Adoption 101 w/ Shonda Rhimes (Part 2)

was going to adopt children. The idea that, um, I would grow something inside me and it would come out was never a thing that sounded exciting to me. It's not. And also, I think you know, I was a huge reader as a kid, and in every children's book you ever read, there's always an orphan and so somehow to me, like adoption always seemed like a thing I knew I was going to do. Then um I got older and then illogically adopted became a thing I really needed to do.

So and it was lucky that it didn't phase me at all. I was kind of like relieved, like like this always made sense to and I was like the universe is just falling into place um and then on top of which, when I knew it was the right time to adopt was it was. I went to like I was a writer, and I was sort of I don't know, you're like in your I was in my early thirties and I had done broken up with somebody, and I was doing that thing where you're like really

into yourself amazing hard. And I rented a like a small house in Vermont, like on like Airbnb, but there was no Airbnb back then, but like that version of something, and flew to Vermont and like drove like through the night to this lovely little place by myself, and I was going to write for a month and like find myself. I had been reading a lot of Alice Walker. And the next day eleven happened, and so I was trapped in the middle. Basically, I was trapped in the middle

of nowhere. Nobody I knew, while it felt like the world was ending, and I was super panicked and just watching like hour after hour of like what was the most traumatic stature. And I remember thinking to myself on on that day, like, oh my god, the world's gonna end and I will have never been a mom, like I've never had a baby. I will have never done the thing that I've always really just felt strongly about wanting to do. And it was surprising to me that that was the thing that was at the top of

my list of like this. It wasn't a career thing, or it wasn't a career thing. It wasn't it wasn't a guy, it wasn't a I want to travel the world. It was it was I will never never had a daughter. And so I went home and I hired an adoption attorney and literally nine months and two days after eleven, Harper was born. What, oh my gosh, I just got goose bumps, like serious goose bumps. So was it a

public adoption a private adoption? Had you do? Were you around people who had adopted before that could help you give advice or was it like you googled an adoption at like I have to say it, Okay, it was a private adoption. And not only wasn't EYE around anybody who had adopted before. I was the only person I knew. I mean I was thirty two. Yeah, I was gonna say,

did any of your friends even have babies? Because like, I was the only person I knew who had a baby, Like my friends were still going out to the clubs, Like I was literally the only person knew had a baby, and I was the only single mom I lost. Basically, I feel like some people were like, you lost your mind, but it felt completely right and completely normal. And my friends at thirty two had given me a call saying like, oh, guess what. I figured out what I'm gonna do after

sitting in this cottage in Vermont by myself. I'm going to adopt a baby by myself. I would be like, no, you're not, Like that's insane. I think all of my friends thought I had lost my mind, but they were all very like, Okay, I guess this is happening, you know, but they thought I was bonkers. It was it just didn't mesh with anybody's lifestyle. But you had a real feeling like in your gut, and Olivia Pope like gut

you knew what you knew. My gut told me everything I needed to know, and it did not feel wrong at all. So how did you find an adoption attorney? Um? I asked around, like I had you know, if you're a writer in this town, you have an attorney. I asked my attorney to like go out into the attorney world and ask who adoption attorneys were. I knew, like I've done enough reading. Um, if you were going to adopt, I highly recommend that you read this book by Dan Savage.

Dan Savages book The Kid is my favorite book about adoption ever, just because it's so honest and irreverent and raw. And it was the first book I read that felt like somebody, like you know, somebody with a dark and twisty mind was adopting a kid versus yeah, versus like somebody who like should be in good housekeeping, which I never was gonna be. Um, what kind of questions did you like when you knew that you were going to adopt a baby? Did you know what he or she

looked like? Oh, you said daughter, so you knew it was going to be a girl. Did you also find yourself very selective as far as what that you knew you wanted to be a little girl of color, that you wanted to be a certain age. So so when I so I found this adoption attorney and I did that over an agency just because I had read a little bit and it seemed like an attorney made sense. In this state, every law has every state has different laws, um and every state it works differently, like some states

agencies are better in some states. Whatever. So I found my adoption attorney and he basically said to me, you need to be really clear about what you want, like and that sounded so weird, like suddenly you feel like you're shopping for a person. It's like that. It feels

kind of gross. But he was really clear, he said, the clearer you are about what you want, I mean, you can say to me that I'm super open, and that's fine, But if you're really specific about what it is that's important to you, then what is in your

head I can put in your arms. So and that made sense because think about this idea of for a lot of people, and I off this for a lot of people, they have dreamed of like making a baby their entire lives, of being pregnant, of having a child that's biologically linked to them, and then they have to deal with that grief and that loss of not being

able to do that. And then once they've dealt with that, now they have this image in their head of what they always thought their child was going to be like and then to have a child put in their arms that is nothing like their imagination. For a lot of people that it's very in congress and maybe doesn't work. Um. Plus, let's be frank people have biases. People just do, and I frankly do not want a child of color placed

in the arms of somebody who has a bias. Good But for me, you know, he was like, you know, what are you looking for? I knew that I wanted a girl, and I wanted a girl because I was a single I knew I was gonna be a single mom, and if I was going to be a single mom, I just felt strongly. While I also believe it's the feminist job to raise sons, I felt like as a single mom, I really wanted I didn't. I was like, I know, I know how to teach a young woman, how to you know, a girl how to be a

young woman. I don't know if I'd know how to teach a little boy how to be a man. When I was just hysterical when I found out that I was having a boy, and I was like, this is the worst. Like, I mean, I love him, but I was horrified. I mean, I'm just so scared about raising a feminist man in this world. I mean it's it's any guy you put out into the world's going to be fantastic. Okay, So you knew you wanted a girl

that made sense to you. Yes, I knew I wanted a girl, And then I knew I wanted an African American black. I don't know how, but I knew I wanted a brown skinned child who looked like me in the sense of I wanted her to be as dark as me. I wanted her to be darker. I didn't care, but I wanted to make sure that when we were out in public, you know, our skin looked like she could look at my face and see herself in some way. Um.

I just think that's important. And I also just felt like this idea that, um, there's a there's a whole colorism thing that happens in this country where people prefer lighter skinned babies, and I was like, that didn't even occur to me. I just wanted a brown skinned baby. What about baby versus? Did you know that you wanted a baby you were on this journey for in your mind you had set you knew you wanted a baby. Yeah, I mean, the one thing I can be absolutely sure.

I was like, there's this like weird baby fever thing that overtakes you once to decide you want a kid. And you know what I'm talking. Were like I would see babies in the grocery store and think like if I just picked that baby up, and just like right, I have it so bad right now for not even only my baby, like my baby is not around me

or something that I see a baby. There was a baby on the plane yesterday and I was in New York and I was like, excuse me, do you mind if I just hold and smell your baby, like for good five minutes. It's like an addiction. It's bad. Baby fever is a real thing. Um. And my sister had just had some you know, had babies, and I was just like they just like they were turning three, and I was like I was missing the baby. I wanted a baby. Yeah, did you, um, did you prepare? Did

you have a baby's room ready? Were you registered? Or did you feel like I don't even care about this stuff, I'm too nervous. How did you feel? Um? I by the way people respond this way, whether or not it's biological or adopted, like I know people who you know. My mom was like, don't don't you dare make a baby's room until that baby's out because it's super you know, superstitious. And the first time around, um, and I do know this, I feel like everybody, it doesn't matter if you're pregnant

or amisurrogate or we're adopting. Everybody has different plants. The first time around, I decorated the most beautiful babies room you've ever seen in your entire life. Um, and it was. It's an extraordinarily gorgeous baby's room and with every single thing in it in the world and it was spectacular. Um. And then I came home with that baby. Yeah. This, Yes, that happened. So the second and then it all worked out in the end, like I came home with that baby and then I went back to get the baby.

But it but it was it was the lesson of a lifetime. Yeah, and it was probably the worst thing that's ever happened to me in my entire life. So the second time around, with my second child, I did nothing. Like I had a room like literally there was like a starkly empty room with This is how women kind of protect themselves. I mean, once you've gone through something like that, did you have was it hard for you to pick yourself back up? And we've talked about this

a little bit with adoption. Just it is your cautiously optimistic the whole time. It's really scary, you know what it is. And I think for me, I was I've always been this person who I was always I really like bonded with the concept of a birth month and like what somebody else is going through and what somebody else is feeling, because you know, this is as much somebody else's journey as it is yours, you know. I think a lot of people are busy thinking about like

what's happening to me? What's happening to me? This is I'm getting a baby. One of the things that I have a lot of friends now who are who adopt, and one of the things I always tell them is like, it is not your baby, Like you are only going to the hospital to see if maybe this could possibly be your baby. That's a great change, Like this is maybe possibly your baby, but this is not your baby. And when you go to the hospital and when you're there, I don't care how excited you might be feeling it.

This is not your baby. You're going to be with somebody else who's in crisis, who is having a baby and having their own experience, and nobody tells you that, do you know what I mean? So yeah, so the first time around was a really i opening, like emotional experience for me and for the birth mom. And to have, you know, to to have somebody in like the laws of like that state, like we have to make a

decision like right away. To have to make a decision like that, like twenty four hours after you've had you've had a baby, He's crazy. And so I absolutely get why she was like changed my mind not doing this um and then like I ended up like literally like just and by the way, this is another piece of advice I give people. Don't pick your baby up by yourself. Don't feel pick your baby up by yourself. People, Yeah, you need a support network, you need this, Like right

it was, I mean I was this night. I literally was like I'm decorating a nursery. I'm gonna go pick up my baby. I'll be home tomorrow. Like it was so like me and my baby were about to take well. I was also like I'm a single mother, I'm gonna do this. It's gonna be me and the baby. It was the dummest thing in the world because then when you're in the weird devastation mode, you're like, how do I have to go to the airport and find a way to get home and figure this whole thing out? Yeah?

And so I got home and then there's you're staring at the nursery and then luckily, twenty four hours later, I'm getting back on a plane to go back and pick her up again, which was amazing. But still it was like up down, up, down, up down, an emotional whirlwind and it was definitely meant to be. And what I love about it is I can say to my daughter, like, you know, your birth mother really really made struggled and made the you know, worked hard on that decision, and

decision was very stressful for her. But yeah, dying to know since what's so cool about having harper Um and Emerson is like, I'm curious to know how you tell them and talk to them about adoption. And the conversations are interesting because I have uh sixteen year old who's adopting. I have a six year old who's adopted, and I have a five year old who's born to be a surrogate,

who's but is biologically my child. So I'm actually you're the master storyteller and vocabulary person, so I'm curing how you talk. I mean, I would be at a loss. I've done really well with the adoption thing. And one of the things I did with starting with Harper was from like the day I brought her home, I was like telling the adoption story, like I was working on the adoption language, so that from the time she was young. It was never like, oh, you're thirteen, now you can understand.

Now I'm going to tell you. I was putting her in her career at night and going like I'm so glad we got adopted, or aren't we lucky? You know some like we adopted each other, Like I was doing that from the so that because you sound really dorky and nervous saying things like that, it's like talking to your kid about sex or something. It just sound dorky and nervous like saying these words in the beginning. But by the time she was three, you said it all the time. It was nothing I said. It's so much

that it was just like second nature. It's just here, and I sounded really comfortable and felt really comfortable saying and it wasn't awkward for me, and it wasn't awkward for her so much so that she'd heard it so much that she was like, yeah, yeah, whatever, this is brilliant. I think this is so great. And I remember she danced.

She was she was at dance class, and she ran into dance class one day and she was like maybe five, and she looked at the dance teacher and she said, I'm adopted, like it had just occurred to her, like what it meant. But she said it was such joy and her dance teacher looked at her and goes, I know, and then she like high fived her and then went on and like that was kind of her moment of like understanding what these sentences had meant her whole life, and she had always heard and now maybe she was

really comprehending with the word at night. And So I've been playing with this idea of you answer the questions they ask, but also just make it a fact of life. So I did that with Emerson, and I did that with Harper, and then one day Emerson and Beckett and I and we're in bed reading and Beckett said, I'm so glad we got adopted. And I realized that I've maybe missed a step. So Becket's the baby and she's

not adopted. I realized I missed a step. And I suddenly realized I had not quite figured out how to explain and how this egg because we you know, all of these all grown in somebody else's tummies, and you've all you know what I mean, and you're all then you all came home and it's it's but it's not the same, and we all have the same picture with the adoption attorney, with the adoption judge. The courts are from the courthouse that day when they're the adoption was official.

Even I even have one with with the judge because of Becket, because I was like, we have to take one with the surrogate. But it's all it's all vague to her. And I was like, I don't know how to explain this one yet, so I'm working on it. She's so, how old is she? No, she's four, and I'm always out of five. I'm always like, we got surrogated. She's like, I don't know what that is, and I'm

like I don't know either. Can you talk me through the first couple weeks and months when you had Harper and when you had like did you get her and finally and bring her home this and you completely flipped out, lost your mind? Did it fit perfectly? Were you like calling all of your clubbing friends and you were like, what was it? Like? It's funny? Okay, So yes, I mean I think when when Harper came home. No, I don't think I flipped out at all. Actually, I think

I was exhausted. Um. I think I was wildly naive about what having a baby was like, even though I'm the youngest of six and all my filings said babies. I was wildly naive about what having a baby was like. And I had like a movie do that I was supposed to be writing that like it was crazy. But I also feel like I was like so excited to be a mom and so excited to be there, and I'm so excited to be doing it. I was fine.

What I think is interesting is people always ask me, or they don't ask me, and they kind of want to ask, like does it feel different? Like you have like questions you have like a biological kid and you have to it not at all, like in a weird way. What's cool is you can really, you can really speak on this because you have I mean, Beckett looks like you. Oh yeah, you know, and she looks like the spitting

image of you to me. Um. And so when people are saying, oh that biological thing, like you look at your baby's eyes and you see yourself, Like, do you feel did it feel different at first? No? It really didn't. I mean it truly didn't. And it's interesting how much it didn't. Like Harper and I were like this little team forever, and so we were like we were super bonded. It was just her and I and it never that

was never a thing that I felt like. I didn't I looked into her eyes and we weren't reflected in one another. And then Emerson and I were super bonded, like I brought her to work with me every day and she would sit in the writer's room and I was like, she's like somehow she was like my emotional soul mate in some deep way. Like I was like, she's got the soul of a writer and her like we were that way. Beckett, it was, it was the same. It was actually in a lot of ways. I was like,

this girl's complicated, like she was. She was the baby that like to cry a lot, and so I was like, this is a complicated kid. Well you know what's interesting. I mean, I know my my my son is I pushed him out, but when I brought him home, I kept saying to Addam for like six weeks, like I don't feel any I feel like he is a complete

stranger to me. Like I had the hardest time, Like I'm looking at him and I know I'm supposed to feel a certain way or I'm supposed to feel this like bond in a connection he's my son, but I did not feel that at all. I mean, I was like, who is this stranger in my house? And why have you messed up my life? Like it's like this is not so. I think it's just I think it's different for each person. Like I just think, I don't know.

I think people like to take things that happen and attribute them to the nearest possible difference, do you know what I mean? Like I have a friend who attributes everything in her life that doesn't work out to the fact that like I grew up without a dad, like she always says that, I'm like, that's not because you grew up without a dad, you know what I mean? Or or like if you didn't feel a bond and you had adopted, you might have think like it because adopted.

But no, like you had to know where that baby came from. You had a baby, and you you had that feeling which and I brought home m Harper and it was like you felt she always been there and we were like deeply connected. So it is very It's fascinating how that happens. It's not about anything. It's just you and your hormonal like experience and reaction to things. Um. We talk a lot on Katie's Crib about the village

and support system that people have. Did you find it difficult being matched with a birth mom because you were a single mom? Like we talked about it, was it hard for me to find it like great? No, and this is I mean fifteen years sixteen years ago. No, Well, hopingably it's easier now. There were two two things, which one is dark and strange. And my adoption attorney says

this to me. He's like, this is a horrible thing to tell you there's going to be a baby boom after nine eleven, because people make babies after tragedies, so there was a huge baby boom um. And I I was in the weirdest position of being chosen by like fifteen different birth moms. So it was like Sophie's Choice around my house, Like there were like all of these dossiers of birth moms and and their stories and babies,

and it was really, uh, that's really yeah. It was stressful, stressful because it's like, you know, how do you There were twins, and it was just it was just yeah and a varying ages, and and I felt strongly like there were a couple of things for me that felt important. One, I needed the story of how that child came to be to be a story that I felt like I could tell my child. Like in that pile there was a birth mother who was like twelve years old. I could not I don't know how I could, you know

what I mean? Like, while I felt for that girl, I just didn't know how I could tell my daughter that story. Um. There were there were twins, and I was like, am I ready for twins? But what it really came down to for me was my birth mom a she loved to read but be when you took her photo, my siblings and I none of us look like each other, but we all look exactly like my mom um in an odd way, right, we don't look like each other, but we all looked like my mom.

When you took my birth the birth mom's picture and you put it next to all of us, she didn't look like any of us, but she also looked exactly like my mom. It was really weird. I was like she got of falls in that line, and it felt very like it made sense, and like you find you search for your little signs, it felt like it made sense. Also, we just we bonded, like we bonded hard. And so that was good. Let's talk about the adoption letter, and I'm sure yours was incredible. Like you had said, you

had a lot of offer. I mean, what is the word I was a lot of possibilities. A lot of birth mothers decided that they sort of chose me as somebody that they thought was a possibility of something they wanted to me. So one of the things that you do is you you know, you write this letter with a bunch of pictures of yourself. You know, basically it's a it's like a very weird feeling of like a sales tool, almost like you do the same thing for buying a house, like to put you over the edge

if there's like multipliers. But it's a little bit like here I am, and here's who my you know, here's my life, and what your life would look like if you choose what your kid's life would look like. So, first of all, for like three months, everywhere I went anywhere my poor friends, I would like hand them a camera and be like, take a picture of me jumping up and down in the snow, take a picture of

me baking this case, like holding this cake. So I was like, show me living my life like it was embarrassing. But I also was like I don't have a lot of I'm a single person. I don't take a lot of pictures of me, So I had to get a bunch of pictures of me. One two. The adoption letter was interesting because it really was me writing about all the things I wanted to do with a kid, like, you know, like I wanted to um be a brown A trip leader, which I'm about to be. I'm so excited.

I wanted to be a brown A trip leader, and I wanted to have sleepovers at my house, and I wanted to you know, like gurl up in bed with girls and watch movies, and I wanted to read all the Harry Potter books and all the things that you

want to do with a kid. So like I it was a lot of that, and then me just trying to explain who I am and where I came from and how I grew up in a huge family and why I thought that I would make a good mother for somebody, and why I wanted to adopt, and also why, you like, how I felt about And this was another thing. It was like how I felt about this idea of adoption in this process of spending of wirth mother and

spending time with them. And because that's the other thing, like they're they're not looking at you, because they just are like, let me pick a perfect person. They're also like, how is this going to be for me? There as trepidacious as you are. So you know, it was it was me trying to convey like I know how hard

this must be. Wow, that's really I don't think we've heard this perspective at all, which I think is really great the birth mom, because I'm sure some people adopted, it's must be hard for them, like they say, if they're too old or whatever their issue is, or if that they just want to And some people are probably like I don't want to think much about the birth mom. I just want to get the baby. But you have to. Yeah, I took I mean, there's a there's a class. I

think it almost everybody has taken. When you're doing your home study, Um, you take a class that's sort of about all these issues. And in my class, I remember being like I was probably younger than everybody else, but I was also the only single person in the class, and there were a lot of people there. And I

think it's important dealing with infertility. Who for them, they had they had gone through a grieving process to get to this place, and so to them it really was about like it was about them, you know what I mean, And like they had been waiting for years for a baby, and so it was like their eyes were on a prize. And for some people that birth mother felt like just a means to an end versus part of the process.

And I get it, but like, there's a To me, there was a guilt, like you are you are gonna find a lot of joy in someone else's pain, right right, right right, And you are forever connected to this birth mother. You just youre are you are, and you have to remember, even if you don't see them for eighteen years, they are going to come back around again. They really are. Like your kid's gonna want to meet them. I'm sure that happens probably every case. So who was the village

that you had? I know, you come from a large family or the youngest of six, and your parents are You're really close your parents where they just your village when you brought Harper home and when you brought Emerson home, and um, well my family wasn't living out here at the time. But I have like my one of my closest friends in the world is a guy named Christopher who is Harper's godfather, who I am known forever, I mean, like truly for I think we met this is another

weird one. We met on the day of the of the Slow Speed Chase. The Slow Speed Chase, Yeah, I think that's when he moved in that Yeah. And he's been involved in Harper's lives and he's been involved. He's a guy who literally we've just been best friends forever and he's a guy who he became, you know, godfather. But he literally has come to over every Sunday of her life to spend time with her until she became like fifteen, and I was like, I have to be

with my friends, but every Sunday. And I mean like, he got married on a Saturday and came over around that Sunday and I was like, um, you just got married, and he's like and it's Sunday, Like he's that guy. Yeah. So you think that's probably very important for people who are adopting, Like I think it's I think it's key to have people you know, um for instance, So like I said, I didn't buy anything with with Emerson, and I don't think that's that's not totally true. What I

did was I didn't. I refused us to get anything, and then somebody said you probably should get some stuff. So first I just feeled like my Amazon cart with everything I needed, and then I was like, well, when the baby comes, I'll just hit But then I was like, then I got too excited. So then I bought everything and I shoved it in a closet like a back closet, and then when the baby was when I was told

the baby was being born and I was leaving to go. Um. Yeah, then I was like, everything's at a closet and my village put it together and like opened everything and made sure everything was okay. Um. Adoption has come up a lot on all of your TV shows. You know what's cool about how you portray adoption is that it's it's not the point of an episode, you know what I mean, Like it may have been back, you know, in the day,

like Webster or Different Strokes or things like that. Like it's about a family that's like adopted a kid, and in your storylines a lot of time, it's just part of it. Um, How important is it for you to depict an adoptions? Is it just part of you? So it just comes out like it just yeah, it just feels like it's part of this, you know, it's it's a it's part of me, Like it's a it's another way people make a family, and it makes sense to me.

And frankly, it's more familiar to me than somebody giving birth, so it just it works for me. What other I know you talked about the Kid Book. Are there any other resources or websites that you lead friends too. I'm glad to hear that you have a lot of friends who are adopting now like this is I'm sure have you noticed a big change between fifteen years ago and when you adopted Emerson? Like, it's interesting. I've noticed a change in this in the sense that a lot of

more of my friends are adopting. But that's because my friends are older. Um, and there's a there's a fertility drop off, ladies. Um. If Katie does an episode on freezing your eggs, okay, I have a lot to say about that topic, and I know we should talk again. It's the most important thing ever. Oh I remember, I think I was already too. And SHAWNA. Rons is like, frez your eggs consultation. You know, that's the hot thing that I'm doing. Now we're going to talk about it

in Katy's crib. But I've been taking I take my girlfriends to their egg freezing consultations. I can't tell you my girlfriends now. I've seen their uterus, I've seen I've seen their eggs. I know their egg count. I hold their hands because they're single. They want to be Mom's really bad, and they got to take it in their

matters in their own hands. See, so everybody in my office. Um, Betsy Beers, my producing partner, actually took me aside and told me that she thought that it was some form of sexual harassment for me to tell people that they needed to freeze their eggs on a regular basis, to set people down and get in their face and ask them about their uteruses. So I've tried to stop, but

you can do it here. But I think it's important that people preserve their fertility because I have held the hands of too many women as they sobbed when they discovered that they couldn't have kids. So but anyway, okay, way, we were talking about how adoption. You have noticed more people coming to asking advice from about adopting because they're older, Yes, they're older. And then you know, for instance, some people

have come and it's been really interesting. Have just been like we just decided to be preferred to adopt, which I love and I think is interesting. But I do think that more of my friends are adopting, and I think that that's good. It can't it can't be bad. Do you have advice for people? What would you tell? I mean, you've already dropped some real ships on this

episode of Katie's Crib. But are is there any advice that you would say besides don't go alone, it's a good thing to come in there and know what exactly what you want. So I have this thing that I'm I'm holding some papers right now. I have this thing that I wrote that I give to all of my friends when they're going to have a baby. Now. It's

I call it my adoption info packet. One of my friends gave me cards that say like adoption doula on them, which I thought was hilarious, But after she came over with her baby, she was like, I'm going to give you these cards because you talk people through it, which is funny. But a couple of the things I think are important is once you get matched with a birth mother, do not tell everyone on the planet that your baby

is coming like you want to. You want to be like you want to shout out from the rooftops, But once again, this baby is not your baby. You're only going to see if it's your baby. So you can tell a couple of close friends that your baby is coming, but don't tell everybody because then you might have to untell everybody and that sucks. So there's that which I

think is important. Um, you know, but you should do, like you should prepare as if a child is coming in the sense of like go find a pediatrician ahead of time, go you know, get all those get all the information if you're gonna need help or a baby nurse, like go go secure all those things, especially because if the baby shows up, the first thing you're gonna want to do when you get home, no matter how many times the job has been to a doctor, is take

the baby to a pediatrician. Like there's all these things that you're gonna want to do and you're gonna want to have in place. But you know, you just have to remember that you're preparing for a baby, not this baby. Like that's the biggest part um. Another thing that I found out is you can get there's breast milk banks that you can get and you can get a prescription for breast milk from a breast milk bank, and you can feed your your baby can have breast milk um

which is great for their immune system. That you can do a week, you can do a month, you can do two months. Like however much you can do, it's expensive, which is a problem. But that's us a really good thing for I meune system if you can make yourself do that. Um oh. I always think it's important to remember, like to remember the birth mother in all in the process.

And that's the thing I think people do talk about a lot, like when you go to if you're going to go to the doctor's visits, if you're going to go to the hospital, Like don't go and fawn over like the sonogram or the baby or like hold up a bunch of adorable baby clothes that you bought, because she's not a part of that, Like do you know

what I mean? Like you have to be respectful of her process, and I have her bad story, you know, like just sad stories of like they show up and they don't seem to carry the birth mother saying, they don't seem to care about me at all, Like I'm just some vessel and you have to really remember that in your enthusiasm. This person is a you know, like she's not a process. She's also not a vessel. She's a member of your family for the rest of your life.

And I think that people don't ever think of birth, you know, may not think of their birth moms that way, and you really have to think of a birth mom that way because that is your child's other mother forever, and you want that woman to feel loved and respect and appreciated because that is your child's other mother for the rest of your you know, forever. That's important. Without her,

your child wouldn't be here exactly now. I think you mentioned that earlier in the podcast, which is so helpful, Which is just that she's also going through something like this, and so instead of maybe showing up, like you say, with one's ease and pictures of the nursery room like you just the seebe even a small thing of like how are you doing, like you know you feel, put some attention on the earth mom. I think that's huge advice.

I've never heard anything like that. Okay, the one piece of advice I want to get is that when you do get the baby and you're in the hospital and everything's all warm and lovely and wonderful, steal everything you can get your hands on in the hospital. I don't know if people who give birth to this, but certainly you're right as a mother to steal every snot sucker, every plastic base base, and every like super everything. Steal everything you can get your hands on. Stuff it in

a bag and take it with you. Just do it. It's your You heard it here, folks, Sean Rhyme says, steal it. I love it. It's true. You can have it's covered. Oh yeah, um, what do you wish you would have known before you adopted? I think one of the things that I think that nobody tells you about adoption that I don't think anybody can tell you really, or maybe people don't want to. It's like a dirty little secret or something, is that you have to remember

this idea that all of this will happen. You'll go through this whole adoption process. You'll get this call, they'll be like the baby's coming. You'll go to the hospital. It will will actually be your baby. The moment will

finally arrive. They'll put this baby in your arms, and you're going to feel possibly a little bit disappointed, which feels crazy because you have been wishing and waiting and hoping and dying for this moment forever and then they've placed this perfect, beautiful, amazing baby in your arms and you're gonna be like, oh. And I think that that comes from not because the baby is not amazing, but because you have had a fantasy baby in your head for a ridiculously long period of time, and you have

imagined what this baby is going to be like. You have braided her imaginary hair, you have played your imaginary games with her, you have decorated her room, you have done all of these things, and that baby is perfect. And then there's the real baby, who is wonderful and beautiful and special. But those are two different babies, and one baby is never going to live up to the other baby because one does not exist. Right, So there's all that feeling that's like just left there, right, And

there's nothing wrong with having that feeling. I think a lot of people have that feeling. I must pretend like no one talks about it's like this big secrets, like you're going to be disappointed. I think people who give birth have that feeling. I did, and I feel like I'm the only person sitting here on Katie's crib. I talked about it all the time, like I hated it.

And my mom swears to me she told me, but she didn't like she was like I told you that you weren't going to feel maybe anything, And I mean, but I did. I felt disappointed, like because I had been imagining it for so long and they're just different. It's just different, and this is like you think it's gonna be this glory. I also think in a very different way for for adoption, Like when you're like adopting, you're like on this like magical, mystical, like amazing journey.

At least I was. I was like, the universe is going to put me together with a baby, and we are you know what I mean, Like it's a spiritual thing. And people know you're adopting and you've been on this like mission and you and a birth mother have been connected with and you're like the literally you're like the universe has placed us here and you feel kind of special.

It's like a drug, like in a weird way. You had to work so hard to get paperwork and meetings, and it's been a marathon, and you are high on the endorphins of adoption, like like crazy, you are high, and those not that drug, and then they give you the baby and they put you there and the marathon's over and the endorphins go away, and all of that high and all that amazing stuff and all that glory is gone, like you had a baby and the universe is like next, and then you just become just like

everybody else. You're no longer this like glorious, you know, amazing person on a quest to find your child. You're just a parent like any other parent in baby class who's babe throwing up on them, and you haven't slept, Like it's not special anymore, and that is the goal, but it doesn't sometimes feel like the goal, and that is okay, Like that's the thing. The thing to remember is that now you have a stranger in your house, which everybody has, whether or not you've given birth or not.

You're a stranger in your house that you have to get to know and like fall in love with and figure out. But it's hard to remember that sometimes because it did feel glorious, like even the crazy, like I'm at the hospital, is this my baby? Is this not my baby? Is the birth mother going to sign the papers? Is you're not? Like that's a crazy high, You're riding

this incredible high. And then she signs the papers and you just feel more alive than you've ever felt, and you're connected on this like crazy way and your motions are right at the surface and then you get the baby and then it's just regular. Just so people know, like that is a thing and it's completely okay. It's completely okay and you and yeah, it's completely normal. It's completely fine. That does not like don't think like, oh my god, I got the wrong baby, because I don't

still feel that high. I don't feel amazing. This baby is not like my dream baby. The baby is your dream baby, Like the universe gave you the baby you're supposed to have. There are no mistakes. They're like, just go with it. It's okay, that's so great. And I think it's going to Disappointment is going to happen no matter what adoption, seriously whatever. I hear moms have it

at all. Sometimes people have that high still for a little bit and then you know, at the six week markt reality sets in that they're not special anymore and this is real. This is my life, Like, this is what my life looks like. Now. That's just it. And I think I think feeling disappointment at any point in this journey is completely okay. And your whole motherhood is literally parenthood in general is just a series of disappointments.

Punctuated by moments of outrageous love. I really do. This is exactly I feel that on a daily regular I've learned so much about adoption in this episode. I can't even tell you, Shanda, I'm so embarrassed, but like I literally showed up and said given up for adoption? Like what am I like a child from the eighties? Like who the hell says craft like that? Like I just didn't even realize talk that you hear, Yes, but you know I had to really just placed and the words

that you use. And it's all important how it's talked about, and and I've just learned so much, And I'm so thankful that you opened your experience up and your stories and your advice to me and to the viewers or listeners guys, listeners were not on TV right now, we're listening to a podcast, Shonda Rhymes. Thank you so much. Thank you for being on Katie's Crib. This was so wonderful, and thank you for sharing all of your time and experience. Thank you, Thank you guys so much for listening to

Katie's Crib. We have a very special episode coming up with the One the Only Dr Harvey Carp. You guys might know his awesome books, The Happiest Baby on the Block, The Happiest Todds Are on the Block. He created the five s is that we all use. He also created that insanely amazing, groovy space aged cradle called the Snow. Yes, he's going to answer your questions right here on Katie's Crib, so to get ready for that, send us your questions.

You can email us at Katie's Crib Pod at gmail dot com or tweet your questions at me at katie Quel's using hashtag Katie's Print. And be sure to check out Shonda land dot com where you can find every episode of Katie's Crib. And we've got crib notes for each episode where you can find out more about our guests and links to some of the resources we talked about on the podcast. And last, but not least, subscribe.

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