reflections on a year

365 days ago I was sitting in the exact spot where I am now writing this and got the call from our agency telling us about little A. I've been thinking a lot lately about the transformations that have taken place in this year.

What little A has accomplished in this year is astonishing. It's astonishing the amount of development that happens over the course of one's first year of life. I feel so privileged to have been a witness to every last development of A's year.

Becoming parents has meant so much more to me than I could have ever imagined. I couldn't have imagined the change it has produced in my own parents - who became grandparents for the first time with little A's arrival. It's changed my relationship to them, I believe it's changed their relationship with each other, and it has most definitely affected them each as individuals in a very profound way. Before becoming a mother, I hadn't much thought about how that would affect my relationship to my parents.

I have transformed in ways I couldn't have imagined as well. Going through years of trying to get pregnant and coming to grips with infertility gave me an awareness of what others go through to become a family. Then going through the adoption process opened my eyes to other ways of becoming and being a family. Now as a mom I see motherhood in a new light as well. I guess it's obvious, but I am still struck by how this has changed me. All of these experiences have given me a new understanding of others and has helped me become less judgemental.

As a child and young adult, I took for granted that I would be a mother. Then for years I braced myself against the possibility of never becoming a mother. Still today, a year after becoming little A's mom, I have a hard time fully believing that this is the case - I am a mom. When little A crawls over to me to hug me and stroke my hair, there is still a part of me in disbelief that this little girls loves me. That's she's here to stay. That we are a family.

When we first brought little A home I can remember having conversations with folks about the future - whether it be when little A starts to walk or when she goes off to school. I had a hard time with those conversations because even then I struggled with believing that this had actually happened. I mean, yes, rationally I knew and know that this is not a temporary situation. But on a gut level I was (and still am) struggling with this new reality of being a mom. How can it be that I am finally a mother? - something that I had at some level I had resigned myself to never achieving. It was my coping mechanism in the years of infertility and then the adoption process.

I am one of those people that is grateful for the infertility we experienced because it's brought me to the wonderful place I am today. At the time, of course, we wanted to get pregnant but in no way do I now wish that had happened. Not only has the experience brought me here, but it's also made me a better I person I think. I truly believe that the struggles in life are what pave the path to bigger and better things. But this lack of security in my motherhood and my hesitation at embracing it wholly without that little voice inside telling me that it's too good to be true - I do wish that it would go away. I hate that our struggles to become parents have left me with this feeling. Don't get me wrong - it doesn't stop me from fully being a mom, from loving little A beyond words. But it's that damn little voice.

So becoming a mom is a lifelong process, just as anything else. I can't really express how happy this process makes me, how proud I am to be little A's mom.