January thru May Update

Hmmm...maybe I'm moving to quarterly updates? Things are that slow around here...

Honestly, our adoption journey has been rough so far this year and I haven't wanted to share too much. We are at the point that things have taken so long that I've read a number of blogs where families have been blessed by adoption twice during the same timeframe that we've been waiting. I know this isn't something to be making comparisons on, but I can't help see what feels like our standing in place. We're stuck.

We have had some situations come up over the past several months that seemed very promising, but nothing has panned out. Two situations in particular have pulled most at our heart strings and have left us wondering how much longer we can keep getting our hopes up and then have it not work out.

We picked up and left town on a road trip (with very little notice) to meet birthparents in March. We were absolutely enamored by the couple and thought our meeting had went well. They met with two other couples as well and picked one of them instead of us.

The most recent situation has been the hardest. A baby boy was brought to our attention about a month ago. An agency that doesn't typically network with ours was seeking any couples open to a rather complicated situation. We initially passed on the situation, but after much prayer and a series of events we emailed our agency back and asked if our profile could still be shown to the mother. It turns out that there wasn't exactly a long line for this little guy. You see, it was expected that he was going to be medically fragile. It turns out he was so fragile that after crying upon his arrival he was almost immediately ventilated and his little life lasted no longer than a couple of days. We had little control over the situation and kept wanting to know more about what was going on. What we did have control over was our prayer. I don't know why God brought this baby boy to our attention, but I am certain He did it for a reason. As a case worker from our agency said we "gave that birthmom hope that her baby would be loved regardless." I hope this is true. I know there were many prayers said for baby boy and have a sneaky suspicion that he has a couple uncles of sorts showing him the ropes in Heaven.

I remember reading an interview that Mariska Hargitay had given after she birthed one and adopted two children. She shared the sentiment that adoption is not for the faint of heart. She shared this after her and her husband parented for 3 days before the birthmother changed her mind and chose to parent herself. I seem to agree and understand more and more...adoption is not for the faint of heart...I know there are much tougher situations that people go through everyday, but my heart is becoming quite tender and hope the road isn't too much longer (or any more rough).

The Ol' Ball and Chain

We did something extremely liberating the other day.

We had no idea it would feel so good.

We spent money.

When you are in the process of adopting your bank account becomes uber important. For me it had become something I didn't realize I was so fixated on. Constant running and rerunning of numbers. Strategizing a gazillion different ways how to budget our money. How much to save vs. how much to pay on debt vs. how  much to spend on groceries.

From what I hear this is just part of adoption. The money focus starts almost immediately after your first introduction and orientation into adoption. When you add all the fees, (which are rarely published for the general public, you have to call and seriously inquire into adoption to learn about the fees) potential travel expenses, unpaid maternity leave, actual baby expenses, you begin to realize that it all adds up to a LOT.

We are not perfect with our money, but we do budget and try to be reasonable. Money is always a balance. I remember going to high school with a daughter of an eye doctor who talked about it being irresponsible to buy something if you have to finance it. She felt that you should save up for everything before making a purchase. We were talking about cars specifically. All I could think was how long it would take me to save up to buy a car. Even a cheap car. My family's income was probably a quarter of what her family's was and our discretionary income was probably far less than that. I think there is a lot of wisdom in paying cash for things, but I also don't think it is always practical. Sure, buy a $5,000 car instead of a $20,000 car, but the ability to save up for the lower priced car when you have a lower income can get in the way of so much...like enjoying life. With that being said, I don't think that the definition of living within your means equates to being able to make the minimum payment on all the keeping-up-with-the-Jones'-nonessential things (boats, luxury cars, vacations). It's somewhere in between.

So, I guess my point in sharing my money views, is that we've been working hard to save up for our adoption and don't want to finance all of it if we don't have to. We bit off a lot this year by moving, buying a second house that needed work, and planning on our adoption. It freaks me out when I add it all up. We've both had moments where we felt that we've been giving up a few things and not knowing if we had the right balance. Still not really knowing whether we are striking the right balance or not, we decided to buy living room furniture. And it feels great. We've not done and bought so much for the purpose of preserving every extra penny for our adoption that it was down right liberating. I can't really explain it. I can't really explain why I decided to blog about it either, but it's part of the adoption journey I guess. Heck, furniture is practically an adoption-must since we will have so many friends and family over visiting. Now they'll have somewhere to sit. :o)

November

I've spent a few days thinking about what I wanted to blog about for my monthly adoption update post. The update is there is no update. Technically there is one more day left, but we are pretty sure we broke our streak of one situation each month.

In other news, all things not related to adoption have been pretty eventful this November.

• Jake went from working in Seattle to working in Bend. We think it'll only be a few more weeks before he is back to working in the Willamette Valley and home every night. This will be wonderful...even if I do have to start cooking again during the week.

• I'm changing jobs and will be working in Salem full time. 

• I've been kind of sick for the past 3 or 4 months and was relieved to have negative results eliminating a serious condition as being the culprit. I'm so thankful for diagnostic testing and procedures. I was very relieved when my doctor said "good news, it's not cancer and its not ______" (a scary disease process).

• We hosted Thanksgiving this year and LOVED having everyone over. One of my sisters and I both can't have milk products so I made a completely lactose free meal. It really wasn't hard and nobody probably would have known if it wasn't mentioned. Best part about having a loud and busy house full of family was having a "kid space" in the house. With the nursery having a few things in it, including some stuffed animals now, my nieces had their very own place to play. This was the first time they got to have designated-kid space. It was awesome...and they made us laugh. A lot. At one point we were so busy laughing when they came running out of the bedroom "riding" stuffed animals none of us thought to pull out a phone or camera to take a picture.

• We got to go to the Civil War game and cheer on the Beavers. Although they didn't win, it was a ton of fun to go. I forget how close and easy it is to pop over to Corvallis and catch a game. I love going to sporting events.

I'm sure I'm forgetting a ton of other things, but those are the highlights!

A Glimpse

I work with a wonderful girl on a committee at work that brings us into the same conference room about once a month. I see her at events in between meetings typically, but our paths hadn't crossed for about 6 weeks. The moment I walked into the conference room and we locked eyes I knew. She had become an aunt. Her sister and brother-in-law are in Texas with their new baby boy waiting for their paperwork to go through so they can come home. It took everything in me to not have a complete breakdown over her wonderful news. There was so much running through my head as I looked at pictures of the newly formed family and as I listened to their amazing story. I did feel a twinge of jealously, (that I'm not proud of) but more than anything I felt such joy and excitement. Adoption is just so amazing. I was vividly reminded of what a magical and exciting time we are at in our lives awaiting our first child while getting this glimpse into another family's story. So, so, so exciting.

National Adoption Month

This is the third year that this month being dedicated to adoption awareness has been on my radar. Each year I learn so much more about adoption. I love how so many of the blogs I like to read post more often throughout the month. Reading other's stories and experiences is heartwarming and reassuring.

Although we've been on our adoption journey for 18 months we still know nothing about adoption, or so it seems. Because it is such a personal thing to talk about I get how I had exposure to adoption, but had little idea of the intricacies of the process. Also, there are so many different ways to go about adoption that I only know about the process we are going through.

For us, we are adopting domestically. We work with an agency in Idaho that also does work in Oregon. Our agency networks us (shares our profile) with other agencies that they regularly work with. Adoption agencies all work a little bit differently and its important that the agency itself and their caseworkers are a good fit for you. Adoption is extremely personal and emotional yet requires competent professionals to navigate the ethical and legal territory. Our agency networks us primarily with one agency that we've chosen in Louisiana. However, only 2 of the 4 situations that we've been considered for have been from the agency in Louisiana. The other two came from agencies in Oregon and Idaho that reached out to our agency looking for more couples to find a better match for their situation.

All of the situations that have been brought to our attention have changed me. They've changed my understanding of the process, how I look at these various situations and feel about the details i.e. the birthmother's life information, the health of the baby, etc., and they've changed my heart. At the end of the day I'll never know who these women and babies are, but they've had a great impact on my life and I've learned from them.

The entire month of November has also become the month of thankfulness. My facebook feed is full of 'today I am thankful for' posts. I'm thankful that more and more people are learning about adoption this month. Adoption in the United States has greatly evolved in the past 60 years and so many of the things that weren't great about it have been remedied. There are many myths and questions surrounding adoption, but it is no longer taboo...or at least that is the direction it is headed. For this I am thankful.

For anyone wondering about adoption in general or about our experience please don't hesitate to ask. Adoption is one of my favorite things to talk about. Even on the days that I'm a bit frustrated with the duration of our wait, talking about it lightens my frustration. I'm thankful for this as well.

Like Clock Work

I seem to only provide monthly updates anymore. Won't it be fun when I have more to say? :o)

Like clock work another month has gone by and with that another situation...that we were not chosen for. That makes four. This one was completely different than the others and we could feel the difference. Not sure if what we were/are feeling is because the baby was already born or something else. Jake and I both have a growing longing to bring baby home. I think a big part of that is simply because it feels like we've been waiting f-o-r-e-v-e-r (picture that being a Sandlot forever).

a baby room

We decided to go ahead and start putting the baby room together. It's far from finished, but it was driving me nuts having a crib and mattress sitting in boxes and having the closet not organized.

 

We were mildly worried that the crib would be a nightmare to put together so we kind of joked about needing to grab a beer and glass of wine before we got started. We opened up the box, grabbed the directions out, and saw that there were only 5 steps. Could it really be that easy? Yes. It took us longer to unpack and wipe the crib pieces down that it took us to put it together...and we love it!

 

 

I looked at hundreds of cribs. I finally found this one online and read about the company finding out they are hand made by a small company in Wisconsin; just a few hours away from where my parents grew up. 

 

It really was easy to put together. Side note - Jake cracks me up. When I started taking pictures he said something like, 'Wait, you are taking pictures? If I knew you were going to do that I would have changed my clothes.' Apparently he felt his outfit was dorky and thought his future children would look at the pictures and laugh at it. He should have known better. I always take pictures.



 

 The baby room is the second largest bedroom in the house (being just one foot narrower than the master). It's a great room, but we realized not so great for crib placement. There is only one wall that doesn't have windows, heating vents, or doors. So, the crib ended up under a window. We plan to replace all the windows in the house in the next year or so and hopefully that will help with any drafts.

 





There is still tons to do in the baby room, but it is at least started and there are more projects for it in the works!