Meeting Ethan

We arrived in Sarasota about noon on Sunday. The caseworker from the agency pulled up at the hospital at exactly the same time as we did. Another God thing since we were a little nervous! Joe and I were extremely nervous at meeting our birthmom because you never know if she is gonna meet us, not like us and change her mind. (She had until Monday afternoon to change her mind). We were still 24 hours away from that deadline. I was also nervous because I knew that I had to take Aiden in with us to meet her. First of all, when Aiden travels he always has one day (the first day) when he is totally out of sorts and very grumpy. My little guy is also very outgoing so he is NOT afraid to let the world know about his unhappiness! Remember he has been traveling for 2 days straight and in the car for the last 6 hours with no nap. Aiden is a little hyperactive......actually a lot hyperactive. He's is NEVER still....EVER. So for him to sit still in a car seat for 2 days is like caging a wild animal. His little body explodes with energy. If he can't move, then his behavior suffers. The last thing I want is for the birthmom that is trying to decide if she made the right decision sees my 3 year old climbing the walls and mommy and daddy trying to get him under control..OR him telling the birthmom to "go away" and that he "doesn't want a baby." So as we were walking into the hospital, I quickly prayed....God, please, PLEASE help Aiden to be good because I know him and I know that in this atmosphere, with the extra energy and frustration he is experiencing, this could be really bad.
Y'all, we walked into the room and my little guy went right to the birthmom, introduced himself, asked if the IV was her "medicine" and started a conversation with her! HE loved her and she loved him!!!! YAY!!! GO GOD!!!! He was on his best behavior, and even remembered to use please and thank you! I LOVE HIM!!!!! God used him to put us all at ease and HE helped his mommy and daddy to start a conversation with this stranger that we were now connected to!
So the caseworker took Aiden on a walk and Joe and I went in with Sabrina (the BM) to meet Ethan. He was SO little. She had told us that he was 4lbs, 10 ounces.......but he was actually 4 lbs, 0 oz...........So tiny. He had lots of tubes - a feeding tube, an IV, a heat lamp and he was jaundiced..........but he looked SO perfect! We couldn't hold him yet because he needed to rest but we took lots of pictures and promised we would be back to see him. There were still SO many questions that I had but he was still hers so we weren't really allowed to ask. The staff couldn't discuss anything with us unless Sabrina asked in front of us. so we just trusted that everything was okay and that God led us to this baby because he was our baby!
After we visited Ethan, we went back to the room to visit with Sabrina and get to know her. She had lots of questions for us and we had a few for her. One of the things she told us is that she felt God had led her to us. She had been with another agency until the previous week and they had over 4,000 families. She couldn't find one that was a good fit for her.....4,000!!! Then she joined the agency that worked with our facilitator THAT week and saw our profile and KNEW we were the family before she even spoke with us. Originally she had told her agency that she wanted this baby to be an only child - she didn't want a family with another child.So when she picked us, they questioned her about it since we already had one child. She said I know what I said.......but I want this family. God led me to them...........all while we were praying that if God didn't want us to abandon this adoption journey, to lead us to our family........all in the SAME week!! We shared our story with her and she was as amazed by God as we were!