False Alarms

We had a first (hopefully only) false alarm yesterday with the adoption yesterday.  At just about 8:30 in the morning, Jackie received a call from our birth mother that she was going into labor and we needed to head down to the hospital (4 hours away).  Jackie immediately called my office, and I happened to be in court, which I'm rarely in court.  A co-worker immediately came over and got me, another one covered my hearing for me, I rushed back across the street, hopped in the car, and drove like crazy to get home and start the trip.

Thankfully, just the previous weekend, we decided to get everything prepared for the trip, for whenever that phone call would come.  I installed the car seat into the car we would be taking.  We both packed bags for the trip, and had a list of the additional things that had to be grabbed before heading out.  We started the practice of making sure that the car always has enough gas to make the trip without having to stop.  We had confirmed that a co-worker would be able to come over and pick up Ellie, as we expect to be gone for a couple days whenever the birth happens.  We were set.

So, by 9 o'clock, we were on the road, speeding (responsibly) towards the southern part of the state.  Once we were halfway down, as we continued to exchange phone calls with our birth mother, it was confirmed that there would be no baby today, as the doctors wanted to have the pregnancy go for at least another 3 weeks, and gave her a shot to stop/prevent labor.  We continued down and ended up meeting our birth mother for lunch, and talked about our "trial run" of the day.  It was a long day for all of us (obviously much more for her than us), but it was another good visit on what continues to be a good journey.

It was also good to have the trial run, as we discovered small adjustments we could make to improve how quickly we could leave and get there - a slightly different route that shaves 10-15 minutes, packing more comprehensively, improving how we will communicate with each other when *that* phone call comes again. We think it was good for Ellie to have a trial run as well - to have someone else come get her and spend some more time with that person to gain familiarity and comfort.

False alarms and trial runs; makes us realize that this journey may reach its next point in just a few, short weeks.