How many times can a person hold back tears?

Grant & I attended PRIDE last night and it was a panel night. The panel consisted of foster families and their biological children, someone who grew up in a foster home, adoptive parents, a couple going through her second view-to-adopt, and a birth mother...a wide cross-section of stories and experiences were shared. I can't remember how many times I grabbed for my water bottle to take a drink hoping it would stop the tears from rolling down my cheeks, but I seriously had to use the bathroom after the panel finished sharing. The stories they shared were scary, encouraging, heartfelt, honest, raw, and terrifying all at the same time. The experience that showed us a glimpse of where our adoption journey may take us (and made me reach for my water bottle the most) was shared by the couple who adopted their child when he was 4 months old. The father commented that he never thought he would love being a father so much and how exciting it has been to watch his son develop and see what he is growing to look like (b/c he obviously won't look like the adoptive parents). The mother talked about going to parent-baby groups and feeling like such an outsider b/c conversations seemed to always end up with mom's sharing pregnancy or labour stories. She said it's difficult knowing she missed out on the first 4 months of her son's life. There was a woman on the panel last night that Grant & I agreed grabbed at our heart strings the most and echoed our story - She opened up about having multiple miscarriages before having her biological daughter (which was deemed a high-risk pregnancy) and although doctors told her she can get pregnant again (she just experienced another miscarriage) her and her husband knew the plan for them was to grow their family through adoption. They are pursuing their second view-t0-adopt (process to be explained in another post) as the first one fell through and wow, did her story speak to us and really confirm for us that we are definitely meant to adopt!