Smashing Heads

I used to bump P's head into doorjambs on a regular basis. Not on purpose, of course (no calls to CPS, please). But I'd be carrying him from one room to another, trying to remember where I'd left the thermometer or his shoes or his bottle and then. . .THUNK. . .followed by. . .Waaaah! To be followed by the internal tongue lashing at my self for being such a rotten mom that I'd cause a head injury to this amazing child that I was caring for until the state officially made me his parent. To then be followed by the worry that I really did hurt him and that I would have to bring him to the emergency room and CPS would decide I was too careless to be a mom and take him from me. Fun times, those were. Eventually, I got better at figuring out how to enter and leave a room without giving P a concussion.

It occurred to me recently that there's the possibility that my clumsiness may have something to do with adoption. I think that maybe part of the reason pregnant women get big (other than carrying a child in their uterus) is to prepare them for parenthood after. If you've become used to maneuvering carefully through doorways for a few months, perhaps that carries over to maneuvering carefully as you carry your infant. . .who grows a bit every month during which you become accustomed to his size and shape and adjust accordingly as you carry him and so avoid walking him into doorjambs. Maybe because we adopted P I just needed a few extra months to get used to his space in my arms. I needed to catch up.

Or maybe not? Maybe all my friends who gave birth to their children caused them near-concussions on a regular basis, but never told me? Maybe it's not an adoption-related issue at all and I'm just clumsy. That's a real possibility.

I'm still here. It's hard for me to know what to write sometimes. Navigating through adoption is one part of my life, but it's a fairly small part at the moment due primarily to P's age and somewhat due to our lack of relationship with his birth family. My time is mostly spent just living life as a working mom of a three year old. Adoption isn't front and center. And I kind of feel that the reason people tune in here is to read about adopting after infertility or adopting from foster care. I don't know that my adventures trying to get P to wear pants (yes, that is a real issue in our home) are what they're looking for. But I have nothing else to offer at the moment, so from here on out this blog will be a mix of whatever is happening in my life---the terrible (and awesome) threes, relationships, adoption, body image, and a partridge in a pear tree, or whatever else may come my way.

I didn't call the next morning or the one after that. I waited until DH and I could have time to have a conversation about this possibility of a second child. Immediately being told "Absolutely not" isn't much of a conversation. When we finally did talk, I told DH that I really want to do this. That a sibling isn't taking away from P; it's a gift. That I would be thinking about this for a while because although his No would make my decision for me, it didn't change what I was feeling in my heart. The end result was the same. We're not going to adopt again. I can't force a situation on DH that he really doesn't want to be part of. I called P's adoption worker and left a message, explaining that we weren't able to move forward with the situation and shared some of DH's concerns. She wrote back a kind email thanking us for considering the situation and stating:

the fact that you are so focused on P's best interest is one of the many reasons I thought of you for the child I am currently working with. P is lucky to have both of you.

Of course, we all know that we're the ones who are lucky to have P in our lives, but it was a lovely reply. I'm doing better with the whole situation as time passes. I don't want to live my life as though it's lacking in some way because I have only one child. I know I'm beyond fortunate to have my one beautiful boy. I'm trying to focus on appreciating what I have.

Possibilities

P's adoption worker called me this afternoon to "check in." Since we finalized over 6 months ago, I was surprised to hear from her. She gave me her cell phone number to call her back and said I could call until 9 o'clock tonight. Little warning bells started going off in my head. I called anyway. She's trying to find a home for an 8 month old legally free baby girl. She asked if we're interested. She didn't know if our reluctance to remain in the pool was due to wanting only one child or if it was about not wanting to deal with legal risk and all that it entails again. I told her that I'm shocked she doesn't have a line out the door for this little one.* I told her I'd talk to DH and call her back tomorrow. What I wanted to tell her was, "Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes!"

DH has had serious reservations about adopting again. Sure enough, he immediately shot down the idea. He doesn't think he can physically handle two kids. He worries that we couldn't financially handle two kids. He loves taking care of P during the day and is afraid having a baby would take away from P. He's concerned that this little girl may have more special needs than we can deal with (there's prenatal drug exposure and mild developmental delays and the unknown). I totally understand all of his reasons. I know I need to respect his reasons even if I have more faith than he does in our abilities.

But, oh, this is breaking my heart. I didn't even realize how much I long for another child until this afternoon's phone call. Now, I'm sitting here imagining a sister for P, a daughter for us, knowing I'm just torturing myself because it's not going to happen. DH is unchangeable once he makes up his mind. Even so, I'm not going to call the social worker back to give our answer until tomorrow. A lot can happen in 16 hours. It's not likely, but keeping the possibility open even just until the morning makes me feel a bit better.

*Realistically, I think there's more to the situation than she can share with me now. There are many possibilities. Since we aren't at the point of a disclosure meeting, she can't tell me all. I have a hard time wrapping my mind around why there wouldn't be families fighting over this baby. A legally free 8 month old available for adoption is unheard of.

IVF always works. Everyone who uses it is successful and has a baby.

So I'm a little late on the Bust a Myth post, but the theme of my life seems to be better late than never, so it's only fitting that I'm trying to pump this out less than two hours before National Infertility Awareness Week ends. The reason for my tardiness is that I've been going back and forth about which myth I felt called to bust. I thought perhaps the one about not being able to adopt a baby when doing foster-adopt. Or the just adopt one. Or the just relax one. But in the end, it's the IVF myth that has caused me the most heartache and so, for me, is the most deserving of being busted.

I started 4 IVF cycles. Two of them ended in transfer. Two of them ended in IUIs due to poor egg quantity and probably quality. None of them ended in pregnancy. I was ready to keep on going until I reached my health insurance provider's limit of 6 paid IVF cycles (I live in a state that mandates infertility coverage). I had a friend who was able to get 7 IVF cycles paid for by her insurer and got pregnant with her daughter on cycle #7. I bought into the myth. I figured if I just got in enough cycles, I would hit the jackpot like everyone else who did IVF. . .

And then I had my first, and then my second, failed cycle. . .

And my RE brought up the donor egg talk. . .

And I got booted from my RE's practice so as not to mess up their success rate, nicely booted, but booted just the same. . .

And my new RE told me that my chances of getting pregnant were less than 5% with IVF and way, way, way less than that without it. . .

And my health insurer decided that I'd be blowing their money if I tried IVF again with my own eggs so they said #4 would be my last. . .

And I finally realized that IVF doesn't always work. That the fail-safe sometimes fails. That there would be no biological child for me and Mr. OGE. I wish someone had told me! Although, if they had told me, and perhaps they actually did tell me, I would have always pictured myself on the positive side of the statistics. You can't go into an ordeal like IVF expecting to fail.

The revelation I've come to recently is that even though I didn't get pregnant, IVF didn't fail me completely. It gave me options. It gave me some sense of control. It gave me the opportunity to learn what an amazing and supportive group of friends and family I have. It helped me feel like I did everything I could possibly do to have a biological child, and in doing so it helped me to let go of that dream and move on to another---the dream of becoming a parent through adoption.

For more information about infertility, visit RESOLVE.

For more about National Infertility Awareness week, visit here.

Still here and waiting some more

I know it's been a while.  I just thought I would share that we're still waiting to get P's amended birth certificate.  We were told it would take 16 weeks from finalization which seemed an inordinate amount of time at that moment.  How naive we were.  We aren't at 16 weeks quite yet, but DH went to the state office to check on the status of the birth certificate.  He figured it might be ready and if not he'd have a better idea of when it would be.  He was told not to bother checking back until at least another two months have passed. And that it probably wouldn't be ready then because they were short-staffed and swamped.  So sorry.  Next in line.

Ugh.  I love bureaucracy.