Surviving Mother's Day

Normally, I can keep myself out from under the black cloud of depression and dig myself out of the gaping hole of sorrow that accompanies infertility. I put on a very brave face, and for the most part, it isn't an act. I have a good life, and I focus on what I have and enjoy the moments of peace. 

I love summer. I love the warm mornings, the long evenings, the flip-flops, the swimming, the camping...the list goes on and on. What I don't love about summer is the two most painful days of the year: Mother's Day and Father's Day. I love my mom.  She is my best friend.  I didn't realize that I liked her until I was an adult, but that tends to happen with snotty teenagers. I enjoy celebrating her as my mom. But for me, Mother's Day is also the day that the knife in my heart gets twisted, jabbed in and out, and spit on a few times. Mother's Day is the sole day set as a reminder of what I am not. And what I may never be. What I may never have. (I love our fur-babies, but I seriously don't consider myself a "mom" because I feed and walk a dog or scoop a cat box).  

Father's Day is painful, too.  It is the day to remind me that I have failed my husband. I have failed to fulfill his wish to be a dad and to give a child the great experiences that his dad gave him. Father's Day doesn't seem to bother K as much as it bothers me. But he deserves to be a dad. And I can't give that to him. 

So, as I sit here wallowing in my own self-pity, I just ask you to remember you infertile friends on these days. I don't ever want to take any of your joy or happiness, and you are all amazing inspirations to us as parents. I know this is a buzz-kill, and I don't mean it to be. I don't really have an ending to this black posting. So I'm linking some etiquette rules for dealing with buzz-kills like me when we get on pity-me rampages :)

http://www.resolve.org/support-and-services/for-family--friends/infertility-etiquette.html

Update, Rant, References in no particular order

The reference letters have gone out. One of the references was nice enough to snap some pictures so I know what they are asking about us. I know that our friends don’t see it as a nuisance, but it seems…off putting…to me to ask others to take the time and fill out 4 pages of mini-essays. These people have lives, too! Plus, this was done 5 years ago! We haven’t become felons or mass-murderers since that time (trust me, they check the criminal history backgrounds). Here are some of the questions asked of our references:

Q: Characterize their ability to tolerate challenging or negative behaviors or emotions in themselves or others. Hypothetical Answer (HA): if it is negative behavior in each other, they’ll smack each other upside the head and move on. This probably applies for kids, as well.
Q. Characterize their ability to deal with rejection by a child.
HA: isn’t life all about rejections? I was a total dork in high school and was rejected constantly.
Q: Describe their ability to delay their own gratification such as affection, respect, sleep & personal time. HA: Nope, all about the instant gratification. Sheesh. How about 6+ years trying to have a baby? If there is a better example of delayed gratification, I’d like to know! Move along.
Q: Describe their ability to find happiness in small increments of improvement or change in others.
HA: we married each other, didn’t we?
Q (my personal favorite): if for some reason you were unable to care for your children, would you feel comfortable in allowing the applicants to care for them on a permanent basis? Why or why not?
HA: Only if I want my kids to be rednecks like K!

I’m so glad that the friends we chose to be references have a good sense of humor and don’t mind the semantics of government questioning. In my opinion, the questionnaires should be this simple:
Q: Are they good people? If yes, proceed to next question. If No, STOP & return forms.
Q: Do they enjoy beating children for recreation? If yes, STOP and return forms. If No, proceed to next question. And so on.

On a different note, we went to what I was told was an “orientation” for foster & adoption. What it really was was a recruitment meeting to try & reel in more prospective foster parents. K was extremely upset about going, as it was 2 hours of his evening for things we’ve already heard. I insisted we go. Maybe I’m a glutton for punishment, because he was right. It ended up being 2 hours of this: foster care is great!! We support you. We give you help when needed. The birth parents are great people. The State loves you. The kids aren’t too bad all the time.
We actually had a hard time keeping straight faces and not scoffing or laughing during a lot of it. Granted, our past experience was basically a fluke. Everything that could go wrong, did. We had a horrendous licensing worker whose response to everything was “if you had kids of your own…” like we were complete effing morons who knew nothing about life, children, human beings or common sense because we didn’t have kids of our own.
(Tangent warning) This is probably the biggest thorn in my side in general. NO, we don’t have kids of our own. This is NOT by choice. YES, we know everything is different when you have kids. YES, we know that we can’t really comprehend how hard/time consuming/exhausting/rewarding it is to have children because we don’t have them. I GET IT!!! We definitely know how to enjoy our free time now, spend money on vacations, sleep in, stay up late, go to concerts, etc. We KNOW that will all change with the first kid. HOWEVER, just because we don’t have kids, doesn’t mean we are stupid. I babysat from the age of 13. Not my siblings, but stranger’s children, whom I found by going door to door advertising my “expertise”. My youngest sibling is 1.5 years younger than me. There was no raising of him. There was no babysitting him (yeah, like he would have EVER listened to me as an authority figure!). I have a lot of nieces and nephews. I have friends with children. I’ve had friends with children who have lived with me. I’ve worked in hospitals and as a family practice MA. I gave shots to your kids. I’ve done foster care. I’ve been a GAL/CASA for kids in foster care. I’ve done it, and some of it is a lot harder than just normal kids. So, to sum up, having-or not having-kids of our own is NOT an answer. Oh, also, you having kids does NOT make you better than me. I know you are working harder than I am and you are raising a functional human being, but you’re not better than me. Which brings me to a hilarious web-site: http://www.stfuparentsblog.com/ Good fun for parents and non-parents alike.

Anyhow, with our previous experience with foster care, the State gave us the kids and disappeared. There was no response to numerous phone messages. Nobody read emails and some even came back as undeliverable. It took me 9 hours to get permission to take the youngest to a doctor for an ear infection. We weren’t allowed to cut the hair of the oldest even though her lice was so bad, she was being bitten in the face. We were the prime example of “out of sight, out of mind” and K’s favorite saying “Not my fucking problem”.
One thing they told everyone in the orientation meeting is that “We are a team. We work together. If something needs to get done that you, as a foster parent cannot do without permission, we get it from the administrator without problem.” What they failed to mention to the other glassy-eyed people (my cousin excluded) was the process of permission:
1. Foster parent (FP) leaves voicemail for case worker.
2. FP leaves three more voicemails and sends three emails over the course of 5 days.
3. Case-worker finally gets annoyed & calls FP back, discusses issue & says “I’ll talk with the administrator to get permission and call you right back.
4: repeat steps 1 & 2.
5: Day 10-case worker calls back, says it is still “in review”.
6: repeat steps 1 & 2.
7: Answer is yes, paperwork will be processed, sent to court, added to case plan, discussed with birth parents and you will be informed of when you can go forward. OR answer is no. Deal with it.
Phew, that was a LONG 3 weeks just to see if you have permission to take the child to the water park.

I guess it is a good thing that we are experienced now in how this really works. We know that we can be picky, because they will push us to do things we don’t want. We know to be a pain in the ass and make them call us back just to shut us up. We also know THEY NEED US, not the other way around. We want to do this. We want to help kids. But we will not be bullied in the process. And trust me, They. Will. Try.

Conclusion: We’re very thankful that we don’t have to go through the training again!! It is 27 hours of the same unicorns-and-butterflies-and-rainbows stuff that the orientation was.
I got fingerprinted yesterday & K goes next week. The next step is just waiting for the criminal back ground checks to be done and schedule a home visit.

Let's start this over

Well, it's been a little over two years since my last post. In all honesty, it got depressing to basically update on something that just wasn't happening. We were both busy with our jobs and life in general.  

So, the last two years. Let's see...I don't really remember too much in 2011 to write about, is that bad? It must have been a big blur!  I'm sure BSU football was involved, as well as camping, trips to Elko and lots of friends, whitewater rafting, dogs...Oh, and we did our annual Browns trip to San Francisco this time. We flew into Reno, and then drove to SF with Mom & MOD. We did the full tourist experience, because K has never had the fun of exploring SF before. Alcatraz was the favorite, as well as the food at Tadick Grill.  It was Halloween weekend, and that was a sight to see!! The Browns lost (of course!) but it was still an amazing trip.

2012: We did a frozen cycle in February. Basically, they thaw out the embryo's that were frozen from the fresh IVF. I did a ton of injections, but this time, they were horrendous. The worst part was that they were Intramuscular (IM) injections, so into a muscle instead of just under the skin, and I had to do two daily.  Since K is still terrified of needles, I had to do them myself. But IM can't be done in the belly. Ideally, they should be done in the bum.  But, since I can't contort that easily, I did them into my thigh.  By the end of it, I was almost in a wheelchair because my muscles were so shot from the injections. I had huge knots in each thigh and my doctor was amazed I was still walking! Everything looked good, we did the transfer, and...nothing.  No sticky bean. Life goes on. 
We were fortunate enough to go to Hawaii again!  Yep, K earned his 2nd President's Club honor. This year it was the Four Seasons Maui. We were prepared for this trip, so we stayed a few extra days and did lots of fun excursions. They had to drag me out of the water each day, as the snorkeling was amazing! We did a whale-watching tour and saw a few playful baby humpbacks. We made new friends and were sad to come home.  
We bought a new camp trailer that summer as well, so most of the summer was spent camping as often as possible. We did discover new destinations, explored the original Oregon Trail, spent 4 amazing days in Hell's Canyon and took the mutts with us often. 
Our Annual Browns trip was to Indianapolis. Let me tell you, what an AMAZING city!  It was so clean and there was so much to do just walking distance from our hotel. We stayed right down town and could see Lucas Oil Stadium from our hotel. We did a murder mystery dinner, Indy 500 and kissed the bricks at the finish line, the NCAA Hall of Champions, the War Memorial Museum, the Indianapolis Art Museum...and of course, the football game.  Again, the Browns lost, but the experience was awesome. The stadium is beautiful and, as disappointing as it was to not see Petyon play (he went to the Broncos last year), it was so cool to see how he still had the crowd trained to be silent on offensive plays. You could hear a pin drop! But, the coolest part of the trip was meeting Rebecca Lobo. If you don't know who she is, Google her. Short of it, she's an Olympic Gold Medal Women's Basketball star who is now a commentator. The WNBA Championship was that week and game 4 in Indy (Fever!) was there. She was staying in our hotel and having drinks at the bar. Naturally, K recognized her and started chatting away.  She even bought our drinks! She told us that Game 4 was the next night, and balcony tickets were $10. So we figured we can't lose. I know zilch about basketball and negative zilch about Women's Basketball, but it is still a fun time. So we went, experienced the beautiful new digs and watched the Indiana Fever win the championship game!  That was pretty darn cool, I don't care who you are!!

So, fast forward to now.  I had surgery on my hand/wrist in February and I'm slowly gaining function back from that, but it's a slow, painful process with nerves entrapped and junk.  Oh, and K was nominated by the bank to be sponsored for the Graduate School of Retail Bank Management. Basically, it is a three year graduate degree in banking. They are paying for everything, and most of it is online. He gets to enjoy three weeks in the summer in South Carolina (ha!).  This July will be his 2nd year. They stay in the dorms, eat in the cafeteria, etc. He's a college student all over again! Also in the past two years, I've had two new nephews born. 6 of our "close friends" couples have had babies.  We're surrounded by babies! We did see a new specialist out of Salt Lake City, and he was awesome. K loved him. He has a program that does 4 fresh IVF and unlimited frozen (based on how many you have to freeze each time).  It is a 100% money-back program if you don't take a baby home.  It's also $20,000 cash and does not include the medications.  So, we'll get to that when we win the lottery.  *sigh*

The reason for updating this blog, is that we have decided to take the re-leap back into foster parenting. We have a huge support network now and just feel much more prepared. Plus, our experience as CASA/GAL (court appointed special advocate/guardian ad litem) has taught us a lot more of the in's & out's of the foster care system and what our rights are. So, while we are not actively pursuing IVF at the moment due to money constraints, I figured we would chronicle the foster care process. Maybe it will open (or shut) some eyes of other prospective foster parents.  Keep in mind, we have done this before, but it was a HORRENDOUS experience. It has taken 5 years to be prepared to embark on this again.  Hopefully, this time around the results will be better! 

It is starting slowly for now. We submitted the application last week. I spoke with a 'recruiter' today and the licensing worker. We still have to get fingerprinted and do the background checks again, as well as the home visit since we're in a new house (well, new from last time we did this). My fingerprinting is scheduled for May 8th, if that gives you any idea of how slow it all is. But, I did find out that we don't have to go through all of the training again! Woo-hoo!! There's 8 weeks of time we don't have to lose this summer!! 

I hope to be a bit more productive this time around on the blog, but we'll see. Summer is coming up quick and the last thing I want is to be behind a computer any longer than needed!