caerula's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- a stupid day I didn�t go to work today, for the stupidest reason ever. Blue, leaving for work last night, says to me �do you want to move your car? I won�t be home before you leave for work.� Me, in my pajamas getting ready to go to bed, says �no, I�ll drive the Lumina, that�s fine.� Cut to this morning: I�m ready to walk out the door, and can�t find the spare set of Lumina keys. The spare Saturn keys are on the hook right where they should be, but since Blue has the Saturn, this is no help. It occurs to me that since Blue drove the Lumina last, the keys are probably in the pocket of his coat, which he is of course wearing. Sigh. Well, theoretically, I could have called a couple different people but I hate putting anyone out by making them drive all the way out to where I live and then all the way back in to Ann Arbor. And since Blue has his second interview for the job (yay!) and then a doctor�s appointment, there was no telling when he�d be home or if I�d be able to get in touch with him to come pick me up, since I knew he planned to come home and go right to bed. So I called my boss and told her I have some stuff here I can do, and any time I need to make up I�d be perfectly happy to come in Wednesday and do. We�ve got no plans for Christmas Eve day and the office will be quiet and empty, meaning I can get more work done in any case. I felt stupid beyond belief, but she was fine with it. So I went back to bed, cozying up with Sophie and the cats and the new Guy Gavriel Kay ARC I just received. When Blue got home around 1:30 he found me eating soup and watching Days and said �betcha would�ve liked some keys, huh?� �Actually, you know, this is fine. I just wished I�d realized I didn�t have the keys before I put all that effort into getting ready for work.� The extra keys were, for some reason, in the Saturn. Which Blue realized only as he was getting back into the car when was leaving his interview at 11-something. Very helpful, that. But, the second interview went well and the job seems to be a lock as long as his criminal check etc comes back clear, which of course it will � it�s required for health club employment, who knew? The job won�t be available until mid-January, as it�s a new establishment just opening up and the massage facilities won�t be ready until then, but that�s certainly something we can deal with. So a hopeful yay � until Blue�s officially hired and filling out tax forms, I�m not counting on anything, but it sounds good. 7:04 p.m. - December 22, 2003 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Why aren't you adopting an American baby? Rant and ye shall receive. Over at Chez Miscarriage she's put together a primer for answering the stupid questions people ask adoptive mothers. I now have the perfect answer for "Why aren't you adopting an American baby?": Hee! 8:15 a.m. - December 20, 2003 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- adoption thoughts International adoption isn�t always faster and easier than domestic, according to the Miami Herald. Well, duh. Either way you go you have to be smart enough to research your agency and lawyer and where your money goes. Unfortunately there are still a lot of places out there who know how vulnerable adoptive parents are and take advantage of that, whether they are trying to adopt in this country or out of it. And there are still countries (including ours) where people engage in baby-selling and baby-smuggling; it�s one of the reasons Romanian adoptions were shut down for so long, and it's a huge problem in African and Latin American countries as well. I�m mentioning this because I�ve had a couple of people say to me lately, "oh, but there are so many kids here who need homes, why aren�t you adopting an American kid?" There are thousands upon thousands of kids who will never be adopted in foster homes and group homes all across the country. I know. And there are thousands upon thousands upon thousands of babies and children in orphanages all over the world. Some of those kids are in better situations than others. Kids in the U.S. run the gamut from having awesome foster parents to awful ones, or being placed in group homes because they can�t get into a foster home due to behavioral problems. Many of those kids will be in the foster system their entire childhood, moving from place to place and never finding a permanent home. In Guatemala and South Korea, two of the countries we�ve researched extensively, many babies are in loving foster homes from birth to the time they are adopted, while others are in excellent orphanages receiving lots of personal attention. In Russia and many other Eastern European countries, many kids are in poor, understaffed orphanages, lying in their cribs all day to the point where their heads can become misshapen, fed and changed on strict schedules, taught to go to the bathroom only at certain times in the day, lined up on training potties with 40 or so other little ones. Older infants and toddlers often have attachment disorders resulting from a lack of personal contact and require intensive therapy to settle into their new homes, sometimes successfully and sometimes not. For a while, when we started thinking about adoption, I felt some guilt for just wanting a healthy young baby when so many kids need families. I still feel a little bit guilty about it. But the truth is, we already took in a child with major emotional problems; the fact that he is my husband�s biological son doesn�t change how hard it was to take in a child that we didn�t even get to know until he was a toddler, whom we didn�t have full time until he was seven years old, and so in that way it was much like an adoption. He had history and habits that we had no idea about, problems that we had to learn to deal with, and emotional issues that he continues to try and deal with daily. So, you know, we�ve done that already, and it was hard. It continues to be hard. Is it wrong of us, then, to want a child we can bond with from his or her first year of life, who will only ever remember us as her parents, who will know from babyhood how special and how loved and wanted he is? YMB will have to carry the knowledge for the rest of his life that his mother walked out on him. Our adopted baby will know that his birth parents gave him up, yes, but because they loved him; he won�t be faced daily with the intimate knowledge that YMB has, that his mom chose to leave him but kept her other kids, that for whatever reason she couldn�t accept him as her own. So I deeply admire the people who can adopt older kids, kids with emotional problems and special needs who would otherwise be stuck in the foster care system. People who adopt foreign children who need major medical attention � I�m happy for them, for their ability to do something so great. Those kids will be better off with those people, who are better equipped to provide for their needs. And I don�t have any issues with couple who decide to go with domestic infant adoption, but it�s not something we felt we could do; there are just too many loopholes, too many changed minds and too much heartache to go there. We�ve seen both sides of those issues up close and personal. We�ve already lived for years and years with the fear of our child being taken away, and I can�t do that again, even if it�s only for a short time. And I never ever want to be in a position of denying a natural parent their rights to their child, after seeing Blue go through that same situation for years. Of course I don�t explain all this to the people who criticize our decision to adopt internationally. It�s none of their business. So far I�ve only smiled and said "we're doing what feels right for us." Which is what every adoptive parent should do. No matter how long it takes us, I strongly believe that we will get the child we are meant to have, and that�s why we�re not saying "we are adopting a boy from Guatemala" or "a girl from South Korea." Until we submit applications and sign papers anything could happen and I want to be open to that. This is the fourth year in a row we�ve had to say "maybe next year we�ll have a baby for Christmas." That�s getting depressing and discouraging. But this is the first year since we�ve found out we can�t get pregnant the old-fashioned way that I feel like maybe next year is a realistic goal. I might not have a baby in my arms by this time next year, but there will be a baby out there somewhere destined to be ours, and for now that�s almost enough. Some good adoption links: This Woman�s Work: a hopeful adoptive mom with lots of info and links And I am rapidly coming to love this woman. Bless her heart for making infertility funny. I was beginning to feel like I was the only one who could laugh at this sometimes. 10:51 a.m. - December 18, 2003 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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