Pinch me....(copied post from adoption blog)

This post written on April 30, but not shared until today for privacy reasons:

....am I dreaming?

I can't even begin to explain the wide range of emotions that I am feeling right now.

Today, the unimaginable happened and a pure miracle (to say the least) took place right in front of me.

Lately, our hopes have been down and our spirits crushed with the long wait for our home study to begin. Though we've been overjoyed with the progress of our friends adoptions & foster plans, we couldn't help but feel a wee bit selfish and sad that ours was not progressing. Though I'm a sure I would have NEVER noted that before now.

Today, our adoption social worker called and I immediately got excited with knowing she MUST be calling to set up appointments for our home study visits to begin - YAY!

How wrong was I?

For the life of me, I can barely remember a word she said (as I was in sheer shock)....but the message was CLEAR! She was calling to give us a referral for a little girl.

She told us that this girl is a really good fit for our family (except for she was older than Noah -11 yrs old) but would we consider. As she told me about this little girl's story, I cried and babbled. I felt complete incoherent. I had no idea what to ask, nor did I know what I wanted to ask or even say. I was in utter SHOCK that this moment was actually happening and that it was happening NOW.

How could this be? Was I dreaming?

I really liked what I learned about this little girl. After a 1/2 day of processing, talking, thinking, writing...I can't even begin to describe how 'right' this feels. I'm really starting to fall for this little girl and I don't even know her name.

How weird is that?

Our SW told me that the little girl wrote a beautiful and detailed letter to her prospective adoptive parents - telling them what she wanted and didn't want in a new family. The letter was absolutely adorable! She was very specific with her 'wish list' and it confirmed that our family matched her criteria almost perfectly (well, maybe not because she did write that she wanted her parents to 'not be too old' and Noah seems to think that we're really old!!! LOL).

Considering we don't have our home study even scheduled to begin and they need this little girl into a permanent home as soon as possible - this could all happen REALLY fast (possibly within the next 2 weeks).

So how do I feel right now....I'll let you in on a few of the raw emotions.

• Confused - how could this be happening so soon (or is it soon considering in a few weeks - Mother's Day to be exact - we'll be celebrating 2 years since the day we sent in our application to adopt)
• Shocked - that we are considering an older child. By this I mean, accepting an older child than Noah. It had NEVER even entered our conversations because this was (up until now) a complete NON-ISSUE for us. We just always said that Noah needed to remain the oldest in the family. But now that we are considering this little girl, I see SO many positives with Noah being the younger sibling.
• Excited - for our family to be expanding.
• Excited - for me to have a 'daughter'.
• Excited - for Noah to have a sister.
• Excited - to learn so much about this little girl.
• Excited - my belly is in flops. You know that feeling you get when you're going down a big hill on a roller coaster where you feel like you have a baby moving in side of you - THIS is how my insides feel right now.
• Anxious - my natural instinct is to get 'our daughter' home and start protecting her, start getting to know her, get on with our new life we've dreamed of for so long.
• Nervous - the question 'AM I ENOUGH?', 'ARE WE ENOUGH?' keeps playing over and over in my head. I want to be the BEST family, parents for this little girl. I want her to trust us and feel comfortable with us. I want her to know that we may be far from perfect and we WILL make mistakes, but that she will ALWAYS have a soft place to fall and a loving place to land when she falls.
• Blessed - that this is finally happening with 'relatively' no wait. By this I mean, finishing our home study and waiting for a child to match our family. It JUST happened.

AHHHHHHH..........I could just SCREAM with all of the emotions going through me right now.

We could be welcoming our "daughter" into our hearts & home sooner than we ever dreamed of and yet this moment is something we've dreamed of for so long. And to think, all we were hoping for this year was for our home study to start & be completed. Tonight, I am certainly COUNTING MY BLESSINGS!!!

Until our home study is complete, there has been special approval for our family to be allowed to welcome this little girl into our home as a "Provisional Foster Family". At the completion of our home study, we could then continue on to adopt her (if this was something that she wanted - which they all feel she does).

As soon as I got off the phone, I called Jacques at work and told him to 'CLOSE THE DOOR' to his office. He knew I meant business! He closed the door and immediately came back to the phone and said, "What is going on?" in a very concerned voice. When I told him, naturally he was just as shocked as I was. He got off the phone pretty speechless, naturally!

Later in the night, we talked more and had more questions. I go from feeling excited, to feelings of nervousness, to feelings of being thrilled, to feelings of confusion, then to tears of fear......I just can't describe how excited I am. I guess the big shock of getting 'THE CALL', then to be thinking about an older child than Noah that sounds perfect for our family - in so many ways.

Tonight, I also began a hand written journal. When I think to process, I need to WRITE. I will carry this journal with me for the next several weeks (I am sure) to document all the moments that I am not at my computer as well as to jot down any questions we have (so we don't forget).

Noah's Reaction:

When I told Noah, he seemed genuinely excited. He seemed genuinely excited with the idea of an older sister, especially when he found out that she liked sports (in order of her favourites are soccer, hockey and gymnastics). His one big concern is that she would want the top bunk (of the bunk beds we don't even have!!!). In conversations about adopting, we talked about the possibility of him having to share a room and if this happened we would get bunk beds. I guess we forgot to leave out the important information (assuming he knew) that boys & girls don't share rooms!! (Woops.) Now that this is cleared up, he seems happy that he won't have to share a room!

Once we had this cleared up, he was good to go. Of course, he wanted to know if she was French or English. If she would be going to the same school. His third question asked about her family, why she had to come to live with us? What happened to her parents? I did not tell him anything, I don't think we should share this information - but I thought it was sweet that he even thought about this! He also asked about what her favourite activity was (which I didn't know and can't wait to learn).

Towards the end of our conversation, his concerns were mostly just about the sharing aspect of having a sibling. Will she break my toys? Do I have to share MY DS? Will she be bossy with me? Then he asked many 'what if' questions: "What if she does this....." or "If she does 'that', then what?" Then THAT was it....he was ready to go play again, just like that. Cute!

Like I said, it's all happening SO fast (like I always said it would).

So THAT is our wonderful, exciting, unexpected and happy news.

Please, please, please, if I am dreaming, PINCH ME!






I wrote the initial post with the intention of waiting to share the information, but since then I have had to write for myself. All that has happened since the original post is below, listed in date order!

Saturday, May 2:

Had a little overnight get away with Jacques (Noah stayed with Jacques sister and we got a room). We talked and talked and talked.....in the end, we are both 100% a YES!

Monday, May 4:

(around 8:30 am):

• Spoke with the little girls SW to have many questions answered. First question: What is the 'little girls' name? " ISABELLE" I LOVE her name - so sweet! We received a lot of background from Isabelle's SW and nothing stood out as alarming or deal breaking for us! We communicated that we wanted to proceed, pending how Noah's visit with our SW goes. We found out there was another family approached and they were waiting to get an answer from them as well. I thought I was going to PUKE when I found this out. It was a rough morning.

(around 10:15 am):

• Our SW came to visit us. As soon as she walked in, she saw my distressed look. Asked me what was wrong and I told her of our concerns about this other family and I broke down. She was SO consoling and great news: the other family had called our SW just before she left to come to our house and advised that they could not accept the referral. So we are the ONLY family with a referral - which makes the chances of us having Isabelle move in with us a pretty sure thing!!!

• At lunch, our SW went to Noah's school to meet with him and take him out for lunch. According to our SW, it went GREAT. She felt that Noah is very well adjusted about our plan to welcome Isabelle permanently. Though he has some concerns (mostly about the sharing of his love & attention from us) they are 'completely' normal. We did change the vocabulary from adopting to having her come and live us permanently. When she came back to our place to tell us how it went, she walked in and immediately said "Noah is officially the cutest boy I have EVER spent time with"!!!
  

Tuesday, May 5:

• Wait, wait, wait
• Now feeling a little hesitant with the wait, like is something going wrong? Will she come to live with us for sure?
  
• Find out we may have 2 additional family members - a hamster & a beta fish that are her babies!
• Clean, purge, clean, purge....in preparation for Isabelle's arrival
• No new news by the end of the day.....AHHHH
• Going crazy with this wait
  

Wednesday, May 6:
Nerves are shot
Wait, wait, wait
Found out they will be meeting with Isabelle on Thursday after school and will contact us on Friday morning
Wait, worry, wait, fret, wait, worry.....get my drift.

Thursday, May 7:
First full night sleep since last Wednesday night
Feeling relatively calm today
Begin praying at3:30 pm (the suspected time the SW's are talking with Isabelle
Ask God to be with her and comfort her little heart as she hears the news

3:57 pm
Phone rings and it's our SW to advise they spoke with Isabelle who is REALLY excited to come to our family FOREVER!!! Then asks if I want to talk to her.....*waaaaah*....I was SO nervous, mumbled and babbled and chatted. She said she was as excited and nervous as I was.

5:00 pm
Began spreading our great news....

8:45 pm
Posting our great news...

Next steps:

• Meeting Isabelle (Friday after school at our house) for a short visit)
• Spending Mother's Day with her
• Moving her in (by the beginning of the week) - she asked if she could move in before her birthday on Sat. May 16 so she wouldn't have to be in her temporary home for her birthday
• Celebrating our 'new' family and her birthday on May 16