Overall, adoption is very hard at times, emotionally can wreck your heart in one moment and then the next moment be filled with wonder and excitement. I give a lot of credit to anyone who has been part of an adoption plan. Just the continuous questions of "Any word yet?" from loving friends, families and strangers are always bittersweet. It makes me happy to know they truly care but I wonder if they think they won't hear our screams and shouts throughout the whole world once we are matched! They will know and so will you - if you follow the blog! I promise!!
So, while it has been 8 months now, we received a big envelope from our agency today, stating that it has been a year since our application and it is time to update. [insert crushed emoticon] as flashbacks from last year, spending days upon days at the computer writing our life story out, filling out paperwork for what felt like weeks and finally having that huge sigh of relief once it finally went through are all happening again as a pile of paperwork lays on my desk next to me.
"Dear Jill & Phil, We are writing to inform you that your home study will soon expire" read more like "Dear Jill & Phil, We are writing to inform you it has been a year and you have not been chosen and now we would like for you to go through all of the toughest emotions of being vulnerable and try again with hopes that you wont be doing the same next year and Oh! We need more money - to the tune of $650!"
One of the questions in the update is about our finances, have they changed over the year and I would love to be honest and say they (whoever controls the costs) should start to look into lowering the HUGE cost for adoptive parents. When I sign the checks away, I just think how much this money could help with our child. It certainly brings up questions if we are on the right road in regards to agency vs. lawyer vs. doing it our self, especially because we have only been shown a few times in the year, much of that is because we are semi-closed off on our adoption key (those who are adopting will understand that a bit more).
So how are we on our 8th month update...