Friday, October 21, 2011

'Waiting' - not just a 8 letter word.

First off - I apologize, as this post is all over the map! (The inside of my brain is a scary place!)

As most all PAP's (potential adoptive parents) know, waiting in the adoption journey is very agonizing. I think of it as the hard labour... just waiting for the cervix to dilate enough so you can finally push. It's hard to wait. The only thing that can cure the 'wait blues' is to be active, to feel like you are actually doing something to assist the process. ie - the walking, the rocking and finally the 'pushing'.

You will go through highs and lows... periods where it is just extremely difficult to other days where you may go an entire day without even thinking about it.

When we started this process, I was extremely impatient out of the gate... I fought and fought until I realized that fighting wasn't going to get me anywhere. I needed to take a number and join the line. Unfortunately, we ended up wasting 18 months in this line. When we got closer to the front, it was like the cashier put up the "Closed - Next Cashier" sign just as we were about to unload our cart. Yes, we were cheated out of 18 months and had to start all over again! But then we soon found out that these games, trials and tribulations were like boyscout badges. The more you have, the more serious you will be taken. Everybody has a badge or 2 or 3... It's hard to feel bad, because when you look up in front of you, someone will always have a couple more badges than you. However, on the other hand... it's hard not to have the hair stand up on the back of your neck when you feel as though someone just walked in to that grocery store and jumped the line. That makes the waiting even worse. Like being a week over due... 18 hours into labour and seeing the bubbly blonde who just came in the hospital hours before, walk out (in skinny jeans) with her baby. This can make you pretty darn tired and ready to go I tell ya!... and I think I may have just experienced a bit of that. Sometimes reading blogs is not very conducive to your health! lol.

Oh yes, I have been the pillar of strength in waiting since July... It has been the easiest part of the process. Why? Because I have only been waiting on myself to get the dossier done. Granted, we had to wait for a few things... but I still sat at the control tower. Typically, I would have had this done and dusted in a month or less. But now I have a million things to think about and prepare for. Suddenly this adoption journey has morphed into moving across the globe and homeschooling our children for a year. My distractions are many... where will we live, who will live here, who will buy our business, who will look after our pets, where will we volunteer, how do I stay away from Malaria for a year? etc... So, as you can see - it was easy to feel like we needed to tread slowly, we had to take time to scope out the landscape. Now we are sitting on pins and needles with current events in Kenya. We were also initially hoping to be out of Kenya by the election in August, and now there is no way that is going to happen, so we really have to put a great deal of thought into that. And now, I'm ready. Ready! Let's get this party started! We moved agencies to change programs to expedite our adoption, and now I feel like this could put us behind, not ahead.

So now we sit. I'm going to cross our last t's, dot our last i's and send off our dossier. My director is gone for 2 weeks, so I won't be able to get any advice from her until then. Only we can ultimately decide on where our comfort zone lies, but I would feel so much better if I knew that the dossier could be put on hold while in Kenya - if the country does become unstable. I am hoping this is the case, but will not know until she is back in office in November.

***Edit - and just to prove how crazy adoption can make you - Waiting has 7 letters, not 8. Doh! lol...

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