"The Blues"

Earlier this week we received this update on Baby M:

When I walked into Baby M's room today, she was pretty upset. When I picked her up, she quickly calmed down and rested contently in my arms. Though all babies like your attention, Baby M seems to especially enjoy—even at this young age—your looking her in the face and talking to her. When I looked away or stopped talking, she would whimper—or put on a very concerned expression. As I left her with a caregiver, she gave me an involuntary salute as if to say ‘Thanks and see ya later.’”

While I love receiving these updates, they seem to make me miss Baby M more and more. With each picture, and update, I long for the day that this waiting process will be over and we will travel to Ethiopia to pick her up. There are so many high and lows in this process that I am beginning to get discouraged. I guess you could say I have been feeling the blues lately. This waiting for a court date is really getting the best of me. I've tried to be patient, and I guess I'm doing a pretty o.k. job, but I'm not sure how much more of this anxiety is going to be good for me. The uncertainty of this thing is driving me crazy. We've been waiting almost 7 weeks for a court date, and it seems we are having no luck. It's even scarier to read stories of people who received referrals in April (other agencies) and are still waiting for a first court date! Yikes. I guess we're not so bad off after all. I feel for them, but heaven knows I pray that will not happen to us! That would be a nightmare. I'll just continue praying each day that we will hear something very soon; and when we do hear something, I pray our court date will be successful on the first time around.

My profession is very high stress, and people rely on me daily, so the unpredictability of this is making life difficult. I have to try to anticipate when I should be removed from our work schedule because they are made three months in advance. As you can imagine, we are already working on the schedule for February, and I keep telling our scheduler, well I might be out by then, so don't put me on the schedule. Then if things are delayed, I'll have to tell them to put me back on the schedule. It makes my work life miserable, and I constantly have people asking me "when are you traveling to pick up your baby?" I give them a sigh and say, I really don't know.

It's all so discouraging. I feel that we have come so far, yet we are still so far. I have been praying for rapid, and successful court dates for myself and all my blog buddies, and for referrals for those who have been waiting extended periods of time. I'm confident these prayers will be answered, but in the meantime I am only human. Sometimes it feels like my spark for this whole process is being slowly extinguished. I know the folks in country are doing the best they can to get kids to their forever homes in an ethical fashion, but that doesn't really shield the heart. I know that they are likely overwhelmed by the sheer volume of cases they see on a day to day basis since adoptions in Ethiopia have grown so rapidly . Let's pray for them too. I suppose, in the end, things work out just as they should. There is nothing we can do to control this process, so I guess we might as well enjoy the ride.

In the meantime, I'll probably have a good cry, say a prayer, each some chocolate, and watch HGTV.