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!

Christmas 2015: Part One- Feelies

There are things we are going to talk about here and things we will not- like how much sugar I have consumed this week. No good. I'm splitting my Christmas post into two posts this year. This is the one in which I share the struggle. The next one I will share the fun, which we definitely are having.

What I want to talk about right now is waiting to adopt during the holidays. For me, it is the hardest time of the year to still be waiting. I tend to mark our wait with how many holidays have passed. This is our third Christmas waiting to adopt and our well, seems like forever waiting to be parents together.

This week is the hardest week of the year for me. John is a produce manager, so he works like crazy the week or so before Christmas. In fact, this week he is closing every night. I'm off this entire week. I've been off of work since Friday, trying to distract myself from loneliness and sad adoption thoughts. It is hard to get through this week without him. Sure, he is close enough that he is coming home for dinner each night, I see him in the morning, and I just saw him on my grocery trip to get brunch supplies for Christmas morning, but it's not really the same as spending off days together.

I'm making the best of it. I had dinner with a friend last night. I spent this morning and afternoon shopping and eating with my sister in law Heather and our nephew. I've been out shopping nearly every day since Friday, since time kind of raced forward and I was/am so behind buying presents.

Netflix is my holiday best friend. Our cats are super happy to have a warm lap to sleep on.

The fact remains though, that we are still waiting. We are trying hard to smile through another Christmas childless. It's not that we don't love Christmas together, it's just that we've been there, done that.

The baby's room is ready. I have shopped my way through all of the funny and cute onesies I can find. I want to play Santa Claus. I want to take our kid to all of the fun Christmas things our city has to offer. I want to be sitting around the house, dressing up baby in his or her Christmas gear and wait for John to get home to make him laugh. To surprise him with cookies the kiddo and I made together. To run around the corner to see John at work with our baby in tow.

2015 is almost over and I have accepted the fact that we will not be adopting this year. It would be a miracle if we did. I'm no longer willing to say 201_ (fill in the blank) will be our year to become parents. It's unsafe for my emotional well being to say those things. We've been saying it for years and for years it has not happened.

This is not a sad post, this is an honest post. Christmas brings mixed emotions. A deep pain is hanging in the air, reminding us that we are still not parents. Also though, there is love and excitement for a holiday with our families.

I've lost faith in the process for now. I know it will probably happen eventually, but I feel like it is us who will have to make it happen. We have had one single contact from someone thinking of placing her baby through our agency in 27 months (we will hit 27 months tomorrow actually, but who's counting right?). Anyway, ONE through them, the people we gave our money and trust to help us. It is disheartening. All of our other contacts have been our own doing. Through our own networking and people like you, dear readers of this blog (if there are any left with my slacking). Edit: I remembered that we have actually had two expectant mom contacts through our agency. Two in 27 months. Fantastic. Sarcasm. 

My Christmas wish is for this to work out for us. For us not to spend another Christmas next year wondering when or even if. I remember when we stopped trying to get pregnant, we thought now it's when and not if anymore. But now it feels like if again. If. Ugh.

I am a sliver of hopeful. Just a sliver today.

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 Skinless. I Am Raw.

I am in love with a child I've yet to meet. I am in love with the idea of a child I may never meet. I am terrified of that thought. 

These are the words I tell myself when either someone else we know adopts or a possible match for us falls through:

You are not good enough. You are not pretty, fun, smart, thin, ANYTHING enough. Not enough.

But this is not okay. This is not what teenage me overcame self-esteem issues for, or what a functional adult tells herself. The adoption wait is hard. The longer you wait, the harder it gets. It’s not you! It’s not me or John or anyone for that matter, it just is. 

I hate the word “just”. In our battle with infertility people would often say “just adopt” or “just hire a surrogate”. There is nothing “just” about any of these paths. They are filled with trials, grief, and financial hardship. In this case, I think the word just is acceptable. It just is what it is. It’s a hard pill to swallow. It doesn't make it okay or more tolerable.

We have done all we can outside of hiring a facilitator who will charge us thousands for who knows what level of ethical behavior. We have accounts on just about all social media, I keep this blog, we have networking cards, we redid our letter with a professional designer. Our letter goes out often from IAC due to how open our profile is. Despite our efforts, here we sit two plus years later, waiting.

Wondering if we will ever be parents. 

I know there is nothing wrong with us. (I wrote that and felt a twinge of “but is there?”) No Sarah, stop it. We are young, healthy, fun, educated people. We are ideal for this. We have more love in our pinky fingers for our future child than there is love in the rest of the entire world. 

My heart hurts. Literally. There is a heavy deep ache in my heart where our child belongs. It’s been there since May. I can remember the first moment I felt it- after the nearadoption fell apart. I miss feeling lighthearted. I miss being my goofy self. I’m now serious and solemn. There is a darkness following me around. I miss the person I used to be before I knew this level of grief. My chest hurts and my guts are in a constant state of being twisted. 

I want to call up our agency and beg them for the answers. Tell us what we are missing! Tell us what we can do to make this happen! Tell us the secret to it all! I'm not surviving this and I need answers. (FYI, there are no answers). 

Friends and family don’t know what to say to us anymore. See: What We Need: A Guide if you have that problem. Invitations to events with our friend’s kids are dwindling, because no one wants to hurt us. Honestly, sometimes that’s a good thing. There are days I could snuggle my friend’s kids for hours and then there are days that the thought of being around children makes my entire body ache in longing to be a mom. Nephew excluded- nephew time welcome all day, every day. He makes my heart feel joy and love and all things light and wonderful about the world.

The problem is no one, not even myself knows what version of my adoption world I will wake up to each day. A Facebook post from a friend about her successful adoption (Yay...and cue to the self criticism). It's not under my control. I feel selfish, but it happens without my permission.

I am skinless. I am raw. My nerves are exposed and the world is poking at them with sharp fingernails. I wear my grief on the outside of my body these days. I have cried until I just don’t have any water left in my body to cry.  It’s apparent and ugly and drives people away. Please stay strong for us, please understand it’s not intentional. Please stick around for the end of this, as I believe the finale will be remarkable.

Until you have walked in our shoes, you just don’t know. Until you have wanted something this bad and had it dangled just out of reach, you can’t judge. There is no grief like feeling like you have a hole in your soul that may never be filled.   

This is the point in the daily adoption emotional roller coaster that I feel a little better. I got some stress out by writing this post. Some steam has been let out, I'm letting myself fantasize about "what if". Feeling a little exposed for what all I wrote, but I'll probably publish it anyway, because my goal is to be completely transparent. I'll blast my headphones as I work to drown out my own judgments of myself.  I'll stress about any judgments that may be flung my way and then scream away those judgments to music or maybe just a nice long stress relieving scream in the car. Yes, that would feel good.