After reading the article I have included below, I decided I wanted to reflect a little bit on the grief Pete and I (and our family and friends) experienced following our failed adoption.
I don't think I'll ever be able to write the whole story.
What I'm ready to share is the moments and days following it all.  We waited in the hotel lobby with a social worker from CPS for the boys Mother and Grandmother to arrive to get them.  I was holding "Miles" and Pete was holding "Timothy", I don't remember much about this, other than time seemed to be moving very slowly, and passing way to quickly all at the same time.  I just kept kissing them both and fighting back tears, readjusting their swaddles and hats to make sure they would be warm in the cold Michigan air.  His Mom arrived, we walked them to the car, lots of tears and hugs and Pete secured them in the car seats, and they were gone.
We cried the entire walk back to the hotel room.  Once inside, the room was a chaos of baby things, I fell to the floor and sobbed like I never have before, and haven't since.  Those minutes were a defining moment for our marriage.  In fact, the whole experience was changing us as a couple, but those moments, alone, the babies gone, and the chaos reminding us that only a few short moments before they were there, I felt closer to Pete than I ever knew was possible.  I think it was the first time I really let myself let go of any control I ever thought i had over my life, and just "be" with the person that matters the most to me in the whole world. In all our broken messy sadness.  I'm not going to share the details of what we discussed, or the intimacy of being so broken with someone else, but it was, I think, the epitome or what sacramental marriage is meant to be.  We packed up the car rather quickly and started the five hour drive home.  We didn't want to spend another minute in that city.
While we ventured home, our family and friends were busy cleaning our house of all things baby, and stocking our refrigerator.  Let me just say, this action of love, on a Saturday night was unbelievably humbling and helpful.  Words are failing me.  How you express the gratitude you feel for such an act is beyond me.  So blessed.  So understood. I would not have been able to walk into our home with those reminders.  If you have someone in your life who has a failed adoption, offer to do this, I promise you, they will feel your love.  The next day at my parents house I had a conversation with my sister-in-law on the back deck, and while I don't remember exactly what we talked about, I remember she was crying right along with me, and this gave me strength in a way.  Our families lost those boys that day too, the ones that met them and the ones that only dreamed about them.
My parents had been with us for most of our time in Michigan, if they had not, we would not have survived it, I'm serious. Nothing I can say about what they did for us will do it justice.  They know, and we know.  They left the morning we returned the boys to their Mother, not knowing at that time that would happen later that day.  I begged them to continue on their journey home after discovering she had changed her mind, and reluctantly they did.
We spent time with Pete's parents later that same week, and went over all of the craziness of the experience.  They embraced us, they understood.  More love, more support, all of what we needed.

Now, five months later, we are waiting for a 13 month old boy in South Korea!  And I can't wait to hold him!

So I guess what I'm saying is, no one grieves the same, no ones experience is ever identical, so when i share things like the following article, don't assume that everyone experiences their grief like this.  Just know that for all those people in your life that may have or had a failed adoption don't minimize their experience.  Feel it with them, love them through it, and help them find the joy in the journey.

http://stillstandingmag.com/2014/02/grieving-child-never-died-grief-failed-adoption/?utm_source=feedblitz&utm_medium=FeedBlitzRss&utm_campaign=stillstandingmagazine

I really am the worst with keeping up the adoption blog.  I guess I feel like when you wait there isn't much to share, its rather boring for the observer. But, here goes nothing.
Since my last post we are officially waiting, we've got all the appropriate approvals that we can get until we arrive in Korea.  Things are looking as hopeful as they can on that front.  It still doesn't feel real. Perhaps because of our failed adoption I have walls up, I just can't seem to let myself embrace it fully.  I still look at his picture and cry everyday, I'm still buying things, but in the back of my mind I think "just be ready for this to not work out".  The counselor in me recognizes this for what it is, and I'm oddly peaceful about it.  If there is one thing I've learned in the past two years with all of this, its nothing is certain, you have little control, and there is no point pretending it to be otherwise.
Don't get me wrong. I'm excited. We are slowly getting the house ready.  Very slowly. I'm trying to imagine what life will be like this time next year, and I really can't even wrap my head around that.
Since baby boy will be a little older and because its international, we are going to have return to our plan for bringing him home like we have with our Ethiopian adoption.  That means that at least for a month pete and I will be the only ones meeting our sons needs.  He has to learn that we are his parents and that we provide for him. That means if he cries we are the only ones to comfort him, when he is hungry we feed him, we change his diapers.  That doesn't mean our friends and family can't love on him, (wild horses couldn't stop that anyway :) ) Its just for a little while we need to help him trust us.
The general consensus on this is about one month for every year the child has lived apart from you.  This of course can vary from child to child.  We will cross that bridge when we get to it.

Baby boy

Well, only a few short hours after my last blog post, while still in Tennessee we got a call from our KY agency saying an agency that works in South Korea thought we would be able to adopt a waiting child we had inquired about. Let me back up, our agency posts birth mother situations on a group website and each family responds if they would like to be presented to that birth mother. A few weeks prior to our trip two little korean children were posted about. The problem was that Korea has BMI restrictions. I didn't meet them, but I was only missing it by a little. After getting a letter from my doctor that I had in fact lost weight since our home study and was continuing to do so, the korean agency needed to review everything to decide if they thought it would be a problem. I wasn't holding my breath. BUT, our agency called and said they thought it would be fine and did we want to pursue an adoption. YES! So we had records reviewed by a pediatrician, submitted our forms to the US government for approval to adopt an orphan from South Korea, etc. I won't bore you with the new round of paperwork but were moving forward. Korea could still say no, but we won't really know that until we get there. So here's to trying again, loosing more weight before we travel, and hopefully coming home with our son in the next six months!

The mountains are calling and I must go

I'm typing this entry from my phone, so please forgive grammatical errors. As I type this I'm looking out over the mountains of Appalachia, from a one bedroom cabin off a long gravel road. Pete and I decided to come when I started to feel this year taking its toll on my spirit. We have been blessed, a lot this year, and when I was having trouble seeing that, I knew I had to reconnect with the earth, and with my creator. Pete is my strength and being the amazing husband he is, would stop at nothing to make sure I'm at peace. I'm pretty sure this year was taking its toll on him as well, but he remains centered. In may we found out our ethiopian adoption would take nearly as long as it took for me to get my masters degree, in June my uncle, who I loved as a second father passed away unexpectedly, in July we were matched for twin boys through domestic adoption and in September we had them. For five beautiful days we cared for them, for five days I felt like the Mother I have always wanted to be. Maybe this is hard to understand, because they aren't mine, but for those five days, they felt like they were. My first sons. Even in the chaos surrounding that time, the uncertainty and fear, even when we could see that it was going to come crashing down one way or another I made myself love them. Because for whatever reason, we were there in that situation and I didn't see any other choice. No, I was never their mother, and I never will be, but I got to feel like one and that has changed me. I'm not ready to tell the whole story of our failed adoption, I'm not sure if and when that day will come, but the moment we gave them back to their mother I felt I was standing on the edge of a precipice. I knew I had a choice, this is going to crush me or its going to build me up. It felt crushing. So much loss in such a few short months. I needed time, I needed to re-evaluate how much pain I was willing to endure, how much was I really willing to say yes. Of course I knew where I would end up, it's just hard to get there when life remains so busy, when your job requires you to help others heal their brokenness when your own darkness is deep, when you have amazing family and friends that helped you keep your head above water (whether they know it or not) and you want to see them, to enjoy life with them, but you really want to pull the covers over your head for a dozen years and hide.  So, yes, I needed time a way. I needed to process everything and. let. It. Go. I needed to be still and catch my breath. I needed to see the beauty of the earth and remember this is not about me, it, in fact, has very little to do with me. We took a three mile hike up mount leconte yesterday. We were both mostly quiet and to ourselves. I won't speak for Pete, but every step I took I was thinking. I thought about the last hike my family took when my uncle was there ( the trip we found out I was going to be an aunt!) I thought about conversations I had with him and plans we made that were never fulfilled, like getting tattoos. I thought about holding those sweet sweet babies and watching my husband do the same. I thought about the birth mom, remembered the pain in her eyes the last time we saw her at the hospital and the pain in her eyes when she came to get her sons. Never was I angry. But she feared I was. I love her. I love her sons. I pray for them everyday. I thought about all these things as we were hiking and it began to melt away. I'm sitting here, tears streaming down my face as I write this, because it all still hurts like hell, but it's okay. It's beautiful really. We live in an absolutely beautiful world, and ill be damned if I ever forget that. We are blessed. We are sitting in a small cabin, I have the most amazing man to walk this road with me, and we have a future. I'm glad it's uncertain, because I wouldn't want to know. The view at the top is amazing, but the hike is really why we do it. So I'm going to remain hopeful, I'm quieting down, and I'm going to enjoy the hike.

Losing a good man

Where do I even begin?
Shortly after my last post Pete and I began looking for a domestic agency, we found one and began the paperwork process, which was a million times easier than the international process. During the first week of June we went on a vacation with my family. My mom, brother, sister in law, niece, uncle, aunt and two cousins. I will be FOREVER thankful for this trip. It was fantastic, and we got to spend so much time with our family.  Little did we know only three short weeks later, my uncle would die peacefully but unexpectedly in his sleep. This loss has been devastating on our entire family. My dear uncle Tim was the definition of a good man. He was never married, never had children, so for all of us nieces and nephews it was like we had a bonus dad. On nearly every vacation, every holiday, every childhood event he was there, cooking, making us laugh. One of the firsts to reach out in times of distress, I never once heard him utter an unkind untrue word about anyone. He was rational and loving, sincere and fiercely devoted to his family. It still feels like it can't be true, and despite having meltdowns at least once a day, I'm still able to convince myself he is still here.
Even when we got the news in May that our adoption was going to take so long, he was one of the firsts to make sure I was okay. We had plans. We were going to take care of him if he ever got to old or sick to live alone, and he joked that in our house full of elderly relatives that we have walls built around his bed so he could be alone sometimes. I can't bear the thought that he won't meet our children and they will never have the chance to know the most selfless person I have ever met, that made such a profound impact on the way I view the world. A counselor himself, he was one of my greatest inspirations to become a professional helper. And now he is gone, and I have no idea how our family will manage.  We have, and we will, but his passing has left a hole in all of our hearts.
For several weeks following this news I didn't want to do anything (I still really don't). I quit training for our 5K (it's in one week to raise money for our adoptions), I stopped doing paperwork for the adoption, I went to work, but I can't say I was doing that great at helping my clients.  My friend Annie basically told me to get a move on in regard to getting our home study done, and on auto-pilot, we did.  I'm glad we did.  It's been a welcomed distraction.  And its important to remember that life is full of ups an downs and despite our sorrow, we have to find joy, everyday. Tim would have. 
And so here we are, home study basically approved waiting one final background check, and,as far as I can tell, a completed adoption book, ready to be viewed by birth moms and dads.  One day at a time, together.
So if any of you have a creative way to make "Timothy" into a girls name let me know.  We are thinking of honoring him in the middle name of our child, if its a boy, that's easy, but I'm not so sure Timothia will work. hah. (Though my brother is thinking of doing the same thing so we will see!)
Love and Prayers.  Hold each other tight and value everyday.
Miss you Tim. Everyday.

Broken Hearted

For two weeks, maybe a little more I've been sick.  Sick to my stomach, chronic headaches, a constant sense of unease in my spirit.  I don't ever take this lightly.  I've learned to trust my instincts, they have rarely lead my astray, its when I have refused to listen that I have made poor choices.  I imagine this same sense I have had these past few weeks is similar to a Mom's instinct that something is wrong with her child and she must check on them. Today I checked my email every chance I had, the contacts with the agency are the only connection I have to check on our child.  I was looking at it before even getting out of client's rooms at times.  I just knew. 
About four this afternoon we received an email from our agency.  A run down of changes in Ethiopia.  First it stated adoptions in Ethiopia are NOT closed, a sigh of relief, and then panic immediately sets in when I realize this is the good news to cushion the blow.  Every month we get an update e-mail, how many families have received referrals, what's new in Ethiopia, how many families have joined the program this month, etc.  A week or so later we get a personalized e-mail with our updated wait list numbers (you move down the list as families get referred to help you gauge how close you are to your referral).  It's been slow. We are new to this, and we knew it was slow.  I did the math in my head every month thinking, there is no way we will have a referral in two years, let alone one. 
They informed us today that Ethiopia is changing how it handles all adoptions.  For good reason.  A few corrupt agencies were dealing in unethical adoptions.  Sickening. They have been closed, but the ramifications remain for those still waiting.  The result is longer wait times.  Longer.  How. Could. This. Get. Longer. ??  The numbers jumped out of the e-mail like big black doors closing on my sense of hope. Possibly 3 1/2 years.  From now. Not from when we started, from now.  Tears.
Like everything with adoption, nothing is certain, not one damn thing.  We knew this, but we jumped in anyway, feet first, ready to be broken and broken again because we want it that much.  We want our children that much.  We have options.  We immediately decided we weren't leaving the program, we would wait for our Ethiopian child, no matter what.  We are in it for the long haul.  Our agency, being the amazing agency that they are, have listed all the options.  Details about paperwork that I won't even try to explain right now, our options about switching to another country, and pursing other avenues.  They want our family together nearly as much as we do, and we are blessed for that. 
Pete and I didn't get to talk about it much, he was getting ready for work.  He read the email while I cried in the bathroom doorway.  If I haven't emphasized this enough, Pete is amazing, he just blows my mind every single day.  He hugged me and let me cry and said it was going to be okay.  He's right.  I know he is, but right now it doesn't feel alright.  We briefly decided we would stay on the Ethiopia wait list while we pursue other avenues for building our family.  We are lucky in that we can continue with our Ethiopian adoption while pursuing another adoption. 
So what this means exactly I don't know, probably trying for a domestic adoption while we wait.  More unknowns, more waits, more closing doors, again, no control.  But I would walk through fire for our children and we are certainly not going to let this stop us from having the family we know we will have and we both so desperately want.
I had a girls night planned for tonight, and despite wanting to lay on my couch and cry into a pillow for the remainder of the evening, I went and being the amazing ladies they are they reminded me that I am strong and brave and this life of ours will continue and it will continue with our babies.  One way or another. 
So what this means: Pete and I will be adopting our baby from Ethiopia, its just going to take a lot longer than we ever wanted.  We will likely be adding to our family in some form or fashion, yet to be determined, before our Ethiopian child gets here. So yay for another child! It's like being pregnant with two of your children at once but one will be born way before the other... sort of. 
My hope is not gone, I'm not giving up. Tonight I'm going to keep listening to all of the saddest songs and cry into my Cabernet, but that's just for tonight.  I will remind myself when I wake up tomorrow that its a new day, and we have a new opportunity, and that somewhere in this world we will find our children, all of them, and eventually we will bring them all home.

Not much new to share regarding the adoption. We are waiting. We have gone down five spots for a boy and five for a girl since being placed on the list. Slow and steady. I would add a photo but I've been having problems with that lately. 

Since my last post the Catholic church has seen the retirement of one Pope and the election of another. Very exciting times for us Catholics. I've decided to include in this entry a link to a transcript of an interview between Pope Francis and Chris Matthews, when Francis was not yet the Pope. I really love him and think this interview is a little insight into why. It never aired, clearly in the interview because mr. Matthews was not getting the answers he wanted. 

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/3000243/posts