Climbing Aboard

So, the train station. The platform.

I hate them, and yet they have become a source of weird comfort. They are familiar; even though the snack selection sucks and the bathrooms are gross, there is comfort in familiarity. You know what you’re getting and what to expect. You know which hot dog stand will let you take all the ketchup packets you want and which bathrooms to avoid. It’s not fun, but it’s predictable.  Hopping on a train, though the whole point, can be hard.

After the surgery, we examined the map again, so to speak, and considered our next move.  Move towards adoption, or try again at giving it a shot at growing one?  Deciding felt like a loss either way. It was like we were toddlers who wouldn’t decide which shoes to wear and cried whenever we put a pair on because we wanted to wear the other ones, but then the grown up side of us wanted to JUST PICK A PAIR SO WE CAN LEAVE THE DAMN HOUSE ALREADY.

As we sat the two options in front of us, we noticed that there was something about adoption that continued to draw us in. It felt a little brighter; there was a sort of shine to it that gave us hope. While we knew there were difficulties and potential heartbreak with that path, it was new. Unchartered territory. Like that boyfriend named Pierre who still can’t decide if he wants to commit to a relationship or spend the next year working on an organic soybean farm, we remained unconvinced that biological kids would work “for real” this time.

As we continued to stare at Thing 1 and Thing 2, I noticed a pattern: every time I would lean towards adoption, an anxiety would well up inside of me – What happens if we adopt a child and the second it’s in our arms I spontaneously conceive?  I continued to perseverate on this like my dog stares at shiny things until my inner parent interjected with that condescendingly patient tone, Well, Bethany, 1+1=2, so that would mean that you would have two kids instead of one.  Oh. Right. If I DO get pregnant, then… I have an additional child. Right. And the human race has continued to evolve, so while challenging, it IS humanly possible to raise two children close in age. And then another fear crept in – What if we decide in a couple years we want to try fertility treatments again? Well, as it turns out, it is not a requirement of adoption that I hand over my uterus and say Here you go, I hear I must trade this for a baby?  And also –if we DID get pregnant naturally (which is unlikely but certainly not impossible), the likelihood of having two kids (which we would like) biologically IS very slim. So, we finally came to terms that some of my biggest holycrapholycrapholycrap worries could actually be incredible blessings (as well as a multi-year sentence of about fourteen minutes of sleep a night.)

So, onward. We filled out over thirty pages of paperwork that detailed some of the most intimate details of our lives, had multiple interviews, and allowed a (very kind) stranger into our house to look in our closets and ensure they did not house a meth lab or exotic animals. We did several background checks and I was waiting for someone to tell me how to prepare for the cavity check when our caseworker looked at us and said, “Well, that’s it.”

“What next?” I asked, expecting her to pull out the Bill of Rights and asking us to translate it into Latin.

“That’s it. I’ll polish up your home study, and then you’re ready go.”

By ready to go, you mean…

“Ready to advertise yourselves. There are several different options out there. You can just advertise on social media, or there are websites that expectant parents look at that have varying prices…”

Wait. We’re done?

I had become accustomed to assuming that there was always going to be one more thing to do. One more test to run. One more pill to try. One more piece of paperwork to fill out. One more background check to get. One more class to attend. Every time we had started to get our hopes up that we were nearing the end, or at least nearing a mile marker, we’d find out there was further to go. It was like running a marathon where the finish line kept getting moved farther and farther away. Eventually, you start to assume that you will never be done, even when you see the finish line on the horizon.

As we wrapped up that conversation with our caseworker, she reminded us of how there were no promises with timing. We could be matched with a baby in two years or in three months or never or tomorrow. She recommended that we get a few essential items ready – carseat, onesies, diapers, portable toddler urinals – in preparation.  The thought of gathering tangible items for a baby seemed odd and foreign, like buying windshield wipers for a car we didn’t own. She gave us some more advice about making an online adoption profile and reminded us to call her whenever we had any questions. We thanked her for her time and walked her to the door.

We stood inside our doorway, silent. Seth hugged me, and I cried. And cried. And then cried some more. I cried out of relief. I cried because answering pages and pages of questions that ask about everything from childhood trauma to our biggest fights to how infertility has affected us takes a lot out of you. I cried because it was hard to believe we were done. But mostly, I cried because of a feeling I hadn’t felt in awhile when thinking about parenthood – hope. I felt Hope.  I felt ready to get on another train. I felt excited about the future. Letting Hope in when you’ve shoved it in the closet and shut the door as fast as possible to keep it from sneaking out feels strange at first.  It’s like, “Hmm, what’s that smell? Did someone leave the oven on? Who lit that lovely scented candle? Is Joanna Gaines here?” Opening that door and letting Hope waft through the house takes some adjustment, but I felt a lightness and joy I hadn’t felt in awhile.

After a round of spousal hugging and crying, we decided to move on with our evening, and Seth went outside to do a couple things in the yard. My mind wandered to our storage shed that still had baby items a friend had given me when she cleaned out her kids’ things. “I know it’s premature,” she had said, “but I’d rather give this stuff to you than someone I don’t know. Put it in storage out of sight until you need it.” I had followed these directives and shoved them in the back corner of the shed; every time I went out there, I would avert my gaze from that corner and try to pretend they weren’t there.  And now, mere minutes after our caseworker had left, my feet carried me without my brain’s full consent outside and to the shed. I pulled the bags out and brought them inside, folding the clothes and sorting them by size. And, also - sobbing. I sobbed as I touched each item as if it already belonged to a baby.  I sobbed as I marveled at the insane tiny-ness of each item. And I kept sobbing. Months of grief and deferred hope that I had shoved in the freezer to keep moving on with life was rapidly defrosting.

And then, Seth walked back in, work gloves on and walking with the intention of a man in project mode.  He stopped in his tracks when he saw me and a mound of baby clothes on the couch. From his perspective: Ten minutes ago Wife was getting ready to go take a shower. Now Wife is crying over newborn baby onesies. He sighed a loving but concerned sigh with a half-smile, took off his work gloves, and sat next to me on the couch. He held me for a minute before he tentatively asked in the voice a man uses when he is treading in uncertain emotional territory – “Um… this is good, right?”

“Yes! Yes, it’s good. It’s very good. It’s just… I never wanted to look at these clothes, but now all of a sudden I want to. It’s the first time in while that… I’ve… had… hope.”

“I know. I know, babe.” He sat with me for a few more minutes, and when I had recollected myself, left me to continue my catharsis.

So, now, we have accomplished another step in the journey. We have the legal document we need to be eligible to begin the adoption process should the opportunity present itself.  The only thing we need to do next is to get the word out that we are ready to adopt. The quickest way to do this is through websites that allow you to make a profile that expectant parents seeking to place their child for adoption can look at. They are easy to use and simple to complete when compared to the mounds of adoption paperwork. But this time, there is a new thing that seems to get in the way of getting that done. Not time, or collecting the right documents, or figuring out how to navigate the system. It’s different than that, and writing it down makes me feel very vulnerable and small –

I’m scared. I’m really, really scared.

Waiting for awhile to have a kid is kind of like standing on a diving board at the edge of a pool that you’re really excited about jumping into, but when you have to stand on the edge for awhile, you also have a chance work yourself up about how cold the water’s going to be and wow this diving board is really high and what if you bellysmack and what happens if you realize you don’t know how to swim once you hit the water?  All the lovely friends and family watching say they’ll be there to help you stay afloat, and you believe them because they are indeed very lovely people, but what if you’re really cranky with them at times because you’re so tired and what if you feel like you’re asking for help too many times and will they be annoyed when you say it’s hard because you also wrote a whole damn blog about how hard waiting was?

This time, I don’t have thirty-seven pages of paperwork to blame. Just that I’m scared and have become really good at finding other things that MUST BE DONE IMMEDIATELY the last couple weeks to avoid the scaredy feelings. Because in swift succession after the fear comes another from the Hall of Mom Feelings – guilt. Guilt that I am feeling scared in the first place because I also want this so very badly.  Guilt that I put off doing a simple thing that could make our dreams come true. It’s a crappy cycle that often leads directly to chocolate.

I’m learning a lot, though. I’m remembering that I have felt the most scared before best and most life-changing things I have ever done. I’m reflecting on my adaptation of an Anais Nin quote: “Our lives expand in proportion to our courage,” and envisioning what that expanded life could look like. I’m learning that fear is not a chain I must completely untangle myself from before I move forward; that sometimes you shake off just enough anxiety to get some traction under your feet so you can take the next step. I’m realizing that fear and uncertainty will probably creep in a lot in this journey, and that it’s less about trying to shove them away and more about recognizing the fear for what it is, discerning what thoughts are helpful and what are not, and then gently nudging them aside so we can continue forward.

And so, a new train.  There is a lot that can go wrong on this line. There are spots where the track isn’t perfectly straight and the weather might get bad and at some point a cow will probably wander on the track and block us from making progress. But there are also a lot of beautiful things to see and some amazing potential destinations. We know that fear and guilt and sadness will probably hop on the train from time to time, but we’re determined to keep moving forward.

Onward.