A Fish Tale

We have a fish tank in our dining room. It is a modest tank, 20 gallons, tropical fish, a big fake rock and plants. We have a couple types of tetras, some Danios, a big Pleco, some other bottom feeding types, and an inherited goldfish. I hate goldfish. They are really gross and this one is a pig. However in a lot of ways, I think he’s good for our tank. Before we got him, there was a layer of slime all around the bottom of our tank. Now, this goldfish thinks he has to be eating constantly, so he went around our tank and basically picked up the gravel piece by piece and cleaned it off. Between the gravel getting stirred up and him moving everything around, our tank became spotless within a week. We have had him for about 10 months and I think he is finally on his way out.

He has always been a sort of acrobat in the water. He picks up a rock at the bottom, and while he is moving it around in his mouth he will turn upside down and do a somersault. It’s quite amusing. Now for the past week he has just been floating around the tank always upside down. It actually looks like he has an air bubble in his stomach and the only time he can truly relax is when he floats on the top of the water. I’ve been waiting and waiting for him to die, but he is still hanging on. E was going to take him out the other day but then he thought maybe he should wait for Dani because she has been asking questions about death lately. I told him not to worry about it until he actually dies because I don’t want her upset if we get rid of the fish and he is still alive. When this fish does die, I don’t know what to do with him. I’m afraid that he will clog our toilet.

Oh Me of Little Faith

I have little faith. I don’t know what to believe in. I have been given conflicting dogmas to follow my whole life. When I go to church I look around at all the people and they are singing, very off key, but loving every second of it. They really believe what they are hearing and singing and I can see their faith. It is visible in everything that they do. I often wonder why I can’t have that faith.

Faith is something that E and I have discussed several times. We both feel that there is no book that can tell you how to have faith. Faith is a very individual and unique thing. The question is, how do you get faith? I want to have faith. E has asked me before, “What do you have faith in?” Well, I have faith in him, and us, our family, our love for each other and Dani and soon Lana (which we already do love her I’m just afraid to have faith in my love for her). I have faith that we will always be a family. After that, I don’t have faith in much of anything. I think I really need it.

It has occurred to me that every stumbling block that I* have encountered throughout our adoption throws me into pits of despair. Not enough money, not enough time, taking too long, redoing documents… these all drive me crazy. I am afraid that by some twist of fate Lana will be stripped from us and we will never feel strong enough to attempt adoption again. I’m afraid to believe because I don’t want to get hurt. This is very similar to not dating because you don’t want to get dumped.

While I made this realization, I also realized that I don’t really take anything good that happens to me and let it be good. I always have to put some negative twist on things. Like we finally have our referral, in my mind I think ‘I could have had 2 Clomid babies by now.’ Thoughts like that make me feel so ungrateful, but I love all the good things in my life. I don’t know what I would do if I didn’t have Dani and E to share it with.

So I guess I need to challenge myself to two things. First, have a little faith… after all a little will get me a lot further than none. And two, say out loud that I am happy with what I have.

* I say ‘I’ because E has an insanely irritating way of being calm about everything.

Going Postal on Homeland Security

.... or wishing that I could.

Our fingerprints are redone, but I feel that if the decision was up to the government, I would have made a 7 hour trip for nothing. The guy that we talked to didn’t understand why we were even there since our prints didn’t expire for 2 more months. I tried explaining to him that we needed them current for our court date which could be very close or after the expiration and that I wanted to allow plenty of time for the new document to be processed. He suggested that we come back in the beginning of May. I couldn’t control the tears anymore…. I looked at E and said, “So we have to come back down here…. I made this trip for nothing.” The guy then said, “Where did you come in from?” My answer, “Fairbanks.” He then sucked in his breath through his teeth and made a grimace that looked like he had just swallowed a bug. He said he would look into it and he would be right back. As soon as he walked out the door I started praying. E was pissed.

He came back a few minutes later and asked us to follow him, and we went to another room. A lady there said that she would try to figure out exactly what we needed. She looked us up in the ‘system’. She looked really confused… “Are you sure that you’ve had fingerprints done?” Ummm… E said, “Yeah, otherwise we wouldn’t have a piece of paper that says they are expiring.” So she asked for her supervisor. Long story short, evidently the way the orphan petition works is very different than the rest of the work they do with immigration and our prints weren’t even in the system. We had to pay to have our prints redone. No problem. Then she gave us our receipt and we went back to the print waiting room.

They took me in first and the guy was really friendly. I think I thanked him about 20 times. I said, “I only have one thing to say, someone in Fairbanks needs to get a digital machine. The city, the troopers, somebody.” He tries to defend himself by saying that they do have a portable unit and that they try to get up there about once a quarter. Well, that doesn’t really do me a lot of good. It’s just comical that people try to defend themselves and they really have no idea that it was just easier for me to just go down there instead of waiting for the next full moon on a Sunday for them to come to Fairbanks.

Anyway, they are redone and hopefully we will have the current 171-H between our trips though everyone I spoke to didn’t understand why it took 3 months for us to get the form the first time.

It’s really nice to have E home. Dani is the happiest that I have seen her in weeks. It kind of makes me feel like chopped liver.

I had a thought last week after church. It seems from what I have studied and heard Jesus was a very nontraditional man regarding the church. He didn’t give his sermons in temple, nor did he have, if any, rituals. As I was sitting in church, it occurred to me that church is nothing but ritual. There are always the songs, the offering, communion, and sermon with several prayers sprinkled throughout. I found it funny that we model our religion after such a man that went against the grain of the church, yet we stick to our rituals of worship every week.

Calm Before the Storm

Things are a little better. Last week was the week from Hell. I spent 4 days running back and forth from town requesting documents, and picking them up. I also had an MRI on my back and they wanted me there at the butt crack of dawn.

This week seems to be a little easier. E is due home on Thursday. By a twist of fate I have to go down to Anchorage because our fingerprints for immigration are probably going to expire for before our final court date. Luckily, a work acquaintance of E’s is going down for his graduation so I can bum a ride with him. We can get our prints done on Thursday morning and then we can come right back home. Hopefully we will get the document we need in a timely fashion. The last time we waited for our 171-H for 3 months. I don’t think we have that much time. We have our tentative travel dates. It will be later than we were originally told due to a database error in Moscow. We can’t see our child until she is off the registry and the database error has added another month to that time. Oh, and we need to come up with another $5000 for our expenses while in Russia. It never ends.

E is getting paperwork together to amend his orders. Hopefully the extra month that he is asking for will be approved. Also, hopefully that it will be enough time for us to make our second trip.

Now, we could just move as originally planned, however that would require us to file for a new 171-H when we get to FL.. We would also need new fingerprints in that state, and we may even have to get a whole new homestudy. So it could feasibly add 6-8 months until our adoption is finalized.

Another snafu we are going to run into will be driving into Canada and reentering the States. I don’t know if the Russian birth certificate that we will have will be enough to allow us to take our daughter out of the country and back in. Or into Canada for that matter. If we can’t take her over international borders, then we will have to ship our vehicle and fly to FL.

I am so exhausted and stressed about this.

The weather is unseasonable warm. I don’t trust it. Our temps should still be hovering around 0 yet they are in the high 30’s and low 40’s. Our winter has been eerily mild. I have my guard up and my snow shovel is still poised and ready for action.

I'm just not happy right now

Our apostille office will be closed from the 18th of Feb. until the 1st of March.

I have spent all week running around Fairbanks getting old documents refreshed.

I saw my doctor today to get the medical certificate started. First I find out that the blood test results may not be back for 3 weeks. E will have to get his blood work done when he comes home next Thursday. So I have to add another week for his labs to come back (around the 2nd week of March). They will still need to be notarized and apostilled. My doctor says that she will not get her signature notarized. She also will not supply the information for her medical license which is a requirement for the Russian court.

I checked my email when I got home, and my case worker says that Russia is backlogged so we may not travel until April. I guess that will give us some leeway for the apostilling.

We are supposed to move in April. And if we do, we will have to redo half of our paperwork. My husband can get an extension but I don’t even know how long he should ask for.

I’m tired. I’m tired of papers. I’m tired of people not helping me. I’m tired of being alone. I’m tired of this whole process.

I always thought that this would make me stronger, a better mom somehow. But I just feel like giving up. I don’t know how much more of myself I can sacrifice for this.

On the other hand, I have seen the baby that has been chosen for us. It’s only a picture, but it is the only glimmer of hope that I have seen in the past 16 months. I know that she is my child, a long awaited member of our family, and nothing is going to stop me from bringing her home. I’m ready to move to Russia and become a citizen there so that I can adopt her. I’d probably be able to that quicker.

I need something stronger than me to hold onto. And I do feel like I’m doing this on my own. E is not here to help with the paperwork. He is stuck in Anchorage with no transportation, no ability to make calls during the day, and no way for me to talk to him when I need him. He’s also going through a lot of frustration with his class so I don’t want to add to it. But something’s got to give.

Dani is also stressing me out. I can appreciate that she misses her Dad, she tells me so about 20 times a day. I know that she really wants to see him, but she is rebelling against me which just makes me want to bang my head into a wall until I pass out.

That’s it, I’ll just pass out for the next week, and then I won’t be alone anymore.

Oh, and I'm dieting, the Atkins way. I've lost 10 pounds in 21 days. 20 carbs a day until I am at my desired weight of 140- 145. So I'm hungry, and I just want to eat a whole casserole of macaroni and cheese, and an entire bakery cake with butter cream icing.

Clogged arteries, anyone?

Do Not Question My Psychic Abilities

I had the call with my agency about our referral (2 hours late) but we have it. We will be seeing a little girl. She is currently 7 months old. We cannot go to see her until March because she is still technically not available for release. Which will make my stressing out about E having to leave his class unfinished unfounded. Thank goodness. I do not really know how much information I can give… perhaps I’ve already said too much.

But there are a few coincidences that I want to share. We started our adoption in September of ’04, sixteen months ago. She is currently 7 months old, add 9 months for pregnancy… she was conceived the month that we started our adoption.

I’ve been asking Dani, “So, what do you think your sister will look like?” Dani always says, “I think she will be a baby.”

I’ve been telling E for a few months, wouldn’t it be neat if her name was Svetlana and we can call her ‘Lana’ for short. Her name? Svetlana.

I love the way the universe works sometimes.

In Which I Lose My Mind

So, I call my agency yesterday to see if I can find out who our point of contact was now. Ironically, it was who picked up the phone. She said she was just getting ready to email me about a document that they need. No problem, I’ll give you the one I have in our dossier and I’ll get another to replace from our homestudy agency. Good idea, she says. She proceeds to tell me that the reason they need that document is that our name came up in the next bath of 100 families that are due for referrals. That’s fantastic I think. A light at the end of the tunnel.

So, I text E that info as he cannot answer his phone during class, and I go about my day. Dani tries to call Daddy and hijacks my phone. This is about 3:15 in the afternoon. She comes back down around 3:30 and I ask her where my phone is. She doesn’t know. Did you leave it upstairs? Ummm… yeah, I think so. So she goes back upstairs and comes back with it. I look at it, 1 missed call. GRRRRR and a message. So I check my message. It’s someone from the agency, and they need me to call them back. OK

So I call them back, “I have great news for you. We have a referral for you.” I think I stuttered. I was overwhelmed. I didn’t know what to think. That call was basically just to tell me that we had our referral and set up a time to talk and view medical info, and a picture. That phone call should be taking place any minute now. I am so excited.
However, this schedule is very tight. We may travel as soon as 3 weeks. E will be gone for 3 more weeks. He is also supposed to test for promotion sometime in March, we think, and that may collide with our second trip. Then at the end of April we move. Diagonally across the country….. Alaska to Florida. So, I’m a little wigged out. Hopefully we will be able to travel after the weekend that he comes home. That way he won’t have to repeat his class. The testing, we can figure out later. The moving, that will happen eventually be it April, or May. We don’t ‘have’ to be there until June. More to come.

And Now.... The Rest of the Story

It took less than a month for my divorce to be finalized from my ex- husband. I filed sometime in early January and we had our day in court on Feb. 6. Ironically, E's birthday is the 7th, so he got a single woman for his birthday. We were pretty much exclusive from that point on. I do feel that we rushed things way to quickly. Through the past 8 years we have had countless conversations about those early days and months. I have told him several times that I wish I had been able to wait for a little while before hooking up so fast. He told me it wouldn't have mattered. He said he fell in love with me at first sight and he would have waited years. But Hell, I didn't want to wait. I wanted to spend every moment that I could with him, and we did. It was amazing. Everything was amazing.

Except for the nightmares that I had about my ex for the next 6 years. Probably relating to how weird he really was and I didn't realize it until after we split up. If any young girl ever reads this, I hope that she remembers this. When my ex and I were dating, I lived further out of town than he did. Once I started driving, he told/asked me to beep the horn once on my way into town, and twice on my way home so that he would know where I was. My naive 16 year old self thought, "Oh how sweet! He wants to make sure that I get home and that I am safe!!" Now, my 29 year old self gets creepy shivers. I think if he had been more of a man, he would have been very possessive.

In fact there was another occasion when I was staying after school for drama practice. I was waking up the aisle to get to the stage and a guy friend of mine tapped my butt with a broom. I looked at him and laughed.... we all had a good laugh. I thought it was funny. Well, I told this funny story to my boyfriend. The next several days my friend didn't talk to me; he hardly even looked at me. I finally asked him what was wrong. He told me that my boyfriend had 'requested' that he not speak to me, look at me, and definitely never touch me again or there would be problems. I was pissed. I told my boyfriend that under no circumstances was he ever to 'defend' me again without me asked for it. Warning signs..... GIRLS pay attention!!!

Bleh, I get sick and angry when I think of the 7 years of that relationship.

I have things much better now. In fact, in a weird way, E likes it when guys flirt with me because it makes him feel like he's really got something special... it's not bad for my ego either. Though I hardly ever notice when I get flirted with so it's kind of useless for me.

I think I'm going to write a lot about E. You see, he is gone for 6 weeks. He's at a school down state. It's weird not having him here, but it is a whole lot nicer knowing that he is in the same state with me instead of on the other side of the world living in a tent. Dani sure does miss him. She talks to him on the phone every night and asks him to come home. I'm so glad to see that they have that bond.

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

There are lots of things that I want to blog about. I just never seem to get around to it. Christmas went off well. We had fun. Nothing spectacular happened. I’m just glad that we were able to spend the holidays together.

New Years’ has always been a special time from me and E. We met shortly before Christmas in ’97. Over meeting just a couple of times in the next 2 weeks I knew that I had to make a change in my life.

You see, I was currently married to my high school boyfriend. The thing was that I wanted more from life than just sitting around on the weekends drinking and playing cards. I wanted a family, which he was in no hurry for even though my 15 year old sister was currently pregnant. I felt rushed. I wanted an education and he was fine being the breadwinner making just over $1000 a month. Oh yeah, we were livin’ large. I wanted to have a spiritual relationship with God and he considered himself an atheist. Now, you might ask why they hell did you get married? Well, quite simply, I had been with him since I was 15. He was the only boy I had had a sexual relationship with and I hated living at home. I didn’t know how to go about getting a college education by myself. My mother didn’t have the energy or funds to help me go to school and my siblings were really difficult to live with. I would go weeks without talking to my younger sister.

So getting married seemed like the best thing that I could do. I was so naïve. Whenever I see young high school students so involved with their significant other, I get sick a little bit. I know where they are going. I think what bothers me most about it is how important marriage is to me and a 15 year old really can’t grasp that. I don’t care how mature you are. And I was very mature. I was 15 going on 30.

So, fast-forward to when I met E. It was amazing how well we connected with each other in just a few meetings. He was deep into spirituality. Not the Bible or church but with yourself. I loved that… I wanted to be like that too. On New Years’ Eve, the year we met, my husband, myself, E and several other acquaintances were at a party. I got my husband drunk to passing out and I spent the rest of the night with my new friends all the while my drunk husband was sleeping on the couch.

Around 5 am a few of us got the idea to go the beach and watch the sunrise. E and I jumped at the chance to see something so beautiful together. So we went. And it was incredible. I don’t really remember what it looked like. I just remember how I felt. That first sunrise of the new year was like being born again. I was feeling so many things and I felt so confused yet unafraid and terrified at the same time. It was thrilling.

We went back to the house, my husband started waking out of his slumber and we staggered home. I let him sleep a little while after we got home while I got up my nerve to tell him I was leaving him.

He woke up and I felt sick to my stomach. I told him that I had something important to say. The last thing that I wanted to do was to hurt him, but by staying with him I was hurting myself. He got very upset, told me get out and when I put my hand on the door, he begged me to stay. He asked my why I was doing this to him. I didn’t know what to say. It was the hardest thing I have ever done.

In my heart, I knew I was in love with E. I didn’t want it to happen. I had never felt like I did about anyone and whether it grew into a relationship or not, I wanted to see it through with him. Later I formed the words that best described how I felt. It wasn’t fair to my husband, E, or me for me to stay married. So, I did what I felt was best and broke the beginning of what could have been a very messy triangle.

Although I have spent many days wondering if it could have been easier, there has never been a day that I regretted my decision. I think that’s what I liked best about it; it was MY decision.

Trials of Parenthood

Why I love being a Mom.
Dani comes in my room in the mornings to wake me up. She climbs in with me and says, "You ready to get up mommy?"

"Yeah, in a couple of minutes."

She says, "Ok.... I'll lay here with you and we can smile at each other."

I smile say, "Ok honey."

Why I hate being a Mom.
"Dani, honey, you need to clean up your toys."

She says, "No, I don't want to. You can take them away."

"No, I'm not going to take them away. It's your job to take care of your toys. Why should Santa bring you new toys if you aren't going to take care of the ones that you have?", I question.

"Oh, I guess I don't want any toys for Christmas. You can call Santa and tell him not to come."

ARRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!

Time for a little fun....

Remember?

If you read this, if your eyes are passing over this right now, even if we don't speak often, please post a comment with a COMPLETELY MADE UP AND FICTIONAL MEMORY OF YOU AND ME.

Then when you are done, post this on your blog and see what your friends have to say about you.

This is fun, and I'll be interested to see if ANYONE EVER READS THIS!!!

Grossed Out and Lost in Translation

I saw the most disturbing, icky, gross thing on VH1 last night. The Secret Life of Swingers (http://www.vh1.com/shows/dyn/vh1_news_presents/80253/episode_about.jhtml) was on their late night programming. Aside from the fact that people who swing are having affairs on their partners, this just really grossed me out. I can’t get one scene out of my head which was 2 couples who had switched but all 4 people were in the same bed together. I got physically ill and I only watched about 2 minutes of this show. I was discussing it with a friend of mine today and we were really abhorred.

I’m all for exploring your sexuality, but if you want to sew your oats, don’t do it while you are in a relationship with someone else. Just because the two of you agree that it’s OK doesn’t make it right. On a more political issue, just because someone kills someone else, doesn’t mean that they should be put to death. Different scenarios I know, but I think you get my point.

The whole thing just grossed me out. Swinging is obviously not something that I will ever be OK with. I called my husband while he was at work and I told him under no circumstances will swinging ever be brought up as even a last ditch effort to spice up our sex life through fantasy. I told him even if it takes me 57 lifetimes to reach enlightenment it will never be an option, so don’t even think about it.

I’m glad we agreed.

In Adoptions News……
Nothing.
I think we are lost in translation. It has be 7 ½ weeks now and we haven’t heard whether we are done being translated or if we are officially waiting for a referral. My hubby did call our agency last week and he did get some news. Our agency is currently restructuring their staff. They are also opening a new office in Texas so their staff is pretty thin. The kicker? Our case worker is currently experiencing complications due to a high risk pregnancy. She is our second case worker with this agency. Her clients are being shuffled around to the rest of the staff, and I think that we are going to be working with the director of the agency. I’m having severe questions in whether we chose the right one. But as it stands right now, we are $10,000 into this process. As far as I’m concerned, there is no turning back.

The fact that our case worker was pregnant was information that my husband said getting was like pulling teeth. I was concerned about her because she had always been a daily participator in our support group. It had been 3 weeks since we heard anything from her so I made sure that hubs asked about her. That’s how he found out the rest of the story.

Confessions of a Lurker

I’ve had a rough couple of weeks. I feel like I’ve been torn into a few different directions, mostly all by me. I think that the pill I was on was seriously messing with my head. I have had the goriest and scary thoughts occurring to me mostly when I am alone. Today I was at my local clinic waiting to get a script filled and I can count about 5 times when I almost broke down into tears. Why? Damned if I know. Most thoughts come to me when I am driving. Usually when I am alone because that is when I am alone with my thoughts. I remember one instance I was driving and it was late, about 2 am. I felt fine, but I saw a vehicle driving towards me. An immediate thought came to me, “What if that person swerves at the last second and drives head on into me.” Immediately I could imagine what my van would look like. Then I pictured what I would look like. I could see the steering wheel pressed into my body and I could feel the life leaving my body. It really scared me. These thoughts have just been progressively worse since I started taking BCPs.

After waiting for a week for a doctor to call me back regarding the itching on my arms, she finally called back and prescribed me a different pill*. So I guess I will be a pill whore for a little while. I was talking to my husband last night and I was pissed because I hadn’t heard back from a doctor. I told him that I could probably call the doctor and get to talk to someone about my itching and all would fine. But I’m pretty tired of being jerked around by our medical system. Oh, and IT’S NOT MY JOB TO REMIND MY DOCTORS TO CALL ME!!

*Our fine military doctors have 72 hours to return a phone call. At the time of my conversation with my husband it had been 108 hours (4.5 days with a weekend thrown in for good measure).*

I also have this fantasy of a doctor calling me and mentioning that he/she doesn’t want to risk an accidental pregnancy by switching drugs too often. I picture myself laughing and saying, “Hello!!!! Do you have any information on me?? Accidental pregnancy is not something I’m concerned about.”

Religion has also been on my mind. A few weeks ago we went to a new church. Biggest selling point to me was that they start their Sunday service at 11. I like being in church but sometimes it’s embarrassing. I get very emotional and I have a hard time keeping my composure. I wouldn’t say I’m moved by the spirit, but my spirit relaxes. I feel like a church is the one place where I can go and completely let my guard down. The downside of church is all those Christians who hang out there. Don’t get me wrong, I love humanity, think religion is great, but everyone else’s religion is not for me. I just want to be with God. I don’t want to do the Secret Sister, handing out flyers, ministering to the public Christian thing. Another thing I want from church is just old fashioned fellowship. I think I need to be around people. Now, this all seems reasonable right? Well, throw my husband into the mix and going to church becomes about as fun as pulling teeth.

He wants the debate. He doesn’t want to shatter everyone’s faith; he just wants to clarify his own. The problem here is that when he listens to a sermon, he has to pick it apart and analyze the points that he doesn’t agree with. Now, he has never gotten into any kind of a discussion with a minister or anything like that, but he has with me. And let me tell you, this man has some ideas. If he had any fact to back them up, he could probably create his own theology. But it’s frustrating to go to church with someone who doesn’t agree with the concept of church. And granted neither do I, we just go for very different reasons. I just want some friends. You know, friends, those people that you surround yourself with who share similar ideals. The people whose house you go to for dinner and who have kids your kid’s age. We don’t have that.

Right now the closest thing I have to friends are the other women whose blogs I visit religiously (listed at right). I consider them my friends, but in no way is it 2 way communication. I have looked to them for strength and encouragement when I am feeling hopeless. They will probably never know how much their trials help me through my own. I comment once in awhile on their blogs hoping that they will wander to me, and a couple have, but I don’t think that I am much of an influence on them. Someday when we are all in better places, I hope to be able to let them know how much they have helped me. Until then, I am a devout lurker.

Catching Up

Our dossier is officially in Russia. Just waiting the translation and authentication process. I swear, I honestly don't see how people can view adoption as "doing such a good thing", or "making a difference in the world". In general, I agree with those statements however, this whole process is so taxing. Its so hard to believe that I am doing something "good" when I need to validate my role as a possible parent to a child who needs love and a home. My hubby and I have been fingerprinted by our agency, Homeland Security, interviewed, background checked, spent nearly $10,000 in the past 12 months and very often I feel like we have nothing to show for it. Sure, all we are waiting for now is a referral and that could come anytime after the next 3 weeks, but where am I supposed to fit in until then?

I dreamt last night that my husband came home from work and told me that he had to go to a training school for 6 weeks. In actuality, he may have to go and we are trying to get him to go later this month rather than after the New Year because we will most likely be traveling. Anyway, he starts crying and says he can't leave me for six weeks because he got me pregnant. In disbelief, I say, "What?!?!" Evidently some doctor that he saw that day told him that I was pregnant. I don't know how the doctor knew this because I hadn't seen one all day. While my husband is distraught at the thought of leaving me in the beginning of a pregnancy; I am telling him that it is impossible. I just kept telling him that logically it didn't make sense.

In real life, I am on the pill. My doctor diagnosed me with PCOS (Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome). He said bc pills will help regulate me. I have been on it for 2 1/2 months. And yes, I have regular periods. But OH MY GOD, my left arm itches like crazy and I think that it is related to the pill. I noticed that the itching was the worst in the first week of the pack. It got a little less the second week, and now in the third week, it's just a little itchy. I had to stop going to the tanning bed because tanning aggravated it even more. I can't seem to win. So I am going to finish this pack and then wait to see if the itching stops. It is driving me crazy. If the itching does stop, then I know I can't take that pill. If it doesn't, I'll have to renew my prescription.

I think that my going off the pill is giving me false hope. That little voice in the back of my head is saying you might be able to get pregnant now!! I wish I could shut it up.

I guess they showed me.

Finally, I got a phone call today from our agency. They are going to place us in Stavropol, Russia for our adoption. Our dossier is being sent tomorrow. They will most likely get it in about 5 days and they will start on the translation process. That may take about a month and a half. My case worker said several times in our conversation that, "I think you will be very pleased with the turnaround that you will see with this region." I don't know if she was just making a general statement, or if she was speaking in some kind of code. But I feel like I can have hope again.

On a different note, I frequent many other blogs relating to infertility and adoption. These other sites have been invaluable to me over the past several months. I have been able to start to emerge from a very dark period of my life. I occasionally delurk to make comments. Today, I commented on a site that I have been reading regularly. She was talking about a woman in Target who made a comment, "Please take my kids." Well, the author of the site who has delved further into fertility treatments than my husband and myself and who is currently awaiting a referral from China just gave the lady a dirty look. Probably about what I would have been able to muster as well. I made a comment to the effect that I had a somewhat similar experience while dropping Dani off for preschool last week. Following is my comment,

Oh, Oh.... I have a clueless fertile story.I finished dropping my daughter off at preschool last week and followed 2 ladies down the hallway. The first said to the enormously pregnant other, "When are you due?" The massive one answered begrudgingly, "Five more weeks. I can't take it."The first lady said, "Oh I know, I just had twin girls 3 months ago. I feel your pain."Pain.... In my mind I chimed in, "Oh, it can be so frustrating.... I had a baby die inside of me, and now we are waiting FOREVER for a referral from Russia.... it's soooo exhausting." Yeah.. I think that would have fit right in.
Aside from my bitterness, I hope that your referral does come quickly.

*End comment*

Well, imagine my surprise and chagrin when I see this comment on my comment,

Liv, how is that a clueless fertile story? I've never been lucky enough to get pregnant, despite all the trying, but I think a recently pregnant woman and a recently delivered woman are allowed to condole on the discomfort and the interminability of those last few weeks. It doesn't mean your miscarriage(?) doesn't count as painful, or something. You might as well say that families who had a rapid referral and are now waiting to travel to Russia should not vent about the wait, on the chance that someone awaiting a referral might be within earshot.

*End comment*
It bothered me. I don't want to discount anyone else's discomfort, or time waiting or pain. But this particular site has been a place where I have been able to see all of my frustration expressed. That is what I view it as. The author of the site was ridiculed by several people that she was too sensitive and took the woman giving her kids away as too literal. I think that if her blog is the only place where she can express herself, then people ought to keep their mouths shut.

Yeah, I was able to get pregnant twice. Both with the aid of fertility drugs and I only have one child to show for it. God only knows what I would have done if I had to go through months and years of IF or whatever other difficult procedures there are out there. I didn't go that route because I knew that I wouldn't be able to handle the disappointment. I think with my second pregnancy I was too confident. God sure showed me, Haha.

I guess my comment wasn't really a conflict with these two women. I guess I just wanted to fit in somewhere. I can't complain with the other pregnant women, and I can't complain with the women who are adopting because they can't get pregnant even with drugs or procedure. So where am I supposed to comment to try to relate to other people? Does the fact that I had one successful pregnancy separate me from all the other infertile women? I don't think so. I can relate to their pain and frustration just as well. And even if I do comment, do I need to give a complete medical history so that people know that I do have infertility issues? It seems a little redundant and unnecessary to me.

Fairs, Birthdays and Airplanes

So, I'm a little stressed. I am part of a direct sales business. It's similar to Tupperware, except its jewelry. But the construct of the company is basically the same. The secret to this type of business? Bookings and recruits, neither of which I am very good at. One of the best ways to boost your business, or so I'm told is to have a booth at your local fair. Display your product, get people to sign up for prize drawing and then call them with the contact information they left on their prize entry for booking a party. I hate doing that. So I don't. However, the Manager in our area put a deposit down and paid for the booth last year. She did this thinking that we would have such a large group that it would be no problem for people to pitch in to pay her back.

Currently the cost of the booth is divided among 9 people so the cost per person is $75. That's a lot of money for me considering I am not even going to call these people who might book a party. Also, I am only working 2 days of the fair. That is my choice. I told my manager that I would work the days that noone else was available. However, since we aren't permitted to bring our children, I have to pay a babysitter a drop in rate $7 an hour. That will be about $70 when this is all over. But wait, there's more, evidently, I am the only one in our group who has any creative talent. So, booth design, decoration, and building has been my 'contribution'. I don't really mind those, I enjoy that type of thing. However, it's really difficult to get anything done when every 20 minutes Dani has to go potty and drink out the hippo watering fountain.

I wanted to decorate the booth in a Fiesta theme because the company this trip this year is to Mexico. Nope, theme of the fair is Feast or Salmon. Is it normal for fairs to have a theme? Seems like I never remember that when I was a kid. But then again all I cared about was riding the ferris wheel. Now, we aren't required to decorate with the theme of the fair, but that's what my manager told me to do. Which I have some issues with. She is a manager only by position in the company. She does not tell me how to do my job or make a schedule or anything like that. The nice thing about a home business is that I do that myself. I work when I want to. Currently I am having about 4 parties a month. And I really love it. It's so much fun. It is literally a treasure hunt every time I do one. Pearls and jewelry, need I say more? Ok, one more thing, we find the pearls in the oysters.

The fair aside, I don't think there is a day that goes by without my infertility rearing its ugly head. Yesterday should have been my son's first birthday. I intended on making some cupcakes just to make myself feel better more than anything else. I was so busy and tired after setting up the booth that I couldn't go grocery shopping and I made bacon and eggs for dinner because that is the only food I have in the house. While going to bed last night my husband and I were discussing the stressful day that we had and I told him that I had wanted to make cupcakes. He asked if for anything special and only a tiny part of me was offended that he didn't remember. I told him why and he understood. He's really good about that. Just don't count on him to remember anything. I'm amazed that he knows my social security number.

OK, I saved the best for last. Yesterday I call my mom to talk her about the birthday and I didn't get to mention it because, she told me that I should call my credit card company and dispute a charge that the airlines did when they missed their flight in Seattle. Well, what happened is this:

My mom and stepdad fly standby as far as they can get, in this case Seattle.

They needed tickets from Seattle to Fairbanks roundtrip.

I found flights and booked them on my credit card.

On the day of their trip they get stuck in Dulles Int. Airport.

They will miss their flight that the tickets start in Seattle.

She calls Expedia and tells them that they are delayed and will not make the flight.

Expedia tells her that she will need to repurchase new tickets and the charge for doing that on the day of the flight will be about $4000. The $1500 already paid will be deducted from that charge. Did she understand that?

Somehow another $2100 was charged to my credit card for new flights. My mother says she explicitly told the man she spoke with on the phone that she could not authorize the charge because it was not her credit card.

This incident happened on 19 July.

My mother told me about this YESTERDAY!!!

YESTERDAY!!

My husband told her he wished she had something when they got here, or anytime that they were here..... her reply, "Yeah, I guess I should have."

Thanks Mom.

This afternoon at 3:00 I started recovering from the 8 day visit from my Mom, Step-Dad, and 7 year old niece. My mother has always been very supportive and sympathetic in my infertility issues. I love her for that. However, if I happen to not be feeling well, or very tired, she always gets that hopeful look in her eyes and she asks that dreaded question, "Could you be pregnant?"

"No, Mom, I have only gotten pregnant twice in the last 10 years and they were with fertility drugs and I only have one baby to show for it. I don't let myself think that I might be pregnant anymore."

She always agrees but I can see the look in her eyes saying, "But you could beeeeee."

Oh God. It's excrutiating to see that disappointment. I can't fix it. Every child wants to please their parent, it doesn't matter how old they get.

On a positive note, our dossier is completely notarized, apostilled, and on it's way to Texas to be organized. After that, off to Russia it goes. We are so excited. Hopefully, in the next 2 months we will have some news. I'm praying. And I never pray. I have started to wonder what she looks like. I had a dream a few weeks ago that I got an envelope from our agency. I opened the envelope and pulled out what was inside. I pulled out a picture and was looking at the back of it. On it was written, "Congratulations, you have been removed from the referral list." And I turned the picture over.... but I woke up.

On a completely different tangent. I started reading this book... The Disappearance of the Universe by Gary Renard. The basic concept of the book is that our world as we know it is not real. There was once a part of God who wondered what life would be like if there was this world and BLAMMO, the universe was created. Pretty nifty, eh? Well, to further along the theory, the collective human race is now trying to gain enough knowledge to return to the perfect state of enlightenment. To make a long story short. So reality as we know it does not exist. We are suffering through this life for nothing. Well, that's not entirely true. We are living our life trying to earn what it is that our mind needs to reconnect with the One. It's all very interesting and I'm enjoying it. My husband turned me onto to it. He is currenty reading the book that my book was inspired by, A Course in Miracles.

My only question thus far is, Is my husband a figment of my reality, or am I in his.... or are we a part of someone elses?

Oh, the Mystery that is my Uterus

Ok, ultrasound today.

I don't have fibroids.

Everything looks normal.

WHAT?!?!

How is it that 2 weeks ago, I had "a large mass" to now when everything is normal. And how it is that a CT scan saw something large, yet ultrasound didn't. Maybe my period was so masssive that it just cleared everything out. Could be... I hadn't had one that 'cleansing' since I was 17. Funny because when I was 17 it was normal.

Ok, so I talked to the nurse, and she asked how I was doing. Well, I'm still tender, sex is painful, and my sciatic pain is excrutiating. Oh and I haven't had a normal cycle in 10 years. She said she'd talk to the doctor and see what he suggests. Ok. Whatever.

Adoption paperwork, still plugging away. Just waiting on a few more documents, then we send it off to Juneau for apostille. I was talking with my hubby the other day, and I realized that I will feel a whole lot better about this stuff when it is taken out of our hands. Or my hands rather, since I have done 98% of the work.

Well, until next time.... same cramp time... same cramp site.....

It's Like a Bad Dream

I have started tackling the new document requirements for Russian adoptions. After looking over the requirements more carefully, I realized it was much more than just 4 more documents. The good news is that the medical stuff doesn't have to be taken care of until right before we travel. The hard part will be getting the appoitments, results, signitures, notary and apostille before we get on the plane.... the time frame seems like it will be very small because the documents will only be valid for a few months. We are entering our time crunch. We are due to leave this base in April of next year. Which means that the latest we can make our last trip will be February (to make sure we are here to out process the base in March). Which means our first trip has to be in Dec. or January. We still have to get our documents apostilled which may take one week, or since this is Alaska.... 3 years!!!! Also, when we get a referral it should be about a month before we travel, so... November. Who knows how long our agency will hold onto our dossier before they send it to Russia.

Needless to say, I'm a little stressed. I didn't intend this to be an adoption blog, but I guess that's what this is turning into. I guess since adoption occupies my every waking thought, it's appropriate.

Lost in Space

I seem to be lost in the Blogger World. Nothing different from real life I guess. I kind of fit in with everyone else and nothing extraordinary really grabs attention. Would profuse swearing help? Maybe nude pictures... maybe I need to blog more often... no, that couldn't be it. I just have a hard time keeping up with things.... laziness I guess you could say.

Not much to update on our adoption. We got all of the documents for our dossier done and sent to our agency for proofing. We got an email Friday evening from our agency saying that in their re-accreditation process, 4 more documents are now required in dossiers. The first being a letter from the department that licenses our homestudy agency. Second, a detailed financial statement, third a detailed medical clearnance letter requesting lab results and reference numbers from different tests, i.e. Hiv, HepB, TB, and something else.... The last document, and this is a kicker: a letter from whoever licenses our medical doctor stating that they are, in fact, a Doctor. Let me tell you something about military doctors. I don't even have the same one that I had when our homestudy was done. He just processed to a different base. Second, our clinic doesn't know who is going to take his place yet. Third, it takes us a month to get an appointment as it is.... it just seems hopeless.

While we are on the topic of medical issues. I just found out last week that I have fibroids. I don't know anything else than that. I told my doctor in April that my stomach was very tender and as always my cycle was erratic. He didn't even examine me. I made an appt. for a gyn. exam and he found "something". He said he couldn't tell what it was, but wanted me to have a CT scan. I played phone tag with our radiology dept for 3 weeks before I got my scan. Then a couple of days later, I get a call from the radiology dept. and they want to schedule me for an ultrasound. "Hold on I say, my doctor wanted me to have a CT Scan which I had two days ago." She said, "yeah, he ordered an ultrasound for you yesterday." So, now I'm freaking out, why do I need an ultrasound? "You should call your doctor." Fine. I call and 7 hours later, I finally get to talk to a person. Fibroids. Large mass. Ultrasound. Those were the only words that I heard.

So, good patient that I am, I call radiology back to schedule my appt. "When do you expect your cycle to end?" the tech asks.

I giggle, "If you can tell me, I'll give you a million dollars. I have no idea."

She says, "Well, when was your last period?"

"April."

"Well, how long has your cycle been irregular?"

"Oh... for about 10 years now."

"Well, I can't schedule you until you start your cycle so call me back when you start."

"When I start? What if it's a month, 3 months?" I feel like my uterus is splitting as we speak, and you want me to wait LONGER!?!?

"Well, if it hasn't started in another month we'll go from there."

Fine.

Can anyone see how I may be a little pissed? I should have been exercising my psychic abilities so that I would know, then this whole thing could have been avoided..... I would know when my period would start. I would have known I was going to get fibroids so I could tell my doctor what was wrong with me.

So, for now, I will go around with my swollen middle, looking like I am in my 5th month of pregnancy, and I will grit my teeth through the pain, and when my cycle starts, I'll go have my ultrasound. If I don't bleed to death first.

Honestly, I'm glad that there really is something wrong this time. At least there is an explanation.