Forever Family

As I hang up with the social worker, I’m feeling so confused and full of angst.  I wonder if I can really get involved in this again.

It would seem that birthmom has requested some pictures of our Kiddo.

Sounds like a fairly harmless request, right?  Well, that’s what I was trying to figure out.  I suppose I can understand why she might want pictures.  Her biggest fear was always that Kiddo would have a miserable life in foster care, and perhaps she wants some reassurance that he’s healthy and happy.

My initial reaction is that it can’t really hurt.

But then I start to worry.  What if we’re just opening a can of worms?  What if the thing I’m hoping will give her closure and help her move on, really just opens old wounds and makes things worse?  Clearly she’s still struggling with some issues, otherwise she wouldn’t have lost custody of this second child.  She’s not healthy yet…physically, mentally, or spiritually.

Hubby and I have worked very hard to ensure a happy and safe environment for our kiddo.  We’ve made some major life changes and gone great distances to do so.  Would sending a picture jeopardize it?

Hubby and I discuss that night.  He has the same initial thoughts I did, and his ultimate inclination is to not send anything.  It’s not worth the risk.

At first, I agree.  But then, I’m fairly convinced that birthmom and I connected on some level he can’t understand.  I really feel like she liked and trusted us, as much as she could considering the situation.  She knows Kiddo is in a great place.  I don’t think she is asking for the sake of reassurance, and I don’t think social services would contact us for that reason.

Ok, so if I rule that out, what does that leave me with?

Well, maybe she really is just curious and a little nostalgic.  I can’t blame her, and I’m sure a new baby would definitely bring up old memories, but I don’t think social services would play along.

Then, after a long sleepless night, my exhausted brain starts taking me down dangerous paths.  After all, she wanted to relinquish custody to us the first time…maybe she wants to again.

Could it be a crafty way to pull us in?  For all her faults, I never doubted that she always wanted what was best for Kiddo.  I would be willing to bet she’s feeling the same way about the new baby.  Maybe she wants them together.

But then there’s these paternal relatives.  From what I gathered, it sounds like there is some strife between her, the birthdad and his family.  Maybe she’s just trying to manipulate the situation and exert some sort of control.  I don’t want to be a pawn.  Pawns rarely win the game, and I don’t have the energy.

Then was the social worker reaction when I told her we would absolutely take the child.  Her mood changed and she said she was “grateful” to hear that.  Why would she say that?  Could it be that she knows some kind of alternative permanency plan was needed for this child, and ultimately we could adopt?

Here’s part of the problem.  Once our adoption was finalized with Kiddo, we moved out of state.  It was a good decision, and our life has been better for it on several levels.  However, we knew that by doing so, we would complicate the situation if there was to be any other children.  Being so far away, we could never foster a child of hers that she or birthdad were entitled to visit.  We would have to wait until parental rights were terminated.  That can take a year or more after a child has been removed.  That’s a lot of time to miss.

So no matter what, the baby could not be given to us until parental rights are terminated.  The social worker indicated to me that they were still several months away from that happening.

After a couple of days of willing myself to not obsess on this new baby, I had another talk with my Hubby.

I told him I thought we should send a picture.

So by now, I’m pretty much in some sort of emotional overload.  I don’t know much, and I am extremely hesitant to be hopeful, but my multi-tasking skills come in handy as I manage to make a lengthy mental baby prep checklist and come up with a whole slew of baby fantasies.  I’m already making an inventory of the baby stuff we’ve kept as Kiddo has grown out of them, and wondering how much a can of formula is going for these days.

No no.  Cannot think like that.  That’s how I got in so much trouble last time.  Be cool…chill out.  Breathe!

I look down at the phone number, and I begin dialing for the social worker.

Oh yeah, now I remember how it’s supposed to work with these guys.  Does she answer?  No.  Can I leave a message?  No.  Her mailbox is full.  Dammit.

Do you doubt that I didn’t dial that number every 30 minutes until I could either a.) speak with her, or b.) leave a message?  You bet your a** I did.

Surprisingly enough, I get through that afternoon.  Immediately I think, “It’s meant to be!”

Stop thinking like that!

This social worker can’t be more than 22 years old.  I wonder how she asserts herself in this very difficult job sounding so young.  But she’s crafty.  She doesn’t tell me much, other than a name, sex, and age.   She assures me that he’s safe.  The paternity of this child is different, and this time there are some relatives who can be trusted.

She can’t tell me much about the progress of the case, because it is till so very much in progress.  She can’t really even indicate to me that parental rights will be terminated.  The only information I can infer is that birthmom and birthdad have disagreed about what to do with the baby.  I sense there is some tension between birthmom and the whole birthdad family.

What I can guarantee you is that this social worker doesn’t think much of birthmom.

I ask her why we’ve been contacted.  If we’re not needed, then why get us involved?  We’ve taken great lengths to distance ourselves, and now we’re being pulled back in.  I appreciate that they let us know that Kiddo has a bio-sibling, and someday we’ll share that with him.  However, something else is going on here.  What gives?

She doesn’t really answer me.  She says that birthmom requested it.  I laugh and tell her I know they are not stupid enough to contact us just because birthmom may have some unresolved issues and needs some closure.

And yet, for sounding so young, she’s really good at evading me.

So I decide on a new tactic.  I decide to talk about us, and how well things are going.  I tell her how happy we are, and share some cute stories.  I point out how healthy Kiddo is and how far he’s come.  I hope I can maybe dazzle her with our parenting skills, in hopes that it might put some positives in our column if they’re considering what the permanency plan for this child should be.

I ask about birthmom specifically.  I hope SW can pick up on the bond (however strange it may have been) that b-mom and I had.  I tell SW about the conversation b-mom and I had about future children, and I told the SW that we would absolutely adopt any more children.

I even tell her that Hubby and I actually just had a conversation about working on child #2.  In fact, I had just been online the previous week looking up how the foster process works in our new state.  No joke!

All of a sudden, the mood of this girl changes.  She goes from somber to happy.  She’s “grateful” to hear that.  Grateful?!?!  What does that mean????

She then makes a request.  It’s on behalf of birthmom.  I need this conversation to end, because I’m getting all mixed up and my head is starting to ache.  I tell her we’ll talk it over, and I’ll call her back.

I’m not much of a phone person, but my need to know exactly what was going on with this baby situation far outweighed my awkwardness to dial the number.  Besides, past experience would suggest that the social worker wouldn’t answer anyway.  I could leave a message and wait for her to call me back, giving me ample time to calm down and get my wits together.

I mean…a baby!  She had a baby!  Clearly she was struggling with it, otherwise there wouldn’t be another social worker involved.  Plus, she wanted us to know!!!  She was reaching out to us!!!

Amazingly, the above thoughts raced through my head in less than 15 seconds, which proved to be just enough time for me to become really overwhelmed, and for the phone to ring exactly 2 times before the social worker answered.

Dammit!  She answered!  No time to recoup.

I pulled it together as fast as I could.  I used inane pleasantry babble as both a cover for my anxiety, and as a time staller.  I shared a couple of cute stories about my Kiddo and how well he was doing.  In my mind, I applauded myself for accomplishing the ulterior motive of proving what fantastic parents we were.

Then we come around to the email.  Social worker knows nothing.  The new worker had contacted her at request of birthmom, because birthmom knew that old worker would be able to contact us.  However, she feeds into my speculation.  Perhaps new baby needs a home.  I remind old worker that of course we’d take the baby (and how wonderful it would be to keep the siblings together!), and that birthmom and I had a chat about that (once upon a time).

She wants to know if I would like to be in contact with the new worker.  In my nonchalant and cool way (it’s important to not appear overeager), I say “sure!”  She gets my new phone number and agrees to pass on to new worker with my email.

“Well, do you think you could give me her name and number, too?  That way I can just call her directly.”  Again, I didn’t want to wait for them to call, and especially on their time.  It could be weeks before I knew anything more, and I was pretty darn sure I wouldn’t be able to stand it.

Fortunately, she agreed in a way that was more like “duh, why didn’t I think of that,” instead of “gee I really shouldn’t but I will anyway.”  I was feeling good.

I hung up with her and immediately called my hubby.  The thing that really sucks about being adoptive parents is that we are NEVER together when we get baby news.  It’s always over the phone while we’re at work.  What a bummer!!!!

Was he excited?  Most definitely.  Was he now wondering all the same things I was?  Absolutely.

Now I start dialing the new worker.

Being a parent is H-A-R-D.

Duh, right?

And yes, no need to remind me.  It ain’t gonna get any easier.  Just when I think I’ve got it nailed…when I think I know what I’m doing…when I’m feeling confident about how things are progressing…WHAM!!!  I’m gonna get nailed in a blind spot with something new.

I always said I was up for challenge.  I’m sure the moments when I will want to eat those words will be haunt me to the end of days.

Outwardly, things have been great.  People ask me how I’m doing, and in a chipper voice I respond with “Great!” or “Fantastic” or “Things are swell!”  I have so many blessings to be thankful for.  I have my health, my family, employment, and a roof over my head that I can afford.  I’m living the American Dream, while so many others have stumbled and fallen on it.

I am head over heels in love with my Kiddo.  He’s the best kid.  Ever.  Sure, I’m slightly biased, but pretty much everyone who comes in contact with him agrees.

And yet, I’ve been struggling inwardly with a very simple problem.  Something is missing.

Fortunately, my psychosis is easily diagnosed.  I pretty much know the exact moment that my brain went into a cluster.  I received an email from a very unexpected source.

I hadn’t realized just how much I had packed away into tiny dark recesses of my mind how emotional our adoption journey was, until they all came flooding forward when I saw an email from Kiddo’s old social worker.  I really do think my heart stopped.  She had not included a subject, so my inbox was good enough to point out the lack of subject by stating (No Subject).  Yeah, thanks MSN for the head’s up.

My mind raced through the options.  What could she want?  Are they coming for him? (impossible, but you fear it like some people fear giant man-eating spiders)

It was only a paragraph.  She started sweetly enough.  She thanked me for some pictures I had forwarded along over a year ago, and gave me a brief status report on her promotion.  Two sentences into the email, she dropped the bombshell.  Kiddo’s mom had another baby.  The new caseworker had notified our old worker at the request of the birthmom, because she wanted us to be notified.

That’s all she knew.  We were to email her back if we wanted more info and she would put us in touch with the new worker.

Ok, so my first reaction was relief.  Nothing was wrong.  The paperwork was done and some loophole wasn’t setting us up to be the next Lifetime movie.

But then, my heart starts racing.  Another baby?  I knew it!!  I knew that girl was pregnant again.  But why does she want us to know?????????????

Let’s step back in time for a moment.  If you recall, Hubby and I agreed to meet Kiddo’s birthparents back in our foster parent days, because we were hoping it would help out case.  At one point during our visitations, I had a little tete-a-tete with b-mom.  I told her if she ever needed us again, and if there was another baby and she just wasn’t ready, we would absolutely take it.  She seemed to be relieved and happy to hear that.

Could this be why she was looking for us?

Email’s too slow.  I picked up the phone and called the social worker.

And yeah, I’m gonna do that to ya.  I’m gonna leave you hangin’.  You’ll have to check back for more.

I wonder if I even remember how to do this!

Yes, that’s right.  I’m back.

Back from where is a little more difficult to explain.  I haven’t really gone anywhere.  My life has been going on as usual.  No one was sick…no one died.  I didn’t experience a tragedy worthy of excusing my absence.

No, my journey has been more of an excursion of the mind.  Outwardly, things are fine.  Inwardly, however, has been a little bit of a different story.

I’ve closed down for a while and numbed myself to survive the day to day.  I also just needed the time to focus on my family.  But stability is coming my way (for now anyway), and I’m ready to document my experience.

So, be ready…

Yeah, it’s been that kind of week.

I pretty much go through my day, with WTF repeating over and over in my head.  There is nothing else I can think to say.

So I promise I’ll try again tomorrow to be somewhat more upbeat, or at least post something worth reading.

All I can write now is W…T…F.  Not exactly literary stimulation.

The good news is that I wrote several posts for my new site Symphony Rocks last weekend while I was still in a pretty good mood.  One will be posting Friday morning, so you can pop over there for something slightly more meaningful.

I promise I’ll get all caught up on my comments and such.  I know I’m behind.  I’ve been doing more lurking than usual lately, but there’s no excuse.

I’m feeling a little discombobulated today.  Something’s been off all day and I’m just not sure what it is.  Perhaps it’s the fact that it is April 7th, and snow flurries are blowing past my window.  Maybe it’s because this darn chair is hurting my bum so bad that I want to just pick it up and throw it off the balcony and right square onto the freeway below.

Darn it my tooshie hurts.

But that’s not quite right.  There’s something else.  Like the universe is out of sync somehow.  Do you ever get that feeling?  Like you want to launch some kind of rocket into outer space that will start a chain reaction and will magically set things to right?

Could it be because there is so much arbitrary silliness in the world?  Why does it always have to be about the bottom line?  What happened to nurturing thought and promoting quality?

Maybe that’s part of it.  But that’s nothing new, and why it surprises me so much when it proves to be all about the money is beyond me.  I guess I’m a slow learner.

Well, whatever it is that’s throwing of my chi, it’s downright irksome.

Something just tells me that our little community here will never be the same, and that the loss is ours.

Anyhoo…

My friend The Tarot Queen gave me an award.  Huzzah!

Yeah, I know.  You’d think this would help my dilemma, but my chakras still ache.

If you haven’t stopped by and asked a Stephanie a question , well then that’s just your loss.  The questions have ranged from “what shall I wear to prom,” to “how to become a rocket scientist,” with a dash of Tarot reading thrown in to spice it up .  It’s a great read with a new home .  Even if you’ve visited before, you should go back and be sure to bookmark her new home .

“This award is bestowed upon a fellow blogger whose blog’s content or design is, in the giver’s opinion, brilliant.”

I love that word brilliant.  It makes me feel so smart.

Now I’m supposed to tell 10 honest things about myself.

1. My iPod is on shuffle.  A Bach piano concerto just finished playing, and the next song is Living Dead Girl by Rob Zombie.  No.  I’m not schizophrenic.
2. I once played piano for Benjamin Zander, who’s currently director of the Boston Philharmonic.  I played Poulenc.  He thought it was good!
3. I won a piano competition playing that same Poulenc piece.
4. I am not above shamelessly self promoting my new blog Symphony Rocks .
5. I have a new unattainable crush with Seth MacFarlane.  He’s the genius behind shows like Family Guy and American Dad.  Have you seen the new Hulu ads featuring him doing all the voices from his shows?  He’s H-O-T!  He’s witty, and clever, and a writer, and a composer…the man is a complete package.  He’s a sci-fi fan, a skilled pianist, and is not afraid for speaking out for what he believes in.
6. I have not played the piano in over a year.  I’ve made up a bevy of excuses, but I’m ashamed.  I want to set a good example for my son.  I’m so bad, I haven’t even been good about keeping the darn thing in tune, which is now another excuse.  I can’t possibly play an instrument that is out of tune.  Whatever.
7. I’m obsessed with the piano today.  Perhaps it’s because I downloaded some Phillip Glass piano etudes last night.  As I was listening to them, I was thinking “I could totally play these.”  Which then led me to a guilt trip about item 6.
8. I’m currently very annoyed with account executives.
9. I’m going to use a vacation day to see the new Star Trek movie.  I don’t see how else we can do it.  Kiddo is too little for a movie like that, and we don’t have a sitter.  I am über excited!
10. My son’s birthday is still 3 months away.  I’m already planning it.  Yeah.  I’m THAT mom.

And it’s my turn to pass the baton.  Let’s see…here are a few good ones

Kellyology at Mommadosey

jasdye at ChicagoDads

Melissa at Full Circle

Tami at Sunflower Seeds

Texasholly at June Cleaver Nirvana (yes, I’m a lurker)

Jen at Cake Wrecks

That’s a start.  You’re all fabulous!

And many thanks to Stephanie.  

Well whaddya know.  Madonna flew home this weekend…without a new daughter.

Huh.  Who woulda thunk it.

My first reaction was surprise.  I didn’t honestly expect a country struggling like Malawi to turn away from a gift horse and not take advantage of the money and notoriety someone like Madonna has to offer.  Can’t say I really blame them for wanting a piece of her very extensive financial pie.

My next reaction was happy.  Good!  See?  Fame and fortune really can’t buy you happiness!  Take that, Madonna!  See what it’s like to be the rest of us that have to play by the rules.  We don’t get little inconvenient laws bent and an army of lawyers at our beck and call to exploit loopholes.  Now she knows what it feels like for thousands of other adoptive parents who’ve waited months, even years, for a court in another country to rule in their favor or paperwork to get sorted out.  It SUCKS!  It’s incredibly taxing, emotionally draining, and just downright exhausting.

That was all fine and good, until I saw this article this morning.  Then, being the girly sucker I am, I started to feel bad.  Check out this picture.  I know that look.  That look is layered sadness, dejection, hope, and perseverance all mixed up.  I think this really hurt her.

I wouldn’t wish that kind of pain on anyone.  It’s hard to describe the hurt of being within grasp of taking a child into your family, only to have it snatched away by a court.  It’s so difficult to meet and spend time with that child, working towards finalizing that adoption, but not knowing.  You want to just sweep that child up and reassure them that you will always be there to love them, but don’t yet have the approval of some judge in order to do that.  This small innocent face just looks up at you, not knowing what to do or how to think, but wanting so badly to have you be the one that returns some love and sense of family.

I’m starting to think she really wanted this.  No doubt she was hoping for a shortcut, but I’m guessing her heart really was in the right place.  I’m so sorry for her.

However, it’s really Mercy that’s getting hurt through this whole mess.  I doubt she knows what is really means to be Madonna (the whole fame thing), but she does know about mothers.  She knows she needs one, that one was there, and now she’s not.  Mercy doesn’t understand about courts and laws, but knows she’s still waking up each morning in an orphanage.  How confusing and painful this must be for her.

Madonna will appeal.  It will be interesting to see if the Malawi court will continue to stand their ground.  How far will she be willing to go?  How far would you go if you were her?  Would you follow their rule and take up residency in Malawi for at least 18 months?  No tours…no press junkets…no flitting about with A-Rod.  Will she put that all on hold?

If she does, I may resurrect my old 1980’s old school Madonna collection and become a fan all over again.

In case you missed SNL’s weekend update, click here for your enjoyment.   I tried to embed the video, but I’m having problems and got tired of fighting with it.  Old fashioned links never fail!

IT’S FRIDAY!!!!!!!!

No, I’m not excited (insert sarcasm here).

We must commemorate this week.  We’ve had a pretty positive week.  After all, it would seem that my son has mastered the potty.

Plus, I have more good news.

I’ve started a second blog.

Yes, I’m crazy.  I’m still sorta figuring out where I’m gonna find the time.  But it’s been nagging me for some time to do this, and as I watched my friends at Rocket Scientist , Caregiving Daughter and Huskies to Husbands take the plunge, I started feeling left out.  Slow down the bandwagon…I’m hopping on.

After all, if I don’t feel challenged I start to get bored.  Boredom is not good.  Not that I haven’t been challenged just keeping up with this site, but I see those great bloggers doing it and I don’t want to get left behind.  If they can find the time to manage it all, then so can I.  I hope.

So, without further ado, I introduce you to…

This blog is completely different from my mission here at Forever Family.  The purpose of this site will be to nurture my personal passion.  I feel pretty good about my musical appreciation skills, and it’s here that I’ll share my gift with the world.

With this site, I’ll get to feed my soul a little.

So if you could hop on over and check it out, I have my intro posted.  I’ll be writing my first real posts this weekend, and be throwing them up next week.  It will be fun, I promise.  Even if you don’t think you like classical music, you will learn to appreciate it after I’m done with you.

Which leads me to my other bloggy milestone this week.

Stephanie the Rocket Scientist aka Tarot Queen aka best advice giver I know has awarded me with Honest Scrap award.  This means a ton to me, cause as I’ve said before, I have a little blogger crush on Stephanie.  She’s a master of the written word, and I’m totally twitterpated that she comes to visit me.  To have gotten an award from her is the coolest thing that’s happened to me in a while…aside from the potty that is.

So I’ll do that award proper homage in my next post.

So where’s you next stop?  That’s right….Symphony Rocks .  And leave a note when you check it out.

I have nothing revolutionary to say today.  Pity, huh? 

I had a hankering to write anyway, so I went surfing for something to talk about.  Google searches for adoption turned up lots of articles about Madonna and pets, but I’m not interested today.  After all, I’ve been there and done that in these posts.  I need some new material.

Scroll scroll scroll…click click click

And repeat.

Then I found this article .  I saw the byline that it is from Science Daily, so I figured it had to be somewhat interesting.  At least I could count on it not mentioning Madonna.

The thing that gets me about some of these studies is that someone actually spent 3 years of their life engrossed in something we all kinda know anyway.  When it comes to parenting, why do some people prefer boys to girls, and vice versa?  

Adoptive parents make a perfect subject to study this question, since we’re not forced to play gender roulette like biological parents.  We can be choosy.  

Dr Goldberg concludes: “This study represents the first investigation known to date that explores the child gender preferences of both heterosexual and sexual minority preadoptive parents. The data suggest that both the adoption context and the sexual orientation context may have implications for how men and women think about the gender of their future children.”

Thanks Dr. Goldberg for scientifically proving that conclusion.  I’m pretty sure all parents, adoptive or otherwise, tend to obsess over the gender of their child.  It’s kind of like ground zero for future development.  Most of us would consider it a pretty big deal.

And no, this picture has nothing to do with genders and our babies.  I just thought it was funny.

In case you’re concerned and despite the total lack of quality of this post, I’m not losing my marbles.  I’m just a little punchy and I’m cooking up a new project.  The reallocation of my brain power resources causes strange disruptions at first, but it will correct itself eventually.  Have hope for tomorrow.

Plus, I’ll have a big announcement about the aforementioned project.  Aren’t you excited??