Off The Record
After Years Of Infertility, We Finally Adopted A Baby—Then I Overheard My Husband Talking To His Mother And My World Fell Apart
Shelby and her husband eventually bring home their long-awaited miracle—a newborn girl—after years of heartache. However, a few days later, Shelby hears a conversation that challenges all of her preconceived notions about love, trust, and the price of clinging.
When I first met Rick, I was thirty years old and felt that I had lost my opportunity for a meaningful relationship. Although I wasn’t one of those women who had been planning her wedding since she was a little girl, I had always imagined a noisy house with tiny socks in the dryer, fingerprints on spotless windows, and laughing that rose like steam from the kitchen.
Rather, I had a job that filled my calendar but not my heart, and I lived in a one-bedroom apartment with a withering spider plant. I felt as though I had done something wrong since the silence was so total when I got home at night.
That was altered by Rick.
He was a steady, gentle, and patient high school biology instructor with gentle eyes that carried more peace than I believed the earth had left. Within five minutes of greeting him at a friend’s cookout, I had managed to spill wine down the front of his shirt.
I felt ashamed.
He merely chuckled before turning to face me after glancing down at the stain.
“All right,” we’ve been formally introduced. “My name is Rick,” he said with a smile.
My response was, “And I’m Shelby,”
It wasn’t love at first sight in the traditional sense of the word. That was not the case. More slowly. However, it moved confidently. His smile gave me the impression that I had just run into the ideal amount of mayhem. The kind that softly rearranges things till they fit better without blowing your life up.
Two years later, we were already fantasizing about midnight feedings and crayon drawings on the refrigerator when we were married. We therefore purchased a crib that we didn’t yet need and painted the spare room a gentle gray.
And as if they were already ours, we discussed sleep schedules and baby names over supper.
But whether you’re prepared or not, time has a way of going on. I began to question whether we were creating a life for someone who might never arrive while the crib remained empty and the gray walls reverberated with nothing but optimism turning to dust.
Treatments for infertility came and went, initially with hope, then with fear, and finally with nothing but silent monotony. At home, Rick administered my hormone shots.
According to my doctor, the camera would provide all the information we required, so I underwent a hysteroscopy. However, it felt like yet another dead end when they couldn’t find anything. After that, I had to have a laparoscopy to check for pelvic adhesions, treat endometriosis, and check for any obstructed fallopian tubes. They discovered a lot of scar tissue, those microscopic threads that hold everything together like dark cobwebs.
I requested that they thoroughly clean everything. They promised to try.
The rooms where we tried acupuncture sessions smelt of desperation and peppermint. As if order could ensure a result, I tracked my bloodwork and cycles on a spreadsheet on my phone.
It didn’t.
Every test failure seemed like a little funeral. When two lines never came, Rick was always close by, providing steady arms and soft words, but even he was unable to drown out the echo.
I once buried my face in his chest and said, “I’m just so tired,” following our third IVF cycle.
He gave me a slow, rhythmic back rub as if he were scared of saying something incorrect.
“I know,” he replied. “I understand, sweetie. I still think it will happen, though. Somehow.”
I did believe him at times. I didn’t always.
In parked cars, behind toilet doors, and at baby showers where other women put their hands on their developing tummies while I smiled and wished them well, I learned how to cry discreetly.
Even when the grief made me irritable, Rick supported me through it all. I was never told I was too much by him.
After seven years, hope started to feel as fragile as tissue. Then, one day, my doctor smiled softly while leaning across the desk.
First, “Shelby, Rick,” he said. “I think it might be emotionally and physically unwise to continue.”
Something inside of me broke at that very moment. However, another item also opened.
I mentioned, “I think we should adopt,” during a dinner one evening. I hardly raised my voice above a whisper.
“Yeah,” my spouse remarked, raising his gaze from his dish. He grinned as though he had been suppressing that same idea for months. “Yeah, I think we’re ready.”
It was not an easy task. They questioned, examined, and studied us. However, the phone rang on a wet Thursday afternoon.
“There’s a newborn girl,” according to the agency employee. “She’s happy and healthy, and she desperately needs a home.”
I was unable to talk. With a calm voice, my husband removed the phone from my grasp.
“We’re prepared. Indeed. Of course. Let’s get things started.”
The following morning, we took Ellie home. Her face was smooth and rosy, her fingers naturally curled around mine as she lay wrapped in a fresh hospital blanket.
Shouting, “She’s so small,”
“She’s perfect,” Rick remarked, gazing at her as if he had been desperate to hold her all his life.
He rocked her softly that night while I sat on the nursery floor and watched them, heart agape.
“This is what it’s supposed to feel like,” I replied.
My spouse remarked, “She’s our miracle,” with gleaming eyes.
But the tranquility was short-lived.
I sensed a change within three days, which was initially mild, like a lightbulb flickering in the corner of your eye. Rick fell silent in a way that had nothing to do with exhaustion or overwhelm.
He seemed to be keeping something from me.
In the backyard, Rick began answering calls while pacing close to the fence, one hand knotted in his hair and the other clamped around his phone. When I approached too closely, he would speak more softly.
He had said, “It’s just work stuff, Shelby,” even though I hadn’t asked.
I initially ignored it. After all, we were both getting used to it. I wasn’t exactly a picture of peace either, and Ellie hardly ever slept for longer than two hours at a time. Rick, however, hardly reacted when I described her, how her eyes occasionally seemed to look about the room for something that wasn’t there, and how she smelt of milk and lavender.
One morning, as I was washing bottles, I remarked, “I’m obsessed with that little yawn she does, honey,” “It’s like she’s surprised by how tired she is.”
He nodded once as he raised his head from his dish of bread, eggs, and coffee.
He said, “Yeah, she’s cute, Shel,” and then he slipped outside with his phone once more.
I was unable to bridge the growing gap between us.
Then one night I heard his voice coming from the living room as I walked past the nursery. It was strained and low.
“Listen,” he said. “I must keep Shelby in the dark. Regretfully… We may have to give the baby back, in my opinion. We can say that things aren’t going well. that we’re having trouble connecting. Just a little something.”
My ribs were struck by my heart.
Before I could stop myself, I entered the room.
“Return?” I spoke sharply and shakily. “What on earth are you talking about, Rick? Why would we ever give our child back?”
With the phone still at his ear, my husband froze, his eyes wide. He remained silent for a long moment. Then, with a hesitant smile that stopped short of his eyes, he turned to face me and hung up.
He said, “You must have misheard me, Shelby,” too hastily. “I’ve been considering returning the pants that I purchased. What do you know? You’re worn out, sweetie. You also need to get some rest. Continue.”
When I said, “Rick,” my voice cracked. “You expressed exactly what I heard. Return the infant, you said! Who even speaks in such a manner?”
He said, “It’s nothing,” as he rubbed his face and sighed. “Stress is the cause. That’s not what I meant at all.”
“So you’re talking to someone else about how you’re feeling rather than to me? And you’re attempting to deceive me by saying that I’m tired and you wanted to return pants? Who are you, Rick?”
“I’m stressed,” he said again, plainly.
“You said return Ellie like it was a real option.”
He uttered, “Shelby, please,” “Drop it.”
However, I was unable to.
I asked for two days. Gently at first, then straight.
“Tell me what’s going on, Rick,” I replied. “Is the adoption at issue here? Have you changed your mind about our child? or about fatherhood?”
Each time, he shut me down.
When he said, “You’re imagining things,” It isn’t what you believe. Give me some space, please.
I made an effort, but he didn’t assist me understand; he didn’t meet me halfway. He hardly touched me instead. He hardly gave Ellie a glance.
And his hands shook as he did.
I was at my breaking point by the third day. I gripped the steering wheel as if it were an anchor as I drove to my mother-in-law’s house.
Her expression softened as soon as she saw me as she opened the door.
“Honey,” she said.
“Hi, Gina,” I said in a whisper. “Can we talk?”
The aroma of coffee permeated the quiet between us as we sat at her kitchen table. The kind of woman who remembered birthdays and gave me a little longer hug than was required, Gina had always been lovely to me.
But now, as though terrified of what may fall out, her gaze were riveted on the surface of her mug while her hands remained clenched around it.
I told her everything.
Regarding that phone call, Rick’s distance, and the fact that he no longer gave Ellie much attention. I took my time going over it. I needed Gina to feel the weight of the truth, so I let it slowly pour out.
She pressed her fingers to her temple and let out a deep breath when I was done.
“Sweetheart,” she began in a voice that was too loud for the space. “What I know, I can’t share with you. That is not how I can betray Rick. My son cannot be betrayed.”
Something within of me gave way.
“Gina,” I said in a whisper. “I’m not requesting that you betray him. All I have to do is comprehend what’s going on in my own house. He refuses to communicate with me, and I need to know how to keep my child safe in case something goes wrong.”
My mother-in-law whispered, “Shelby,” as her eyes finally locked with me. “He cherishes you. He also adores the child.”
“Then why does he look at her like she’s a mistake?” I retorted.
She said, “I’ll talk to him,” “I’ll tell him that he has to tell you the truth.”
Her commitment made me want to be angry, but I knew that I would have done the same thing if I had ever had to defend my child. I would carry her secrets with me to the hereafter.
Rick hardly moved from the couch when I arrived home. He gave me a good-night kiss on the forehead, but it felt more like habit than affection. He looked at Ellie as if she may disappear.
That’s how a week went by.
Then he arrived home early one evening. Before he spoke, he lingered in the doorway for a long moment.
His words, “I need to tell you something,” were clear.
I said, “Okay,” and shut off the stove. “Come sit.”
He was seated at the kitchen table opposite me.
“This secret has been with me for days. I’ve been tormented by it. I did something behind your back, Shelby. I saw a tiny birthmark on her shoulder when we got her home. It had the exact same form and location as mine. I kept thinking about it even though I told myself it was nothing.”
He took a deep swallow.
“A few days prior, I had placed an order for a DNA kit. I had no idea why, but something had been bothering me. However, I applied it as soon as I noticed the mark. When I was holding her, I wiped her cheek. sent it off early the following day.”
I sensed the tilt of the room. The notion that, after everything we had already endured, he had once again gone behind my back I was having trouble breathing.
“The results came back two days ago,” he stated.
I felt sick to my stomach.
“Ellie is… She is the biological daughter of my.”
The birthmark had caught my attention. However, I hadn’t given it much attention; I was simply in awe that we had a child to cherish and name our own.
There was a long pause.
Late last year, it took place. Rick went on, “I just got into another argument with you regarding treatments.” I met someone when intoxicated and furious. Alara was her name, and it was only for one night. She was never seen by me again. I was completely unaware of her pregnancy.
The world swayed.
“So, when you saw the birthmark… that’s when you took the test?” My voice was hardly steady as I asked.
Rick gently nodded while keeping his gaze fixed on the ground.
“I was so scared that I didn’t tell you. I assumed you would depart, they would take her away, or I’m not sure. But Shelby, she’s here. We own her. I’ve been torn apart by this secret. Please, let’s figure out a solution to this.”
He clarified that he had gotten in touch with the agency to verify the information when the findings were received. The birth mother acknowledged everything when they contacted her. She was prepared to put her refusal to have the child in writing. No fight over custody. No conditions.
Numb, I sat there.
I was cheated on by the man I loved. told me a lie. And the baby I already loved so much, the one I had waited seven years to embrace, was evidence of it all.
Rick sat quietly on the couch that night while I rocked Ellie to sleep. He wasn’t watching the TV, although it was on. Instead, I saw our kid, her mouth fluttering as if she were dreaming of something lovely, her small chest rising and falling.
I knew then and there. She has nothing to do with this. Not the lie, not the suffering that followed, not her birth. Despite being trapped in the midst of everything, my little girl remained unaffected by any of it.
I put her in the crib and watched for a time, taking in the steady whir of the baby monitor and the gentle murmur of her breathing. Behind me, I heard my husband clear his throat, but I didn’t look back.
Silently, “I never meant to hurt you,” he said.
“I know,” I replied. “But you did.”
I tried imagining forgiveness throughout the course of the following few days, but it never settled. I could feel the void his treachery had created between us each time Rick reached for my hand. The house no longer felt like a home.
It had the appearance of a reproduction, yet it was too close to be a home.
I finally informed him that I desired a divorce. He didn’t dispute. His eyes were wet yet resigned as he simply nodded softly. There were no yelling or fights.
Ellie would never have to choose between us since we decided to share custody.
Weeks after he moved out, I sat in the nursery one evening holding Ellie close to my chest. Soft shadows were made on the wall as the mobile slowly rotated over her crib.
“She’s going to be okay, right?” I muttered into the quiet.
My daughter shifted slightly before settling back down.
I stated, “You’re loved, Ellie,” out loud. “And that’s what matters most.”
Rick’s blood may be in Ellie, but my heart belongs to my daughter. Even though some miracles are accompanied by suffering, they are nevertheless miracles.
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