Monday, August 25, 2008

Home Study Scheduled

We have our first homestudy meeting on Sept 9th at 1:00pm for about two hours. I have made arrangements to leave work for the two hours and then to go back. Because this will be the first week of school things are busy at work and finding time off is becoming more of a challenge. I'm excited and this has really motivated dh to continue working on the basement. We got another wall done last night. It's really coming together. Although our SW said it is fine to be working on our home...hey the basement has been an eight year work in progress! :)

So this weekend is the week that I tell my parents--I'm hoping that they will not be in a total state of shock and know that this is really how we have decided to build our family. I used to write poetry before I was labeled an infertile....and I am slowy coming back to being able to journal and write poetry. I've always found this to be the most amazing outlet and I wanted to write a poem to share with my parents that we are expecting...through KOREA! I had visions of them coming over and going to the spare bedroom where we have the crib set up and walking over seeing a referral picture of our baby in the crib with a big SURPRISE we are expecting again!!! This time our baby will have to travel the world before he/she is home.

I haven't quite come up with a poem yet...nothing seems to be coming together..but finally my home has a calmness to it..I've left the anxiety and sadness of the "not knowing" behind and finally have something to look forward to. I'm going to by a Mommy Again in 2009!!!!


If you have ideas on how to announce our adoption plans...please let me know. I'd love a creative way to share our good news!

Jackie

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

APPROVED!!!

APPROVED!!!! Official word today!!! We have been approved! OMG! Next year I am gonna have a new baby!!!!


I have to inform my boss on Friday just because I am nice and since I plan on taking 12 weeks off they will need to have a replacement lined up for me...I talked about the possiblility of working from home and this is something that they are entertaining...That would be nice, otherwise I will have to come back and do 3 months of back work!!! But I'm not worrying about that since I focusing on one step at a time and today we celebrate because we have approval!!!! I'm still hoping for a referral by Christmas!!! I'm wondering how far off I will be.


But hey--next summer off would be fantastic too!!

Jackie

Thursday, August 14, 2008

Woo Hoo--Hurdle #1

Yes, Yes we are in the beginning stages but I am so happy to report that our Application is now in the hands of FAC. I met with our SW yesterday at a meeting and it was just me and her. I loved being about to ask so many questions and to have her full attention..I feel spoiled a bit. I felt SO SO comfortable with her too. Our paths have crossed before as she used to work for the company that I work for but ended her employment prior to me starting but it was fun to talk about all the people we knew from work. She shared a great deal with me and also said as an adoptive parent and mom of Korean daughters she is more then willing to share all of her experiences with dh and I. I am SO glad that we have someone that lives down the road from us and that has gone through what we are about to embark on. I told her that I knew it was important for me to collect all the tools I can to make sure I can offer my child everything he/she needs to feel complete in our family. SW also told us that she feels this process can be complete by next year...I was fully thinking 2010..but no..2009 may be our lucky year!! And babies are coming home around 10mths!



I hope that I can be a successful adoptive parent..I know that I am a good mom but the bonding experience will be so different with our little one. SW explained that babies have to be in the orphanage for 5 months and at times there can be 50 babies and 3 workers..I worried about attachment issues..since babies will then go to foster care when they are 5 months and we will receive our referral there. SW assured me that the babies are well taken care of and talked and played with..I can only imagine 50 little ones just waiting to be loved..it breaks my heart. SW also said that this agency KSS is the smallest Korean agency and that because of this the babies get more individualized attention then the three large Korean Orphanages.



On a side note, I did stumble across something that worried me..dh's physical had an HBA1C test marked as abnormal...this is the 3 month blood test to indicate if your sugar is being metabolized correctly... His metabolic panel came back normal though...dh has diabetes in his family and apparently the the number has to be below 5% to be excellent..dh's came through at 6.4% which is not diabetic or even close, but enough to be above the reference range. I was so upset that the Dr took the test from January 08 and used that on our adoption form instead of requesting a new blood test, since his could now be in the normal range and the fact that he NEVER told dh about it..just said he wanted to watch it..HELLO..watch until he is a diabetic or scare the crap out of him to lose weight and watch what he eats.....or wait until it gets worse. I'm just frustrated because the DR is so passive regarding this..so dh will be finding a new primary care giver and getting back in the gym. I on the other hand may be unable to carry babies but I am in picture perfect health :)



So now we wait....I hope the approval comes soon!