Category Archives: The Adoption Waiting Game

Good Things Are Happening!

Posted in The Adoption Waiting Game by

The wheels are moving!

Yesterday, the hubs and I received an email of an expectant mother profile! What that means is that our agency is working with a young lady who has decided to make the courageous decision to find a family for her baby, and her preferences and our preferences overlapped so we asked to be presented to her! She has received our adoption portfolio, along with several others, and will make a decision by the end of the week. I do not know how many other couples asked to be presented, nor how many she was interested in looking at, but we were among them. Our agency is pretty small and they have about 8 “paper ready” couples, including us; although there are not many adoption situations that come along, when they do, the ratio of waiting parents is narrow enough that we feel like we at least have a chance of being chosen.

This is very big for us, although to be completely honest we do not allow ourselves to fully experience emotions of excitement or anticipation at this stage. It is just one of those things where we sort of perk up with optimism, but don’t let it overwhelm us, because we still need to wear our “heart armor.” It’s sort of like running a computer in safe mode!

I won’t reveal many details about the adoption situation here, out of respect for the expectant parents. If she does choose us, I can reveal more details at that time, with her permission.

For every family that is overjoyed and elated about the addition of a long-prayed for, much desired baby, there is always a mother, and sometimes a father, that is grieving the greatest loss of their lives. So, while we certainly appreciate, and in fact, solicit, your prayers and positive energy, consider doing the same for this amazing woman who could easily have chosen to terminate the pregnancy and go on with her life. Instead, she chose to carry the pregnancy, all the while knowing that the family that would be blessed by this baby, wasn’t her own.  I know I sure haven’t done anything that selfless lately, or ever.

I will update this post with the news of if we were chosen, or not, as soon as we hear about it. I have been committed to transparency all along on this site, and that means sharing the good and the bad. Sharing the bad sucks, it is true. Oh so true. But it is part of the process, and all of the process matters.

Wish us luck, cross your fingers and toes, channel that energy, or shoot up some prayers!

www.borrowedgenes.com

A Couple of Teeny-Tiny Updates on the Adoption Front

Posted in The Adoption Waiting Game by

The adoption front has been pretty stagnant, but I am happy to report that I have a couple of updates to share. Maybe you remember that our adoption profile was presented to an expectant mother a couple months ago? We never received any feedback or information after that, so we assumed she chose another family. We recently learned that she is taking her time choosing a family because she is not due for another couple of months. Basically that means that (1) our profile did not thrill her so much that she decided then and there that she wanted to place her baby with us and (2) she is rightfully taking all the time she needs to make a decision and it is still possible she will choose us.  Peace be with you, expectant mama, wherever you are.

When we learned about the first expectant mother, we learned there was also a second expectant mother who was having a hard time getting medical records together. After two months went by, we figured that she had either decided to parent or that she was just taking the time she needed to process how to move forward. We were wrong—she was STILL dealing with medical professionals and trying to get copies of her records! Listen up, doctors, insurance companies, and hospitals; if a woman is in a situation where she is choosing to find an adoptive family for her baby, try not to make her life a living hell by giving her the run around as she attempts to gather all the necessary records for the agency. Seriously. Anyway, our adoption coordinator has told us that she will have a profile of the expectant mother to share with us by the end of the week. That was on Monday. Tomorrow is Friday. I have been checking my email every 15 seconds. I do not have a great deal of faith that we will actually see it tomorrow, but patience is the name of the game in adoption. Patience and fertility are two things God did not grace me with, so the adoption wait is basically the ultimate in horrible irony. But I digress.

Target is having a huge baby sale this week so I went and bought a bunch of diapers. Little teeny ones. Although there isn’t much happening and we have no reason to believe we will need wee diapers any time soon, I believe in preparedness. Also, it gave me an excuse to wander through the baby aisles and ogle all the adorable baby things. Okay, let’s be real.  I found out about the baby sale because I was already there looking at the adorable baby things. But the reason I was at Target in the first place was to acquire some Hyland’s homeopathic cold and flu tablets for my little one. It’s complicated, like your classic “which came first, the chicken or egg?” scenario. But I like it there. The first time around preparing for a baby, I had no clue what I was doing. The baby aisle at Target was a scary, frightening place. I wanted no part of it. Now that I’m an old pro, wandering through the baby section is quite comforting.

Also, I completed the nursery and it is baby-ready. That will be a separate post* because it was a rather involved undertaking. But I needed it done, because again, preparedness. What kind of monster brings a new baby home to an undecorated nursery? The horror!

Here’s to hoping we have more exciting news to share in the not too distant future, and to keeping an optimistic heart and mind.

*I’m super excited to share how I redid the nursery and managed to keep it gender neutral. It’s orange and turquoise! And the theme is elephants! And cuteness! But mostly it was a much needed time of creativity and DIY therapy to keep my hands busy and my mind engaged. Details and pictures coming soon.

www.borrowedgenes.com

Fact: It Will Be Worth the Wait, I Have Proof!

Posted in The Adoption Waiting Game by

A few weeks ago, I received an email about an adoption situation in Georgia.  The mother had seen our adoption profile via Facebook, of all things, and we happened to be on an old email listserv of the lawyer she was working with.  The lawyer was to the point: baby boy, born three days ago, mother is choosing to make an adoption plan rather than have the baby removed by Family Services to disappear into the foster system.  Were we interested?

Of course we were interested!  In my “adoption situation presentation” fantasies, interest is always enough. So it definitely a swift kick to the ovaries when I immediately realized that interest alone was not going to cut the mustard in this scenario.  There were a ridiculous amount of circumstances that made this situation impossible for us: paying new and unrelated adoption fees* for the baby boy in Georgia, when we have already invested our adoption nest egg into our adoption agency here.   Ten days would need to be spent in the state of Georgia as we waited for papers to be processed that would allow us to bring the baby across state lines back to Oregon.  Two plane tickets would need to be purchased on zero days notice, as well as ten days of lodging.  We have a little boy who would wonder where in the hell his always-present parents, who have never been separated from him for more than one day, had gone away to, and why he was left behind; we also did not have family lined up to care for him for ten days on five seconds notice.  The hubs is currently grinding his way through the absolute busiest time of work in his field, and leaving with no notice was going to leave a lot of people and circumstances in the lurch.  We had absolutely nothing going for us in this situation except interest, and our interest was not a magic wand that was going to turn the impossible into the possible.

*Adoption fees and expenses: Been car shopping lately? Think of the MSRP on your favorite SUV…and now you know why it would be quite the hat trick to come up with that twice! 

Adoption is an extremely competitive industry, despite the non-profit status many agencies hold; as a general rule, agencies don’t work in cooperation with other agencies, because it isn’t financially beneficial to do so. In other words, my agency and the lawyer were not going to join forces to make our dreams come true. Fair enough.

It was hard to decline the situation, but it was the only option at our disposal to make. Is it still considered an option if there is only one to pick from?

Something I know to be true about myself: I do not handle situations with one “option” well.  I would say that is probably true for the majority of us, nothing special about that. For me personally, the concept of being without choice or power harkens back to our long infertility battle, and later on, our miscarriages. Grief with which I have long since addressed and healed, but which is brought bobbing to the surface again by that nasty common denominator: powerlessness. The ultimate place to find oneself robbed of choice, and even in the strongest of us, hope.

It was poor timing that four days after declining the situation, I was then felled like a giant oak tree by old school influenza, the kind you get a shot for, but then the shot doesn’t work because the virus is tricky and outsmarted the scientists this year. Plenty of time for me to lay in bed and analyze, analyze, analyze, which is both my best characteristic and my worst.

It’s hard to see the forest for the trees when you haven’t showered in five days. I think that is probably an undeniable truth for anyone, unless you are in an actual forest and the reason you haven’t showered for five days is because you went out there to see the trees.

And, for all those on an infertility journey or an adoption wait, I leave you with this groundbreaking realization: it really is true that the greatest joys in life are worth the wait. We waited over three years for our little man to grace us with his presence. I came up with that obvious little factoid after my cathartic ugly cry two days ago, and it made me feel so much better I wrote it down and taped it somewhere I can be reminded whenever I need a pick me up.

Hope Shaken, Not Stirred

Posted in The Adoption Waiting Game by

While the rest of the country continues to get abused with relentless ice and snow, our little corner of the world has had unseasonably warm weather, clear skies, sunshine.  Things are blooming that have no business doing so at this very moment, but no one told them that, so they just keep poking their little heads up higher and higher and higher until they burst through the dirt to meet the sun.  I’m afraid that we are going to have a hard freeze one of these nights and it’s going to shock those little buds right back to the ground.  When tender buds that didn’t expect to get blasted by freezing weather do, they often don’t come back until the next year. The ones that stayed just under the top layer of dirt for a little while longer are protected from the frost and come out when the coast is clear.

So, let’s talk about train of thought writing and the unexpected consequences.  I did not expect, as I was looking out the window and writing about my flowers, to write a painfully obvious and cliché metaphor about my own heart.  I did not expect to have to grab a napkin from the dining room table to bawl my eyes out when I realized the reason I’ve been feeling just a little bit sideways is that at some point, I am not even sure when, I seem to have lost the ability to believe that something good is going to happen to us in this adoption journey.  And I totally do not have the right to believe that, because we have only been home study ready for six weeks, and we worked so hard to get to that point.  Really, we should just be enjoying the fact that we made it through to the other side, because it was a lot of emotional hard work.  It’s also worth noting that it is a darn good thing we did not get called right away, since during the month of February I got to enjoy both the stomach flu AND legit influenza. (Note to self: stop justifying your feelings away with practicality and facts, for heaven’s sake! You have a right to be upset sometimes just because.)

I spend some time every day reading the WordPress journeys of other women like myself, women who are going through IVF, or considering using an egg donor, or pursuing adoption.   It’s important to read their stories and remind myself there are other people out there going through this too, because otherwise it is isolating to the point of suffocation to be the only one. One of these ladies recently underwent IVF, was successful, and learned she is having identical twins.  That was last week.  Probably I should have stopped reading at that point, like a total jerk who can’t be happy for someone else because her twins have their own amniotic sacs and mine didn’t. Instead, I continued following her updates and today she was seeking advice about whether she should tell her boss and her coworkers she is eight weeks pregnant, and before I knew it I was shrieking at my laptop, “No, woman, no! Why would you do that?!” Yeesh.  Never mind that when I was pregnant with E, I told everyone I encountered that I was pregnant at about 4 weeks along.  The hubs thought we should wait a while to tell people, and I was like, “Yeah, that’s not gonna happen.  Hey, did you tell your mechanic yet?”

But then we experienced loss.  And more loss, and then nothingness.  Through all of that we had this shining little beacon who was oblivious to our pain and radiated joy through our home like Tinkerbell and her pixie dust.  It’s hard to feel despair when the embryo who did show up to the party is now a little boy full of love and light.  And I’m so incredibly grateful for him, and I think the truth is I just don’t know if lightning really can strike twice in the same spot.  Perhaps the biggest problem is that I’m just not sure I believe it can, for now. When God blesses you with what you desired most above all else, is it fair to ask for another miracle?  When you do, is it fair to expect one? 

Borrowed Genes

 

 

Adoption 101: The Post I Wish Had Been Written By Someone Else Four Months Ago

Posted in The Adoption Waiting Game by

IT BEGINS! The hubs and I have been shown our first birth mother profile, and we gave permission for our agency to share our portfolio with the expectant mother. Although this young lady will be shown a number of profiles, and it is unlikely that we will be chosen the very first time around, it feels good to finally be in this place where someone could choose us if they so desired. The idea that we could be bringing home a baby sooner rather than later makes my heart pitter-patter just to think of it.

Many people have asked me how adoption works these days, specifically open adoption. It is a concept unfamiliar to most people, unless you have gone through the process or love someone who has. WE HAD NO IDEA WHERE TO BEGIN OR WHAT WE WERE DOING.  Also, no one could really explain it particularly well.  I guess that is because there are so many variables and no two cases are the same.  Four months later, we have gained a wealth of knowledge that I hope will be helpful to others in the same boat.

Firstly, there is no such thing as a closed adoption anymore, unless the birth mother specifically requests it. All adoptions throughout the country are open, and “open adoption” spans a very wide continuum. For example, at it’s most minimal, the birth mother and the adoptive couple will know each other’s full names. At maximum, the birth mother may insist on a certain number of visits per year, as well as monthly photos and letters. As an adoptive parent, one must choose what they are comfortable with and stick to it. The arrangement you decide on with the birth mother is written into the contract.  In other words, you cannot agree to three visits a year and then just disappear.  The only provision is if it’s in the best interest of the child not to see birth mom because she is not a safe person to be around at that time.  As the parents, we of course get to make that call.

Oregon is a very adoption friendly state, both for expectant mothers and adoptive parents. During their pregnancy, expectant mothers are offered a great deal of counseling to make sure they understand the full commitment of what they are planning. Other options are discussed with the birth mom if she decides during her pregnancy she just can’t go through with an adoption, such as what types of public assistance might help her afford to parent, or other resources like counseling or rehab if those are needed.  All of the options available to a woman with an unexpected pregnancy are discussed well ahead of time. On the other hand, consent to adopt papers are signed the day the baby is born. Immediately after those papers are signed, the mother signs another paper revoking her right to contest the papers she just signed. This means that the adoptive parents can take their new baby home without fear that the birth mother will change her mind and take the baby back. In many states, there is a 30-day waiting period, even after papers have been signed, where the baby can be reclaimed and the return is automatic.

When we were researching adoption agencies to join, we came close to signing up with one that works with adoptive mothers from every state. We requested that we only be shown to expectant mothers from certain states so we wouldn’t have to experience a full thirty days of incomprehensible fear that our newly adopted baby might be reclaimed. They were unwilling to do that for us, and so we signed on with our next choice, a local agency that only places infants in Oregon and Washington. Washington has excellent adoption laws too, similar to Oregon. The nationwide agency was unable to understand why we couldn’t just have enough “faith” that it would work out. (I am a gigantic fan of people busting out the “faith card” in order to try to manipulate me into seeing things their way).  The final straw for us was probably when the adoption coordinator from the national agency told us, “I suggest you just reserve the majority of your heart for the first month. Try not to bond too much with the baby, and think of yourselves more or less as caregivers.”

Psycho.  Psycho psycho psycho!  What kind of person says that?  Don’t bond with the baby?  Should we refer to he/she as “it” and avoid eye contact at all costs, too?  Please.  I’m so grateful the hubs and I were on speakerphone with that lady rather than Skype when she decided to drop that little nugget of wisdom on us.  We were able to look at one another and gesticulate wildly at the phone while mouthing “WTH?” back and forth at each other.  If you are considering adoption and want to know the name of that agency so they can avoid it, definitely message me on the BG facebook page and I will gladly share.

But I digress. Back to the process.  After a couple has miraculously survived the lengthy and emotionally draining process of becoming “home study approved,” each birth mother that turns to our adoption agency for assistance cites her preferences for an adoptive family.  For example, maybe it is important to them that the couple is a specific religion, or even a certain race.  If we meet those preferences, the agency emails us a detailed profile of the birth mother and asks us if we would like to be presented. After the birth mother has decided on a family by sorting through profiles, a meeting is set up and she will then decide if she wants to place her baby with you. It’s that simple! Ha! Ha ha ha! There is nothing simple about adoption! Nothing!  But much like any road that leads to parenthood, it is worth it 1000 times over.

The hubs and I are feeling optimistic and relieved to be in the place we are now regarding the journey.  I will keep you posted!

A Most Unexpected Case of Adoption Nesting

Posted in On Motherhood, The Adoption Waiting Game by

There is a room in our house that has become sort of a catch-all.  Most people have one, or at least a counter or a closet where everything goes that you don’t want to deal with at the moment.  Sound familiar?  In our case, this room is the place that is going to become the nursery for our baby.

The hubs and I discussed what to do about the nursery a while back.  We thought the best course of action was to wait until an expectant mother chose us, or possibly even wait until we brought the baby home.  That way we would know whether to decorate for a boy or a girl.  We would also avoid the heartbreaking situation of having to come home to a fully operational, decorated nursery if the mother changed her mind in the hospital after the birth of the baby.  A sound, logical plan decided upon by two extremely practical people.

Practicality, logic, thorough analysis of every possibly scenario–the hubs and I are a nonstop party!  Whoop whoop!

About a week ago I started feeling this strange tickle in my subconscious.  That room was calling out to me.  I ignored it briefly because I certainly have plenty of other tasks awaiting completion that occupy a higher priority level at the moment. But then, I realized what the tickle was…nesting.  I recognized it from the final weeks of my pregnancy with E.  Our little man selfishly decided to be born at 37 weeks, so I missed out on the really good nesting window that starts right around week 39, and increases in both fervor and insanity until the baby is born.

Baby E, who thought it was more important to arrive early than to allow his mother proper nesting time. I got back at him by having no idea how to properly put on a diaper.

Baby E, who thought it was more important to arrive early than to allow his mother proper nesting time. I got back at him by having no idea how to properly put on a diaper.

I did not get to experience this myself, but I have a good friend who did.  I witnessed the madness that is week 41; my extremely pregnant friend, who had already cleaned all there was to be possibly be cleaned, finally resorted to polishing tile grout on her bathroom floor using only a Q-tip moistened with water.

I figured nesting went hand in hand with pregnancy hormones, especially late pregnancy hormones, but I figured wrong because I have the fever.  I had the hubs carry the heavy stuff out of the future nursery to the attic.  I sorted out what was left and parceled it out into piles of what I still needed and what was bound for Goodwill.  Once I was left with only an empty room, I actually scrubbed the baseboards.  I crawled on my hands and knees brandishing a sponge and a bucket of vinegar solution and scurried around the entire perimeter of the room scrubbing baseboards.  This is pretty big time for someone who generally cannot be bothered to pick her wet towels up off the bathroom floor.

Now I have a pristine, empty bedroom just waiting to be nested.  It mocks me every time I walk by.  I think I hear it say, “The sooner you decorate and organize me, the sooner your baby will be here.”  Well, the logic is sound, and no one appreciates sound logic more than me.

If you enjoy www.borrowedgenes.com, please like my page on Facebook and feel free to share.