Semisweet Anniversary

Tomorrow will be two years that Princess Tomorrow has been with us! I was going to blog about this tomorrow, but since Mike is at the movies with the boys for the Toy Story 3D Double Feature and Tomorrow and I are watching the Barbie version of the Nutcracker, I would be foolish not to take this precious time to write.

It is increasingly difficult these days to find the time to write or even blog. I keep a journal stashed in the drawer of my bedside table and jot down epiphanies, frustrations and inspirations in it, but rarely do I find the time to transfer those sleepy scribblings to my blog. it may sound silly, but most often, I receive some sort of divine inspiration in the shower. A dear friend of mine from Saint Louis once told me it has something to do with positive ions and the spray of warm water, and I don't know anything about that really, but I know for sure that the shower is often a wellspring of emotion and reflection for me where I am finally able to braid a few days worth* of my scattered thoughts into something that looks beautiful and purposeful. *I only take a shower every few days. I take a bath every other day with Tomorrow since I would be getting soaked anyway, and I wash my hair in the sink a lot.

It occurs to me right now, that were I to send the boys to public school, I would likely be able to write every day, just as I am now using the laptop while Tomorrow and I sit quietly together in the front room watching her Barbie movie, with her only occasionally announcing a new bird at the feeder. Almost every day, I remind myself, Someday they will be gone and I will miss this maddeningly loud time with all of them here around me now, and I slow my racing thoughts with the idea of writing a book about foster-adopting Tomorrow.

Two years ago today, we got the call that Tomorrow was at the hospital and needed to be picked up. I didn't have any questions but eagerly inquired what hospital room she was in and if we could go see her even though she would not be released until the next day. As soon as Mike could get off work, we went and visited her at Children's Hospital on the eighth floor. I remember how I dressed the boys up as if we were going to church, and myself in the black/blue/brown swirly blouse I wore to my first nephew's baby shower, a pair of 1928 earrings with teardrop pearls hanging from them that were my moms and which babies love to gaze upon, my black dress boots and my long brown sweater with the faux diamonds and fur collar. I remember the pink and white checked flannel blanket Tomorrow was wrapped in, the metal bars of the crib in which she was sleeping, and how it looked like she was in a little cage. I remember being so surprised she was sleeping soundly, and asking if she was medicated, how long she had been sleeping and when she had her last feeding. The Nurse on duty told us only that she would probably be waking up soon and so we just waited. I sat and stared at her gorgeous little brown face peering out of the blanket in which she was swaddled. The thought running wild in my mind was actually, WHY ISN'T SOMEONE CONSTANTLY HOLDING THIS POOR LITTLE BABY?! Now I know, that was where we came in and why God called me and led us on this path.

After we had settled in to the new, state of the art hospital room with our two very excited boys, Tomorrow finally woke up and started crying. I will never forget her lustful, sad cry. It haunted me that night as I lay awake on the day bed in her nursery, wishing I had demanded to spend the night with her. Mike and the nurses has insisted that I go home and get a "good night's sleep" because we were going to need it for her round-the-clock feedings and medication, but I didn't sleep much anyway. When I finally did crash, after arranging all of the newborn clothes and diapers I had in her closet, I had a horrible nightmare that she was in her crib at the hospital crying and no one was going to her. I know it might sound crazy, but it was as if I could actually hear her cry. It's clear to me now that was the beginning of my bonding with her. Mike says I bonded with her at that very first feeding in the hospital, when she woke up and cried and we got to feed her and change her diaper, but I think now that bonding is a more gradual process and not a single moment that has a clear starting point. I do remember how she looked at us, quizzically at first, but how she quickly smiled~ really, she SMILED! at only five and a half weeks~ at Hammy and Mike. I swear she was flirting with them. I thought it was so adorable then, now I look back and wonder if that was how she had learned to not get hurt by people. I feel like I know too much. I don't know why I have to go through this remembering but I do. I no longer try to stop it, I just let it happen. It's how I honor really major events. Plus, these remembering blog entries may help when I begin to write my book about our heart-wrenching journey toward adoption.

If only I could go back to the worried new mother I was that day, and know that she was going to be safe with us for this long. Of course, that is not possible, and I try to take that hard-earned experience and apply it to today. So far, so good. I must be getting accustomed to this limbo-like situation, because there are far fewer days now when I panic and worry that "They" could come for her and take her away from us. It is irrational to think that way, I simply remind myself, because there is no reason for anyone to take her from us. Yet the fact that the legal possibility is there has me living like a person who is always on call in her own home. I feel like I cannot fully relax. Someone could come and do a surprise home inspection today, right now. Are there any medications, even homeopathic remedies or vitamins, left out? Any cleaning solutions not up high enough? Is there glass out on the counter that she could reach with a step stool (she could drop it, break it and cut herself on the glass)? Is the house too messy? Are the children wearing clean clothes? Is Tomorrow in a dry diaper? Did I get the empty bottle out of her room from before her nap? Are her sheets clean? Do I have enough clothing in her current size? Have I spent enough money on her this month? Did I sign off her medication administration sheet (for her gummy vitamins)? Is she meeting all of her developmental milestones? Is she current on her well-baby visits and vaccinations? Does she have enough long pants and shirts? Seven pairs of warm pajamas? A winter coat that fits, boots, and gloves? Do we have blankets and water in our vehicles for winter weather? Where is the First Aid kit and does it need restocked? Is the evacuation plan posted in her room (or did the boys take it down and play with it again)? Are the house rules posted and are we consistently enforcing them? Are they age-appropriate for all three of our children? Is the wax building up in her ears again? Are they going to need to scrape it out again (and traumatize her just when she is starting to trust having her ears gently cleansed with natural drops)? Why is her hair falling out again? Are we not using the right ethnic products? Does she need to get a trim? Is it okay to let her wear her hair in a 'fro to go to Lowe's with Mike or should I put it in plats before she goes just in case someone sees her? Am I going to get in trouble for not taking her in for her two year well-baby visit yet? With her doctor's knowledge, I've been waiting for Children's Hospital to get the swine flu vaccine so she only has to go twice rather than three times, and so Mike doesn't have to miss work three times. What if she gets the swine flu before Children's Hospital gets the vaccine? What if she does get the vaccine but she has a bad reaction to it? Do I have any say as her foster mother in regard to a vaccine that hasn't been out long enough to be proven safe?

I think this has evolved into another blog post but I'm going to leave it as it is, in the context of Tomorrow having been with our family for two years and with our full intention of adopting her, because it is honest and it is real. It is high time for us to adopt our daughter. As much as we like to get a monthly stipend, we are tired of waiting to make her part of our forever family. Supposedly, the County is always begging people to adopt kids who are placed in their homes, so why on Earth is our case taking so long? Why can't we adopt Tomorrow in November on National Adoption Day like a bunch of other families? We know a foster family who will probably be adopting another little girl (who has been placed with them for the second time), and she has been with them this time for less than a year. It isn't fair. I know life isn't fair, but couldn't this be? DOESN'T THIS LITTLE GIRL DESERVE TO HAVE THE WHEELS OF JUSTICE SPED UP A LITTLE? WHAT THE HELL IS THE HOLD-UP? Are we falling through the cracks of the system because we had a county Case Worker leave "The Department", and now we have an Adoption Worker who is only part-time and just back from a three month "maternity leave me alone" period? Or is there something going on that I don't know about?

This is where my paranoia comes in, and BELIEVE YOU ME I do not need any actual reason to be paranoid because I can be paranoid in the absence of any rational or verifiable reason for being paranoid. This is where I start to unravel a bit, and lose part of my faith in the child protective system, the legal process (what little of that there is left from my own experience at nineteen). This is where I get frustrated with having all of these child protective professionals visit our home regularly, and with more professionals being added to our team rather than replaced. We still have a Case Manager with our licensing agency and our regular "ongoing" County Worker, and now we have an Adoption Worker. But these people don't come and go, they are just added to the roster. So now we have THREE relative strangers coming into our home on a regular basis and judging the way we live and raise our children. And they can stop by anytime and will at least once each quarter in addition to their regular "convenient" home visits. Every time a new professional gets involved, I worry that they will somehow complicate our case, that they will do something wrong or drop the ball on something and somehow bring about a delay us being to adopt Tomorrow. Or simply not speed the process along. Even though Halloween is not yet here, I've mentally begun to face the fact that we are quickly approaching yet another Thanksgiving and Christmas without having sealed the deal for our family. It would be the greatest gift of all were we to be able to adopt her in November. I want to feel like the longer it takes the better it will be, and I know that a child as wonderful as Tomorrow is more than worth the wait, but I'm running very low on patience for the bureaucracy of it all.

So yes, on one hand I am ever so grateful that Tomorrow was placed with our family and that she has remained in our loving care for two years. Still, on the other hand, every month that passes without any progress towards adoption weighs a little more heavily on my heart's scale of balance. I've been spinning plates for two years and I am really, really ready to take a break. And let our house get really, really messy, for like a whole weekend.

Tomorrow we will celebrate both as a core family and with friends. But I just had to complain a bit first. This is an anniversary I will always honor, just like a birthday, for it's when she born into our family~ but it only illuminates the step we have left to take with her. As Mike put it: "It's not quite bittersweet because she's here with us, so it's more like semisweet." We simply look forward to tasting the pure sweetness that adoption will bring.