12-12-12

So the day arrived where we met with Children's Aid. It started at 945, ended at 1, and by the end, I think the only word to express my thoughts was shock.

Starting from the beginning: We spoke about ourselves, our families, our dreams, our vision of what our family would be like, what we would do together, who would take parental leave etc...

Then came CAS' turn to speak; to describe the babies; how sweet Isaac [names changed for privacy], age 5 was. How he was a protective big brother with a great sense of humour once he warms up and a beautiful smile, coupled with a little bit of anxiety over the whole situation. With fears of disapproval, unacceptance, thoughts around "are they going to like me" ... and a huge heart that just wants a forever family and stability that he so deserves. And then there's Naomi, age 4... a mimic to her brother, a strong support when he gets down, loves to dance and enjoys music, has a beautiful smile, and sweet disposition and who looks for praise and affirmation from her foster parents.

And in my head, I keep thinking, I can do this! I can be that affirmation! We can give them a forever family! I like music, and jokes, and smiles and ... We can do this! Or can we???

Wait... can I be a "parent" to a 5 yr old boy and 4 year old girl?!?! Can I discipline and couple that with love?!? Can I pack lunches and read them to sleep? Can I answer the 5 million "why" questions? Waaaaait a minute! How the heck do I parent School Kids?!?!?!

[in enters  'shock']

Phone Calls That Change Everything

So... on Dec 7th, MarcAnto and I got a strange call from our Practitioner.

She'd called to speak to us about a sibling group of two that we were not being considered for through CAS... huh? Yup. That was the call. We weren't being considered for a couple reasons - one, our HomeStudy wasn't completed, and two, we weren't a match ethnically for the kids. In any event, she went over the kids' history with me, asked quite a few questions, including would you and Marc be willing to accept children of a different race, and then concluded by asking me to talk things over with Marc and get back to her - on the children we weren't being considered for. Don't worry, I was just as confused.

There wasn't a whole lot of talking I needed to do with Anto, because we knew what we were willing and not willing to accept. By now... YOU BETTER KNOW!! I emailed my practitioner that evening, gave her a thought-filled run down of how we felt and why, and she had replied and said she'd be in touch.

On Monday, I received a phone call from Children's Aid. They indicated they'd spoken to my practitioner and asked if it were okay to contact me directly. She went in to further detail about the sibling group, and asked if we could all meet to discuss them in length - if we believed this was something we were willing to consider. *Blink Blink* ...

Is this really happening. Are we really going to sit down with CAS and chat about "real" children?! with Names and All?!?! Lol!

This was serious! like FOR REAL!

Okay... so once I composed myself... I spoke to Marc, and confirmed a date and time with CAS.

Wednesday, December 12!

This is now the part where I start to panic, freak out, run in imaginary circles (in my mind)... and rush to get the house composed for the visit in TWO DAYS! LOL!

Not too good at this blogging thing

  I know that this blogging deal serves two purposes:

• One: it's therapeutic for me
• Two: it can serve to help others.

Theoretically... the way I've been writing... is moreso for me than for others. Sorry "others" !!!

The adoption overall... the "mission" to be a Mom... has not been easy. It's come with a great deal of pain... discouragement... sadness...emptiness... defeat... I'm pretty sure I could fill up a page. At the same time, the mission has strengthened me, beyond even my imagination's expectations. My faith in my God - whom I've adored forever, is at a level that I don't feel I could've arrived at, had I not gone along this path. Would I do it all the same if I had a choice? Umm... well... *scratches head* ... selfishly... I'm not confident to say yes on that one. So praise God for being in the driver's seat eh?

So, where do things stand with the adoption process today? Well, 7 months later, Marc and I have completed all the necessary home study interviews and provided all paper work necessary. In October, we were well in the mindset of applying to the Philippines internationally along with Children's Aid Peel.

There was some additional requirements Philippines needed - included in which was a psychological assessment, and my practitioner had requested I call Cornerstone to confirm whether the eval had to be done with a specific Dr. or whether I could go anywhere. So as I made that call on October 31, my disposition changed, and my heart dropped once again. We were informed of the answer to my question, but was also told that Philippines was no longer accepting applications until AT LEAST April 2013 as a result of the high volume of applicants.

So in doing the math, I realized, I would need to wait probably at best, well into 2016 to maybe be a mama. MAYBE!!! Wow... what a disappointment, and what a defeat to a mission that hadn't even really started - meaning, I'd not even submitted my application yet. I was SUPER dejected...

Thank God for Marc. After giving me some time to grieve, he reminded me that God was the controller. God continued to have our paths mapped, and our job was simply to follow and remain on course. He reminded me that in addition to Philippines, we still were applying to CAS, and perhaps, this is where God had wanted to lead us. In my mind, I agreed with all Marc had said except had little faith in CAS. Why? Well, at the info session, our Representative had informed us that the wait could be now tilll never... comforting words!

I spoke with my Practitioner, advised her of the Philippines details and she clearly knew I needed time to absorb. She'd asked me whether I had my heart set on PI, and I explained it wasn't a heart setting but rather, I'd seen it as my only hope due to the "now or never" comment. She sighed, looked at us and said, 'please take that with a grain of salt'. Unfortunately, they have to say this... there are many individuals that expect a baby very quickly, and don't realize the process involved, and as a result, CAS has been advised to sort of... "reality check" those applicants. - I am paraphrasing now but, that was the jist of it. So... that was a little more comforting - in addition to my voice-of-reason spouse!

And from there, we continued to trek along and life continued to get interesting...

While I Was AWOL...

I celebrated a Birthday!

(written Oct 1st and forgotten about till today LOL)

September 17th marked not a milestone birthday, but a significant birthday nonetheless. Why? Because... this was probably the closing of "the worse" year of my life... 

With the miscarriages, and the pain and despair that came along with that...with me not speaking to one of my closest and bestest friends (my mama) on my birthday-and really the previous 6 months leading up to my birthday... with the many question marks and no "light" in the distance with the adoption... my past year had been likely THE ROUGH-ESSST year ever!!!

Now... that being said... I grew in my faith, more deeply than I ever had before. And that revelation... did not come so easily, but...it came...eventually.

I looked back at Facebook over the last year - of all things eh? I looked at my posts... and my blogs... and thought.. none of this... NONE of this, really would have happened had "this" not happened first...

On the anniversary of the day I was born, I "status'd"

I'll sing 2U Lord a hymn of love. For ur faithfulness 2 me. I'm carried in everlasting arms, you'll never let me go... thru it all. Thank u Lord for Blessing me with the hardest year of my existence to date - and also GIFTING me w/ the MOST faith strengthening, spirit filled, time of my life :)

It is ABSOLUTELY true. God has gifted me with a year of strengthening, rebuilding, renewing...and... it is unfortunate - but still true, that I wouldn't have hit this stage had the pain never been experienced.

God's words rang true based not only in HisWord but in my fellowship with my Christ centred friends. Friends that are grounded in Him, that encouraged me through His Words and teachings, that never let me forget that through it all... God loves me, and wants the best for me, and has something RIDICULOUSLY AWESOME planned for Marc and I.

It's been hard, and it's definitely been an up and down battle...

It's been awhile...

It's been a long time since i've written.... and a lot has changed and at the same time... I feel like nothing has moved at all...

What's been going on..

• We Finished PRIDE - assessment and all.
• We interviewed/spoke to over 6 adoption practitioners - all of which I found "something" wrong with... 
• July (8th) we chose a pratitioner, Terri Sikora - over 20 yrs of experience both privately and via CAS. She sent us questionnaires (overwhelming) and Marc and I started/tried to make a dent...
• Meanwhile, we still had the questionnaires from CAS to fill out - more tedious simply because they were hard copies and typing was not an option (shake my head). 
• August long weekend, I put my head down and went full steam ahead to complete MY questionnaires - then I could focus on getting the husband to complete his... One thing I'll say... the paper work, the length of time... EVERYTHING about this process (administratively) I really feel is just a way to weed out the "fad-ers" from the "for-real-ers" - if that makes any sense...
• After I completed my portion, Marc was right around the bend... and our first of four meetings with Terri was Aug 15.
• The first meeting was almost 3 hours long, not hard, but exhaustive - I probably did that to myself simply b/c I was so focused on making a good impression - and also worried that my pups would eat her which surely wouldn't help in convincing her that we were a safe environment LOL!
• the next interview - one week later was one on one with Marc, and the third was her and me. 
• With all of the messed up drama in my life (as of late)... I really was not keen on meeting with her. Again, I thought she would find me unfit, unable to deal with conflict appropriately (my mother issues), i don't know.... a whole lot of fears haunted me. I mainly did NOT want to shed a tear, and at the time (early sept), hearing my name said in the wrong (unintentional) tone would make those tears flow.
• By God's grace... that meeting went superb. No tears. Strength. Focus. Precise answers. Honest. Genuine. And towards the end, Terri stared at me and said Crystal, I want you to know, this is not you. The conflict you are facing with your mother, is now in her court and there is nothing more you can do. These words, have been said to me by some of my dearest, most loving friends NOT TO MENTION my spouse... but they needed to be heard from her... this time. And this weight... was lifted.
• At this stage... we have now completed 3 of 4 home studies. We have completed our Criminal/RCMP checks and are simply waiting for them in the mail. MAJORITY with the exception of two references have come back... and Terri says we just wait...
• Regarding that CAS package that I said was overwhelming in hard copy... we FINALLY dropped it off on Tuesday (this past tuesday). Yes.. it has been awhile but... there were some hard questions (mainly the child checklist) that I was wanting to avoid.

The checklist was basically asking us, "Marc and C, what child are you going to say "no" to" ... or at least that was my guilty interpretation. So the questions looked like: Would you take a child with Diabetes? Yes? No? Possibly? How about missing limbs? Asthma? Epilepsy? Drug exposure? Alcohol exposure? how bout just a little bit of alcohol? HIV? AIDs? Schizophrenia?

And everytime I said no... for the times I said no... I pictured myself, staring a child in the face and damning them to a life without a family...Self Inflicted guilt much? So, the checklist was a challenge, and as such, I avoided... nonetheless.. we completed everything and finally delivered it.

Today, I received an email from Suzanne Gri (lovely lady) confirming she received my (expansive package) and was holding on to it until everything else arrived...

• Adoption Homestudy
• Medical Report (for each applicant)
• Medical Specialist Letters if you have seen a specialist/therapist in the last five years
• Financial Statement
• Local Police Clearances (for each applicant)
• Foreign Police Clearances if you lived for any time as an adult (18+) in a foreign jurisdiction
• References (5)
• Child Welfare Agency Record Checks – A foreign child welfare record check is also required if you lived for any time as an adult (18+) in a foreign jurisdiction (this may be difficult in some cases, please indicate this early in the process so the issue can be resolved).
• Home Safety Checklist
• Questionnaires #1 & #2
• PRIDE Homework and Trainers Notes

Yup... so I sit there and wonder... have I really accomplished ANYTHING?!?!?!?!

Am I Crazy?

In discussing everything throughout my PRIDE training - missing puzzle pieces, attachment, identity etc... it hit "areas" that I never really thought would bother me... And i'm starting to think I'm crazy...
Long and short, my father was very physically abusive - more to my mother and brother than to me (though I wasn't completely spared). As a result... my mother took us and left when I was around... 5-6 I think. And I was relieved. It was hard for her, but it was the best thing for everyone involved. The "trauma" caused some emotional wounds, but also physical ailments as well. NOTHING unfixable, and soon after we left... things sort of got better - minus the small hiccups that we dealt with.


As a result, I was very, ummm, nervous - watching over my shoulder OFTEN (as my father would show up on school property when he was already ordered not to and do other... dumb things); I was very protective of my Mama (that's kind of normal though)... and as I learned in training, I was "hyper sensitive" with emotions/expressions - having a 'heightened' awareness of the emotions of others...or gathering the cues quite quickly that people would give off if they were sad, mad, angry etc... the "bad" in that... I let other's emotions affect me.. and I would take personal blame often times for that... the good... I was sensitive and considerate with the cues, and made efforts to diffuse situations before things (hopefully) got bad. 


When I was 13ish (could've been 14 or 15 I'm kind of learning), we (my mother by way of her sister) were advised of his death through heart attack and I, my mom and aunt went to the viewing (chose not to go to the funeral). The viewing was made difficult by his family who spoke of how much he loved me and how much he missed me and how many pictures he had of me in his home. The problem = they had no clue of went on behind our closed doors, and never will they be told as that's my business, and not for the purposes of defaming his name (note: we don't keep in touch, they won't read this blog EVERRR).


As a result of the guilt I felt, I chose not to go to the funeral. I did not mourn. It was a very matter of fact thing. My father passed. And since I hadn't seen him for at least 6-7 years now, it really had minimal affect on me.


Fast forward now to maybe 20 years later... when I am in PRIDE training, praying to be blessed with a child and learning about "missing pieces" and the "benefits of open adoption" and I'm starting to learn that I will be trying to fill in the missing puzzle pieces for this child when I have... quite a few missing pieces myself... 


The more we spoke of "missing puzzle pieces" the more I started to evaluate these missing parts of me - which never caused me discomfort before. Mama was great... and my life was good... now, I find myself wanting to learn where his final resting place is and trying to remember things about him, wherein... I really can't... I can't really remember much of anything...why?? How?? Why? I realize I said that already...


It started to bother me in session 3...when there was a "pride connection" (exercise to be completed) on GENOGRAMs (date of births/deaths of siblings, parents and grandparents) ...and I didn't know a lot of the info... 


Unfortunately, since mid March, my Mama and I had a "falling out" I suppose, and as a result, void of all my attempts, my mother and I haven't spoken. So... i don't have anyone to go to, to answer some of these questions DOB/DOD questions. 


Anyway... I'm kinda hesitant to start this home study because I think I'm crazy for thinking the things I am... and because I don't have a lotta answers about my father and I don't have my mother to turn to with these questions... so...will this impact us and the home study?


WIll these... hauntings, ruin things overall...


Perhaps the answer is no.. but I certainly feel inadequate. I feel "messed up" ... and I've never considered or looked at myself as "messed up" before... till now.


And I know there are a lot of things people have in their pasts - perhaps worse than a dead parent and a feuding mother... but to me... who has so much "riding" on this home study... I feel like... this is a nail in a coffin... and that sucks... 


Sigh... in any event... I'd decided that it is important for me to locate my father's final resting place. Perhaps for closure... who knows... 


I know... it's just dirt... but... I want to... need to do this for me...


So, I contacted my aunt today, and asked if she remembered anything - like WHERE was the viewing...She reached out to another aunt who advised me of the location. I spoke with a wonderful (God willing) gentleman there, that kind of eluded to this being a needle in a hay stack... but said he would try and make this his personal project. That warmed my heart. The "haystack" was for a few reasons... I couldn't really give him a date of death. I thought it was feb/mar 1993... then... he called back and said no file was found... So I thought about it some more and apologized and told him I really wasn't sure. Maybe it was 94, or 95... maybe it was winter but not feb/mar.... I wore a winter coat... I thought I was in grade 8... but in all truths... I haven't thought about this FOREVER... and the memories I tried so hard to ... erase... have successfully been erased... and now... this sucks... or does it?!?! Do I need to know... 


Sigh... 


So...that's the deal. That's what's been on my mind this week.


Today however, was productive. I got some reassurance from some very important people in my life, and I made strides in starting the process of finding my father's resting place, and I made a dent in our PRIDE assessments that need to be completed STAT!


Next week, I will commit to TWO things... finishing PRIDE evaluations, and speaking with the referrals I was given for a home study practitioner and take it from there.


Wish me Luck! - Or rather, Blessings!

Congratulations! You are Now Pregnant Through Adoption

Today, we COMPLETED our PRIDE TRAINING! Woot Woot!!! What a BIG DEAL  this is!! Marc and I are ecstatic with the feeling and sense of accomplishment. Sofie concluded our class by saying "Congratulations! You are now Pregnant Through Adoption!" LOL! Funny lady!

Us with Our Certificate

Considering the past 2 months leading up to this, I was (and still can be) a basket case, we have certainly come a long way! These last two days of Pride were again, overwhelming (not as much as the first two days but...) and reassuring in that what we are doing is what we are destined to be doing.

Yesterday, we learned further about attachment, transition issues our child will experience and "alphabet soup" - also know as the "Scare you to death list of Syndromes/Diseases/Ailments" your child could have.

In discussing the "transition issues" we discussed what challenges we could expect them to experience:

• cultural transition if they are coming to us internationally
• change of food (again if they are international)
• language
• religion
• tradition/customs/holidays
• name change (identity transition)
• multi sibling units to single family dwelling
• change of environment/climate etc

We also discussed ways to address these concerns:

• learn their culture and do not discourage their learning of their heritage
• take part in cooking classes (for that culture) and have the child take part with you - or prepare a meal together at home
• go to restaurants of their ethnicity
• Perhaps celebrate their "gotcha day"(the day the adoption was finalized) at a restaurant of their ethnicity
• learn some words of their background
• learn the history of their country - heroes, legends etc
• understand national holidays of their country and celebrate it - ie Chinese New Year
• if our child were to already have a name, KEEP the name even as a middle or 3rd name, but do not entirely take it away...children attach to their name even if you do not think so...
• submerge them with other children of hopefully like nationalty and if they are also adopted...BONUS!
• create and maintain a LIFE BOOK (BIG ONE!!) - a blog post all in itself!

We learned how to answer the difficult questions children WOULD Have...

• why was I abandoned?
• how much did I cost?
• If my birth parents didn't have money, why didn't you just give them the money?
• there was more but...

How to answer... wow... just message me if you really want to know!

The long and short answer for almost any difficult question: reassure...reassure...reassure. YOU are their real Mommy and Daddy, YOU are and always will be their forever family, he/she will never be bought or sold because that is not what adoption is. We made a plan, we chose them. 

We finished by talking about alphabet soup:

• HIV
• ADHD
• FAS
• FAE
• SSD
• and again...I am sure there are more...

The bottom line is, know what you can accept-by way of challenges you are willing to adapt to... be true with yourself. And also... do not always go by the "label" because... children can excel far beyond said "labels". An awesome link Sofie shared is below:

Labelling Kids with Bogus Mental Disorders

Additionally - and lastly for Saturday, we discussed the importance of creating our profile (for candidacy), the importance of a LIFE BOOK and addressing the questions our children might face at school. As much as we want to protect our children, there will be the insensitive questions from their peers. Prepare your children ahead of time, ensure that from the beginning, your child is aware of the positive adoption language (referenced in my previous post: no clever title just what i learned ) ensure you have open communication and welcome questions, and if we feel so inclined, we could go in to their classrooms and educate the children on what adoption means and is... Sofie wrote a beautifully articulated book: What is adoption.

can be purchased via amazon: What Is Adoption?

By the time we left on Saturday, we were pretty on par with where our head was at...We also were excited to start our LIFE book for our little one and lastly, we started thinking about how and what we wanted our life book to look like.

All in All... it was a super tiring and productive Saturday Session... 

Today... 

Well today was an amazing day... 

We went through questions that uneducated/insensitive friends and family might ask and how we might combat said stupidity - ooops, that wasn't my inside voice eh?

some of the questions were as such (take this as a hint never to ask these questions):

• It's so great you "rescued" this child, what would they have ever done if you didn't "rescue "them?
• What do you know about their real mom?
• how much did he cost?
• I hear their real mom is in their life, you know they'll never love you the same way, right?
• you could never love this child as intensely as your real child, it's just not the same

In addition to learning to combat these questions, we also heard from so many guest speakers:

• past adoptees - with good and bad stories
• past adoptees who went on to adopt themselves
• past adoptees who created an adoption plan for their own child and now live in an open adoption with their birth child's parents
• and lastly, a couple who suffered through infertility and went on to adopt two wonderful children - one with ZERO complications - a clean bill of health at birth and clean history from Mother and Father, whom has now presented with a learning disability and a second child who came with traces of cocaine and two other drugs in their bloodstream, whose mother didn't know she was pregnant till two weeks before delivering and during that time, consumed unknown amounts of alcohol...who now, has developed exceptionally well at the age of 6 and presents ZERO signs of disabilities or learning challenges. - The point being, you will never know! It is in God's hands... and He will always know what you and your spouse can handle - even if you don't believe it or know it yet!

In all of their stories, the resonating point was such: OPEN ADOPTION IS AN INTEGRAL PART OF THIS PROCESS!!! And if you're not on board, you need to get over your own insecurities and GET ON BOARD for the benefit of your child! 

Marc and I were certainly in the CLOSED ADOPTION camp. We thought we could not manage with "sharing" this child with their birth mother/father... Sofie helped us see... this is not about us... and knowing their birth mother does not mean they will love us less, and it does not mean she can take them back. These children will be OUR forever family... that being said... this child of your does not have all of their pieces to their puzzle. Whereas in most birth families, we will know where we got our eyes from, our smile, our hair colour, smarts, artistic side etc... these little ones will have question marks that we will never be able to satisfy. IF their birth mother is willing to be part of their story, and complete parts of their puzzle, why wouldn't we want to help our child transition more smoothly? Why wouldn't we want to mitigate their pain - in ways that are within our powers?

We are now very much on board with helping our child complete their puzzles.

To hear these adoptees today, speak with great healing but still, a small bit of pain about not knowing; to think there is a better way of doing things versus adoption 30 years ago...to believe our children can have an even larger family and their love can expand past "us" through open adoption... makes me even more proud of this child we have yet to meet....

Through this training... our eyes have been opened to the "cons" of adoption. The non-romaticized version of adoption - and still... and even more... we WANT THIS CHILD!

Through this training... our minds have been prepared for the reality of illness, addiction, attachment issues etc ... and still... and even more... we WANT THIS CHILD!

Through this training... our hearts have been broken with the painful stories we witnessed, our hearts have hurt alongside the parents that also suffered through infertility, miscarriages, disappointments again, again and again... 

And... our hearts have grown...through this breaking and hurting...through likely millions of tears at this point.. it has grown stronger and bigger to see past ME AND YOU and to actually see the "US" God is preparing for Marc and I in a very new, very different way...

Now...  we are even more prepared... more determined... more encouraged. And we know with complete certainty...

WE WANT THIS CHILD!

God has paved this path for Marc and I, and that is... mind blowing. This is something the rightmost side of my brain could NEVER ever DREAM UP!!! And... it is AWESOME. It is ... simply ... 

AWESOME

I've got no other words for it. 

Today... as you can see... is a good day. It is a positive day... and... when (notice I say "when") I have those down days again... I will need to reminded of June 3... I will need to be reminded that God has a plan that is AWESOME, and mind blowing and unfathomable at many times...

But today... is a good day... and that, is what I am going to hold on to tonight.

Be Blessed!