Catching Up
I’ve written about a dozen posts in my head over the last week but frankly haven’t had time to commit them to paper. The overwhelming amount of information I’ve been sifting through about adoption agencies in my rare free moments has rendered me completely ineffective in just about every other “free time” area of my life.
But back to that in a moment.
Yesterday I handed my remaining Repronex off to a fellow patient at my clinic. It was a strange feeling. I felt lighter. But sad. I hope she has better luck with it than we did. Honestly, I didn’t think that the Repronex really helped me. Even our smaller successes were had with Follistim. But that pile of meds in my closet was a link to the hope of possibility that comes with trying.
I still have a bunch of Heparin if anyone is in need of any though. Just leave a comment and I’ll put it aside for you.
What really lingers from the past few years of trying is (1) exhaustion and (2) debt. I look at myself in the mirror and can’t believe how exhausted I look all the time. I’m praying that in a few months, when all of the meds are truly out of my system and some of the adoption decisions are made, that some sort of rest will overtake me. We have a get-out-debt-plan. And it’s a workable one. But trying to figure out adoption agency payment plans in addition is a bit of a challenge. Yes, there are adoption grants but you can’t apply until after you’ve had the home study (which won’t happen until we’ve actually found an agency as some will only work with certain others). There are also no-interest or low-interest adoption loans. I’m just not sure we’d get one until we can gets some of our other debts paid off. The frustrating thing is that we’ll be in a much better place by the end of the year. But when you’re looking at international adoption, which can take up to 3 years, you don’t want to delay more than you have to. Particularly if you’re already into your 40’s.
In trying to choose an agency, we’re looking for one that back-ends it’s fees (i.e., you pay the bulk of it at or after referral rather than at the very beginning of the process). That would allow us to get into the whole thing without taking on a huge amount of debt (the federal tax credit and hubby’s employer’s contribution will allow us to pay off a chunk of it but neither are applicable until after the adoption is finalized – unlike domestic adoption where you can take the credit in the year in which the payments are made).
The only plus at the moment is that we’re in agreement in our plan. To adopt a girl from Bulgaria. As young as possible but given the realities of the situation there, we’re expecting a 3 year-old.
When talking to my dad about all of this, I explained to him why we were looking overseas. It honestly isn’t my first choice – I’d much prefer to adopt an infant from the US who hadn’t been put through the experience of being institutionalized. But vainly, we do want to raise a child who bears at least a passing resemblance to us (both of us are caucaisan and have dark hair and eyes). The thought that we could raise a child only to have the birth mother/father change their minds, terrifies me. Also, and I know that this is terribly un-PC to say…..neither of us are comfortable with open adoptions and that seems to be the way of things at the moment. I have great respect for those of you who are going through an open adoption. Sincerely. But neither of us want the confusion of the birth family in the picture although, speaking for myself, if my teenaged or adult child wanted to find their birth family, I’d do everything I could to assist them. Of the three people close to me who are adopted one has never had any interest in finding his birth parents. The other two seem to go back and forth. It must be a very deep-rooted and complex set of emotions.
Anyhow, I currently have a list of about eight agencies that I’m in touch with to varying degrees. Finding out about their programs, experience, fees. I never thought that anything would make ART look easy but getting a progesterone shot once a night and taking some Follistim seems VERY easy compared to this.
Somewhere in Between
In response to a question (from my father no less)…..yes, I’m keeping this blog open. It may change it’s tone and be more focused on adoption and reflection and trying to adjust to everything but hopefully, it will end up where I always dreamed it would – as a parenthood blog.
In the meantime…..I’m grateful that this weekend wasn’t the sobfest I was expecting. I’m always much better when prepared in advance and I did know that this was coming. Not that there were no hard moments. I spent yesterday morning running some errands and decided to pop into the mall. Really, this goes on my #1 list of places NOT to go on a legal holiday when you’ve just found out that your last ART cycle has failed. TONS of small children everywhere. Mostly blocking doorways and running around screaming and I have to admit that those kids don’t make my heart ache. But with others it was a different story.
I survived though and came home to sort out my meds. I now have a huge box of needles and syringes to donate to the clinic. I discarded the out of date vials of progesterone. I sorted through my Follistim stash but didn’t bother to add things up. I have enough to probably eek out one unmonitored but not crazy cycle and we’ll do that sometime before they expire this summer.
I do have a number of boxes of Repronex and some Heparin vials that I’d like to donate to someone without insurance. If this is your protocal please drop me a line by commenting on this post and I’ll get back to you.
Anyhow, we had a very nice but somewhat sureal Valentine’s Day. The last thing I wanted was to sit home all day on Saturday thinking so we headed out to a park we hadn’t been to and had a great walk with the dog. Then home to go to a nearby restaurant that we’d been looking longingly at since we moved here but couldn’t really justify. So we walk in promptly run into hubby’s hiring manager and his wife. I was used to running into people in NYC but not here where we really know no one. But we hung out with them for about an hour before we ate and found out that (among other things) they’d completed an international adoption recently. I don’t know the circumstances except that they have an older biological child. Although the question was in her eyes, the wife thankfully didn’t ask if we had kids although she fished a bit. I’m always leery of mixing work and pleasure (okay, that’s going to come as a huge surprise to the very close friends of mine who read this blog and who used to be co-workers) but I guess what I mean is….this is hubby’s boss’s boss. He’s been in his job for a week. I just want to tred carefully, you know? Anyhow….hopefully there will be further conversations and I can get all sorts of info when we need it.
Dinner was very nice after that and the tiny bar is probably the most interesting around. It’s always nice to know where those are.
And so, aside from the fact that I’m so buried in work that I’m turning down freelance work that I really want to do (and get paid for)….I’m feeling a bit stuck in the middle. We aren’t doing ART anymore but we haven’t moved on to adoption yet. I’m not taking meds anymore but I don’t have my body back yet either (and oh how I want all of these fertility meds out of my system and how I hope that I can get back to my “normal” weight). Hubby has his shiney new job but won’t get paid for a while and we’ve got bills to catch up on but I’m desperate to steal him away for a vacation. I’ve submitted out forest of medical bills to our tax guy but we don’t know if it will be enough to offset my freelance work. I know that we need to get started finding an agency to get the home study under our belts but I haven’t had time to even begin the research.
I have a digital picture frame on my desk at work and seeing all of these photos of hubby and I over the past 7 years has really made me want to find a way to re-focus on us for a while – to be indulgent. I suppose that will be easier than it was while cycling – I won’t have to worry about having to be in town for clinic days, home for shots, when I can’t drink, when we must or can’t have sex. I’m not sure how to get that mind-set back yet. I know how to focus on him, on us. But how do you stop being aware of every physical twinge and ache? Every burp that is the cause of a fizzy drink rather than progesterone.
I thought that the adjustment would come from the loss of hope and opressive sadness. And that will, I’m sure, hit at some point. But for now the adjustment is more mental: how do I move my thoughts? How do I put my energies into these other areas? What do I do with all of this knowledge that I didn’t used to have?
