ON THE WAIT LIST!!!

Start the clocks, our dossier is on its way to DC as we speak! I never thought this day would come! YAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAY!

Maternity Clothes

So we're cleaning out our basement this past weekend...I find the dreaded boxes of maternity clothes that my step-mother gave to me before moving out of the country. I've had them for 4 1/2 years. I kept them because I thought that one day a miracle would occur and I would need them. Well, that's not happening.

I decided to sell all of them on Ebay. I had these nice intentions of using the money to pay for stuff around the house. Then I went out to lunch with a friend. I told her the story and she looked at me angerly and said, "I want you to take any money you make off those clothes and spend it on something absolutely ridiculous. Pink shoes, an exotic purse, a necklace you don't need. You deserve to get something fun out of the horrible infertility road you've been on. I DEMAND it."

So I agreed! Any thoughts on how I should spend??

Done with the dreaded paperwork!

We FINALLY got word today that our paperwork is complete for our dossier. KBS has one or two more authentications to do and then she'll send it to Gladney. I'm SO glad that pretty soon we'll be able to start the clock. We must be the WORST paperwork couple on the planet. Pathetic. We were so busy in February that things got all clogged up and we did all these forms incorrectly or just sloppily. I was so frustrated. So I'm really happy that now we can think about the good stuff!

So yay!

PAPERWORK SUCKS!

It sucks! It really really does. I'm now on the third letter from my bank (and my 6th phone call), my life insurance letter has to be redone because the notary didn't put when her commission expired, Pete's doctor's letter has to be redone, and....here's the REALLY good one, 5 documents that Pete and I both notarized have to be redone because Pete put the date as 2/2/9 instead of 2/2/09. SERIOUSLY? That can't be translated? That isn't a legal date?

I'm taking a self-imposed break from this today. Need to chill.

I guess one week isn't going to make a difference when the wait is getting longer and longer for referrals and court dates.

Frustration!

Favorable Determination

Those are amazing words to hear. Even better when they come in the mail from CIS! They did it in under 2 weeks which is unbelievable. I never thought we'd be behind the government in terms of getting our stuff together. So now we just have to get 1,000 things notarized, wait for one more letter, and it's in the hands of KBS Dossiers. I'm hoping this will all be taken care of in two weeks. Probably wishful thinking....

Ending the Week

Okay, today we got Gladney approval and our home study situation is all worked out. We were fingerprinted on Wednesday AND we've hired KBS Dossiers to work on the authentication process which is going to save me a ton of angst. Cleared up the bank letter (the bank guy was beyond thrilled about us adopting and said, "thanks for letting us be a part of this" when we got off the phone. a bit strange but cute), and Pete is taking care of the life insurance letter. So all in all, this week ended much better than it began.

I'm going to go cheer on my college at a hockey game now!

Having a bad day

Today I am overwhelmed. I feel like I've been going through cycle after cycle of payments (both financially and emotionally) and sometimes I wonder if this will ever be over and we'll be a family. This failure to have a child has become such a major part of who I am that it's hard to see the end of the road these days. I read this
blog post today and I can't possibly think of a better way to describe what I've been going through the last three years.

I guess it started when I called Gladney about why we haven't received the official approval yet and they informed me that my final homestudy wasn't there. I know that it's out there because it got to CIS so I called our homestudy agency. She sent it out a month ago AND said that if they don't have it, the person that would prepare the new one (the word processing stuff) is recovering from surgery and won't be able to do it for another few weeks. Sigh. Sigh. Sigh.

I'm sick of getting things notarized and signed and prepared. I'm sick of fighting with places to ensure they do the darn forms correctly. I'm sick of knowing that even when all these forms are done, I have a long (and it's getting longer) wait in front of me.

And I'm sick of articles like this that make me feel like a horrible white woman who steals babies from other countries.

I thought that we were doing something good by adopting overseas and that it would convince me to stop what I viewed as selfishness with repeating IVF treatments over and over. This way we could HELP a child that had already been born.

And I'm feeling some panic too. I'm worried about the first time he/she says, "you're not my real mother!" and how much I'll sob. I'm worried about the weird comments and looks we'll get from people because we don't look the same. I'm worried that people won't consider him/her as much a part of my family as they would a "natural" born child.

Time for some cookie dough therapy. Enough ranting for today.