Don't Call It A Comeback

Inspired by a few friends who have expressed to me how awful the holidays are while waiting to adopt, I am pumping a little life into the ole' adoption blog.

You guys, I haven't forgotten what it's like. I may never forget and I really don't want to. It's good to keep some of the pain near the surface, to stay grateful for what you have in life. In no particular order, these are the things that got me through the holidays whilst waiting, year after year. Your miles may vary.

1. Near constant distraction in the form of doing things. Concerts, movies, girl's nights out, dates with the husband, shopping WAY too much. You get it, leave the house.

2. Netflix binges. Not just any Netflix binge. The holidays bring Love Actually and Bridget Jone's Diary... The ultimate in holiday chick flick bingeing. Add some peppermint schnapps that we won at a curling bonspiel raffle to some hot cocoa and maybe, just maybe, something extra calorie ridden to eat, and BAM you got yourself a full afternoon of no thinking. Optional: random British romcom featuring Colin Firth, as suggested by Netflix.

3. Tacos and margaritas. Jalapeno margaritas to be exact, because who doesn't want their burning drink to burn more? Extra points for doing this with other people waiting to adopt or your BFF.

4. Three dollar draught beer with your BFF with half priced apps and Barnes and Noble shopping afterward. Thankfully, you will be tipsy from beer and not mind Christmas shopping while at B&N. Beer and books are, quite frankly, the perfect combination.

5. While the husband is away, the wife will play....records. I did a lot of exploring our record collection. We grief ordered a 7 foot beanbag after our neardoption last May. Lounging on said beanbag chair (if you can call it that? beanbag sofa?) and listening to records was indeed the therapy my counselor couldn't provide.

6. Speaking of counselors, a good therapist is everything in the adoption wait. If you are in the Atlanta area and need one, I have the person for you. She has plenty of experience thanks to going through the wait with me! We laughed, we cried, we sat and stared at each other silently.

7. Frank Turner's music (obvs). Being careful to avoid certain songs and albums that made things worse. Never "Song For Eva Mae". Never.

8. Hugglin' my friend's kids and my nephew. Huggles all around. Even when I thought it would be hard to see them, their kid innocence and joy was exactly what I needed in the end.

9. Talking about WHEN not IF with my friends. Gosh, it hurt so bad when people would say "IF" if it happens for you. My heart would soar if a friend said in passing "When your baby comes". It's such a small thing, but also not small at all.

10. Remembering that no matter what emotions I'm dealing with, the woman who would eventually be placing her child with us will be dealing with so much more. Perspective.

This Christmas, we celebrate with our son. This was longed for. Previous Christmases made me feel sick for us. This Christmas I feel sick for my friends, because I get it. I so get it. Below you will find links to a few of my friend's adoption profiles through the agency we used. Please share and spread the word. I wouldn't share anyone I wouldn't vouch for as solid, awesome people.

My jalapeno margarita/dog cuddling/exercise so we can brunch heavily sister from another mister and her fun loving, as well as funny, husband. They are local!

Jessica and Clay

Friends with senses of humor, tons of personality, and good all around people. Also local!

Sarah and Chris

They've been through it all and still keep a positive stance. We go way back to the beginning of our wait. West coasters!

Nicole and Don

Our former profile neighbors and adoption wait warriors. Located in NC.

Angela and Ethan

Full of fun and and wit, with the brains to back it up (Graduated from the school I where I work!). Local peeps.

Kristan and John

She's nothing but kindness and warmth. Indiana.

Heidi

Sarcasm and artistic talent? Local!

Amy and Ryan

I am so grateful that our list of waiting friends that we feel emotionally invested in through our agency is shrinking! Congrats to everyone who adopted in 2016 and here is to this list getting even smaller in 2017! If I missed your profile, it wasn't on purpose. Send me a note and I will share your profile.

Finding My Zen State. Again.

Once upon a time, I wrote this post for America Adopts Finding My Zen State While Waiting to Adopt . If you know me, or read this blog at all, you know that Zen state comes and goes. I am, or I should say WE are, on a mission to find that Zen state again. And keep it.

The goal is to enjoy every moment we have child free. To really appreciate each other and our freedom to whatever we want at the drop of a hat. Once we adopt, we will never be just the two of us again. Even when the kid is grown and out of our house, we won't be a family of two. There are wonderful things to celebrate about just being us. Here is a short list of the good things about being a party of two:

- If we feel like it, we can eat ice cream for dinner. We have no one watching and learning from our poor choices yet. Once we have a kid, there have to be actual meals, with veggies! Ok, so we do eat that stuff too, but a Saturday movie night? Ice cream is ok!

- We can hop up and go somewhere whenever we want. If we both have the weekend off and want to hop over to Athens or Chattanooga or Asheville, we totally can. We only need to pack a few items of clothes at most. This is not to say you can't take impromptu trips with a baby in tow, it's just way more complicated. Did you pack everything you need? Diapers? Formula? Extra clothes? Pack n Play? Entertainment? Could it possibly fit in the car? What about his or her sleep schedule? Alternately, can Grandma and Papa babysit over night? (Hint hint Grandma and Papa!)

- Oh, we got a text that our favorite band is playing at the Masquerade! Better hurry down there! Yeah, that isn't happening with a baby in the house.

- Using the restroom in privacy/silence. I've heard the stories. I know we will be giving this luxury up. Nothing more needs to be said.

-Sleeping through the night! Sweet sweet sleep. We sure do love it. For now, we sleep soundly. The future is not so well rested.

- Wearing  baby vomit/poo/drool free clothing. I mean, that's nice. I think we can all agree on that.

We would give all of these things up in a heartbeat, but for now, we are making the most of it all. More curling trips, maybe another trip to Philly to see one of my BFFs again, more beaches, more mountains, more concerts, more of each other.

Can we also talk about life lessons? I often joke that I've had too many of these, but it's not true. You can never learn too much in your life. The friends I keep referring to who are adopting before us or matching or just going crazytown with the contacts? These are people we care for. People we want to be happy. We want them to adopt and have their kids be our kid's friends. We have to keep up the soul searching to be happy for others, while supporting our own feelings of grief. A very wise friend of mine told me the other day "Sarah, you have to let them have their adoption stories too". A life lesson.

Goodness, Lisa T! You are always such a inspirational person. I don't know if I say this enough, but thank you for being you.

Things are rough, people. I'm not going to lie. This has been the most challenging thing we have every done. This process is what you make of it. Sometimes it takes hard experiences to remind you to do better, be better, and just do you. We are going to do us and others will do who they are. It will 100% be worth it. We will 100% come out of this one one piece... no, three pieces: mom, dad, and baby.

Thicker Skin

Light in the midst of darkness on my walk to work today.

I woke up feeling light-hearted today for the first time in a long time. I don't have a good explanation for it. I've been off of Facebook for a couple of days, so maybe that's it. Maybe it's because I have had to deal a lot lately with reconciling my feelings of jealousy and feelings of joy for friends either adopting quickly and/or before us or having many many contacts while we sit silent or get scammed again and again. It's a full time job processing those conflicting feelings. Maybe it's because I started my Frank Turner listening party at 5:30am this morning. That never hurts.

I'm going to be honest, I had kind of forgotten how it feels to be happy. I know, that sounds dramatic. There is a difference between moments of happiness- like when we have our nephew and he cracks us up- and just simply being happy in general. Man, I hope this lasts. I hope it isn't a total freak out that I am mistaking for elation. My chest is feeling relaxed for the first time in a while. It has just been so tight for, I'd say months. Is there fear that we will never adopt looming? Of course. Is there sadness that another day passed that was not the day we became parents? Of freakin course. Do I feel some grief trying to sneak in? Ugh, yes, but I'm fighting it.

We have to be the best version of us in order to be awesome parents, which I know we will be. This means not giving in to jealousy, despair, or anger at the process. Okay, so some people adopt right away and that isn't us. We will be stronger for it. We will love our child that much more, because we had to fight so hard for this. We've always had to fight hard for everything we have. We are at a place that the only thing we are fighting to achieve is parenthood. The rest has been settled. We can get through this one.

That's all I really have today. It's been hard to write. It's been hard to feel the things I've needed to feel. I have 3 blog posts that I wrote, but never published, because I've been too hard on myself. I am my own worst enemy in this process.

May I always see the road rising up to meet me and my enemies defeated in the mirror behind. My adoption wait anthem:

Newborn Parenting Class: Meet Pancake

 Baby Pancake Cuddles

A couple of weeks ago, we attended a class called Baby Essentials. This class is offered at Northside Hospital in Atlanta for expectant parents, but this one was special. It was only for waiting adoptive families from our agency, The Independent Adoption Center.

Our baby for the day (pictured above) was a good sport. I named him Pancake. I felt it went well with Waffles (one of our cats). I promise I wont insist the real baby be named after breakfast foods! Pancake was a newborn, but could somehow already sit up on his own. Our kid for the day was super advanced and smart obviously. 

The instructor was an adoptive mom, though she did not do domestic newborn adoption. She adopted her daughter internationally. Despite the difference in our adoption paths, she did seem to understand many of the feelings that come along with the adoption wait and due to working in labor and delivery was familiar with adoptions that take place at birth.

The class covered the things babies do that might make you panic, but are totally normal. Like black poo-y stuff called meconium. Apparently, black tarry stuff in the diaper is A-OK for a newborn. Noted. Actually, we talked about many colors of infant poo. Riveting.

We went over a lot of things we are already familiar with like how to hold a baby, how to change a diaper, and how baby should sleep ( flat on it's back, nothing else in the crib!). Gone are the days that our parents put us on our tummies to sleep!

The class was about three hours. We of course were the longest waiting family there. It's pretty rough on the ole' self-esteem. My big goal this year is to hold my head high and just know that our baby is coming, it just hasn't been our time yet. Like I said, goal. You work toward goals, right?

There were people in the class who were just finishing their initial home study. I kind of felt like everyone looked at us worried when we said how long we've been waiting, but I'm hoping that was just in my head. The reality is though, that many of them will likely wait years. Anyway, enough about "boo hoo, we are still waiting".

The instructor suggested that we all get a car seat and take it to an authorized car seat inspector before baby comes. We haven't purchased one yet and honestly I'm glad we haven't. If we had purchased one when we started, I would be worried about if it was going expire before we finally adopt. I still am not comfortable buying one without at least a call saying it could be time. We have Target gift cards from our parents in case we have to fly somewhere and then buy stuff like that. Even if there isn't a Target, there is likely to be a Walmart or something. Heck, I have Amazon Prime, we can have whatever we need delivered to the hotel if need be.

I felt like that was the one piece of advice from the class I wouldn't necessarily follow. The rest of class was mostly safety stuff. I got pretty attached to little Pancake Cuddles Farrar. It was rough giving him back at the end of class. I'm sure he is on to other expectant parents with better doll naming skills.

All in all I thought the class was wonderful. We saw some adoption friends we've made over the last year or so and scoped out the new competition. Not that it's a competition... sort of. I mean, I hate to think of it that way, but some people are seeing our profile along with brand new people's profiles! Ugh. Oops, I'm doing it again. Long waiters. Once you are one, it kind of sticks in the forefront of your brain.

In other news, it is kidney walk time again! For anyone who is joining Sarah and John Adopt late, I am a two time kidney transplant recipient and unstoppable life force. My kidney walk team, Team Walking Beans, walks every year. The walk raises money for the National Kidney Foundation which provides education and resources for people with kidney disease and for the community at large.

If any locals want to join us, it is June 4th at Turner Field. My personal kidney walk page is located HERE! 

That's about all I have for today. I'm trying to take a new blog approach. If I only have negative stuff going on, stay off the blog! Life updates, adoption updates, fine. Whining, no. A mix of both, maybe.

Post #100. A Day In The Life.

This is our 100th blog post! That is crazytown.

I'm finding it really hard to blog lately. I have this new theory about adoption. Well, our adoption. I am starting to think that this is some social/psychological experiment to see how long it takes two perfectly sane people to crack. Like really crack.

How much can two happily married, middle class, suburban (only by location, not mindset!) people take before losing it? A lot. We can take a lot. Adoption, you are trying to break us down, but you can't win.

Can we talk about the day to day of adoption? A day in the life. Note: I am leaving out some of the stuff that can happen day to day that are adoption related for privacy reasons. And for optimism reasons.

Alarm goes off. A moment of peace in my warm bed. Restroom, put coffee on, feed the cats. I pick up my phone (admit it, you all do about this time) and my email begins to update. Eight new emails in my personal account. Smyna Vinings Patch with their vague headlines. A coupon from World Market, nice! Updates from my grad class. A thought pops into my head "Sarah, don't think it, if you think it, it won't happen". But I think it anyway "I hope this is the morning"....

I nervously (this feeling doesn't get better. Always nerves firing) look to see if there is a 1 or 2 or 3 next to sarahandjohnadopt@gmail.com . The number 2 appears. "Sarah, you thought it, so it's going to be junk mail", but hope sticks around as I hit the account...

"Dearest Pleasant One" oh yay. A scam email. "Hello I am emailing of the baby Saint Bart's Orphanage. We have all the blondest haired, bluest eyed babies in Cameroon (personal note, this is not important to us.We are open to all races and ethnicities). Of the sincerest email us. Baby waiting for you sincerely". Two scam emails. Hooray. I close it, disappointed I drink my coffee. I force myself to get dressed. One mismatching article of clothing at a time. I mean who cares right? It's not like today will be the day. Besides, maybe if I'm horribly unprepared and look a mess it will happen.

I park quite far from work, so I have a nice calm walk in to the office. It's early, the elementary school is just opening, so I'm surrounded by little kids, holding hands, chattering about recess and who is friends with who. It hits me again. Warm heart feelies. Maybe I should refresh the email. Maybe I should check google voice in case we got a text and google didn't email me. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe.

I park my rear at my desk and refresh my email, check google voice, triple check our adoption Facebook page. Nada. A deep sigh.

Meanwhile on Facebook another couple from our agency has adopted. They announce it on their page with such joy and relief. They waited 7 months. We hit 28 months two days ago. My chest hurts for a minute. The underlying grief of our wait rears it's ugly head.

Grief. It's a theme of a long adoption wait. People you meet and love adopt before you. People you love have failed adoptions. You feel grief for both. Your own adoption fails. Grief. Babies being abandoned in woods, dumpsters, high schools on the local news. Grief. If they had known about us, would they have chosen us? If they had known about our agency, would they still have abandoned their babies? So much grief.

The rest of my day is distracted mostly by work. The thoughts pop into my head between students "Check your email. Check adoptimist. Check it, check it check it". more thoughts "What if our lives change tonight? Ugh no Sarah, you thought it, it's not going to happen now".

I know I am not that powerful. I can't think us into or out of an adoption.

The drive home is full of music that triggers emotions. Life gives you demons, but I made friends with the devil, so I am invincible. Revved up, yes Frank, I am invincible. Adoption, you can't crack me.

At home, evenings are my favorite. John and I watching whatever we recorded while we have dinner. We talk about our day, an undertone of "it didn't happen today". I refresh my email. My chest hurts again. More TV, homework, bedtime.

I wake up at 1am in panic, a dream that we had a baby. A girl, 4 months old, chubby as can be. It takes a full 3 minutes to orient myself to realize it was a dream. Back to sleep hoping to be stronger tomorrow.

It's tomorrow and I feel stronger.


Working on a new Q&A since we are getting a lot of the same questions. For now you can review the first three Part 1 Part 2 Part 3


Some Monday tunes. 

Goals, Not Resolutions

I have already surprised myself in 2016. I woke up New Year's Day just like I wished I would - hopeful.

Is 2016 our year to become parents? It feels less risky to say it is now that we are in the new year. Maybe it's the distance between now and 2017. We can maybe leave it at it is hopefully our year, but I'm not expecting it to be.

I'm not going to make resolutions, but I am setting some goals this year. I feel like goals are something to work towards and resolutions are things you MUST do. That's too much pressure! In no particular order, here are my 2016 goals:

1. Adopt. Obviously. This goal entails more networking, guest blogging, and getting over my fears and insecurities to get us out there and seen as much as possible. (I will be mailing networking cards soon if anyone wants some! Business card sized, with our information on them).

2. Sit on a beach! Seriously, beach time is a must this year.

3. No sugary stuff for at least a month (on day 4 so far). Note: this is excluding margarita night with my fellow waiting adoptive moms, because adoption is kinda hard you guys. Margarita night with the ladies is a must.

4. More nephew time. Henry is four now and so much fun to hang out with. On Christmas day he told me he is going to tickle our baby's feet! He now calls our yet to be born baby his "baby cousin" and talks about it with excitement. Now it really needs to happen ASAP, because he is more aware and expecting it.

5. Be more organized! I ordered a new planner http://www.passionplanner.com/  that has goal setting/achieving steps, along with the usual planner stuff.  I read tons of reviews and decided this was the way to go for me. Between work, school, and adoption stuff, I always need a physical planner. People always say to just use my phone, but I like the old school way of writing stuff down. I remember everything better that way.

Okay, so those are my five goals for 2016. I think five is enough.

We can do this. We can be tough enough for our kid.

End Of Year Wrap Up: Goodbye 2015

My Fortune. Yes, I'm listening.

A year and one day ago, I woke up and thought "this will be the year we become parents". My heart screamed with hope and excitement. I thought it would be crazy if we didn't, seeing that our profile is so open and that we put in our time to make it to "average" waiters (just about).

Spoiler Alert: We did not become parents in 2015.

Today is hard. I didn't expect it to be. It's official that 2015 was not our year. I got to the parking area at work and sat in my car for 30 minutes, debating whether or not I should go back home and get in bed. I listened to Frank sing about having a "Happy New Year" and considered grabbing my passport and getting on whichever flight took me out of the country fastest. My heart said "flee", but my brain said "keep holding on".

I struggle with which tactic to use. Do I run into 2016 with optimism? Positive that this will be our year? OR Do I tell myself not to expect anything to happen, so I don't feel so let down if it doesn't. 

It doesn't feel safe to think 2016 will be our year. It feels like setting ourselves up for failure. Is it possible to brainwash yourself into thinking it's over and it will never happen, just so perhaps one day IF it does happen, you can just be pleasantly surprised?

I'm upset that the word IF has entered my adoption vocabulary again. We said goodbye to that word when we decided to stop trying to get pregnant and move forward with adoption. But here it is, swimming around in my head again. If we ever adopt. If we can get through another a year of this. If someone sees us for who we are- good people, honest people, people who just want to be parents. People who will honor our open adoption and honor our kid's past, present, and future.

I wish I had taken today off of work. I wish I had pampered myself with good coffee, no alarm clock, and maybe movie tickets or a trip to a museum. I wish I had known that today would feel not so great.

My wish is to wake up tomorrow and be hopeful and positive and just know for sure that 2016 is our year. I wish to feel different tomorrow. A new year, a new perspective. Trying so hard to make that happen. I wish for 2016 to surprise me.

We need help to do this. 

Can everyone just tell at least one person today that John and I are waiting to adopt? Networking is key. We are waiting to adopt through open adoption. This means the mother of our child needs to be made aware of us and choose us. Open adoption means some sort of contact throughout the child's life.

I get an average of 120 views per blog post within the first 3 days of posting. If everyone who views this post today, tells one new person about us, 120 additional people would be aware and who knows if they know someone who is looking to place their baby with a loving couple.

I've lost faith in the fact that our agency will ever come through for us. I'm sorry to the people who work there who I really care about- who I know do all they can- but as a whole, I'm not seeing the light with them after all of this time and not much of anything to speak of. I sure hope I eat those words sooner than later. I will totally own up to it if I am wrong, but observation and experience is telling me otherwise.

So it's up to us. 27 months and counting and that's just the waiting to adopt part. Doesn't include the infertility part. We've come way to far to stop now.

Goodbye 2015. You were not my favorite year, but you did bring us vacations and fun times with friends and family.

Now for the one of the best things I saw on the internet in 2015. This brother and sister knocking this song way out of the park:

Christmas 2015: Part Two- Funsies

I'm ready for part two of my Christmas post. The last post was about feelings. Boo feelings! If you happen to like feelings though, here is a link : Christmas 2015 Part One .

This is not a feelings post. This is a what we have been up to and what we will soon be doing post.

As per my recent hiatus ending post noted, I saw Frank Turner again. Oh yes, I did indeed. Pictures below. I'm off of work this week, so there has been plenty of laziness and general hanging out.

John has been curling, and watching Everton play soccer, and working hard as usual.

The house is superbly decorated. Presents are wrapped and ready to be torn into (or bags peeped into, because wrapping got tedious, so I turned to the good ole gift bag.

Christmas cards are hung in our entry way. What I really love about our Christmas cards is that so many of them are pictures of families created through open adoption!

It is lifting my soul up to receive these cards from friends we have made during the adoption wait. Watch out, when we have our kid, our Christmas card photos are going to be epic.

Let's not forget the cards featuring friends and their pets! More fur please!

Our annual tin of Christmas cookies arrived from our friend Katie and her family. You may remember her from such blog posts as Vacation Recap: Philadelphia . 

Katie's cookies mean the start of Christmas. She may be thinking "Great, now I can never stop sending them!" No Katie, you cannot. Kidding, sort of. 

I particularly loved the card, which included a drawing by Xander, Katie and Anthony's 4 year old son. I believe he now fancies himself an artist and author of stick figure and worm family books.

We saw Star Wars on opening day. This is the only picture I took, because, well, I was sending it to another friend we met through our adoption agency who was also seeing it that night.

This is the freezing cold line to get in. Yeah, sure it was cold that night, but it won't be for Christmas! It's supposed to be 77 here on Christmas day. It's currently pouring rain here, with a risk of tornadoes tonight. It's not exactly holiday spirit inducing weather.






I know you are all waiting for my Frank Turner trip update!

So, here it is. My friend Jessica went with me to Nashville to see Frank. She had seen him open for (I think) Ben Folds years ago. She was the first person I have met who actually knew who Frank Turner is, so ya know, I kept her. That sounds creepy (she's in the basement..shhhh). Kidding. No, she's actually getting ready to fly to Italy. Whatevs. I'll just hang here in the 'burbs.

Anyway, we went to an instore performance at Grimey's in Nashville and like .. um.. met him and got his autograph and stuff... Yeah, I know, I have met him before. Trust me, it doesn't get old. He liked my shirt (*blush*). I may  have prematurely put my arm around him for our picture. Man, I can be awkward.

What's that? An autographed record? Mine! All mine!

Also, he said I my way of spelling Sarah is the best way and I was all like, yeah, totally, mumble mumble squirm. Because I am super smooth when talking to my music idols.

So, let me not leave out the part where a friend I made in the Frank Turner Army (it's a thing, ok?) Marisa is her name, got us wrist bands to make this possible. It was a know a girl who knows a guy type of deal. I am so thankful to Marisa and her friend!

Then we went to the actual show. It was at 3rd and Lindsley, which was a really awesome venue. We squeezed our way to the front and I sang/screamed/yelled/jumped/danced/sweated my face off.

I no longer have a face. 

I think Jessica is hooked now. It's contagious, that Frank Turner bug.

Ok, I'm stopping with the Frank Turner fan review. Let's talk about my onesie addiction. My name is Sarah and I have a onesie addiction.

If I see a cool, cute, or funny onesie, it will belong to my yet to exist baby. Maybe it's a coping mechanism, maybe I just like to be prepared!

If you hear of a good onesie sale, you know where to find me. Merry Christmas future baby, you are already well dressed.




Well, that's my picture collection for this entry. If you follow us on Instagram: Our Account, you probably have seen most of these already. If you don't - Surprise! Pictures!

It is the Eve of Christmas Eve and I am home alone. John is working, making sure all of you have your ingredients for Christmas dinner. Tomorrow night we will have lasagna and monkey bread and celebrate our Christmas together.

Christmas day we will brunch at my parent's house and marvel at how funny our nephew, Henry, is. How big and smart and wonderful he is. Then we will drive to see John's mom and sister and eat some more, as people do on Christmas. We will chat on the drive up and back about how maybe... just maybe next year there will be three of us. Then hesitate, because maybe not. We don't know.

Tonight though, I am writing for you and for myself. For our future child to know how much we loved him or her before we ever set eyes on our perfect baby.

For now I will watch Love Actually eight times and Bridget Jones' Diary three, maybe four times, because there is no such thing as too much young Collin Firth or too much living abroad in your imagination. I'll wait eagerly for John to get home tonight. To torture him with said chick flicks and spend what is left of this holiday, just the two of us.

The lightning outside seems too close for computer comfort, so I'm signing off. From our hopelessly hopeful family of two to your family, Happy Holidays!

Reinventing What Waiting Is

Hey, is anybody still out there?

Well, it's December 3rd and I haven't blogged in over a month. I've gone back and forth about whether I'm ready to get this going again. There were a lot of positives about taking some time off of adoption. I mean, you never really take time off from the adoption wait, we were still waiting, still hoping, still doing some networking here and there. I guess it was more like taking time off of the extreme emotions that come along with waiting to adopt. A month of pushing it out of my head as much as possible.

Updates? Ok. We had a couple of contacts that appear to have fizzled out. It's hard not to overthink everything you said, wondering if something came across wrong, wondering if you ruined it. I mean, I don't think that is the case, but it's always something I will wonder about. The fact is though, nothing can be done about it. I'm pulling myself up and moving on.

We have about 300 pass along cards if anyone is interested! Email me sarahandjohnadopt@gmail.com . I mailed out about 200 to friends last month (thanks friends!).

Enough adoption news. ENOUGH! Let's get to the fun part.

We have spent the last month having adventures. I've done some of them without John, because the holidays generally mean he works A LOT #producemanagerlife. Yep, I just hashtagged in the blog. What is happening to me!?!?!

Waiting to adopt doesn't have to be sitting around wondering why not us? When will it be our turn? Waiting can be a time to do all the things that will be too hard to do once you have baby demanding your every minute

Without further ado, here are the tales of adventure.

I saw Free Throw (link to their site) at the Masquerade with our friend Stephen! A) Free Throw is awesome. Clangy, buzzy, emo, punk-ish. I just made those descriptors up. Opinions may vary. B) Stephen is also awesome. He is one of our #1 supporters in this adoption process. He was the best man at our wedding and is a friend extraordinaire.

Also, someone puked at this show. Front and center. The crowd parted like the red sea. No thanks.

We ate at Ponce City Market beforehand at Farm to Ladle, which was delish. Fresh, fast, unique. Important to note for Atlantans or people visiting, King of Pops does pops (that's KOP for popsicle) dipped in chocolate at Ponce City Market.

John and I saw Glen Hansard (linky) at the Buckhead Theatre. This was sort of a dream come true for me. My favorite movie is Once, which is how Glen entered my music library. He has come through Atlanta a few times, but never when we could go.

A maybe too jolly opening act, t-shirt purchase, and one gin and tonic later, we had our minds blown by Glen himself. He opened unaccompanied by any instrument, in the dark. Chills. I do love me a musician with a beard and guitar.

Let us not forget what the Buckhead Theatre used to be.. Goodbye Roxy, you will not really be missed. Sticky, old, metal folding chairs... Nope. You even made Henry Rollins screaming about republicans less fun, which is hard to do! The Buckhead Theatre is nicely redone- comfy couches, unique touches all around. Would return.

Just this past Monday (11/30) we saw David Bazan (linky dinky doo) .

We saw him in a random living room in Marietta. GA. Let's just say I only felt the pain of sitting cross legged on a wood floor a few times in the hour plus that he played. It was simply one of the best musical experiences of my life thus far.

He would play a few songs and the open it up to questions from the audience. Obviously, being in someone's living room, the audience wasn't that big, so it was very intimate. John asked two questions. There were cameras filming for a documentary, so we may end up in it!

I guess this happened before my little hiatus and I may have already written about it. I can't even remember! John and I went to our friend's wedding. We got all gussied up and ate like 4 kinds of cake. Superb.

Congratulations to Carla and Scott! May your life always be filled with cake buffets and ice cream sundae bars!

I spent some time having taco and margarita nights with friends. Luckily, just about every friend I have is up for tacos and margaritas. Some of which are waiting to adopt as well. Visit http://www.iheartadoption.org/ to see our profiles. Ours first though ok? We've been waiting the longest. Seems fair (in my head). Of course, so far we have learned that adoption is not exactly fair. To anyone. We do the best we can.

Jalapeno margarita anyone?

Yeah... sorry about the random depressing thought!

In happy news, my dad and I did our annual Turkey Chase (And yearly terrible selfie. It's a tradition now). We hadn't done a race together since last year's Turkey Chase. Usually we do 3 or 4 a year, but we both had a lot going on.

This race is one of my favorites, because it's colder in November and I kind of hate sweating and it's fairly flat and scenic. The lazy person's race.

Our extremely talented friend, Katie, made another hat for our future child. She knows my weak spots- cats and tiny baby things.

Katie is another super supportive friend as far as our adoption wait goes. You may remember her from our trip to Philly over the summer.

We made it through living together in our early twenties, so I think it's safe to say we are friends for life.

I'm sure I left some adventures and fun stuff out. I wasn't planning on writing today, but I finished my grad class for the semester and I'm all caught up at work. I figured why not get it out there.

Our tree is up (yeah, we went fake, despite my declaration of wanting a real one). Our stockings will be hung shortly. We are having a small holiday party with friends we met who are also waiting to adopt in just over a week.


OH MAN. How did I forget... my friend Jessica (also waiting to adopt) and I are driving to Nashville next week to see Frank Turner! I mean, did you really think I could have a come back blog post without mentioning Frank. hahaha! Silly people! I CANNOT WAIT. Capslock level excitement.

So there we have it. Updates. Busying ourselves. Hoping that since hardcore networking has not brought us a baby that possibly ignoring it will? Is there magic in booking nonrefundable trips and buying tickets to shows? If you want to see something bad enough, will the adoption happen to thwart it?  We can only hope.

I want to be a mom. John wants to be a dad. I never thought those urges would become so strong. We are ready! As always, thanks for reading. We are hopelessly hopeful as ever.

Blog Hiatus, But Never Giving Up

I've been toying with the idea of a hiatus.

No, not giving up on adoption. Just letting myself slack on the blog, the facebook page, etc..

It's so important that John and I enjoy who we are as a childless couple before we finally become parents. I've been in a probably unhealthy place of thinking we can't be truly happy until we adopt. It's skewed thinking, because we have been happy the entire time we've been together. We have always been able to fill our lives with fun and joy as childless people. Those days are limited now, as we could be parents any time now. The phone could ring today for all we know.

So here is my plan. The blog, which I love, is an aspect of the adoption wait that has at times caused a great deal of stress. I am going to take a few weeks (maybe more) off of writing for this blog and see how it feels. I have other writing assignments for other sites I need to focus on and a big project due for graduate school.

You can find me uploading pictures of food, cats, crazy skies and way too much coffee on our Instagram account: https://instagram.com/johnandsarahadopt/ (I use this more often than other adoption accounts we have) and the occasional share on our Facebook page: John and Sarah Adopt Facebook Page .

I would love to write on this blog every day if I could get my head in the right place to only write about baby room progress, exciting vacations, and well, all things living life- and maybe this break is what I need to find that inspiration.

Last time I took a few weeks off, I lost quite a few readers and it took a while to get the numbers back. I'm hoping you guys bear with us. There needs to be some heart healing and inspiration before we get the blog up and rolling full speed.

I can't wait to come back with news of holiday fun and some things I have planned for the baby's room!

WE ARE STILL WAITING TO ADOPT! There will be no hiatus on that. Never giving up!

If you are reading and want to contact us, we are available through:

email: sarahandjohnadopt@gmail.com
text: 408-414-7245
call us toll free: 866-707-5959

Or use the contact form on the right side of this blog.

We are ever hopeful that our dream of becoming parents through open adoption will come true soon.

Signing off for now.

I Am Invincible-ish

Yargh.

It's the pirate's life for me.

No, well, it's the suburban Atlanta life for me. It's that life that mostly suits families with kids. I even bought a four door car. See? Prepared.

Gary and Neal at Carmax in Kennesaw were superb. They even put a bow on it for me. I named her Momo. Stands for Mom Mobile. High hopes, people.

My little Hyundai did me a solid the day I went to trade it in by flashing some warning lights on the dash. It didn't want me to feel bad about kicking it to the curb.

My dad made sure that me parking at Georgia Tech was properly protested. Let's hope no one keys my car over it!

She's roomy, she's got a backseat built for cramming kids in (that's how you do it right? Cram them in?). I'm so on top of this parenting thing. 









I feel like I am at a constant loss for words these days. I know, weird right? It doesn't matter the subject, I sit there and feel like I can't respond. Unless you are arguing with me about whether or not to get the flu shot (don't get me started, but yes, get the flippin flu shot), I feel kinda blank.

I had a really awful phone call from someone the other day. A bait and switch adoption professional. They call and present an expectant mom to match with, but really there is no expectant mom. They want you to pay their insane fee, then after that they will tell you that woman chose another family, but we will match you in mere days "guaranteed!" Yeah, I'm on to you. I am not new to this, I am not uneducated on this.

I admit, I reacted poorly. I was angry. I may or may not have dropped the F bomb loudly at work when I hung up. I may or may not have ranted on my personal Facebook page. I definitely screamed in the car. Well, I definitely did all of those things.

It just feels like you can't trust anyone anymore. Guilty until proven innocent is how it feels sometimes. Every call or email feels like and usually is someone trying to pull one over on you. I've always been very cynical. I'm used to seeing the world through cynical eyes, but adoption has really made me wary of just about everyone. Wary and weary.

I want the world to give us some proof that we can trust people again.

Despite all of the weird things that have happened over the last two years, we are going strong. We have some level of hope at all times that we will be parents before too long.

I'm mailing out our adoption networking pass along cards today and tomorrow. We have nine people in six states willing to pass them along. If you want some, comment or message us. I can send them anywhere in the US. We would so appreciate it! Even if you live down the street from us, we can cover the same territory! Even if you just want one to have our information on hand. I will mail you just one!

Examples of what I have done with them: I hand them to baristas, waiters, our car salesmen, and even coworkers have offered to hand some out. Friends, family, coworkers, strangers... all working for the cause. The cause being "Help build the Farrar family". Love. Love all of you.

Song of the day. This was easily my least favorite song on Frank's new album at first. Now I'm obsessed with it. Obsessed. I know, shocking.

Fire In Our Bellies

"Life is about love, last minutes and lost evenings,
about fire in our bellies and furtive little feelings,
and the aching amplitudes that set our needles all a-flickering,
and help us with remembering that the only thing that's left to do is live" - Frank Turner, I Knew Prufrock Before He Got Famous


I was driving to work, newly adapting to some adoption news we had just received when this song came on. It's a song I've heard a million times before (possibly literally), but this time these lyrics it hit deep. Why are stalling our lives, stressing over when, where, how and mostly why not?

Waiting to adopt does not involve hitting a pause button of your life. It's about enjoying those little moments between you and your spouse, friends, family, whoever makes your world spin. It's about the silent moments in your home you know will be gone once your baby arrives. It's about running out to meet friends in a moments notice, because well, you still can and definitely should! It's about tacos on patios, funky coffee shops, and 6 mile early morning walks to take in the sights and sounds of the city you love.

It's about readying your home with the perfect rocking chair, buying that hilarious "hangry" onesie and hiding it away in a drawer all washed and ready to be worn by that little soul who will some day make it's way to you.

About going to the consignment sale not knowing who you are buying for and getting whatever you damn well please- boy or girl, gender neutral (in reality, isn't it all gender neutral?), tags on. or used by three other babies.

Take that job offer, even if it means you have to get a new letter for your home study. Take that trip, even though it will take you far away from home while you are on the last minute hospital list. Try something new, revisit something you used to love. Just don't hit pause.

Two years we have waited to adopt. Two years of alternating between calm and anxious. Two years of dreading holidays and birthdays childless again. Two years of feeling rejected when those around us adopt quickly. Two years of wondering why not us?

I want to wonder no more. I want to live my life as if adoption hasn't made me question absolutely everything about my life thus far. I want to go full steam ahead shouting that I am who I am! What you see is what you get! I am breathing in the air around me and feeling the life that it gives.

Record collections. Curling bonpiels. Braves games. Concerts. Laughing with your best friend until you can't see straight. 

This year, I want a giant REAL Christmas tree. Baby or no baby. I want to give presents to everyone I know and wrap them up in gaudy bows. I want to bake 300 Christmas cookies with my sister in law like we did the last couple of years, sneaking sips of Kahlua meant for the recipes, leading to many successes and failures in the kitchen! I want to hear my nephew's Christmas list and his amazing kid views of naughty versus nice. I don't want to wallow in what we don't have, but rather embrace what we are so fortunate to have. 

The one person who will one day find us fabulous enough to raise her child will click with us over something you can't predict- a lifestyle choice, a song, a sports team you have in common, the fact you spew your emotions all over the internet in the form of a blog? Yes? No?

It will happen. It will. It has to, because we've come way too far for it not to.

In the meantime, the only thing that's left to do is live.

New Profile = New Hope

I had this long, detailed post written up about us hitting the two year mark in our adoption wait, but I really just think it's all been said before.

The summary: Waiting sucks, but it will be worth it. 

The long version is more eloquently written of course. I may edit and post it in a few days. I'd rather have a positive train of thought today.

First thing first, we had our adoption profile redone by a designer! This is the paper profile (PDF available too) that goes out when a prospective birth mother calls into our agency and does intake (basically inquiring about adoption and waiting families). If she decides she wants to look at profiles, they will send her all of the portfolios of waiting families that match her search criteria (such as married, living in the southeast etc) and of course the family's openness of their profile effects whether they go to her as well.

We are in love with the new design!

The front cover...

Featuring our cats, which we think is hilarious. The colors were inspired by a poster I have at home and a pair of shoes I saw online. I'll let you use your imagination as far as whose poster inspired me (ahem, super fan alert). If you read this blog often, you already know. I just have no shame anymore.

 The inside pages...

I love how much movement it has. Our nephew is featured heavily in this. It's not like we don't know other kids, but we always forget to take pictures with them when we hang out!

Doesn't matter, because our nephew is cute as cute can be.

The back...

More cats. Shocked? No, I'm not either. I guess if someone doesn't like cats, we are not likely to be contacted by her anyway. 

We really feel that this profile is more "us". We didn't realize over two years ago that we could push to have more of what we think represents us. Our agency really tends to edit families down until they all look alike. They say to show what makes you unique, but then all of that uniqueness gets taken away in the approval process.

Can you imagine receiving 250 profiles that more or less look the same and having to choose a family out of the stack to parent your child? Sounds next to impossible to me.

In other news, we celebrated John's birthday yesterday. There was cake and burritos, some TV, some feelings of extreme love and random exclamation of how happy I am that he was ever born and put in my life. Seriously, overwhelming feelings of love. I would like to thank John's parents for his existence. He's such an awesome husband and I have no doubt that he will be even a better dad.

I'm in full swing with grad school. I 99.9% finished my second project of the semester last night. It's a great distraction from "the wait". I had many moments of wondering why I'm putting myself through more school as I was neck deep in this project, but just like adoption, in the end it will be worth it.

Our 8th wedding anniversary is October 6th! So much has happened in those 8 years. I met John when I was 21 and he was 22. I feel like we have literally become adults together. Not that at 21/22 year old people aren't adults, but it's like we grew up into more adult adults- adultier adults- in the past 14 years. We did it together.

I've also started a new list of goals. I used to have this 100 things to do in 1000 days list, but some things like travel abroad probably wouldn't happen in that time frame due to adoption. Totally fine. I made a new list with no time restriction. It is everything from finish my M.Ed. to paint the dining room to remember to wear my glasses. I'm putting five out here today, so I will hold myself accountable:

1. Blog at least once a week
2. No, seriously, remember to wear my glasses!
3. Send more snail mail
4. Take infant CPR
5. Adopt (obvs)

Ok, there it is for now. Until next time!

Vacation Recap: Philadelphia!

 I am finally writing up our Philadelphia trip! I know, a couple of months late, but at least I'm doing it. After our trip to DC, we drove to Philadelphia to see our friends Katie, Anthony, and Xander. Katie was my college roommate and we have stayed close through the years. She moved to PA a couple of years ago, so we decided it was finally time to go up there and see her new Georgia-less life.

We got there in the afternoon and were greeted by the welcoming committee:

The Hounds

The first night we stayed in, tired from our extreme day of walking in DC the day before. Katie has always been a great cook, cooking for me in college and even after. She made us a nice vegetarian dish, keeping John in mind, of curried red lentils (never going back to boring old green lentils!) and poached eggs. I was nervous about this combination, but I have to say, it was delicious. Katie can make nearly anything delicious.

The next day we went into Philadelphia. Our friends live in Ridley Park, which is just a few minutes ride outside of Philly. Xander is four, so we needed to do some kid friendly things and let's face it, adults like doing the kid things too usually! We went down to the Delaware River front and tried out some hammocks....

These may have been the highlight of the day. I know that sounds weird, but the weather was perfect and our feet were a little tired from DC. The wind made the hammocks sway just the right amount. I could have slept there all afternoon!

I actually bought a hammock for John for "almost a father's day" on Father's Day this year. We haven't set it up yet, but now that Georgia is cooling off a little at night, we might have to do that.

While we were lazing around on the hammocks, Katie and Xander wondered around and....

Found some giant connect four!

Anthony had gone back to his car to get his glasses, because we were about to go explore a submarine. Prescription sunglasses will not quite cut it in the belly of a submarine.

Xander seemed to have a great time with the giant games, but was a little nervous about the steep staircases and dark parts of the submarine. He is a brave kid and toughed it out though.

This is on top of the USS Becuna, the submarine we explored. I could be wrong, but I think the ship you see in front is a restaurant.

We ate at Reading Terminal Station later in the day, but that's a story for later.

I can't even say how perfect the weather was enough times in this. Totally beautiful and breezy. Just across the Delaware River, you could see Camden, New Jersey. I considered shuttling across to add another state to my list of states visited, but we had a lot of Philadelphia to get to!

 This is a porthole window looking out of the USS Olympia, a Naval ship. Through that window is.... Camden, NJ. Be excited, I know you are!

Actually, that might have been a hole for the one of the giant guns or cannons or whatever they had on the ship. Can you tell I was paying more attention to the other stuff? Weapons are not my thing. I really liked looking at the pharmacy and surgery rooms, as well as the captains quarters and where the lower ranking officers slept. 

John, Xander and I stopped for some photos on the deck of the USS Olympia. We have a ton, but a blog post can only be so long.

Xander was such a good sport the whole time. For being barely four he was very patient and good-natured during it all.

As a side note, Xander does something called the Xander show. It's a bit of a variety show, with singing, dancing, jumping, and general kid wackiness. I admit, I miss the Xander show.

After the ship, we made our way to Elfreth's Alley which is the oldest continually inhabited street in the US.

It was a little awkward, because as the description says- people live there! We tried to be quiet tourists, but there was an older lady going around looking in people's windows. I was embarrassed for her and didn't want anyone to think she was with us. We kept our distance.

It's a short street, definitely worth a look, but also over quickly. There is a museum, but it didn't appear to be open.

We decided to walk to Reading Terminal Market for lunch. Google maps had us thinking it would be a quick walk, but it was a serious long haul. Hey, at least we earned our....

 CHOCOLATE KIDNEYS! What? Yes, one of the chocolate shops in Reading Terminal Market has chocolate internal organs. Am I in heaven? I do love anything internal organs (transplant recipient here, ya know?!). Katie bought me a new set of kidneys. I can't ever say she never gave me a kidney now.

These are dark chocolate kidneys. I ate most of one on the way back to Georgia.

We also ate tacos, whoopie pies, and homemade marshmallows dipped in chocolate. Vacations are for eating right? After that we headed back to Ridley Park to relax.

Friday, our last full day in Philadelphia, we went to the Philadelphia Zoo. Katie and Anthony have season passes, so we got to slip in as guests. The hippo was my favorite part. The wolves smell horrendous.

I felt terrible for some of the animals though. Zoo Atlanta does a much better job with their animal habitats. The polar bear made me really sad. He just didn't look happy or comfortable.

There were tons of goats, which if you know me, you know I love a good goat visit. Unfortunately, the cool part of the goat enclosure was for kids. Why must they leave those of us out who are waiting to have kids? Special section "future adoptive parent goat exhibit". Yes, please.

After the zoo, went back into the city to walk around and get some dinner.

John and I really wanted to do the cheesy tourist thing and get our picture with the love sign. FYI, it looks all calm there, but there are really a ton a of people trying to get you to pay them to take your picture. Also, a bunch of kids skateboarding and some very talented kids dancing.

I'll admit that I was a little over the walking and sweating at this point. I was hungry and I get a little "Hulk smash" when I'm hungry. You wouldn't like me when I'm hungry! (Teehee... get it?)

A lady told me I had Reba McEntire hair. Not sure that's a good thing!


We ended up at a little hole in the wall pizza place, with a basement bathroom from the depths of my nightmares. The pizza was fantastic though! It looked so unimpressive, but no, it was delish! We then

On the way back to the car to head back to Ridley Park, we came across this piece of art. It is actually an actual plane that was taken apart and put together as if it had crashed. The part John is standing in front of is a sort of greenhouse. The sign said they grow food in there for those in need. I didn't see any food growing, but there were plenty of plants.

If you look behind the plane, you can see they have another statue of a giant paintbrush (it also had a hilariously shaped dab of paint under it).

After stopping off at to see some local architecture, we headed back to Katie and Anthony's house to rest up for our 11 hour ( that turned into like 14 hours) trip home. Next time we will definitely fly! I think we needed another 3 or 5 days to see the rest of Philadelphia. We will be back someday soon. 

You can read about the Washington D.C. part of our trip here: DC TRIP!

John has a bonspiel in Charlotte coming up in early October. I have plenty of homework from my grad class and some other distractions in the works. Hopefully our next vacation will include us as a family of three. Here's hoping, right? 

Any Time Now, Universe!

This post was inspired by a friend I met through our agency. This morning she shared a post from a year ago.

Shared with permission.

Just last night John and I had a conversation about Christmas. How its four months away, but it seems like there is no hope for us to adopt before then. It was a 30 second conversation, yet it felt so heavy.

We are basing our view of the future based on the past, but no one can really know what the next four months hold for us. 

Our last adoption situation that fell through happened so fast. It went from watching TV, not expecting to do anything but sleep that night, to calling the after hours answering service for our agency in mere minutes. I certainly didn't sleep that night! Of course, that situation didn't work out and that's fine. It did in fact give us hope and remind us how quickly life can change.

But it's so easy to lose sight of that. When day after day goes by with no inquiries about us- no emails, texts Facebook messages, nothing. No calls from our agency asking "Can you get to (insert town/hospital here) ASAP?" Not a peep. Unless you count "Lung" who wants to "do a project with us". Real email. That was all it said. Thanks, but no thanks Lung.

But look at what a difference a year can make for a fellow waiting adoptive family (now a family of three!). Weeks before they were matched with their daughter's birth mom, Chelsea and I were messaging each other wondering if it would ever happen for either of use. Wondering what we could do to move this along. She didn't have to wonder much longer.

There is hope. At any time, that could be us. 

This has not been my favorite part of life. The waiting, the longing, the ups and downs- it's all just so incredibly stressful. Talking to friends and remembering how life was before this undying urge to be a mom kicked in, it makes you long for those days. When your biggest worry was who you are going to hang out with that weekend or what coworker is giving you grief at work.

It's not easy, but I can't help but think it will be worth it. When adoption friends post pictures of their longed after children, or relay stories of how they met the children's birth parents, or "firsts" of everything being parents- it's all giving me the energy to keep at it. Yes, your stories of diaper blow-outs somehow still encourage me to stay the course.

Here we sit, still waiting, still trying to pass the time. I'm back in grad school, trying to make something more of myself and John is about to start curling again. John is also looking forward to football season. It's not really my thing (I know, don't judge me!). We will hit two years live with our agency next month, many more years than that trying to become parents. We will mourn it, even though it will appear to just be a day like any other. You have to mourn things to get past them.

Here's hoping our lives change in an instant too, preferably tomorrow? next week? Universe, are you listening? 

All The Feelings: The Feeldoption Process

Who know one person could experience such a range of emotions in such a short time? I'm not even talking about the waking up positive and immediately opening an email from an adoption scammer in Cameroon promising BABIES NOW (really?! so scammy).

I am talking about the emotions you experience throughout the entire adoption wait. It goes like this:

You decide to adopt. There is likely relief that your battle with trying (and failing) to get pregnant is over. You mourn a little, because who doesn't mourn the loss of a part of your body not functioning as it should? You cry, but it honestly feels pretty good. You throw out all of the ovulation tests and pregnancy tests in the house (you think- but somehow those show up on bad days, whilst you are cleaning out the bathroom cabinets). Good timing pee tests...

You go to the weekend intensive session at the agency and it just.feels.so.right. You leave so hopeful, so excited, you are FINALLY going to be a parent.

You start the paperwork for the home study. You might buy one teeny little blanket, because your heart is so full of hope that a baby will be bundled up in it soon. You tear up a little, the good kind of tears, as you pay for the little ducky blanket. Man, you can practically smell the baby poop, that's how close you think you are!

Every step of the home study you complete, you feel accomplished. One step closer to holding that sweet baby. Paperwork..it feels orderly and so very doable. You get to make lists and cross things off- so so satisfying!

Your home study gets completed. Interviews went well, a little nerve wracking, you wonder how that other person's name slipped in and why no matter how much you said you loved your aunts, why it says you aren't close to family... but these things get corrected immediately. A lovely letter and certificate come in the mail proving that both the state and the country find you fit to parent. Party on.

The letter writing process makes you literally roll around on the floor crying out of frustration. Picture after picture is declined. "Smile with your teeth", "Have one of your cats with kids" hahahaha, if they only knew...our cats disappear if a kid is within hearing distance. Trade "our home" for "our house", cut 23 more words. The excited parent-to-be inside you is screaming "please, please, please, just approve it and let us go live".

The letter is done, your official profile is online. With great excitement and fear, you sit with your significant other and write up a Facebook post to announce to your friends that "Yes, we will finally be parents... through adoption!!!!". Your friends offer words of congrats and support. They start spreading the news, eager to help out. It's a love fest. We love them, they love us, we feel warm and safe and determined.

Three months of dead silence. Worries arising, but spirits up. But then a close call. A very sick baby, too many unknowns, and baby's mom wants a closed adoption. Low Apgar scores and some googling and talking to doctor friends. Heartsick, we pass on the situation. The hardest thing ever... so we thought. If we only knew then what we know now.

Boot straps pulled up, you find peace that the sick baby wasn't your baby. Your baby is has yet to be born. Positivity and excitement find you yet again.

Scammy email after scammy email. Even some scammy phone calls. Someone pretending to choose you. Someone you got close to and cared for. Someone who had you picking up the phone to check on them even after the truth came out. Someone who wants to pray for your soul (and also sell you embryos?). At first you laugh it off, saying "people are so weird". Then you cry it off "people are so terrible". Then you get past it "I feel sorry for her that she has the psychological problem that causes her to lie so much".

Drama. Miscarriages, house fires, car fires, drug raids, deaths... or so they say. Your emotions get all wrapped into their lives, but it's all made up. You want to help, but you can't, because it was all made up. You feel for them, but you shouldn't, because it was just someone messing with you. Your faith in the process dwindles. Your faith in humanity wavers. Another hopeful contact turns bad and you are exhausted. You cry, you get mad, you shut down, then you pick yourself up again and move along.

All this time, you have to tell friends and family... "yes, we are still waiting, no there is nothing wrong with us, yes, we could still use your help spreading the word, please don't make me beg for help.. it's just too hard"

The shares on social media slow down. People start avoiding the topic all together at dinners with friends. People have lost interest.

A near match... a neardoption . You were at the top of the world, but then it failed. You got too many hearts involved and therefore too many hearts broke when he wasn't your baby. Not our baby. You swear to never tell another soul about a possible situation again until baby is home for good. So many hearts to protect, but who is protecting yours?

Your adoption friends start getting matched with expectant moms, some adopt practically overnight. The weird feeling of yaaaay....no....yes...no overwhelms you. You sob for the babies that aren't yours. You sob about the expectant moms who chose other waiting adoptive parents over you. You sob until you are heaving, can't see straight, can't hold your eyes open anymore. Then you go out and buy your friend's new baby cute little onesies and hats, because that's what you do right?

And it's healing. Positivity finds you again. If the process worked for them, it will work for us too. They waited longer or almost as long, they had scams, they broke down too- over and over again. They often asked "Why not us?"

You get up the courage to start asking friends to share your adoption info again and it's just dead silence. They've moved on. Your friends are tired of hearing it, their friends are tired of hearing it. Waiting to adopt is so isolating.

Just so isolating.

I'm finding a new normal in this adoption wait. One where I feel like I can't tell my friends and family about how it's going. Good or bad. Good, you risk breaking their hearts when it goes bad. Bad, you just sound like a downer all the time and start alienating everyone.

These days we cope with making ourselves busy. I'm working on my book more, albeit mostly in my head or in jotted down notes. I'm getting these feelings out by singing as loud as possible along to music in the car or shower or even in front of the cats (they love it. so weird). John has curling stuff that keeps him distracted.

We are up, we are down, we are up, we are down. We will be parents one day.

 I'd love to say I'm not posting another Frank Turner song, but I am. For those who care to listen, the man wrote yet another song that is better at expressing how I feel than I am. I know, I'm soooo emo.