My husband and I are in the process of adopting a baby. To clarify (because it definitely is confusing), there is no baby yet. In common adoption parlance, we are "pregnant by adoption." We have been through all the preliminary steps, we've been analysed by everyone who matters including 2 social workers, first aid instructors, parenting class teachers, and 4 references we had to provide on our own. All we're doing now is waiting. And waiting... and waiting... and waiting.
However, recently we were actually matched with a little girl. We were presented to a matching committee and they chose us as a potential match for a 1-year-old girl. Her social worker called our social worker and we went to what is known as a presentation. At the presentation, we were presented with all the information available about this little girl and her biological parents. As for the little girl herself, there were very few things that concerned us. She had some developmental delays that were the result of lack of stimulation in her environment. They were all very normal things we would expect to see in a child who had been in foster care since birth.
It was her birth parents that had us concerned. Both of them were schizophrenic and were institutionalized because of it. Now, we found out that if one parent is schizophrenic, there's about a 10% chance that the child will be. If both parents are, it's about 50-50. We also found out that it's something that can show up 20-30 years down the road. So we had to think long and hard about whether or not we were equipped to deal with this sort of thing and how comfortable we were with the chances that this little girl would develop mental illness later in life.
Now, run with me for a little bit because this next part is going to sound a little crazy. I was in the shower the afternoon of our presentation and I heard a voice in my head that said, "This is not the right one."
Okay, before you judge, let me digress a bit. I'm a Christian. I have been my whole life. And when I entered my college years, I was gifted with the Gift of Prophecy. The point of this entry is not a discussion about Spiritual Gifts, but let me give you the short version. Prophesy is not divination. It is not telling the future. In magical terms, Pagans call it Sight. Some people may call it intuition. Other people call it a gut feeling. It simply means that God speaks to me a little bit more loudly than He does to others. I don't know why. The "why" is not something God has shared with me. I believe it's how God speaks to me. Sometimes it's through music, sometimes it's something I read, sometimes it's a vision, and sometimes a voice like this time. The thing they call have in common is something I call a "feel." When the message comes from God, it has a certain feel. I can tell it's Him. Usually other sources are all from myself. I have a tendency to do what my therapist called "living in my head" which means I frequently listen to my own internal monologue more than I listen to the outside world. This makes it difficult to interpret Prophecy sometimes, but it's a personality quirk, and we all have those. I frequently allow Prophecy to help me make decisions, and I hoped desperately hoped God would give me something good this time.
And He didn't disappoint. Not only did He tell me, he also told my husband. And because the voice was from God, we knew it was the right choice to say no to this little girl.
That does not mean we didn't have issues with the choice.
The first was that we never thought we'd find ourselves turning a child down. We really had hoped we would be a forever home for whatever child may come across our path.
The second was that in some small way we felt as though we were punishing this little girl for something that wasn't her fault. Jesus said the sins of the father should not be visited up on the son. Who are we to say that we don't want this child in our home because we're afraid that what happened to her parents would happen to her? Who gave us that authority?
The last was the fear that this beautiful little girl would end up being raised in foster care because no one else would be willing to take a chance on her.
And yet through all of this, we knew the best thing for her would be to put her back in the pool and allow the right family to find her. Maybe we weren't the right family, but the right one would come along.
Last week, our social worker told us the very next family to hear about her accepted her. And so the Plan goes on. I don't claim to understand it, or even my own role in it. But the Bible says that all things work together for the good of those who love Him, and here we saw it happen. She found a home, we're back on the list, and we now have the conviction that when the right comes along, we'll know. Immediately and without question.
Monday, April 26, 2010
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Birthdays Remind Us to Look Both Ways
It was my birthday last week. I had to work a closing shift that day, and I hightailed it out of the building as soon as I could. I was walking across the street to my car, and suddenly found myself flying through the air. Why, you ask? Well apparently a woman driving a Volvo had come around the corner, didn't see me crossing, and hit me. As my feet lifted off the ground, I thought, "When am I going to land, how much will it hurt?" The answers are: about a second later, and lots.
The point of impact, I believe, was my right hip. There is now a dinner plate-sized bruise there. I'm running an office pool on how big it's going to get. However, I landed on my tailbone. At first glance, this doesn't seem like much, but I had never realized how many things I do on an average day that hurt my tailbone. Driving is the number one culprit at the moment. Driving makes me cry. I literally can't drive longer than 20 minutes because my tailbone hurts so much.
As I sat up, I reached for my phone to call my husband and tell him to come get me. He asked a ridiculous amount of questions before hanging up and coming to my aid. He told me later than he only realized halfway there that I had meant the car had hit ME, and not my car. After I hung up the phone with him, I triaged myself. Head: a small bump, but nothing big. Ribs: okay. Pelvis: tailbone hurts, maybe broken, but functional. Arms: okay. Left leg: fine. Right leg: pain in hip, knee, and ankle. Breathing fine, seeing fine, no dizziness, nausea, or anything else suggesting a concussion. A witness dialed 911 and the very cute firefighter who responded asked me a bunch of questions to make sure I hadn't lost consciousness. I politely refused the $3000 ambulance ride, and told him my husband would take me to the hospital. He made me sign a form so I couldn't sue later if I died. How I would sue from the grave, I still don't know.
Everyone I work with was still in the building and had seen what had happened. They call came out to see if I was okay and called everyone who wasn't there. My husband arrived, talked to the police a little, got my license back, and we headed to the hospital.
We lucked out at the ER: no line. The triage nurse asked me if I at least left some damage on the car. To be honest, I don't know. I never really even talked to the driver, I let the police do that. The doctor X-rayed everything from my lower back down to my right ankle and said there were no breaks, only some deep tissue bruising. As we were waiting for him to come back, I noticed my pants had gotten ripped. That's it! She ripped my pants! Until that point, I had been willing to give that driver a little bit of slack. It was, of course, that annoying time of day when sunset makes it impossible to see anything. I could easily believe she couldn't see me. But that bitch ripped my pants! Politeness Week is over!
The doctor gave me some prescriptions for pain and muscle relaxers. I discovered the next day that if I take them together, the house tilts from side to side. I don't know how those pharmacists do it!
The next day, one of the receptionists called me in a panic because I hadn't shown up to work. I had been under the impression that someone had called her to tell her what had happened, but apparently that didn't happen. She's great. She's everyone's mom. She was sure something was wrong because I'm normally very punctual and it was 20 minutes past where on earth could I be? My husband answered the phone and told her what had happened. She called again later and I picked up, and her first words were, "Happy fucking birthday, right?" I spent that day on the couch hopped up on drugs. It was pretty fun. Everyone at work wanted me to stay home another day, but I felt stupid. Maybe I couldn't do everything I usually do, but I could do SOMETHING. I went to work the next day.
So the bruise is up to 23 cm, which is more than anyone bet on, so I get to keep all $5 in the office pool.
The moral of the story? If you get hit by a car, milk it for all it's worth. Stay home all week, sue the driver for all your medical bills (mine were only $60, what's the point?), shirk responsibility at work, boss people around to get them to do stuff for you. And if you land on your tailbone, suck it up and buy a hemorrhoid pillow. You'll be thankful you did.
The point of impact, I believe, was my right hip. There is now a dinner plate-sized bruise there. I'm running an office pool on how big it's going to get. However, I landed on my tailbone. At first glance, this doesn't seem like much, but I had never realized how many things I do on an average day that hurt my tailbone. Driving is the number one culprit at the moment. Driving makes me cry. I literally can't drive longer than 20 minutes because my tailbone hurts so much.
As I sat up, I reached for my phone to call my husband and tell him to come get me. He asked a ridiculous amount of questions before hanging up and coming to my aid. He told me later than he only realized halfway there that I had meant the car had hit ME, and not my car. After I hung up the phone with him, I triaged myself. Head: a small bump, but nothing big. Ribs: okay. Pelvis: tailbone hurts, maybe broken, but functional. Arms: okay. Left leg: fine. Right leg: pain in hip, knee, and ankle. Breathing fine, seeing fine, no dizziness, nausea, or anything else suggesting a concussion. A witness dialed 911 and the very cute firefighter who responded asked me a bunch of questions to make sure I hadn't lost consciousness. I politely refused the $3000 ambulance ride, and told him my husband would take me to the hospital. He made me sign a form so I couldn't sue later if I died. How I would sue from the grave, I still don't know.
Everyone I work with was still in the building and had seen what had happened. They call came out to see if I was okay and called everyone who wasn't there. My husband arrived, talked to the police a little, got my license back, and we headed to the hospital.
We lucked out at the ER: no line. The triage nurse asked me if I at least left some damage on the car. To be honest, I don't know. I never really even talked to the driver, I let the police do that. The doctor X-rayed everything from my lower back down to my right ankle and said there were no breaks, only some deep tissue bruising. As we were waiting for him to come back, I noticed my pants had gotten ripped. That's it! She ripped my pants! Until that point, I had been willing to give that driver a little bit of slack. It was, of course, that annoying time of day when sunset makes it impossible to see anything. I could easily believe she couldn't see me. But that bitch ripped my pants! Politeness Week is over!
The doctor gave me some prescriptions for pain and muscle relaxers. I discovered the next day that if I take them together, the house tilts from side to side. I don't know how those pharmacists do it!
The next day, one of the receptionists called me in a panic because I hadn't shown up to work. I had been under the impression that someone had called her to tell her what had happened, but apparently that didn't happen. She's great. She's everyone's mom. She was sure something was wrong because I'm normally very punctual and it was 20 minutes past where on earth could I be? My husband answered the phone and told her what had happened. She called again later and I picked up, and her first words were, "Happy fucking birthday, right?" I spent that day on the couch hopped up on drugs. It was pretty fun. Everyone at work wanted me to stay home another day, but I felt stupid. Maybe I couldn't do everything I usually do, but I could do SOMETHING. I went to work the next day.
So the bruise is up to 23 cm, which is more than anyone bet on, so I get to keep all $5 in the office pool.
The moral of the story? If you get hit by a car, milk it for all it's worth. Stay home all week, sue the driver for all your medical bills (mine were only $60, what's the point?), shirk responsibility at work, boss people around to get them to do stuff for you. And if you land on your tailbone, suck it up and buy a hemorrhoid pillow. You'll be thankful you did.
Friday, March 19, 2010
Introductions are Neccessary
Myself, I think my life is boring. And of course I didn't think of doing this until AFTER interesting things happened to me. Oh well, such is life. At least mine. THe idea here is to share ideas from my life in the slim hopes that I may be able to impart some sort of ridiculously useless knowledge onto someone with an equally boring life. We should flock together, after all.
I'm a Registered Veterinary Technician, so this space will be filled with funny animal stories, crazy client stories, and useful pet owning tips. I'm also a member of a waiting adoptive family, so some stories will involve crazy social workers and government hoops that biological parents never have to jump through. I also have a long list of random thoughts the flit through my head at any given moment, so I may wax philosophical about such things as movies, books, or junk food. You never know with me.
For those of you who stick with me... thank you. Your opinion is interesting to me, if not always important. For those of you who come and go... good luck, and fine living to you. And for those of you who never read... well, according to Groucho Marx you must be inside of a dog.
To the beginning of our andventure together... slainte!
I'm a Registered Veterinary Technician, so this space will be filled with funny animal stories, crazy client stories, and useful pet owning tips. I'm also a member of a waiting adoptive family, so some stories will involve crazy social workers and government hoops that biological parents never have to jump through. I also have a long list of random thoughts the flit through my head at any given moment, so I may wax philosophical about such things as movies, books, or junk food. You never know with me.
For those of you who stick with me... thank you. Your opinion is interesting to me, if not always important. For those of you who come and go... good luck, and fine living to you. And for those of you who never read... well, according to Groucho Marx you must be inside of a dog.
To the beginning of our andventure together... slainte!
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