September 18th is the day ...

... that my eyes first saw my boys two years ago in two small photos.  It was such an overwhelming day.  An amazing day.  After so much waiting, life kicked up its pace and has not since slowed down.  Becoming a mom has exposed my inner self - its all been laid out for the world to see.  It has been humbling.  It has also opened up a well, a deep well of crazy love for my Scootle and my Boo.  They undo me - completely - in every sense of the word.

I stroked their cheeks as they slept tonight and the thought came to me, "these are the ones you waited for."  I smiled.  These are the ones I waited for.  I would wait a million years for them.

Saturday Sunshine - One Year Ago Today

One year ago today, I saw this picture for the first time:

A and K Referral Photo

It scared me to the bones.  Not your typical reaction to a referral.  One of the things that scared me most was how big A looked.  The first thing I noticed when I first met him was actually how TINY he was.  In this picture, he must have fit in my pocket!  And K in his pocket.  The above picture is one that we have in a couple of frames around the house.  Both Bill and I have a hard time looking at it.  There is so much pain in that photo, it breaks my heart over and over again.

But this is Saturday Sunshine, right?  Today, we will celebrate with an adoptive families picnic (great date they picked, right?) and later at home we share an Ethiopian meal - just the four of us (though Samba also loves injera).  I have ordered each of the boys a book telling their adoption story.  We have small Ethiopian gifts for each of them.

There really are no words for how I feel as I write this.  I feel like the luckiest woman in the world.  I am writing this on Friday night and we have just put the two boys to bed.  We each held a boy in the dark.  We all looked up at the glow-in-dark stars we stuck on their ceiling almost two years ago.  The only other thing we could see was K's glow in the dark pacifier.   I could not stop crying.  I cried with gratitude.  Infinite, infinite gratitude for this gift of mine, this gift that we share.  To think that we, who once looked up at three different night skies, now share this tiny little sky of ours.

K and A two weeks ago.

Here They Are!

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Referral Day, Part IV - Love!!!

Monday (9-21-09): AGONY – no news yet.

Tuesday: Instead of the promised 48 hours, it takes them 51 hours (I counted!) to get back with us. Seems like every child in the county decides to get the flu when I need their doctor’s attention. (I know, it is not all about me, but come on!)

There is a problem. A PROBLEM!!!! I never prepared myself for a problem!!! The doctor tells us to ask for more information from Ethiopia. We do and are told it could be several days. We are completely deflated. We have what is now a HUGE, WONDERFUL SECRET that we can’t share. We decide to accept the referral officially no matter what by Friday, with or without the updated info.

Wednesday: More agony. I am begging God for good news and for news soon. I feel unfairly treated by God and the universe – the longest wait for a referral from Ethiopia in history (though I have not checked this fact), a reaction I was ashamed of at the point of referral, a long wait for medical clearance and now this??? I was so ready to enter FULLY into joy.

Thursday: Even though WH staff were in meetings all day, at noon, our social worker sneaks me an e-mail – we have the medical info! We immediately send it to the adoption clinic. The nurse there takes the info to the doctor personally and they get back with us in less than 30 minutes. ALL IS WELL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We immediately start telling the world. Bill calls a staff meeting at our organization and there is joy. I am on cloud 9! I decide I will go to yoga with a friend at 4 (I needed it!). Before that, we run to get papers notarized, I go to the bank (YIKES), all the while calling people on my cell phone to tell them of the good news. I am thrilled beyond thrilled to hear my friends say, one after the other, that I made their day or their week. Finally, this is real! Our moms are finally released from their oath to secrecy and can go public with their ridiculously cute ga-ga-ness. There is so much joy all around us.

That evening, I had double booked myself and felt terrible for not being at the first “Crafting With Spirit” group meeting. But it turned out to be a memorable night. Bill and I had been given $150 tickets to a fancy fundraising soiree downtown. Lucky for us, we only knew one couple there, so instead of having to make the rounds of small talk, we were privately celebrating what is happening to us in the middle of a crowd of people. I am visibly glowing (according to the one couple we knew) and we are enjoying good food, wine and super yummy fancy sweets of all kinds.

Friday: Bill says it is so nice to see me SO happy. I had not been this happy in a very long time. We bought each of the boys a set of PJ’s & one outfit. I snuggled with their PJ’s for a long time. It was as though I’d already been through a lot with them already.

Since then, a woman who was in Ethiopia to pick up her daughter the week before our referral sent me pictures of our oldest, A. I showed Bill and he asked, “Is that our son?” He looks so beautiful! He is smiling, unlike the referral photo.

For 2 years, 1 month and 1 day, I imagined and envisioned all kinds of scenarios for what my family would look like. Those visions helped me to survive the wait. On Friday, September the 18th, 2009, I almost didn’t recognize my children. Their picture, their story, contained more than I could ever have imagined or envisioned. They were no longer this vision I held. They were two very real little boys, very much needing a family. We were two souls, very much needing children. I was unprepared for reality, for how two little people would awaken a love I’ve never felt before in my life – a love that is already very deep, visceral and fierce! God had truly taken me by surprise. THIS reality is more than I could have dreamed or asked for. It is more, so much, so much MORE!

Referral, Part III - Giddiness

On Sunday, Bill and I both have responsibilities at our respective churches and are out the door without a chance to talk much. I am painfully aware that I still haven't said "yes" to this referral, even though my loving Bill has. I go to church, full of nervous energy. I go through the motions with the things I am in charge of, feeling more than my body can contain. During the service, I am overwhelmed with this scary/amazing “secret” I have. I picture myself sitting in the pew with little K on my lap. I picture A bashfully going up for children’s time. The thoughts fill me with unimaginable joy. Something is shifting in me and it is shifting fast. We are celebrating World Peace Day, but the pastor preaches on “Welcoming the Little Children.” I want to laugh out loud. I want to run home and tell Bill that I am falling in love with these boys. After church, I am asked point blank by a friend if I have any news. I squirm and somehow tell her the usual shpill though I am laughing inside and am so ready to get out of there! She must have thought I was acting so weird!

Back home, Bill is SO happy to hear the way I feel. We can’t wait to tell people. BUT, we are waiting on the medical evaluation. The adoption clinic is supposed to get results back to us within 48 business hours. So it is SUNDAY and they have until TUESDAY noon to get us the results. TUESDAY! I think I might just die of excitement before Tuesday, but we continue on with our little “secret.” At least we are finally on the same page. I am able to let go of all the junk and look at the picture of my boys again. Fear gets replaced by love.

Referral, Part II – Fear

The next part of the story is no fairy tale, but it is important in its own way. This is hard for me to write, but I think it might be helpful for some of those who are waiting, or who have had a similar experience in their referral. Seeing a picture of the boys sends me into scared shock. I am disappointed. I am disappointed that we didn’t get a little girl. I am disappointed that A is at the oldest end of our age request. I am disappointed that I had not been clairvoyant enough to envision these boys. I am upset at being disappointed. Bill and I debrief a bit and read all of the information we have on the boys. Bill heads back to work. I shower, go the drugstore and go mentor at the school. I do it all in a complete daze. I finally come home later in the afternoon and cry on and off for the next 24 hours. Bill and I go to a movie that night, exhausted and unable to take in all that has happened.


That night, I go to sleep crying and wake up crying the next day. I am afraid of so many things- afraid to accept the referral, afraid to reject the referral, afraid to parent two boys, afraid to say goodbye to the little girl I envisioned and most of all, afraid to wound my husband with the way I was acting! Though he was ready to accept the referral early on, he was on complete standby during my emotional roller coaster. Saturday was a hard day!


We still had told no one about what had happened. We didn’t want to tell until we officially accepted the referral. To officially accept, I had to get with the program and we were waiting on the medical report from the international adoption clinic. I felt I had to talk to someone, someone who would not judge me at this vulnerable moment, someone who could help me sort this stuff out, someone who was not Bill. We agreed for me to call my mom. Sworn to secrecy, she listened. The first thing she said was how wonderful boys are. I have two sets of brothers – two in the US from my mom (I am 7 & 8 years older) and two from Brazil from my dad (I am 12 & 16 years older). She thought her boys were so sweet, caring and fun. She helped me climb down that ladder of fear a few rungs.


Why this fear of boys? I had been the only girl growing up and since then I have formed very strong bonds with women of all ages. Though a complete and utter tomboy growing up, I have become a girly-girl woman who loves tea parties, pretty stationary, baking, frilly PJ’s, books by and about women, sewing, crafts, etc. In the leadership development programs I ran, little girls attached to me in a way that boys never did. The boys in our community have been mostly raised by single mothers or grandmothers with multiple factors working against them and extremely few, if any positive male role models in their lives. They are pretty wounded and carry around hard shells of what they think being a man means. Deep down they are lovable, but I must admit they are harder to connect with, for the most part.


But these aren't my boys. They are going to have a wonderful father! My mom was able to make calm down and think from a better place. Bill gave me a lot of grace, too. He reminded me that I created a vision of what our family would look like as a means to survive and keep hope for the last 25 months. I was convinced we would have a boy and a girl and that they would either be twins or at the youngest end of our age request. But that was not reality. Reality took me by surprise.


That night, I go to sleep a little more peacefully, a little less hard on myself, but am still completely and utterly overwhelmed.

9-18-09, Friday, Referral, Part I: Shock

This particular morning, I had a Yoga class at 9:30 am. I dropped Bill off at work first. I told him, “If Wide Horizons calls, you’ll have to call the Yoga studio because I left my cell phone at home.” I go to Yoga and have a very relaxing class – it felt like a good thing to be there. I get out of class, an hour later, and the woman at the desk asks for Evelyn, saying, “Your husband wants you to call him.” I get slightly nervous, but talk myself out of it. How many times in the past two years have I thought, “This could be it!” and it wasn’t? I tell myself that Bill probably just wants me to pick up something else at the drugstore on my way home. I call Bill, who says, “You need to come home.” Come home! That doesn’t sound like he needs something at the drugstore! He says, “E called, we probably have a referral for two boys, one a little older.” (Probably? Is it a referral or not?)


I let out a very audible gasp and start shaking, in the entrance to the very small yoga studio, where the women from the class I just left are talking, getting their shoes on, etc. I hang up with Bill, agreeing to go home to hear the rest of the details form our social worker together. “Are you alright?” the yoga instructor asks. I am not able to really talk, but somehow get out that we’ve been waiting 25 months for a referral and that I think this is it. She hugs me and helps me settle a bit. Another woman overhears the conversation and says she is an adoptive mom. I get some congratulations and head out the door.

On my way to the car and then home, I am trying to control my breathing and focus on getting home safely. I am in shock, but determined to get home in one piece, even though I feel my mind, body and heart are all over the place.

I am met at the front door by Bill. We both have stunned, excited looks on our faces. We get the computer set up and call Wide Horizons. E tells us of two little boys, A, 33 months old and K, 5 months old. She tells us their story, which makes me cry and Bill tear up. We are completely overwhelmed. We hang up and wait for an e-mail with their pictures. Their pictures!

You know what this means?

My life has changed! I am starting a new journal. I am completely, utterly, madly in love with two little boys! A, 34 months old and K, 5 months old. I can't believe it happened. To me. I feel like the luckiest woman in the world. Bill and I are head over heels and so incredibly happy.

I have known of them since last Friday!!!!!!!!!! I finished my necklace on Wednesday and heard of them Friday. I was in agony wanting to tell the world! I wasn't able to do that until today! See my last post? Enlarge that picture. I have a ridiculous grin on my face because I am picturing my little boys in that room.

I would NEVER have made it without you, friends. Thank you for all of the amazing support. Now excuse me while I go back to lala land... :)