Two Months...

Yup! Hard to believe that we've been "actively waiting" for two months now. Crazy how much has happened just even in the last month. It feels a little surreal sometimes, like did that REALLY happen? I seem to be having a hard time with the waiting right now. (Yes, I apoligize to those of you who have been waiting much longer than 2 months, but my impatience is getting the best of me today - You people must be SAINTS by the way!!)

When we first became an active family, it was new and exciting and so full of possibility. Becoming active the second time is not quite as fun and exciting. It's more like "Really? I've been here before..."

I thought I'd be so much better at this waiting thing, but apparently I was wrong. On Sunday our sermon was on the story of Abraham and Sarah, pretty appropriate. Jamie, our pastor, talked about how God promised Abraham a son and that Sarah was impatient and took matters into her hands (so to speak) and Ishmael was born into slavery. (Works of man = slavery) He then spoke about how God blessed Abraham and Sarah with Issac even though she was unable to bear children. (God's promise = freedom) I'm sure that he explained it much better than I did (especially given that he had much more time to explain it...oh and years of biblical training...) but the main point was resting in God's promise. At the time it made so much sense, it was like he was talking directly to us.

Unfortunately I haven't done very well this week with living this out. In fact, I've been really, really bad. I have been impatient and cranky and just overall not a nice person. I know it's just a funk and everyone gets them, but this really caught me off guard. Last week I did SO well! I thought that the worst was over and we had moved on, but the fall out this week is not very pretty.

So, I apologize to all of you that have had to deal with me this week, and especially to my husband who I just snapped at for interrupting my train of thought...to discuss baby names??? I also apologize if you wandered over here looking for a nice uplifting blog post about how awesomely "ok" we are doing. I am hoping that by getting this all out here that I will be able to move on and find that "ok" spot again.

Ok, now that you have listened to me whine and complain, I will share a funny story of my brilliant child's grasp of biblical knowledge. On Sunday in class they learned about the 6th commandment, Thou shall not commit murder and heard the story of Cain and Abel. At the end of the story the teacher asked what they had learned. Mackenzie answered with this little tidbit of wisdom:

"If your brother asks you to into a field and you think he's going to kill you, don't go. Seriously, he shouldn't have gone."

Post again soon!
~Jeny

Cleaning up and Moving on...

So last night I finally put away all of the baby stuff that I had furiously washed and sorted over the last week (Thank you Naomi!). On the up side it is now all clean and organized and ready to be unpacked once we get The Call…again. On the down side, I had to put it away…and I was sad :@(

Not necessarily sad for this particular situation because I know in my heart that this wasn’t our baby and she is with her family where God wants her. More like sad for OUR baby. There is this ache now that I haven’t really felt yet in through this adoption process. It’s almost like it took realizing that this wasn’t our baby to make me miss OUR baby. The heart connection wasn’t really there until the baby part of it was real.

I don’t know if that makes any sense at all to any of you, but that’s the best way to describe it. It’s a little disappointing to be “back at the beginning” of the waiting game, and I know it brings us another step closer to the baby God is getting ready for us, but still…

In the meantime, we are working out a new budget strategy that I’m hoping will help us stock away some additional money each month. After MANY years of marriage and joint checking accounts DJ and I have FINALLY figured out that we manage money totally differently! Umm, duh! DJ is a big picture, long term planner – he works well with a large amount of cash in the account and being able to mentally calculate what has to come out of that amount. I however see it as extra money and proceed to spend it! I am however a micro-manager. I can budget out a week really well – and I work best with a small amount of money and the promise of putting any leftovers into the adoption account.

So we are parting ways….at least in the checking department. DJ will maintain the “big account” that will pay all of the “bills” and I will manage a smaller account that will get a set amount weekly and handle the weekly needs of the household. Fingers crossed that this will work!! I’m hoping that the challenge of staying on budget and doing something I really want with the fruits of my labor will motivate me to get my spending under control. Sadly, I feel I will be missing my beloved Target :@(

I’ll keep you guys post on that end. (If you hear nothing further, assume that it crashed and burned!)

Post again soon!
~Jeny

Not our baby...

When I got into the car this afternoon the song "God of This City" was on. It's a song that I have played on worship team several times before and it is one of my favorites. There is a part of it that goes like this:

You're the light in this darkness,
You're the hope to the hopeless,
You're the peace to the restless,
You are

There is no one like our God
There is no one like our God

Greater things have yet to come,
And greater things are still to be done in this City
Greater things have yet to come,
And greater things are still to be done in this City.

Those of you who know me on facebook already know that the birthparents changed their minds this morning and have decided to parent baby girl. For those of you worrying, take heart, I am not sobbing hysterically in a corner while rocking myself back and forth. Really, truly, honestly, I am ok. It must be all the prayers because I have really felt an overwhelming sense of peace over this situation. We knew going into adoption that nothing is settled until those papers are signed. Honestly, we never felt like this was our baby. I don't know exactly what caused that -- whether it was the awkward first meeting, the whirlwind of early labor or just that gut mommy feeling, but I just never felt like this was "IT".

Not to say that it isn't disappointing to be sitting at home empty-handed, but I know that baby girl is with her mama and that is where God wants her to be now. I have never (and will never) understand God's plan for my life, but I am comforted to know that He has written it and it is perfect. Our baby is out there and it just isn't ready for our family yet....or our family isn't ready for it yet. (We discovered through this "dry run" that we have a TON of stuff to get done before we are ready for baby!!!)

There is a tiny part of me that is a little relieved that things fell apart. It just didn't feel right. The match meeting didn't go well and I just didn't feel connected to them. I was hoping that we would have a great connection with the birthmom, and I just didn't feel that with her. Plus the way the labor went down just was not at all as we expected. So on that end, I'm glad that we get another chance to have those things work out for us.

Thank you so much to everyone for your thoughts, prayers and words of encouragements. I apologize if I don't get around to responding to all of your emails/posts/texts, but know that I have read them all and they are greatly appreciated.

So, we are back in the pool and waiting on baby again. Praying that our baby will be ready soon.

Post again soon,
~Jeny

The Long 48...

Well, this has been a crazy last 24 hours!!! Shortly after midnight we got a call from our adoption specialist letting us know that our birthmom (BM) was in active labor. The birthparents (BP) said that it was ok for us to come up to the hospital. We were ready and up to the hospital around 1:45am. We were ushered into a waiting room and told to wait. Which we did....for a very long time!!! It was every bit as miserable as you imagine a hospital waiting room to be. Some time after 4am we got a few blankets from a passing nurse and managed to get a few minutes of sleep. Around 5:30am we got a phone call from our adoption specialist. Baby girl was born at 5lbs. 8oz. She was taken to the nursery for monitoring because her initial bloodsugar was low. Our AS said the BPs were tired and wanted to catch some sleep. She let us know to head home, get some sleep and she would call us later that morning. We left the hospital without seeing anyone.

We made it home around 6:30 and managed to get a few hours sleep. We spoke to our AS a little before 11am. She said the pregnancy counselor was up speaking with the BPs and that they would call us when they were ready for us to head up to the hospital. We got ready and headed out to lunch close to my work which happens to be about mid-way between us and the hospital. We ate a classy lunch at Denny's and eventually spoke with our AS again. She said that the BM was talking about what she wanted placement to look like and how open she wanted the adoption to be. We took this as a good sign, but were disappointed when she said that they were not ready for us to head up there yet.

So we ran a couple errands and wandered the Target baby aisles for a bit before heading to an Irish Pub in the area to wait and watch the World Cup Soccer game. (Awesome game even if the USA ladies ended up not bringing home a victory) Luckily we ran into a couple friends and the atmosphere in the pub took our mind off of our wait. Around 3pm we spoke with our AS again. The BM was still on the fence about following through with her adoption plan. The pregnancy counselor had just left the hospital and is planning on going back at 9am tomorrow morning. Hopefully we will know more around lunchtime.

The emotions that I am going through are absolutely indescribable! We still haven't seen baby girl, which at this point I am considering a good thing. I can't imagine go through all of this and also having held and bonded with her. In my mind she is still not ours. We are encouraged though that the birthfather is still 100% on board with the adoption plan.

Our AS said that the BM is going back and forth between knowing that adoption is in the best interest of baby girl and not being able to say goodbye to her daughter. I can't imagine what she is going through right now. Praying that God gives her peace and comfort to make the decision that is right for them both.

Thank you to everyone for your prayers and support, they are appreciated more than you know! Hopefully we will know more tomorrow and will finally know if this is our baby girl.

Post again soon!
~Jeny

The Maybe-Baby Update

We spoke with our adoption specialist this morning. The birthparents want to meet with us again soon. Birthmom feels like she did not have a chance to ask all of the questions that she wanted to ask, which is understandable given everything that was going on that day. The good news is that the birthfather is 100% on board not just with making an adoption plan but also with us, and the birthmom was very comforted that DJ and the birthfather got along so well. I'm taking it as a good sign that she wants to continue meeting up with us. I would be concerned if she had no interest in meeting up with us again.

We will find out on Monday where/when we will be meeting. Hopefully it will be soon because I am really afraid labor is imminent! For this meeting there will be no children luckily. I feel like having the kids there was a good ice breaker but also very distracting as well. Definately looking forward to some grown-up only conversation.

In the meantime I am a house-cleaning-diaper-buying-laundry-doing-fool! There is so much to get done in preparation for our Maybe-Baby! I pulled out a couple bins of Mackenzie's old clothes and a bin of stuff that we had bought for Jack. It was great looking through Mackenzie's stuff with her and showing her just how tiny she was. Jack's stuff was a little harder to go through obviously. I didn't pull out any of the stuff that he had actually worn, that would be way too difficult. I had to stain treat A LOT of Mackenzie's stuff because she spit up a lot as a baby. I ended up getting 2 laundry loads of stuff done. Still have to fold it all and find a place to put it....hmmm...hadn't thought about that problem until just now. Just exactly where am I going to put all of this stuff? We hadn't planned on putting the baby's room together until after the baby is born and home with us. Baby will sleep in our room for the first couple months so we have time to worry about getting the crib together, but I guess I will be getting the dresser ready tomorrow!

As a side note, thank you SO MUCH to everyone that has reached out and offered your prayers and support. We are so blessed to have such an amazing network of friends and family to support us. We would not be able to stand so strong without you guys.

Post again soon!
~Jeny

It's Complicated

Well, time to get you guys up to speed…I apologize for the long delay in getting this post up, but as I have said often as of late, It’s Complicated.

On July 5th we got a phone call from our Adoption Specialist…well, not a call…The Call. The feelings that I had were indescribable. (I wrote but not published some posts that I will get up here in the next couple days to share those first couple days) Excitement, nervousness and so much more. A meeting was scheduled for July 15th. Seriously, longest 10 days ever! We knew some about the birthparents but were looking forward to getting more information and getting to know them.

So that brings us up to today. You may have realized that today is July 15th. Yes, we met them today…and things did not go exactly as ideally imagined. When we got to the restaurant we were met by our adoption worker, Elizabeth and the pregnancy counselor who has been working with this mom for a couple months now. One of the first things that she shared with us was that the mom was/is not 100% committed to adoption. She is having a hard time coming to terms with adoption and the pregnancy counselor advised us it was ok to get excited, but not to get too excited. Not exactly what we were expecting/hoping for. While the birthmom is having a hard time with the idea of adoption, the birthfather is 100% on board.

The other thing that they shared with us is that she was in the hospital on Monday with contractions. They were able to stop the contractions and sent her home in the morning. Apparently is it highly unlikely that we will be making it to August 10th as originally thought. Yikes!

Lunch went pretty well. It was easy to tell that she was hesitant. We talked around the adoption a lot and you could tell when it came up that she was not comfortable discussing it. Twice the pregnancy counselor tried to bring up the hospital plan and both times the subject was changed without anything of substance being said. Overall though the conversation felt pretty comfortable other than the whole bit about avoiding the very reason that we were all there :@)

As we were leaving I shared a bit with the birthmom and feel like she appreciated that. I didn’t want her to leave with the impression that we were expecting her to give us her baby. It was very important to me that she knew we would respect her decision even if it didn’t involve us. I then proceeded to cry the entire way home.

So, where does that leave us???

We are in a weird spot…torn between being excited that someone has picked us and scared that they will change their minds. No matter what God is in control of this situation. God knows if this is the baby that we are meant to parent and when the time comes, we will know as well. God has us here for a reason. She picked us for a reason and while I hope and pray that it is because this is the baby that we are meant to parent, I also have to acknowledge that it may be that we are just meant for emotional support.

The good news about her going early is that we hopefully won’t have long to wait for the answer to that question…

Post again soon,
~Jeny