Becoming Mommy

Trying on a new identity

“Where’s Daddy?” the boy asked as we sat on the granite bench, cracker crumbs cascading onto his lap with each bite. 

My body stiffened. Has he been to this playground before with his biological dad? Perhaps a brief outing while they were working toward reunification? Is this triggering memories of the father who stopped scheduling visits with his now-4-year-old son? Or worse, is his birth dad here now, hoping to catch a glimpse of his child?

I looked around uneasily to see if I recognized the man I’d seen in Facebook photos when I’d searched the birth parents’ names, a tall guy with a backwards baseball cap and a chain around his neck. 

“I don’t know, sweetie,” I said. “Want to go play on the jungle gym?”

The distraction worked, and we ran to the plastic-and-metal structure. He climbed up a ladder and reached for me at the top. 

“Help, Mama!” he called, arms outstretched.

I looked around. He was talking to me.

“I gotcha,” I said, scooping him up and landing his black sneakers on the platform.

Was I his Mama? And did that make my husband Seth his Daddy?

I glanced across the playground and saw a tiny toddler in a red hooded coat grasping Seth by his finger and leading him across the astroturf. He dutifully followed as she practiced walking, a skill new to her in the past month. 

Their first daddy-daughter moment

She was ours, and so was the boy, if we decided to move forward with the adoption.

This was our second date with these two kiddos, and after the heartbreak of a previous failed adoption, we were careful to take things slowly.

Or so we thought.

---

Thank you for reading Liz Explores! My most personal stories are not available publicly. If you’d like to continue reading this piece, please consider joining my Inner Circle for just $5/month or $36/year. You may cancel anytime:

www.lizexplores.com/subscribe