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.

Vacation Recap 2015: Washington D.C.

Back in July, we decided to take "real" vacation. I say real, because since we have been waiting to adopt, we always try to do things on the cheap and conserve leave time from work. We do this because there is always a possibility that we will end up adopting our baby from another state. If that happens, we would have to stay in that state for approximately two weeks while some legal stuff takes place, allowing us to cross state lines with the baby. But you can't live your life based on what ifs!

We are lucky that our friends live in Philadelphia and invited us to stay with them for a few nights. We decided to drive and stop in Washington D.C. for two nights beforehand, since neither of us had done the whole tourist thing there since we were kids. This post will focus on the DC part of our trip.

Edit: Philadelphia recap up here: Philly!

Washington D.C. 

First we went to the Capitol and did a free tour. Tourist tip: they give out free tickets at 9am. Enter through the visitor center.

Our tour guide was probably an intern with high aspirations, because she was less than thrilled about her job! Everyone in our group was laughing about her lackluster tour guide skills.

As you can see, they are doing some restoration on the building, inside and out. It was still amazing to see all of the detail that was still exposed. 

More restoration.

From what I understand, the painting on the inside of the dome was painted directly onto the plaster, which can chip off, so they have to more or less constantly restore the ceiling.

I would have asked but, our tour guide extraordinaire was a bit snarly at this point in the tour. Wouldn't want to make her have to work!

That is lady liberty up there looking over everyone (including many statues of important people in America's history).

This room was built in a way that it was very difficult to keep secrets (secrets in politics? never!). You could stand on one end of the room and hear someone on the other end whisper! Our very unenthusiastic tour guide begrudgingly demonstrated it. Again, laughter from our tour group erupted over our guide.

Next up, we went to the Botanic Garden.
 We had been walking outside for a while, so we were happy to find some air conditioning. We have the Atlanta Botanical Gardens by us, which is impressive to say the least, but this was a really cool experience.

You can't tell, but we were up fairly high in this picture in a large atrium. 

Shelob! Had to take a picture of the Tolkien inspired plant name. Nerdin' it up on vacay. 

Next up was the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. This was #1 on my list, since I remember really loving it as a kid.

We spent a couple of hours there and watched a planetarium movie called Our Dark Universe. They have a newly redone planetarium and it was amazing. Totally worth it- both for the movie and to sit down for a little while!







And of course we bought astronaut ice cream. It was...uh... chalky and then slimy. No thanks!

Next up, we headed over the Natural History Museum. We were really looking forward to this, but it was really, really crowded. We had already walked about 7 miles at this point, so we might have rushed this one a bit.

We found the cafeteria and had some ice cream and then decided to head to the American History Museum, which was next door. It was less crowded and I think overall we enjoyed the exhibits more.

But we couldn't leave without some sort of goofy picture.

Some teenager asked me if I was scared right about when this photo was taken. That was super weird...

Nope, not scared of a stuffed bear.

We walked and walked and walked. Came upon the Washington Monument. The line to go inside was really long and we still wanted to do a few more things before we ran out of time. Cue monumental selfie! Get it? I know, I'm mostly only funny to myself.

I misjudged the aim of the picture, so enjoy my face along with a small portion of the monument!

This is the World War II Memorial. It was beautiful. There was a great breeze and we had a much needed rest on a nearby bench.

My grandfather, or Pawpaw as we called him (you can blame that on my oldest cousin) fought in WW2. I made sure to visit the Georgia pillar to honor him. Pawpaw passed away in 2004 and is very missed to this day.

Both of John's grandfathers fought in WW2. Unfortunately, I never had the pleasure of meeting either one of them, but have heard many stories from John. It was great to be able to stop and honor them.

This is the reflecting pool at the Lincoln Memorial. I heard a number of people talking about that scene from Forrest Gump, where he is reunited with Jenny. All I could think about was that I was standing where Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his "I have a dream" speech.

Is it just me, or do Americans often miss the point of their experiences? I try to make an effort not to dismiss the true purpose of places and events, even though pop culture is so pervasive in our society.

Oops, I cut ole' Abe's forehead off. Well, This was the only one with John in it, that didn't have some girl doing stretches behind him.

I never claimed to be a good photographer.

- Not pictured: the kid in the Nirvana shirt who really did not want to be there. If you want to laugh, I'll show you the pictures of him in the background expressing his dislike of the experience.

We were around mile 10 of walking here. Still had the Whitehouse on the to-do list. I think we both has a bit of a uptick in energy heading to our last destination. That lasted like 10 minutes. so.much.walking.

From atop the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

It was a beautiful day. Just enough breeze to get us through the heat. I love how the Washington Monument looks like a stick with a cotton candy cloud at the top. Yum.

Our last stop of the day was the Whitehouse. It looks like we are pretty close here, but they actually have a wide barrier and police officers keeping you away from the main fence.

Too many fence jumpers lately! People are nuts.

 The illusion of calm

The reality!








We really loved D.C. We loved the ease of walking around the city, the access to public transportation (we even rode the Metro at rush hour!), we loved the history on every corner. I loved Union Station, because they had cold brew coffee and cupcakes... it's so easy to earn my love. Coffee, chocolate, I'm yours.

We hope to go back when we aren't so rushed. Two nights is not enough to see everything. We talked about how nice it would be to take our kid one day, but once they are older and can appreciate the history and politics more.

Stay tuned for a picture post about Philly!