The Care Package Fairytale

I have been dreaming of sending my daughter a care package for years...since we started our paperwork in the summer of 2006. I have been collecting things ever since.

Not a lot of things...just things I thought she would enjoy playing with and loving on while she waited for us. Things that would show her how much we loved her. The blanket I started making a year before we were matched to her. The beautiful doll we had made for her several months before we were matched. A photo album of us so she would know she had a mommy, daddy, and two big brothers waiting for her.

And, of course, she would look at our photos daily and snuggle the blanket and doll we sent her and know she was loved. The perfect fairytale. 

And then we were matched with Lillian. Within the first few hours of being matched...with the help of Google...I learned a lot about the SWI our daughter was in and it did not fit into the fairytale I had created. 

I want to say upfront that I know our daughter is loved and well taken care of by her nannies. I don't doubt for a second that they aren't doing the best they can for Lily. But the reality is there are most likely twenty babies for every two nannies and they don't have time to keep track of all the "lovies" all the families are sending. So...Lily most likely will not see anything we send her and we will not get anything back when we pick her up.

And so my struggle began...what do I send knowing it will not be used? Money wasted on things she will not see or play with or love on. And yet...what good mother wouldn't send something? Again, not the fairytale I had been dreaming of. 

I have been able to send a care package for about a month...but have done nothing but agonize over it. I have given myself several deadlines to get it done, but they have come and gone. I am by no means a procrastinator, so what was I waiting for?

And then this WONDERFUL opportunity presented itself yesterday. The Incubator Project. A mother, who's daughter is in the same SWI as Lily, teamed up with Love Without Boundaries and is raising money for a much needed incubator for Lily's SWI. Read her story here. 

So...instead of sending a care package, I am sending a donation. A donation that will help babies at Lily's SWI for many years to come. An incubator that is needed  by the SWI and sent with love. And in the end...although it has changed...I still have my fairytale.