How One Little E-Mail Changed My Life {My Trip to D.C.}

A little over 2.5 years ago, I received an e-mail from a girl named Jill who had found my adoption blog through a message board we were both a part of. She happened to be adopting from Georgia as well. What is stranger is that she was using the same agency as us. Even crazier-our babies were born 2 days apart (after both of them being born prematurely) and in the same area of Georgia! We began just e-mailing back and forth. In fact, writing this out, I went back and checked and I have pages full of e-mails back and forth between us. Those e-mails are absolutely precious to me now and will be printed out for Xiomara's scrapbooks.  Eventually, we decided to become Facebook friends and even shared our phone numbers with each other.

Totally love this girl and the friendship we have!

Re-reading those e-mails now 2.5 years later, I can see that we had this instant connection from the very start. We prayed through each other's adoptions, we shared prayer requests about our children, and we connected in a way that is quite unusual for an online friendship. 

In the past two and a half years, we have e-mailed, facebooked, and talked on the phone. 2.5 years ago we wanted to meet in Georgia, but I left for back home one day before she arrived in Georgia. We've said it from the start that one day we would meet, but finances, or me nursing has always been in our way. Then, this November, she called me up and basically told me, she was either visiting me or I was going to see her. Since where I live is freezing in the winter and there is not a lot to do outside, I told her I would visit her in Washington D.C. and come summer, she can visit me! :)

Standing in front of the Capitol.

We made plans for a 5 day trip in January. I was super nervous leaving my girls for 5 days. Outside of when we adopted Xiomara, I have never left any of my children that long. Chris took some days off of work, along with my parents agreeing to help when needed, and we booked the ticket. On the day that my plane was to leave, I was a wreck. Not only was I leaving my girls for a long extended time, but I was also leaving my baby who was still nursing once a day. On the way to the airport, I told Chris that I sure hoped 5 days wasn't too long being there, but that I had a feeling at the end of the trip I would be in tears leaving her.

I was right.

It's kind of crazy hard for me to explain how close I could become with someone after just meeting them. But this was just what both of us desperately needed at this time in our lives. In the almost 6 years I have been a mommy, I have rarely left my kids. What I didn't realize, was how much it was needed. Girl time, talking, laughing, drinking wine, listening to some of our favorite music together, and crying together until late in the night. Sharing with each other our hopes and dreams, our pasts and our right now, knowing that neither one of us was judging the other. Those five days were some of the best days of my life. We did do the typical tourist things as well: Toured the Capitol, went to the National Art Museum, Toured Mt. Vernon, walked by the White House, we saw President Obama's motorcade, we drank about a thousand Starbucks drinks, walked through old downtown Alexandria, did a Winery tour, walked through Georgetown, rode the Metro, walked all over D.C., and ate at some of the best restaurants.

Visiting Mount Vernon

But at the end of the trip, I can say that what made the trip for me was a friendship that was only deepened by meeting in person.

I can't say that it has been easy to come home to reality, and not to mention cold weather, but I did come home feeling way more refreshed. Perhaps the most amazing thing is to think how God made it so that one e-mail started what I now know will be a lifetime of friendship.

Thank you so much Jill for hosting me, taking me all over the D.C. area to do the tourist things, and just for being you! I count you as one of my best friends. We've talked on the phone and/or texted everyday since the trip, so I'd say we are doing pretty good keeping up on our promise to keep in touch better! :)

P.S. Plans are definitely in place for her to visit this summer, and I put an alert on plane tickets so I can one day go back and visit her! :)

Have you ever had any super close online friendships? Have you ever met in person any online friends?