it's monday

Can this week be normal? Please? Boring, even?

Last week's double punch of hurricane (Ike) and hernia (M's) made for quite the abnormal week. Since when does Ohio have hurricanes?? We lost power, some shingles, and the tarp off of our gazebo. Then, had to get up the next day and take my hubby for surgery. Yep. Looking for a boring stretch of days here.

And. . .

Big shout out to the mostest wonderfullest Auntie Jill!! My superdeeduper seester-in-law drove through hurricane winds to be at our house and help out with the kids and the cooking while I spent the day at the hospital with M and his "hyena" -- yes, it has a pet name. Jill actually took my 3 kids and her baby daughter out to the grocery store and to lunch BY HERSELF! I'm still impressed by that. A huge debt of gratitude is now waiting for her to cash in. :)

And. . .

Big hugs to Aunt Jen. Her 88-year-old grandfather passed away recently. Sounds like he had a fabulous life surrounded by love and will be missed by many, many people.


Hope everyone has a boring, uneventful week.
:)

oh my lord, this did NOT happen to me!!

As a pinky-peach mom to beautiful brown children, I have become accustomed to intrusive, nosy, none-ya-bidness questions from all kinds of people. I am not a newbie at this. We have been a transracial family for 8 years now with J, and we became even more multicultural with the addition of S and E last November. Sometimes I handle the personal inquiries well and sometimes not so much. However, today I had an encounter that goes above and beyond anything I have EVER experienced. And not only did this all come from ONE person, but that person was a complete and total stranger!

So here's the deal. I take S and E to the library and then head over to my least favorite big box store to pick up a couple of things -- S is completely out of leave-in conditioner (eek!) and I needed some more hair goo myself. Normally, I head down the road to a different big box store that I find more preferable, but they didn't have my goo the other night, so I had to go to the icky store.

I am in the hair care aisle with S and E sitting in the cart. A woman rounds the corner, looks at the kids and has a very curious look on her face. It was kind of like she had tasted something bad but she couldn't quite decide what it was that she had tasted or why it tasted bad. I just stared at her. Her expression softened and she smiled at the kids and struck up a conversation with me. Oh, keep in mind that this is an African American woman. Here is what she threw at me:

Are these your kids?
Oh, I could tell you didn't give birth to them, but I wasn't sure if they were yours.
Why did you go there and not get kids here? There are so many here that need help.
She's so pretty! When she gets a little older you can give her a perm. (This is said as she is TOUCHING my daughter's hair. Explains that giving her a perm will make it look like hers -- straight.)
Why didn't you have any of your own? Did you have trouble getting pregnant?
So why didn't you adopt from here?
Are you Christian?
Are they brother and sister?
Where are their parents?
Why didn't you adopt from here?

I managed to turn it around on her after she mentioned having one son and 2 grandchildren and got the conversation away from my kids and our situation. She talked about how hard it is to raise kids these days -- and it doesn't matter if you are black or white. She has white friends! (I thought, omg! They use that too!) And then she blurts out, "I wish I had adopted him because then I could give him away!"

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Talk about shock and awe! Why didn't we send this woman to Iraq? I was dumbfounded. I did manage to say, "That's a personal question," and "Have YOU adopted domestically?" (Yes, she was really hung up on that one.) She seemed to think that because she was a nurse that this was a good enough reason to interrogate me in front of the shampoo and hair gel. Wow.

This woman -- again, a complete stranger -- fired every nosy question and assumption at me that they tell you about in the transracial adoption education they make you complete. I think she assaulted me with more in one shot than I have experienced in the last 8 years. AND SHE DID IT IN FRONT OF THE KIDS!!!!!!

I will tell you that I didn't do nearly as well as I should have. In fact, I feel like I totally blew it. I have always tried to prepare myself for those occasional invasions of privacy, but never in my wildest dreams did I expect to meet Nurse Nosy while shopping for my hair goo. Oh. My. Dear. God.

So, for those of you who have been home a short time or perhaps are still waiting for your beautiful children, learn from my amazing experience. Yeah, ready yourself for those occasional rude, personal questions, but don't forget that ALL of it may happen in one shot with one complete stranger, and it will figuratively and totally knock you on your ass.

Wow.

Goin' to Guat

It's official -- plane tickets have been bought, contacts have been made, research has been done. I'm taking J to Guatemala!

Soon after S and E came home, it became clear that J needed to make a connection with his birth country. Rather than take our whole family of 5 down for the adventure, we decided that it would just be the two of us on a short jaunt. I'm calling it a "starter" trip -- 4 days. I want to give him a taste of Guatemala, give myself a better understanding of traveling there, and get ideas for the future. Also, it is hard to say how he is going to handle this emotionally, and I really don't want to be stuck there for a week if he has a hard time. Not to mention, I'm leaving dad at home with the other two kiddos!

So, we will fly from here to Atlanta to Guatemala City. We will then be picked up and taken to Antigua where we will spend most of our time. Might take a day trip to some place like Chichicastenengo, but I think we will make those decisions on the fly. There's a lot more I would love to do, but they are not for this trip. Not only will this trip be short, but I also want it to be slow -- give him time to drink it in. Hopefully, it will all go so well that we will plan a longer family trip for the future. Yeehaw!!

Very excited and lots to do! Only 4 months to go! woooohooooo!!
hasta luego!
:)

should YOU adopt a child?

As an adoptive parent, I often run across people who say something like, "I've always wanted to adopt." Or, "I've thought about doing that." Or, "Do you mind if I ask you questions about that? It's something I'm interested in doing myself."

And then there are those who have never considered it.

First of all, let me say that a very wide variety of people adopt. Young couples with no kids. Older parents with empty nests. Families with homegrown kids who want more children. Singles. Gay and lesbian couples -- if their states allow it. So no matter your situation, there have probably been others in the same situation who have gone before you.

So answer these questions:

1. Do you want to expand your family? Why?
2. Do you WANT a child or another child? Why?
3. Are you ready and able to learn about a whole new world and deal with the issues that come with it?
4. How do you feel about adoption? How does your extended family feel about it? Are you ready to handle criticism that could come?
5. How hung up are you on dna and "having a child of your own" to pass down your fabulous, flawless genes?
6. Does this apply to you?: "I just don't think I could love a child that isn't my own."
7. How do you feel about having a child that obviously doesn't look like you?
8. If you can't get pregnant, have you taken the time to grieve that and get past it? Are you willing and able to let it go? Will you see adoption as second-best?

If you think adoption is right for you, the next thing you need to do is research. Adoption is often compared to a roller coaster -- and for good reason. It has more ups and downs than the Beast, and it can throw you for a loop faster than Top Speed Dragster. Look at both domestic and international options and decide which fits you best. We were able to decide pretty quickly that we could handle the rigors of international, so that is the path we have pursued. But there are still choices to make after choosing between the domestic or international routes -- countries, states, agencies, etc., etc. There are a TON of websites and blogs to plow through for some self-study, not to mention lots of Yahoo groups and forums. Get out there and ask questions. Educate yourself.

And one last thing. If you are thinking about adopting so that you can "save" a child, don't. A child does not need to grow up feeling like a charity case to be pitied. He or she needs to grow up as a full-fledged son or daughter -- not your church project, not to help you look good in the eyes of God, not to convert them, and not solely to get them out of an impoverished situation. As I have said before, no one has the right to call my children "lucky." They have lost birth families, cultures, languages, countries, and personal histories. If I had lost all of that, I don't know that I would consider myself fortunate. Only they can decide if what they have gained outweighs what they have lost and declare themselves lucky or not. So, if saving a child is your motivation for adoption, please think again.

Ok, one more last thing. I'm sure this doesn't need to be said, but I will anyway. If you are, indeed, one of those people with a "pass down my genes" complex, then no, adoption is not for you. Just in case you were still wondering. ha.

Obviously I am a big advocate of building families through adoption and finding homes for children. However, that doesn't mean that I want everyone to do it. Quite honestly, some people would suck at it. But, for anyone out there that has been feeling that nudge, consider this permission to explore it -- there are kids out there who would love to call you mom and dad.

time

Spring/Summer 2005: Decided it was time to expand family and adopt again. But from where? Our agency no longer had a Guatemala program. We considered Colombia, but our wait would be almost 2 years and our ages would qualify us for a toddler. We're we ready for that? (Yeah, all that makes me laugh now.) China's wait was 6 months, and more than likely we would receive an infant girl. We decided to go with China. Sent in our application to our agency in August 05.

Fall 2005: Learned that the wait time in China was getting longer.

February 9, 2006: Our official Log In Date (LID) with China. By this time the wait had stretched out to a year.

Summer 2006: The China program continues to slow down. All kinds of reasons are given, and everyone continues to have hope of a speed up. Surely once this or that happens everything will return to normal, right?

Christmas 2006: Still no baby.

February 2007: Feeling hopeful. Logged in for a year. Surely, it couldn't be much longer? Surely we would see our child in 07, wouldn't we?

April 2007: Hope has all but evaporated. China has a massive slow down. We need to redo our immigration paperwork before it expires. Our agency becomes licensed in Ethiopia. Decision time. After careful consideration of a number of factors -- not just wait time -- we decide we need to switch programs.

Our agency is very careful and makes sure we understand all the implications. I still remember one employee telling me, "You know you will get your China referral before you would get one from Ethiopia, right?" I was very good and didn't laugh in her face, but it was a close one.

July 2007: Sent in our completed dossier for Ethiopia to our agency requesting 1 to 2 children of either gender, 0-36 months old.

August 2007: Agency sends dossier to Ethiopia.

September 10, 2007: Receive referral for 3 yo girl and 14 mo boy.

November 2007: Travel to Ethiopia to bring home our children.

Fast forward

September 2008: Rumor has it that LID 2/9/06 is the cut-off date for the next batch of referrals from China. One whole year later we would have received our referral for a Chinese baby. One whole year. Over 3 years from the time we originally started the whole damn process. I can't imagine what kind of mental case I would have been by now. And, while it would have been wonderful to receive a referral for a beautiful, sweet Chinese baby girl, I cannot even imagine not having S and E. I cannot make my mind fathom their lives growing up in Ethiopia. I cannot imagine having only 2 children instead of 3. And going through infancy again? Btdt.

International adoption is not easy. It requires the ability to roll with the changes and to make hard decisions. Faith and courage are necessities. I thank God everyday for my 3 children and the mysterious ways in which they came to us. I have no doubt that they are meant to be ours and we are meant to be theirs.

So now I can say:
Hallelujah! to all those February 06 families who are about to FINALLY receive news about their children in China. It has been a long hard road that will soon end with a long flight. Blessings to all of you! And blessings to all of those children who are about to have families. It's all good.
:)