Month: June 2016

Hurry Up and Wait

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Dear No One,

I haven’t given an update on the adoption in awhile, so I thought I’d fill everybody in on where we are today.

We have finished both our print profile and video that birth moms will look at when deciding what family they want to adopt their child. Here’s a small sneak peak of part of our profile:

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We also had our last home study visit a couple weeks ago! What does that mean? We’re done with all of our paperwork!!!

We could go active (have our profile shown to birth mothers) now, but we decided when we started this process we were going to wait until after our family vacation in August. I am focusing on finishing up a practicum class this summer, and we are enjoying our summer and seeing a lot of family and friends before we bring home Baby Hemi.

We did not think we would be done with everything this quickly, although we should have known we’d be done early. I MAY be a little bit of a planner. I MAY have worked on the paperwork every extra second I got. I MAY be impatient and MAY have pushed us to get things done as quickly as possible. “May” being the keyword.

So here we are…2 months until we go active. All the paperwork is done, and I looked at Marcus and said, “Oh my gosh. We could have a baby in a few months. We haven’t even thought about actually preparing for a baby.” Our minds were so consumed with collecting birth certificates, getting physicals, copying financial statements, diving into our past, sharing our personal story with a social worker, writing pages and pages about ourselves for our profile that we didn’t have time to actually plan or think about having a baby.

So what did we do? We bought a crib (yep, I cried on the way home), we painted the nursery (cried when we bought the paint), and ordered new carpet for the baby room. BABY ROOM! That feels so weird to say.

Just in case you want to see my 17 year old paint clothes…

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Anyway, we are done with our paperwork, which is a huge step! Once we go active in August, it could happen in a week. It could happen in a year. It will be completely out of our hands. Until then, we are preparing for what we will need immediately and trying to keep ourselves busy.

Thanks to everyone for all your support! I never dreamed our baby would be so loved by so many different people. We have received so many blessings, in so many ways, that God is making it hard to ignore the signs that we are getting so close to bringing home Baby Hemi, and He is looking out for our baby already.

All my love,

Betsy

I Challenge You

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It’s been awhile since I addressed infertility. Even if I’m not talking about it, though, I feel it every day. I know we are adopting, and I could not be more sure that is the right thing for us right now. But the pain of not having a baby, whether biologically or from adoption, is always there.

My husband is working nights right now. Maybe that makes me extra emotional because I spend a lot of time alone, but anyone who knows me well, knows I’m a crier.

It’s funny how I’ll be fine for days and then something so small unleashes all of my emotions again.

I was at a wedding this weekend, and I was watching a beautiful, little boy all day. I couldn’t stop looking at him. I was even the creepy, infertile woman staring at him as he played on the playground outside of the reception. Luckily, his mother is one of my friends, so no one called the cops on me.

There was a big group of us dancing, and he was the life of the party. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a happier two year old breaking it down on the dance floor. I watched as his parents knelt down next to him, showing him different moves. He could instantly pick up the new moves and imitate his parents. It was in that moment that I looked at his mother and said, “You are so blessed.”

Instantly, it hit me. There it was again. PUNCH to the gut. I walked out of the reception hall as fast as I could in my four inch heels, but I couldn’t keep back my tears.

Jealousy. Love. Happiness. Guilt. Sadness. Anxiety. Fear. Hope. Anger. Embarrassment.

There are no word to fully explain the emotion I felt. I was so truly happy for my friend. They are amazing parents and are raising a beautiful son. Yet I felt every other emotion times a thousand.

So here I am, in a puddle of my emotions, trying to get through the night to celebrate my friend’s beautiful (and HOT!) wedding day. I did not and never do want to make it about me. That is where the embarrassment comes from. No one wants to break down crying in public. That’s what bedrooms are for, but I could not control it.

Yet in my own sad, selfish mourning for the baby I do not have yet, I found something so beautiful. People took time out of their night to listen to me, to hold my hand, to cry with me, to give me a shoulder to cry on. I never, NEVER, would have expected to be comforted by people who have not been through this same struggle. Yet there they were.

I woke up this morning with an emotional hangover, but I felt one more emotion. I was grateful. Grateful that I have a husband who has never given up on me. Grateful for the friends I have made through this struggle. Grateful for the ability to spread awareness about infertility. Grateful for being one day closer to bringing home our babe. Grateful for people who showed me it’s okay to feel. Grateful.

In a world surrounded in ugly, a world where a singer is shot while meeting her fans, a world where people are murdered in a night club, a world where a child gets cancer TWICE, a world where a person will spend most of their life without both of their parents, a world where a couple will never have a biological child, we need a reminder that there is good. There are so many things to be grateful for. If you can’t find something to be grateful for, go do something for someone else. You’ll be amazed at the results.

I am asking you, begging you, to put aside the drama, let go of the anger and just show love and respect for others. Find things to be grateful for and give other people something to smile about. It is just as easy to be kind than it is to be mean. So as I challenge myself, I challenge you, be a better person today than you were yesterday.