What's a Dossier Anyway?

Three months and two weeks after the first conversation Carrie and I had about international adoption, and our dossier was sent to Ethiopia! It also happened to be Ethiopian New Year, which I happen to know because my wife has become an expert on all things Ethiopia. Having the Dossier sent is kind of like being approved at LDSFS. It means that we could now get a referral for a baby. Couples who are now getting referrals for baby boys had their Dossiers sent in mid Feb. You do the math and that puts us out until mid April time frame before we should expect to hear anything.
AAI (the international adoption agency) is really big on humanitarian aid, and we think it is a great idea. Since we will likely have nothing to do for the next seven months, expect to hear from us about ways we can work together to help some of the orphans over there.

Reality

I'd better write this blog now, because if I don't it'll never get written. But here's reality.
In an hour, or maybe even in 10 minutes I won't feel this way. I'll think of how lucky and blessed I am. I'll think of all the good things, and right things, and I'll be happy and fine. But that's not how I feel right now, and right now, I don't want to think about how lucky and blessed I am. The reality is that sometimes you just feel crappy. Yup, crappy enough to soft-swear about it.
Crappy because I'm nearly 32 and have a wife who's a perfect mother, just waiting for kids to raise. Crappy because we've been married for 7 years, and for 7 years haven't been able to have kids even though there is no medical explanation for it. Crappy because we keep postponing vacations, not eating out (as much) and not buying things we want, because we are saving all we can for adoptions. Crappy because in the space of two weeks, two birthmother's have chosen other, less cool, couples for their babies. Crappy because the most recent one was having twins (and I don't care what you all say about twins being hard, I still want them) and we were planning on refinancing our house so we'd have enough money to get them and still pay for our little Ethiopian boy later. But no, for us things will continue to be the same. Not bad, just the same.
Maybe the other couples had been waiting longer, maybe they are perfect for those kids, maybe they are actually supPOSed to have those kids. Bleh.
So, we'll keep waiting. Venting really can make you feel better sometimes, but the reality is, it feels crappier to have someone look at you, review the summary of your life and who you are, and then actively CHOOSE to not choose you than it does to find out that you are not pregnant for yet another month.
Come on Carrie. Let's go out to dinner.

Somewhere

Somewhere there's a couple on vacation, unaware that in December what they've hoped for will finally be coming true. They'll find out soon.

That couple is not us.
And I'm okay with it.

The other day Zack and I were talking about the situation we were in- this whole "Us or Them" scenario. Zack said he hoped the birthmother would choose us, but it was hard to hope that because it meant that another couple had to get their hopes dashed. We are part of a decision where the joy one couple experiences is shadowed by another couple's pain. But that's what the entire adoption experience is about, isn't it?
And no matter how hard you try, you can't shield yourself from the pain. You can't pretend you don't care, because deep down you do.
And so it hurts.
But you learn from the pain.
You grow.
You become stronger.
And you're okay with it.

Disappointment and I, we're comfortable with each other. It's familiar.
It's the joy and excitement and the fulfillment of promises that makes me uneasy. I feel like when it finally comes I'll be wary, watching around every corner waiting for the reality of disappointment and hurt to resume it's familiar place by my side. These dreams coming true, that feels too unstable. These dreams will come true someday, somewhere. Not here and now.
Before you all throw me a pity party and have an intervention at my house, that's only how I feel sometimes.

Most of the time I live with hope. I am extremely happy with hope.

Come to think of it, maybe it's not disappointment and hurt that feel familiar, maybe it's the hope that comes out of them that feels so comfortable, so familiar.

"Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. By whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also; knowing that tribulation worketh patience; And patience, experience; and experience, hope: And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us."
-Romans 5: 1-5

Somewhere our children wait. I won't stop hoping for them.

Not Much To Say, But So Much To Hope!

I won't type much about our meeting today because I want to respect the birthmother's privacy, but I will say a little bit.

First of all, we thought things went really well.
This birthmother is great. We seemed to have a lot in common. She was really nice, mature beyond her years, very straightforward, and seemed to be able to handle and appreciate good amounts of sarcasm. We got along just fine.

Right now she's got a lot on her plate. Lots of important decisions to make. Her first and foremost concern is finding the best environment she can for her baby. To me, that's the best gift a birthmom can give to her child. She's the only one who can make that decision.

We like her a lot. We think she's amazing and we're praying for her that she will be guided to make the best decision for her baby.
(We are also praying that choosing us is the best decision for her baby. We admit to slanting our prayers in our favor. We're not ashamed.)

S0, now all we can do is wait. Hopefully we'll know in a week or so if we are going to be parents in December!

No Way That Just Happened

Tomorrow is the first day back to school for Carrie. Traditionally that is a pretty emotional-rollercoaster kind of day... but Carrie helps me get through it.

But seriously, since Carrie will continue working until we have a baby, every time a new school year starts, it is a reminder to both of us that another year has passed. While we are extremely grateful for the time we have together, and we don't have any regrets, certain milestones just make you wonder, "what if?"

For example, "What if our new caseworker called us tonight about meeting with a potential birthmom?"

Well, then we'd probably be really excited (while understanding that the birthmom will be meeting with other couples as well, so nothing is certain) and plan to meet the birthmom in the next few days. We'd likely be super excited about the possibility of having a Christmas baby that would likely be born around the same time as our Ethiopian baby. We'd talk about them growing together and going through high school together. How fun would that be?

No WAY that just happened.

Oh yeah, and our new caseworker's name is Deborah. She sounded really nice on the phone.

Ethiopian Adoption Time Continuum

Here is my feeble attempt to create a timeline using Paint.





We are currently where the red X is.

As you can see, we have a long way to go. Whether it's good news or not, from "Dossier to Ethiopia" to "Embassy Date" all we can do is wait. Now picture 2-3 months in between each marker. Roughly 9 months (or more).

That's right. Once our Dossier is sent we have roughly 3 or so months to get a referral, then 3 or so months (sometimes longer) to pass court. Once we pass court our child is officially ours. That must mean we can go pick them up, right? Not so fast. Now we have to get our I-600 from processed and approved and then get an Embassy date. Once we have a date set then we can plan on traveling to pick up our little one. We've been advised to book flexible tickets because Embassy dates can change.

Between "Embassy Date" and "Our little one is home!" is a month or two of frantic travel arrangements and preparations to go pick up a baby half way around the world. I won't even talk about the list of things we'll need to bring with us. I have a feeling we will be paying the fee to check extra bags on our flight...

Even though we have a long wait ahead of us, we are excited because we're almost done with the paperwork. We're almost ready to wait! Yea!

Hey, wait a minute....

Checking In

Time for an update to all our fans out there. I know you've been dying to know what we've been up to. (Humor me.) Here's a few big hurdles we've been able to jump in the past few weeks.


First hurdle:
Two or so weeks ago Zack and I finished the last training module of the class we've been taking. The last module was about 2 hours long with a multiple choice and short answer test afterwards. The previous ones were only about 30 minutes long with just a multiple choice test afterwards. We had to watch the module in a couple of increments because of our schedules. We finally got it done and took the test. The last test is hand scored and the results are sent to us via email. We got notification just a few days ago that we passed!
I won't go into everything we learned because that would take way too much time than I care to spend, but I will mention something we learned about power struggles. The first advice: Don't get into them with your kids. (Easier said than done, I know.) Secondly, if you find yourself in a power struggle, you need to win and win quickly. (Once again, easier said than done.) Third, you can't win a power struggle in the following three areas: Eating, sleeping, and potty. Just give it up. You can't MAKE your child do any of those things. (For those of you interested, you also can't make your dogs do those things either. I've tried.)

Second hurdle:
Our homestudy was finished and approved!

Third hurdle:
I sent the majority if our dossier to AAI! They received it and sent a few of the papers to Washington, D.C. (Apparently it goes to the desk of Hilary Clinton. I never would have thought that she would be involved in the making of my family.) When she sends those important papers back then the entire dossier is sent to Ethiopia. We'll be sure to announce when it's sent. That's a big milestone in the whole international adoption process.

Fourth hurdle:
We went to our local USCIS office (Immigration) to file our I-600A form and get fingerprinted. This is a form that has to be submitted and processed before our child can come into the country. As we were driving there we were asking ourselves why we have to submit this form so early in the process, even before we have a child to bring into the country. We got our answer from the nice man who took our forms. We asked him how long it takes for this form to be processed. His reply, "We're working on March right now." Really? It takes 4 months?! Ahhh, government. Efficiency at it's very worst. Can't wait for health care to be run just as efficiently...

That's all our hurdles so far. There really aren't any more. I have to mail our I-600 form, our notarized (gotta love the notarizations) homestudy, and the certificates we earned from the class we took to AAI and then we're officially done...for now. I'll write another post on just where we are in the process. This post is long enough.