Monday, April 28, 2014

Boob Jobs and Adoption

No I am not getting a boob job.   I stumbled across this video on an adoption message board that I frequent.  It is a humorous way to educate people about appropriate adoption language and questions.  Adoption is an unknown for many people and there are lots of questions, sometimes the questions people ask or the words they choose are offensive.  

I have been fortunate that we haven't been asked these questions.  The one thing we have been asked that does fall in this category is a variation of " Aren't you afraid the child will be unhealthy/damaged/emotionally unstable?"  While it hasn't been these exact words it is the idea that adopting a child from foster care means we are getting damaged goods.   Yes these kids have had a hard life and have experienced trauma but that doesn't mean they are any less of a person and don't need a loving family.   There would be no guarantees even if we had a biological child that they would be perfectly healthy.

Questions are natural, and I am happy to answer them, but first ask yourself "would I ask this about a boob job?"


Sunday, April 20, 2014

The Waiting is the Hardest Part

Not much new on the adoption front these days, we've been in a holding pattern waiting for our home study to be finalized.   After finishing our training and our last home study visit our case worker went off to prepare our profile and present it to the team for approval.   Hopefully it will be presented this week and then we get to review it.  There isn't much that we can do until we hear from her.   Waiting is hard.

Once our profile is approved we move onto the exciting part - networking and reviewing profiles of our potential child(ren).   Of course there will be more waiting during these times but we can at least take an active role in things then of viewing profiles and submitting our homestudy for our potential children.   There is no saying how long this process will take.   I know many people can wait upwards of a year but for some reason I think it will be quicker than that for us, but maybe that is wishful thinking.   We did just buy 2 tickets for our vacation to the east coast this summer, part of me thinks that is a sure fire way to ensure that we will need be placed by then and will scramble to purchase additional seat(s) on our flights.  

Dave leaves on a business trip tomorrow ( a little role reversal)  I fly out on Friday to meet him and spend a weekend in NYC.   I wonder if this will be the last flight we take without kids (well I have plenty of trips for work but those don't count).  
   

Sunday, April 6, 2014

What a Difference a Year Makes

Last year at this time Dave had just returned from a trip to Denver to visit family and I was in a tough place at work and very stressed.  This prompted us to start talking about whether we wanted to raise our hypothetical family in Seattle or if we wanted to move elsewhere.  Seattle is great and we loved it but we were very far away from family there.  Flights to see my family required between 6-9 hours of travelling, flights to see Dave's family 3-6 hours.   IF we were going to move we were moving someplace with family and with a lower cost of living.   We looked at the cities and towns our family lived in and  narrowed the list down to Denver.

Denver gave us a number of benefits

  • Family a quick car ride away.
  • Travel to see my family dropped to 4-6 hours.
  • Travel to see Dave's family dropped to no more than 4 hours with the closet trip being 20 minutes.  
  • Lower cost of living.
  • Mountains. 
  • Red Rocks.
  • A great craft beer scene. 
  • 300 days of sunshine. 
We knew it wouldn't be easy, but this wasn't the first big move for either of us.   If we were going to move we needed to move first and then start the adoption process.  We figured it would take about a year or so for the move to become a reality.  Imagine our surprise when a few weeks later Dave learned of a job opportunity, it seemed like a sign.   2.5 months after "thinking" about moving to Denver we were packing up our house and saying good bye to Seattle.   

Here we are a year later, getting settled into our new home and approaching the time when we are home study approved.  The move happened much quicker than we anticipated and there have been definite adjustments, but it was definitely the right decision for our family.  I have mostly adjusted to working from home and am in a much better place career wise, we are making friends, we are exploring our new home state and most of all we've enjoyed spending more time with family.