Waiting: the Early Weeks

Well, it's been almost a month since we posted. The two of us have been insanely busy with work projects and travel and so on... and yet it still seems like some weeks drag on while we try to remain patient.

A little over a week ago, I called our adoption agency and explained (while trying to sound normal) that we had been told at our home study that the social worker saw no reason that we would not be put "on the shelf" to be a potential selection for a birth mother, and a while afterwards we attended our last training session which meant we should be available to an even wider percentage of birth mothers... but that no one had actually specifically said, "You are on the shelf."

And of course, we assumed that we were, but we would have hated for an assumption to have led to an unnecessary delay.

The lady assured me that we were indeed on the shelf. She even mentioned that she had seen our scrapbook, and that it was very good.

We know that the average wait can be 15-18 months once you're on the shelf, and frankly I'm not sure what we would DO if the call came in tomorrow that a birth mother wanted to meet us. But we're basically at the point now where there's really nothing left for us to DO to try to push things forward.

We're waiting. And we're continuing to stay busy and focused on life and family and friends. We're not wasting away with impatience. But every now and then, when someone asks how things are going, or when we see someone else's very young child, or when I forget to try to forget... it's hard.

It will be worth it in the end, I know. But for now, it's hard.

--David