town from a weekend with Emily, and I was gone, I didn’t live there anymore.

When Rob got home and saw that I was gone he called me and then we had the angry confrontation. He denied that he had cheated on me because he and Emily had never “crossed the line” in their friendship, I argued that the minute he was confiding in her about our problems instead of working on them with me he was cheating. He felt guilty but he also seemed relieved that the whole mess was over. I don’t remember how the call ended, but it ended, just as I thought our story ended.

I’m here, sleeping in the living room on the sofa because I don’t have a bed nor any kind of savings to furnish my new apartment. Still sorting through all of my belongings which I had packed in garbage bags and bundles so they were rather chaotic. In my mess I’m quite the contradiction – happy and hopeful one minute, sad or angry the next. I don’t know what the future holds but I cheer myself that the possibilities are endless.

I didn’t know it when I moved out but I was already pregnant with my son. I had a light period and just assumed that it was because of all the stress I was going through with Rob. I still remember sitting in that apartment trying to focus on all the possibilities of the future.

When I met Rob, we were both going through times of intense change. I had just left college when the bar that I worked at closed abruptly and I was left without the means to pay my tuition. (I could’ve asked my Mom and Dad to help but I was far too stubborn for that, and really that’s a story for another time.) I had lived on a friend’s sofa for two weeks before moving in with my friend James to be his roommate. I was trying to figure out what my next move was, but for the time, I was renting my friend James’ spare room and working at a temp agency.

Rob was one of James’ best friends and fairly recently divorced. He had dated someone after his wife but the relationship ended abruptly and tragically, so Rob had kind of withdrawn from life unsure if he ever wanted to let someone in again. In retrospect we were both sort of lost and drifting, and almost from the moment that we met each other, we clung to one another.

James and Rob were going out one night and I was curled up in my room with a book, when there was a knock on my door. When I invited the knocker in, I expected to find James or his girlfriend, and

instead there was a tall handsome man I had never seen before. Rob was not only tall, he had broad muscular shoulders that made him appear to take up most of the doorway. His smile was slightly crooked, and his hazel eyes were twinkling with mischief.

“Hi, I’m Rob, James, his girlfriend, and I were going to go out and I wanted to see if you wanted to come with us,” he said and he laughed a nervous little laugh at the end that made me smile.

There was something about the boyish laugh from the strapping man that was absolutely charming. I agreed to meet them in the front of the house in a few minutes and I proceeded to get dressed and ready to go out.

When we got to the bar, I was having second thoughts. It was a bar that was very popular with the college students and even worse, it was college nights. I was going to be confronted with a number of classmates who would want to know what had happened and why I was in classes this semester. I dreaded having to explain over and over again that I was out of money and unsure what I was going to be doing next, however I peeked over at Rob sitting across from me in the backseat of James’ car and he was talking so animatedly about something that I found myself smiling despite the butterflies in my stomach.

The night was a blur of people and loud music, I only remember that at one point I turned around and felt my stomach fall to my feet when I was nose to nose with my ex-boyfriend. Just the person that I would like to say something positive to, about where I was and what I was doing, and here he was with a beautiful girl on his arm and I had nothing to say. I’ve never asked what Rob saw on my face, but a moment later he was next to me, with his arm around my waist, introducing himself as my boyfriend and just like that he was my boyfriend.

Is it any wonder that in the weeks that followed, I fell in love with him? He was tall and handsome, and he showered me with crooked smiles and generous gifts. We started to see each other a little bit here, and a little bit there until we were together more than we were apart. When we were separated we were like giddy, giggling teenagers talking on the phone all hours of the day and night.

The story I want to share with you, may not be a love story, but there’s no doubt that it’s a story that starts with love.

You know, to me it’s all so clear
Every one of us is here
All because two people fell in love
~Brad Paisley