to listen is an effort

There are an incredible number of women dealing with infertility, that is something that i have learned in the last few years. When i first had problems getting pregnant i had no one to talk to and didn't know anyone who could share their experience with me. It is so frustrating to have well-meaning friends/family approach me with their 'infertility' problems. There wish to have a baby that took MONTHS to conceive. Are you kidding me? months? Talk to me when you've gone years! I know they mean well but really, when you are standing there making dinner for your children and talking to me about the frustration you felt..........i'm sorry but i don't feel it, and i really don't think you have the slightest idea what i am going through. I know that these comments are meant to make me feel better but really they don't. It only makes me feel worse; that you don't seem to have even the vaguest idea what i am going through or what i have experienced. If you did, you would not make those comparisons. I will never have a child of my own. I have experienced 4 unbelievable losses in my journey to have children. I am jumping through hoops to have the chance to adopt a child through a system that is not very reliable. I have been hurt many times in the past by people who are honestly trying to make me feel better. It's hard to say: you know, you just hurt my feelings, made me angry and now i feel even more inadequate. I am sincerely happy for my friends/family who have had the pleasure of starting their family. I think it is wonderful to see them so happy and enjoying the milestones and accomplishments of their children. I would not wish anyone the pain that brian and i have gone through, the frustration and feelings of loss. I just ask for a little sensitivity when talking about your ability to get pregnant, and please don't compare your situation to mine. We all have individual stories and experiences that make up our lives, we should all try to be sensitive to the hardships and struggles of each individual. We are all unique, it is what makes us special, makes us friends and makes life more interesting. I love my friends/family and sometimes it is hard for me to say out loud what i am feeling, it's nice to have a place to write it all down and get it out. I hope no one takes this the wrong way, i really do appreciate the effort.

trying to understand

I am having a rough day, we had some communication with our case worker but there is still no news. I am in an angry place right now, i am so angry that we have been put in this place of having to start our whole grieving process over again. I was finally at a point where i wasn't crying every day. I was okay with the decision and i was ready to have a relationship with our lil' love bug on a limited basis. I am just so angry that we are here waiting again, so many foster parents have had their foster children go home to the birth families and they grieve and move on. I am not trying to trivialize this process, believe me i understand the pain, i understand that the loss is something that will be there forever but i also know that the pain subsides because it had subsided for me and i can only imagine that it would have subsided more if we had been able to continue on the path we were on. I was looking forward to our next placement, we had planned a great vacation to washington dc and north carolina, i was in a good place. We are now on hold, we have chosen not to take in a placement at this time, we cancelled our trip and we are waiting for a decision. I pray that we get our lil' love bug back and then i will know what all this pain is for, i will be grateful and i will finally understand God's plan. If she doesn't come home...............i will be at a loss

sometimes waiting is the hardest part

I am nervous, anxious, frustrated and in general i am a big ball of stress, which always seems to settle in my shoulders! Needless to say, i could use a good massage! I don't know what we will hear this next week or so and it is driving me crazy. I so want it to be news that our lil' love bug is coming back to us but i really don't want to dwell on it. It's hard to explain, i have this hope but i don't want to want it too much because if we get the news that her mom wants to keep her, it's only going to make it harder to take. Probably an irrational way to look at it but believe me there has not been a lot of rational thinking on my part lately. This whole not knowing does some crazy stuff and i can tell i am getting stressed out about this decision the closer it gets to the end of the month. I keep trying to tell myself that i am not going to think about it, but it's the only thing on my mind. I can't get to bed before midnight and i'm up at six in the morning. I am praying a lot and i keep asking God to help me to see the truth in whatever decision we hear and to keep our lil' love bug safe. Only God knows what she needs and i have to rely on his grace and love to keep her safe and happy now. I sure wish God's time coincided with mine............just.a.little.bit:)

waiting again

Our little girl went home in february and it was overwhelmingly sad. I have missed her every single day since, she filled our life and there seems to be a hole in our lives now that she is gone. We finally got to see her last month, it was great! She's grown so much and she just fit right back in with us. She wanted to come home and it was so hard to tell her she couldn't. I wanted her to come home right then and there. She just kept looking at me like she was expecting me to make everything the way it was before. It made me so sad but i was happy to see that she was okay and she seemed happy. Surprisingly, after this visit we were told that her mom might be considering letting our lil' love bug come back to us. She feels that we might be a better fit for her. It was an answer to our prayers. There were so many feelings surroundings these new events and i wasn't sure what to think, i still don't. I want our little girl to come back home to us but i also have this sadness that her mom has to give her up in order for this to happen. I can't imagine how hard that kind of decision would be and i keep praying that God will give her the strength and insight to make the best decision for our little girl. Only God knows what is the best thing for everyone involved and i am not going to pretend i know what that decision should be. I know what i want to happen, i want her back with us, i want to be able to make the decisions for her, put her to bed at night, buy her clothes and do her hair everday. I miss her so much and i pray that whatever the decision is that we hear this next week or two, i will be able to see God's glory and love in that decision.

our path is set in stone

We had our lil' love bug in our home and we were doing wonderfully. She was a joy and at this point we weren't concentrating on having a child of our own. So needless to say we were in shock to find out i was pregnant. It was about a year ago and the way we found out wasn't so wonderful. I had incredible stomach pain and my doctor couldn't figure out why, so i checked myself into the hospital so i could get a cat scan faster. Luckily, i went in when i did and didn't wait for a week or longer for a cat scan to be scheduled. The doctors couldn't figure out what was going on and then they said i was pregnant. I was happy for about a second and then i realized that something had to be wrong because here i was with this incredible pain. Well, once again i had a tubal pregnancy. I was taken into surgery and they were surprised that my tube hadn't burst yet, it was stretched and torn. I lost my other tube. Then and there in that surgery room i lost the ability to ever have children of my own. Once again i was devastated but at this point we had our sweet pea in our home and it didn't seem so disastrous. Although, i have overwhelming feelings of loss sometimes. I will never know what it feels like to have a child that comes from me and my husband. We will always wonder what our child would look like, what characteristics would our child get from our genes. The joy of carrying a baby and being there for all there first milestones. I will never have the joy of giving my baby a name, a name that i have searched for through baby name books, a name that means something to me and my husband. I will never have a baby shower, i won't be going to target to register for baby items. It makes me sad sometimes but i try not to dwell on it, it is nice not to have those feelings of disappointment every month. I know my path now. God has shown me the way once again and i will go with much love, patience, joy and hope for my future. We will have a baby one day, i now know our baby will come from the boulder county foster system. My path is now set in stone.............

an incredible year and 4 months!!

There is no way to describe how absolutely wonderful the time was that we spent with our little girl. I am not even going to try, i started in my last blog and i felt like it just didn't convey the feelings i had at the time. I am going to give a quick and condensed version of our time with our lil' love bug. She made every day exciting, new and full of life. She had some anger issues, she threw up when she was nervous and it made me so anxious everytime she went to a visit. I loved her smile and she had such a great laugh. She was a jokester! Wow, she loved to make us laugh. She was an experimental eater and would try anything at least once. She loved our dogs and her and jasmine were best buddies from the start. She was a very smart girl and learned quickly. She took her first steps with us and it was exciting! Some of our favorite things to do together as a family: eating dinner together, trips to the zoo, swimming lessons, laying in bed and watching t.v., shopping and bedtime. Bedtime was our favorite time of the day, brian and i would take turns reading Goodnight Moon to her every night and then we would take turns laying her in her bed. I loved when it was my turn to lay her down, she would kiss brian goodnight and then it was our special time. I would tell her in those moments how absolutely wonderful and amazing she was. I would give her kisses and it was our special time together when i would tell her my dreams for her and we could just discuss our day. When she was ready for me to leave the room she would say 'go now, mommy'. That's when i knew she was ready for me to leave and let her get to sleeping! What an amazing experience to spend that time with her. I will forever hold her in my heart as my little girl and i hope she will be a part of our lives forever in one way or another. She was returned home to her family on february 22.

we meet our little love bug

We agreed to open our home to a beautiful 13 month old little girl. A transition plan was set up for her move from her current foster home to our home. Day one was a one hour meeting in her home, day two was a 4 hour visit where we were able to take her out locally, day three we had her for the evening at our home, day four we had her the whole day and then on day five we picked her up to come home and live with us. So here i was meeting our little love bug for the first time. (we can't use names or post pics) she was amazing. I went to meet her the first time by myself because brian had to work and it was just a short meeting for an hour. She was beautiful and so darn cute, crawling and walking along furniture but wasn't taking any steps on her own. She was wonderful, happy, cute, curious and right off the bat she made me laugh. She was a jokester. I went home and couldn't describe in words just how amazing she was, even now there are few words to describe how overwhelming that first meeting was for me. Brian and i were able to spend the 4 hour visit with her the second day. We took her to a park and took so many dang pictures! She had a great time at the park and i was introduced to the obstacles parents have to encounter every day: finding a place to change a diaper, needing water to wash hands and face, dirty clothes and finding a trash can. We had fun though and took her to target to do some shopping and finished off with lunch at romano's. We were so excited at that first meeting as a family and she just fit with us so perfectly. I picked her up in the afternoon the next day and she was able to spend the evening with us for a few hours. It was exciting for me to be able to introduce her to her new home, her bedroom and crib. She explored everything, i think she picked up every toy and she crawled around every room. She was curious and i could just imagine her discovering and wondering what this new home would mean to her. It was getting hard to take her back to her home but of course we did and we picked her up again the next morning. She spent the whole day and again it was a lot of exploring and getting to know eachother. She was easy going, independent, curious, funny and a happy little girl. It was so hard to take her back home that night, i wanted her to stay with us right then and there and forever!! We were able to pick her up the next afternoon and i was consumed with happiness. She was coming home to live with us......................................

we're certified, now what?

So we were certified in july of 2008, it was a lot of work but boy were we happy to receive our certification. Now we had to wait for the call, everytime the phone rang...............my stomach would get the butterflies and i was just hoping it was going to be the call we were waiting for. About a month of this and i settled down, the phone went back to being a minor annoyance and a portal for survey takers, pizza orders and telemarketers. We received a couple calls to do some respite care. We watched a five year old for a weekend. It was a fun weekend and he was a cute kid. What a different life this little guy must have experienced to be able to meet us a couple times, and then be able to just spend a whole weekend living with us in our home. I would have a hard time doing that and not having the support and company of at least one person to make me feel connected and safe. It was eye opening to have this little boy in our home, to see how resilient and trusting he was. Our second call was for a 3 year old boy and 1 year old girl. Usually respite care is done in your own home so you can experience children in your home and how you will do in your own environment but these two were already at a home that was doing respite care for them while their regular foster care family was away. So we went to their house to watch them for the evening. They were cute kids. The little boy was very rambunctious and required a lot of attention, the little girl was layed back and was able to play by herself more than the boy. I remembered him more at the time just because of his need for attention and constant supervision. We watched these two for a few hours one evening, who knew this was going to be the beginning of one of the most stunning and fabulous journeys i have ever had the pleasure of experiencing. About 2 weeks after watching these two siblings, we received a call that the little girl we did respite care for needed to be placed in a more permanent foster care home. They were needing to separate the two because of safety reasons and since we had taken care of her, we were being considered first for her placement. Oh wow! I cannot explain the excitement i felt. I must admit that at first i experienced some hesitation, i had always thought i wanted a younger child, a baby that would have all of his/her firsts with us. I soon discovered that all of that wasn't as important as i had made it in my head. I prayed on it and i knew in my heart that the call we received was the call we had been waiting for, God was giving us the child we were meant to have all along. We met our little sweet pea the last week of september.

Here we go........

We had experienced such an incredible loss with the tubal pregnancy and the chances of me getting pregnant again seemed so incredibly slim. We decided to look into other options. Adoption through a private agency was just so expensive and really didn't appeal to me. Something about having to pay for the ability to adopt a child rings of a business transaction to me. We never really considered this an option for us but i definitely understand this option as a legitimate one for some families. We looked into foster care when we were in greeley, we went to an informational meeting and at that time the information we received seemed to be focused on the monetary gain and not the children. It wasn't the right time for us. We moved to longmont in 2005 and i met someone at work who had adopted three children through the boulder county foster care system. We talked several times, brian and i discussed it and we decided to look into it again. We attended our first orientation meeting, so much information and such honesty. What a difference in foster care philosophies! We fell in love with the idea of adopting through foster care. We started the process and believe me........it is a process! We attended the 2 day orientation classes, these were fun, uncomfortable, exciting and LONG! We went through scenarios, lots of role playing and information, information, information! At the end of all this, we decided; Yes, we still want to do this. We started the paperwork and meetings at our house. There is a lot of paperwork: fingerprints, financial, background checks, insurance, pet vaccinations, home study and many personal questions just to name the ones i can remember. The home study worker comes to the house and we go over all the information, she asks more personal questions, checks out your house to make sure it is safe and then asks more personal questions. Normally this process takes about 3 months and you should be certified. Unfortunately, brian hurt his ankle at work a month after starting this process and we chose to put it on hold till he could go back to work, so this process took us about a year. It was a long process, the people we met during the certification process were wonderful and so helpful. I would do it all over again if i had to. It was most definitely worth it. I love the boulder county foster care system, i believe they have some of the most wonderful staff and they have some incredibly big hearts. I am thankful we moved to longmont and discovered foster care through boulder county. I would hope that people faced with the ability and desire to adopt would seriously consider adopting through foster care. Check it out for yourself and see if it is the right fit for you and your family. So many kids need the love of a family.

my second pregnancy

There we were trying again, we had experienced an incredible loss but at least we knew i could get pregnant. That was a good feeling, knowing that there was the possibility. We continued to try and all those feelings of inadequacy and wanting came flooding back. The disappointment surrounded me every month when i knew i wasn't pregnant............again! Such an evil feeling of jealousy would overcome my thoughts every time someone around me was pregnant. This of course went on for 2 more years and then we discovered we were pregnant, the excitement of being pregnant is wonderful! It all seemed to be going fine but then i got a call that my blood level was extremely low (normal being 14, i was a 4!) i was admitted to the hospital immediately and they started doing tests to see where i was losing blood. That's when they discovered it was a tubal (ectopic) pregnancy. Again we were crushed! How could this be happening, how could i be losing another baby. They had to give me blood before they could even get me in for surgery, i was so low. Here we were, this time i not only lost our baby but a fallopian tube. This was harder to deal with then the miscarriage, it was a double loss. Who knew i was so attached to a tube? Well, it really wasn't the tube, it was the idea that it was only going to be that much harder to get pregnant again. We had a really hard time with this loss, i felt like i was letting down my husband and i couldn't understand why my body couldn't keep a baby. Brian of course was wonderful and kept reassuring me we would be fine.........it was just so overwhelming. As awful as the surgery was i feel like it helped to have that physical pain, it made the loss more tangible and i felt like i could grieve and start recovery as my body started to recover from the surgery. We recovered but this time i wasn't so focused on getting pregnant again. I felt like i had such a slim chance of getting pregnant again, i gave up trying. I know this sounds like i gave up hope........NEVER! I still had it in the back of my mind that it was possible that i could still get pregnant. It took us some time to get over this loss and of course this loss brought back the loss of our first baby. It was a hard time but we moved on and eventually we started to explore other options...................it's the journey i am on currently.

My first Loss

A Little over 8 years ago I married my husband Brian. We were so excited to start a family and we decided to start right away. We both knew we wanted kids. We were expecting to be pregnant within a couple of months. About a year after trying and no pregnancy we went to the doctor to start those wonderful tests and they couldn't find anything wrong............HUH?!?! Why am I not getting pregnant then? They couldn't seem to give me any answers. The only doctor I ever went to was my primary care physician, I never went to any kind of infertility specialist, I figured God had a plan for me and Brian and I didn't want to mess with it. I am not comfortable taking tests and rarely take medicine, the tests I had already taken at my doctors was enough for me. It was my personal choice to let it happen naturally. It was an incredibly frustrating time and every month was an incredible letdown!! Then in January of 2002 I found out I was pregnant! What an exciting time............short time. The happiness of being pregnant lasted a little over a week and then I started to miscarry. It was devastating. I couldn't believe we had tried for so long and here we were losing our baby. I cried A LOT! I felt such anger and loss. I am very lucky to have such a wonderful husband and really he is my best friend. We got through it together. I have to say that it was hard not having a girlfriend to talk to about it though. I didn't know anyone at the time who had gone through the same thing. I tried talking to friends but no one seemed to know what to say..............maybe I didn't need them to say anything. I would have loved someone to just listen and cry with me and let me know that my feelings were valid. I had so much anger, I felt so alone and didn't understand why it was so hard for me to get pregnant when it seemed like every other woman(and many teenagers) in the world were able to do it, no problem! There was a lot of 'I'm sorry' and hugs and love surrounding me, so many reassurances about God's plan. I just wish I had someone who had gone through the same thing talk to, maybe then I would not have felt so alone and lost. Even now, it is so hard to express those feelings that surrounded me at that time. I grieved and life goes on, we started trying again. I can't say that I am done grieving, even over that first loss. I think that I have not allowed myself to let go of that first loss because about every 2 years I experience a new loss and it just reopens those old wounds. I have found that I am a strong woman. Sometimes I even wonder how I keep going, keep trying. I believe that God has a plan for me and Brian, I just haven't figured it out yet. We are still trying to have a family and I still have hope that it will happen. HOPE........without it, how would I live. I can't imagine a life without hope and the day I lose hope is the day I give up on life. I don't want THAT day to ever come!

This new thing I call my blog!

Well here I am 8 years after getting married and still no baby. Isn't it crazy how you get married and you just assume the babies are next. It's been a very long and bumpy road........how is it I am where I am now? I guess that's where I will begin my story. How have I ended up childless after 8 years of trying, not only trying to get pregnant but trying to adopt through the foster care system. I don't want this to be a 'oh, poor me' kinda blog, I have definetly done enough of that sitting here by myself and in my head. I don't want to project that I am that kind of person. I am hopeful; yes, hopeful! even after 8 years of some pretty heartbreaking experiences. I know that children are in my future and I know that I was meant to be a mother. I also know that I will be an amazing mother, it will happen for me and my husband. I want other people to know that they are not alone. I am absolutely flabbergasted at the number of women I have met who have experienced or are going through infertility problems. It was probably 4 years into infertility before I met other women who were going through the same thing, and even then it's not really talked about. I felt alone for so long and recently I've realized how incredibly common it is! Who knew? I sure wish I had!

So please read my blog and know that this is all written from my heart with the only motive being to inform, share and encourage all who read and are interested.