We’ve been told by the adoption people that we need a picture of the nursery for our adoption profile book. And, we need it within the next few weeks.
This is not something I want to do right now. I am simply not ready to set up a nursery. And neither is Mr. MPB. Honestly, I was going to wait until we had the child before I bought the crib.
Yes, we have the big family house with the room, we even painted when we were naive to being reproductively challenged. We have one small rocking chair also bought when we were blissfully unaware of the path that we would walk. Most recently we even decided to start buying a few items with the passing of each big adoption step.
But, to actually buy a crib and start putting together the room scares the heck out of me. I’ve kept the door to that room shut for years, and put off going in there let alone decorating for our future child. In my world I cannot actually buy things for this child, because what if it never arrives? To some, this might sound paranoid. To me, after 5 miscarriages, it’s a matter of basic survival. I need to protect my heart. Setting up a room requires me to literally visualize a future baby in our house. For me, this forces me to open my heart, and put myself out there in a whole new way. What if a baby never comes? What if that room stays empty for ever? What if…
Of course, the opposite side of these fears is what if it works out? What if we actually get through the adoption process and bring a baby home? What if a baby gets to call this room theirs?
Yet, after so many painful losses, it’s hard for me to focus on the positive side of the what if game. But, I have to now, because the room now resembles a nursery.
After doing our online homework and reading the Baby Bargain book, we worked up the courage, and walked into IKEA.
The entire time we were shopping, I felt like an imposter. Everyone else in the baby section was sporting their cute little baby bumps, and/or chasing their toddler running around playing with the toys. There we were, completely childless and feeling forced to buy this before we were ready. There was no excitement, just a knot of fear at the bottom of my stomach. As we both wanted to get the heck out of there, we were very efficient shoppers making final decisions in a very quick. Ultimately we preserved and bought what we needed.
We decided to buy a basic IKEA crib, mattress and blanket set. We decided not to buy an expensive crib as we’d rather save the money for the actual adoption and for more long-term furniture once the child is ready to move into a real bed. Even though regardless of gender I would have preferred blue, we went with green to keep it gender neutral in the adoption profile and photo album.
Once we got home with our newly purchased items, we spent the afternoon in the room building the crib and putting the basic nursery together. In fact, I suspect we spent more time in that room on Sunday afternoon then we have probably ever spent total. We hung a very special picture above the crib – the first thing we ever bought for our future child once we decided to adopt. We also hung a picture that was made by my mom when I was little, it matches the room perfectly and is also so special to me to have something for our baby from my mom. We put up the mobile that we got a few weeks ago. And we even cleaned out the closet to make room for future baby stuff that may come our way.
The room is still far from complete as we still need to buy a dresser and a bookshelf (I am hoping to buy them second hand to save some money). But, with the crib and pictures we have achieved our first goal – we now have a picture of the nursery for our adoption profile and album.
When we were done hanging everything and taking the photos, we walked out of the room and closed the door behind us. Just as we have done since we moved into the house. And, even with the door closed tightly behind us, somehow everything feels so much more real now. I am scared. I am fearful.
And so I will remind myself daily that I am hopeful.
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I have decided that international adoption is the equivalent of:
a circus run by a cackle of hyenas.
And maybe better yet, it is like:
a circus run by clowns with the maturity and common sense of a cackle of hyenas.
Needless to say I am frustrated.
On more then one occasion in the last week I’ve even said to Mr. MPB that I’m ready to call it quits. I’m ready to go back to trying on our own. The idea of enduring more miscarriages isn’t so bad when I think about enduring the international adoption process for even another moment.
We were told adoption is not for the faint of heart. We were told international adoption is even harder. We were told when we chose international adoption that no-one holds your hand through the process, and we are left to navigate the waters on our own.
We were warned more then once.
But we decided that we can do it. We made the personal decision that the benefits of international infant open adoption far outweigh the risks of the more complicated process. We decided that we have the ability and know-how to manage almost any professional and personal situation, so we decided can do this international adoption thing. We have each achieved top academic grades throughout our lives. We each have a couple of university degrees. We each operate as professionals with integrity. We’ve survived 5 miscarriages. We’ve navigated a medical system which does not support miscarriage diagnosis. That said, neither one of us are the next Aristotle, Charles Darwin or Albert Einstein, but we were pretty sure we could handle this. (hmmm…side note, why aren’t there more women in the list of great historical thinkers?)
So, why is it that the adoption process is taking over my life and driving me crazy? Honestly, there is no way to say this without sounding arrogant, so here it is: I think it’s because I expect common sense. I think it’s because I see nuances in the system that simply do not make logical sense, that others seem to overlook. Simple things like:
- I think something like a list of requirements is easy to put together and is a common sense starting point.
- I think making sure the documents that are requested actually exist is critical. It just makes sense as a practical approach to determining the list of requirements.
- I think it’s crazy to be changing the requirements every few weeks. Unless the laws change, which they will from time to time, the requirements should not. And they most certainly should not be changing every few weeks. (Although the constantly changing requirements does help explain why no reliable lists exist anywhere).
- I think it’s absurd that fees rise every few months and I cannot understand for the life of me where all the money is going. I do not understand how there doesn’t appear to be much/any accountability or transparency in the financial side of international adoption, even through I believe the Hague Convention aims to help deal with such things. (I suspect there will be many more posts on this subject in the future).
All of this means that I’m spending a lot of my energy and time reminding myself that:
- I do not have to fix the system, I just have to get through it. I can work to fix the system when the time is right, but while we are living inside of the system, and dependent upon it, I must accept that we just have to preserver through it. It is hard for me to let go of something that clearly should be changed, and this is taking a lot of effort for me to let go of it.
- Just because I realize a particular nuance does not mean that everyone else does and more importantly it does not mean that the nuance means anything to anyone other then me. For example, terminology is very important to my technical brain so the difference between words like request and waive is critical in my mind, but interchangeable to others.
- The power dynamics within adoption feel to me like they are paramount. This means I have absolutely no control over this process, and no ability to positively influence it. This is my biggest challenge right now. I think it says something pretty significant when I feel like we had more control when we were going through RPL!! I cannot voice a concern. I can not point our the obvious. I cannot request an update. If I manage to piss off the wrong person, the end result will simply be that we can not adopt. I think my anxiety and frustration is drastically increasing because I feel like I’ve been handcuffed and muted.
So, while I currently think the international adoption process is beyond frustrating, I also know that quitting isn’t really an option at this point. I know we are going to have children, living childfree is not something either of us want. Given our medical diagnosis, the idea of going through more miscarriages is not something I’m prepared to do to another baby, myself or Mr. MPB. So for now, I just need to keep reminding myself that a few more months and we should be through the approvals and paperwork. And eventually, our child will be worth every single moment of stress, every single white hair that I now grow and every single tear I have and will shed.
And in the meantime, I am just going to start picturing these clown hyenas whenever I get frustrated and feel my blood pressure rising.
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My Perfect Breakdown 