Patience is a Virtue

Lately we've been riding a huge roller coaster of emotions: elation when we hear of a potential situation, disappointment when it's not really what we were looking for. Another situation, another high...send out the profile, and...nothing. Jittery nerves while we wait on pins and needles to see if we're selected, but we don't hear back. So hard not to get attached to each situation...we read paperwork on each one, find out details about the pregnancy, the baby, what the birth parents want for their child. We start to hope, and then we just hear nothing. We think often of the babies we've read about...are they ok? Did they go home with a loving family?

Just last weekend we got a call about a baby due in May. The price is out of our range, but there is a possibility it might come down, if the due date proves correct (the agency was guesstimating). In the meantime, we were allowed to read the paperwork the birth parents had filled out to see if we might be interested, should the price come down. The answer is yes, we are very interested! Out of all the situations that have come to us in the past few months, this one just resonated with me. I love that both birth parents took the time to fill out tons of detailed information on their backgrounds, what kind of family they want for their child, and why they're putting their child up for adoption. That was the first thing I noticed...the amount of detail. The second thing I noticed were the similarities in our interests, and our ethnic backgrounds. I fell halfway in love with the birth parents based on what they filled out on their forms, and we haven't even figured out if we can submit our profile. The birth mom was scheduled for an ultrasound yesterday to determine her due date, and if it was sooner rather than later, the price would come down and we could submit our profile. Except I haven't heard a thing. I am not a patient person (just ask my husband), and this waiting is killing me. Since we haven't heard anything yet and it's Friday, I have at least two more days before I might hear something. And the funny thing is, I'm waiting on pins and needles to see if we can even submit our profile, let alone be picked! I keep telling myself that I shouldn't get attached to this situation, but it's so hard not to make contingency plans in the back of my head...if the baby is due in May, I'll take maternity leave through the summer...then bring the baby to work with me through the end of the year, and the baby can start daycare in January. I've got it all figured out...about 3 steps ahead of where we currently are. What? I'm just being optimistic!

Falling into Place

Lately a lot of positives have come our way, and I feel so much more optimistic about the adoption process (and life in general), than I have in a long time. It feels like there's a light at the end of the tunnel, and we're barreling toward it. Recently, Ambrose got a new job...the type of job we've dreamed of him getting for several years now. It pays better, has better benefits, doesn't require traveling, and even has an adoption credit! Plus, he's enjoying it! The pay increase, although small, is a definite boon, as we've been struggling these past few years after Ambrose received a pay cut and never quite got back to where he started. We've also completely finished the nursery, thanks to a recent visit from my mom, and I cannot wait to have a baby in the house again! Other, small things, have fallen into place...we got back our son's infant car seat from a friend we had loaned it to, another friend gave us their baby swing, and (as I mentioned in the last post) we've got the cloth diapers ready to roll. And I finally got up the nerve to ask my boss to allow me to bring the baby to work with me for a few months after maternity leave, as I did with my son. I was so afraid he would say no this time around, but I got the green light!! I don't think I realized just how stressed out I was about life and the adoption, until that burden began to lift. I feel buoyant, optimistic, happy...this adoption is going to happen, and it will happen soon. All the pieces are coming together, and now we just need the final, missing piece to complete our happiness.

Cloth Diapers

I've thought a lot about ways we can save some money, once a second child joins our lives. We'll have two kids in daycare, and that's pretty darn expensive. So, I thought, what is one of the biggest expendatures for an infant? Diapers. I started researching cloth diapers, and was pleasantly surprised by what I discovered; these are not your grandmother's cloth diapers. No more diaper pins, or folding diaper flats (unless you elect to go that route); today's cloth diapers have velcro & snaps! I purchased some bumGenius diapers, as those seem to be the most popular (not to mention easiest) ones to use. I've been test driving them at night on our three year old, and I love them! I feel great about not throwing any more disposible diapers in a landfill, and the money we're saving doesn't hurt, either. :) While I have some bumGenius diapers, I will definitely need more once we have a new baby in the house. Right now, KellyWels is having a bumGenius sweepstakes, where you can win the following:

bumGenius One-Size Cloth Diaper Kit valued at $370.

The bumGenius 4.0 One-Size Cloth Diaper Kit includes:

* 18- bumGenius 4.0 One Size with inserts

* 1 –bumGenius Sprayer

* 1 – bumGenius Pail Liner

What a great way to start cloth diapering, or add to your cloth diaper stash! Click here for the entry form. Good luck, and let me know if you win!

The Beginning of The End

Today, February 11th, marks the anniversary of what I think of as "The beginning of the end." Three years ago, today, I was standing in my kitchen, making dinner, while my sister-in-law held my 5 week old son. One minute I was happily chatting, the next I had started hemorrhaging. So fast...it happened so fast. Unfortunately, a diagnosis wasn't as quick, as it took my doctors almost a month to decide what was causing these repeat episodes, and by that time, it was too late for any treatment but the most radical. I spent more time in the hospital that February, than out of it; three weeks in all. February, for me, will always represent a downward spiral, each date of a hemorrhaging episode branded in my memory, leading inexorably toward The End. While the hysterectomy undoubtedly saved my life (along with a 10 pint blood transfusion), it also ended our dreams of becoming pregnant again. I am so incredibly grateful, every day, to have my beautiful, healthy son, and to have been given the chance to experience pregnancy once...and I know, one day soon, we will be parents again through the miracle of adoption.

The Profile

Now that we had a consultant, our next step was to complete our profile. An adoption profile is basically a scrapbook of your life (where you live, your values/beliefs, what you enjoy doing, etc.) that a birthmom would look at to choose a family for her child. The profile book is a relatively new concept; I know people who adopted 15 years ago who have never heard of such a thing. It has evolved from the "dear birthmom" letter of the past, and will often incorporate a letter to the birthmom in the profile itself. Most people opt to digitally scrapbook their profiles, as you need several copies and it can be expensive (not to mention time consuming) to exactly replicate 6+ scrapbooks. There are several software options out there, as well as websites, to help you digitally scrapbook a profile. I liked the idea of a website for several reasons: 1) If anything happened to my computer, the profile would still exist, 2) I could work on the profile from any computer, and 3) I could email the link to the profile-in-progress to other people to get their opinions. After some searching, I came across the website Mixbook and it was just what I was looking for. They offer either a softcover or hardcover option, several different sized books, tons of embellisments, lots of space to write (a problem I found with other digital scrapbooking/photography sites), and it was free to join. I highly recommend ordering an 8.5"x11" size profile book in softcover. The hardcover version is a nice keepsake for yourself, but it's more expensive to both purchase and to ship; the 8.5"x11" size books are the easiest to ship to an agency. Mixbook has a 20-page minimum on any book, which sounded like too much at first, but was much easier to fill than I initially thought. The softcover books start at $20 for a 20-page book, which seems like a lot until you consider that there's no way to actually scrapbook an entire 20 page book for $20. Plus, we received a 30% off a first purchase coupon, which really helped offset the cost. The only catch was that I had to use the 30% off within a week of joining the website! It was tough, but I managed to complete our profile and order it within the time frame. I am very happy with the quality of the final product, and would definitely order from Mixbook again.

Writing a profile can be rather daunting. You are basically "selling" yourself as if you were a product, trying to make your profile stand out to a birthmom, but still staying true to who you are. I had serious writer's block, so I started by gathering pictures. I knew basically what types of pictures I wanted--our house, a playground nearby, family, traveling, hobbies, pets--and once I had those together, I found it much easier to write a paragraph based on a few photos. I also searched the web for adoption profiles and used those examples to help me write. Once we received our completed profiles from Mixbook, our consultant started searching for situations for us, and we were ready to "hurry up and wait!"

Adoption Consultants

A lot was going on this past fall, and as a consequence I've fallen WAY behind on posting here. I have so many ideas for posts and they're just piling up! My New Year's resolution is to post more regularly on here, so we'll see how long that lasts. ;)

Once we finished our home study, we started looking for an adoption consultant. This is sort of a new niche in the adoption field, and they're becoming very popular. What exactly is an adoption consultant? Well, they're like a wedding planner for adoptions. Which is just funny to me, because I never in a million years even considered hiring a wedding planner when I got married. But, then again, weddings are much more commonplace, and there aren't a lot of confusing legal issues with getting married-it's pretty straight forward. In any rate, a consultant works as a middle man between you and an agency or attorney. Basically, you discuss with your consultant what kind of child you would like to adopt (domestic/international, girl/boy, ethnicity, age, etc.), as well as your adoption budget, and your consultant starts screening adoption situations for you. They have connections with many agencies and attorneys across the country, and are constantly getting adoption situations. When they hear of one that matches what you have discussed with them, they will call and present you with a potential situation. If you agree to the situation, your profile is submitted to the original agency/attorney, and the birthmom will then view your profile, along with several others. What really appealed to me about an adoption consultant is that you are not locked into one specific agency or attorney until a match is made. It really expands your potential exposure to birthmoms, which helps you bring your child home faster. Consultants also offer a range of services such as help creating/editing your adoption profile, adoption classes, opportunities to talk to financial advisors, and even birthmoms who have already been through the adoption process. Not every consultant offers the same services, of course, so do your research and pick the one that works best for you and your budget. An average adoption consultant cost is $2,500-$3,000.

Our social worker gave us a list of three consultants that she had worked with and recommended, and we pretty much just researched those three. We narrowed it down to two, but in the end decided to go with A Step Ahead Adoption. Although they are based in Colorado, they have consultants in many states, including one just a half hour from our house, which is wonderful. One step closer to our baby!

Everything Happens for a Reason

We hear this phrase so often, but I have found it to be so true in my life. It never ceases to amaze me, looking back at the chain of events that led me to this moment in time. What if I had made a different choice 10 years ago...would I be where I am now, or would I be somewhere else? And it's a mish-mash of things beyond my control & consequent decisions I've made that have brought me to this point, each choice building on the last.

When I graduated college, I had grand dreams of being immediately hired & setting up my own elementary classroom...I had absolutely no doubt I would be hired right away. That is, until September rolled around, and I still had no job prospects. But I lucked out...a local elementary school called my mom for a long-term substitute position, not realizing that she had a full-time teaching job already (she used to sub for them in the past). She told them that she wasn't available, but amazingly, her daughter had just graduated with a degree in elementary education, and was available! So off I went...and I ended up subbing part time for most of the fall, then got a seasonal job at Barnes & Noble to cover the gaps. By January I had been hired for a long-term substitute position at another school for the rest of the school year, and was also asked to stay on with Barnes & Noble past the holiday season. With the end of the school year came another round of job applications, and again, no luck until August. I got a call from an elementary school who was looking for a Media Specialist (a fancy name for librarian), a position I had not even applied for...they called me not only because of my education degree, but also because I worked at Barnes & Noble! I ended up working as a Media Specialist in that district for two years. At the end of those two years, certification requirements in NY changed, and I could no longer be a Media Specialist without a Masters in Library Science. I applied everywhere I could, but no luck, and so I turned to Florida, which I had heard was desperate for teachers. Again, I applied for a regular elementary teaching position, but was called based on my Media Specialist experience & promptly hired to fill that position at a brand new school. I worked at that school for a year & a half, before budget issues forced the school to cut my position. (Ironically, this was yet another reason I had left NY, as all the schools were severly cutting budgets up north). After a month of unemployment, I was finally hired at a small public library as the Library Director & Children's Librarian, and I've now been here almost 6 years. If I hadn't had a love of books to begin with, and worked at Barnes & Noble, I would never have been hired as a Media Specialist in NY...if I hadn't had those two years experience as a Media Specialist in NY, I would never have been hired for that position in Florida...and if I hadn't been a Media Specialist in Florida, I would never have been hired for my current position.

And here we are in Florida, where the adoption laws are some of the best in the country (incidentally, NYS adoption laws are very difficult to work with). Adoption was the furthest thing from my mind when we moved here 7 years ago...I had no idea I was moving to an adoption friendly state, nor that I would be in need of such a thing down the road. Kind of makes you wonder if there isn't some larger force at work here. Through circumstances and events sometimes beyond my control, I have been led to this point in my life...my job led me to move to an adoption friendly state, my son's birth led to my hysterectomy, and my hysterectomy led to our adoption plan. Everything happens for a reason.