Fears and Uncertainty in Adoption

It's been awhile since I have written about our adoption.  This is mostly because there isn't much news, just the same old story: "we're still waiting."  But I suppose there is another reason I haven't been writing as much about the adoption: lots of fear and uncertainty. 

We are uncertain when we are going to get our referral.  It could be in 1 month, could be in 1 year or more.  Odds are more on the 1 year+ side, but I keep praying for God to move mountains in Ethiopia and for it to happen much, much sooner.  So, that makes it a little hard for me to plan ahead.  I feel like I have all my eggs in the waiting basket and it's hard for me to focus on putting any in the living-in-the-here-and-now basket. 

I also have many, many fears.  Probably too many to list here and definitely some I am not ready to talk about yet.  I am so, so worried about leaving our kids to go to Ethiopia for a week.  I am worried who will watch them, where they will watch them, trusting someone else to get our kids where they need to go/when they need to be there.  I'm worried about the kids having a hard time with us leaving and missing us like crazy.  I'm sad that I won't be there when they cry at night or when they get home from a bad day at school.  (I know I'm being a little dramatic because it's only one week, but these are just my honest thoughts people!)  Okay, and I am also super stressed about the travel.  I am worried about security and customs and having all the right paperwork and making our flights and knowing where to go.  I am worried that I won't be patient and loving with Chris after a long flight where probably neither of us will sleep great.  I am worried about finding our driver in Ethiopia and making it to our hotel okay.

And then I have a ton of fears after we get our daughter home, but my #1 fear is that our friends and family won't understand or support us when we have to pull back for a bit.  They won't understand why they can't hold her and love on her.  They won't understand why we all can't come to church right away and why we mostly just stay home with no visitors.  They won't understand the parenting style we will use to encourage attachment and to help her through some of her grief and loss (because it's going to look a lot different from the parenting style we have used up to this point).  They will be excited for us and with us because they have prayed for and supported us as we have journeyed through our adoption and I'm afraid they will feel like we are, all of the sudden, snubbing them and acting ungrateful for everything.  And part of me will know how they feel because before we went through all of the adoption training that we've done, I had the same thoughts and misconceptions.

Wow!  This turned out to kind of be a depressing post, huh?  Sorry - I'm just keeping it real.  The waiting is hard!  It's tough to feel like part of your heart is halfway across the world with a child you've never met.  It's hard to explain to people how that feels, because most people have no comparison.  And when the waiting gets hard, that's when my thoughts turn towards the scary and the unknown.  I know that God has answers for all my concerns, He's already got all of this figured out, but my human nature is still to dwell on it as my thoughts are almost always on our adoption. 

I have some adoption blogs that I love to follow - it's helps me to hear another perspective and there are things I struggle to put in words that these people do so well!  I have a list of them on my sidebar, but here are some of my favorite posts right now:

I Don't Want My Children to be Happy
10 Things to Consider Doing as a Newly Adoptive Parent
Supporting and Understanding the Adoptive Family

Puppy love

We dog-sat Chris' parent's dog for a few days after Christmas break while they were visiting Chris' sister in NE.  Normally she is all hyper when we see her because we are guests in her home and she ALWAYS licks Ashten in the face, which Ashten hates.  But once Sierra calmed down some, Ashten found that she actually likes her because she is "cuddly and soft"!

Zoo lights

We went to zoo lights this year at the Denver zoo and it was so much fun!!  I have been wanting to go for years now, but we just had never done it.

We went on New Years Eve night and it was super freezing cold.  I think the high that day was 19 degrees!  Brrr!!  As soon as I stepped out of the car, my legs were already freezing and by the time we had walked into the zoo, my toes were already frozen and hurting inside my boots.  But, I was determined to have a good time, so cold schmold!

The only one who didn't really have a good time was Preston.  He had fallen asleep on our drive to the zoo and we had to wake him up when we got there.  So he was tired and half asleep and cold, not a good combination.  He cried for about the first half of us walking around the zoo, saying he wanted to just go home, but after he calmed down (and Chris carried him for awhile), I think he actually had a good time.

We stopped at Starbucks on the way to the zoo and got hot chocolates for everyone (well a peppermint mocha for me!)  It was a special treat, since we never get stuff from there, especially for the kids. 

When we went around the whole zoo, we got to the end and Ashten said "let's go again!".  Well, of course she would, she was the only warm one: bundled up in her thick, warm blanket and riding in the stroller instead of walking.  But the freezing majority won out, we got back in the car and cranked the heat for our cold toesies!

Ashten and daddy

Ashten has become much more of a daddy's girl lately.  I love to see that because for so long it was me or no one.  I think having Chris home for 2 weeks straight over Christmas break really helped.  Ashten wanted daddy to give her her bath, do her hair, watch movies with her, tuck her in, hold her when she was sad, etc. 

Since Chris has gone back to work, she asks every morning if he's at work and the other day she said "why does daddy have to work all the time now?".  So cute! 

New Legos

The boys love Legos.  We have a ton!!  I need to come up with some kind of system to store all the Legos, but everything I like is so expensive!  But that's besides the point, I digress......

The boys each asked for new Lego sets for Christmas and they each ended up getting a Ninjago set.  Now they all have some of the same set to play with together! 

Brayden worked very diligently on his one night and one morning (for a total of over 3 hours) till he was done! 

Logan worked on his for a couple of hours mostly on his own, but sometimes with a little help from Chris.

This was Preston's first real set of Legos, so Chris worked closely with him to build it, but Preston was engaged the whole time and helped quite a bit. 

They were very proud of their new Legos!

Christmas recap

I finally got the time to get all the pictures off my camera and onto my computer and organize the photos and my thoughts enough to blog again!  We had a wonderful Christmas break with lots of time off as a family and good visits with extended family as well.  (Warning: lots of pictures coming your way)

Christmas Eve we spent with Chris' family, opening presents, hanging out, playing games and eating way too much.  Christmas Eve night we went to the Christmas Eve service at our church, but not before our annual Christmas Eve photo shoot in front of the tree.

On Christmas day, we spent a lazy morning at home just our family, eating a yummy breakfast, opening presents and relaxing and playing.  That afternoon we headed over to my parents house to hang out for a while.  Only one of my sisters was there on Christmas Day, so we did a few presents and had a low key afternoon with my parents after she left.  Some of our kids were still feeling sick, so we just laid around and played games till we left.

On Saturday, December 29th, we went back over to my parents to celebrate Christmas with all of my sisters.  It was a fun time and we got some whole family pictures in, which apparently we haven't gotten for about 3 years! 

My parents

The whole family

All the grandkids

It was a hectic week, but really fun to celebrate and have so much time with family!