Yeah, so we are just waiting…
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I have been asked so many times lately, always with the best of intentions, “so how is the adoption process going?” I just never know what to say.
“It’s going.”
“I’m not really sure, we are just waiting.”
“We are stuck.”
“It’s not going anywhere, so I am starting to freak out.”
I usually respond, “it’s going so well, thank you.”
The truth is, I know exactly what part of the process we are in, but I also have no idea where we are at with it. We are called a waiting family, I believe, and for right now all we do is wait and respond to emails if we want to share our family profile or not. Then we wait some more.
Anyone who knows me, knows that one of my largest struggles is with patience. I just don’t have much, if any at all. I want conflict to be resolved right now. I want things I want to purchase right now. (two day shipping? ain’t nobody got time for that!) I want projects that are in the middle of completion to be done right now. I want my birthday gift (for October) right now. I want to lose ten more pounds right now. I don’t like things hanging over my head and I don’t like waiting for things.
So, being in this awkward stage with the adoption, just waiting for progress, is quite possibly killing my soul from the inside out. That’s dramatic, but you get the point.
The logistics behind “where we are at with the adoption” are that we get a profile that summarizes the life of a birth mother, and we choose if we would like to share our profile with her. Once she receives all the family profiles, she gets to choose which families she would like to “meet” over the phone. After a phone call we would all have twenty four hours to decide if we consider it a “good match” and then from there we wait for the baby to come. We have not gotten to the phone call part yet.
My first thought is complete self loathing, thinking no one likes us enough to want to meet us. I quickly get past that by reminding myself every birth mom will have something different she wants for her baby, and who knows what other families are in the pool. So, it’s not that no one likes us, they just want something different for the baby.
The emotion that I cannot get past during this waiting period is doubt. I am just waist deep in thoughts that revolve around doubting the entire process.
“Why did we want to do this again?”
“Can we really afford this, or should we put the $30,000 back towards our mortgage?”
“Can I even handle two babies? I just lost my cool with ONE!”
“You know, we really like laying on the couch and relaxing at the end of the day, we probably can’t do that with two. We should just scrap the whole thing.”
“Why did we want to do this again?”
I am hoping you read that cycle of questions in a slightly panicked, completely insane voice, because that’s exactly how I sound in my head when I go through all these things. The doubt is paralyzing right now, and I truly am wondering if this is the right life choice for us. I’ve discussed my worries and fears with Jason, and for now we have decided that’s probably normal and should just let the universe take over and put things in order the way they are supposed to be. But I cannot shake the doubt.
So, if you ask how the process is going, there is the long answer that I really want to give. When I say “Yeah, we are just kind of waiting,” I really mean that we are waiting and also second guessing every step we make in life right now. What a strange place to be at emotionally.
If you just jumped in and haven’t followed our entire adoption journey, you can find some of the beginning steps here:
