Growing Family

"That's a WholeLottaCrazy", says The Captain

I don't know if it is the giddiness of The Naked Ovary's return and story, or watching my friend Lil being just days away from bringing her third into the world, that's addling my brain.

Yesterday we got an email from the agency we used to adopt Small Sun. It was a call for families. In an adoption industry where the majority of couples want to adopt healthy white infants, our agency is always looking for families to adopt children that are African American, or biracial. Right now they are facing about seven possible placements, with only two families ready for a placement.

I thought about it all day.

So far what I've found out about our ability to adopt as expats in Australia has run the gamut of Impossible -> insanely complicated. I was really interested in pursuing another (American) domestic transracial adoption, from abroad, but the only agency I've found that does expat adoptions closed their domestic program. They also looked sketchy.

It is technically possible that we could adopt and finalize before we moved...or by delaying our trip only slightly. We could adopt here with so little hassle - just update our homestudy and amend our visa application.

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The hardest part of transitioning to two for me was when Small Sun couldn't walk from the car to the front door and I was carrying him and the Sprout. She's mobile and while I couldn't just set her walking, she's pretty low-maintenance at this point.

Is that even possible? A child being low-maintenance? What am I saying?

I'm consistently well rested and we're in a pretty good groove here. I can imagine adding a baby to the mix. Having the contrast of birthing a child and adopting a child, I feel like I could adopt again a lot sooner than I could birth again.

It was about 11:30pm before we got in bed last night and I mumbled this idea out, half ashamed to even bring it up. I got my nerve up to ask the Captain what he thought and he shot of questions like rounds of ammunition. His closing remarks were "that's a wholelottacrazy". Until I prompted him for something more definite, and he managed to squeeze out a "we'll think about it, and pray about it, and see what happens."

See, I'm married to a good man. Most others would have bolted out the door, running for the hills in their boxers.

Perhaps that is the appropriate reaction?

PS- maybe I shouldn't be weaning the Sprout after all, I might need this milk supply. And maybe I shouldn't give away all of our baby stuff because we're moving...

Throw Pillow Therapy

Last night we received official correspondence from the Australian visa processing body. They are requesting some more documents. We seem to be a couple weeks away from having our application assigned to a visa processing agent. I suppose the letter should make me feel excited - our application is close enough to the top of the stack that someone is checking it out! Instead I just feel so tired. I've already done so much to get that application submitted in the first place. Did I ever tell you that the visa application required more paperwork than 1) the Captain's U.S. citizenship, or 2) adopting Small Sun? Not to mention costing a large sum.

So instead of feeling elated, I am hunkering down for the [hopefully] last couple months before we leave.

I am a space person. You may find that hard to believe in our little postage-stamp of a house where our way of life has the word minimalism stamped onto every choice. I am a space person in that the space I am in has a great affect on me. I hate clutter. I love a clear aesthetic.

So to calm my tattered will-we-ever-move-and-how-much-longer-can-I-make-it-in-this-teeny-tiny-itsy-bitsy-house-with-two-children-and-myself nerves, I organize and I un-decorate. I buy an organizational tote or bin at Target at least once a month. I give things away. I throw things out. I put things in the attic.

Today, sitting in the kid's room, feeling like I wanted to blah all over the walls, I got up and started pushing the furniture around. It is now in a new configuration that I'd tried before, but it worked today. Tonight I roamed the aisles of Target, allowing myself to buy some things for the house and for Christmas. On one hand I'm thinking "20$ for a throw pillow I'll be giving away in a couple months", on the other hand I'm thinking "If I don't find something to make me want to be in that living room for a couple more months I might go insane."

Each year we think it will be the last Christmas we spend in the U.S. with my wonderful family. Each year we toast and make a big deal, everyone saying "this is probably the last time we'll all be together for awhile." I LOVE Christmas, but the disappointment of still being here after so many "last times" has a lump in my throat. I'm hope next year I look back and cry at these sentiments, missing my friends and family, missing cold weather at Christmas, missing snow/icicles/holly actually making sense, missing my evergreen Christmas tree. I hope I am missing it all. I hope I'm crying nostalgic tears onto my kebab as I Christmas on the beach with the rest of Sydney.

Meeting Cloudscome

A couple of years ago I didn't read any blogs. I thought they were a silly fad - anyone and everyone publicizing their every thought? it did not sound appealing to me.

My first foray into the world of adoption online took place when we were adopting Small Sun. I spent a lot of time at the web forum Bethany Christian Services provides. There I was often struck by the poignant additions by a certain Cloudscome, also waiting to adopt (for the second time). She felt like a kindred spirit and we've been friends in the blogosphere for nearly three years.

Last week, during our holiday travels, I had the honor to meet Cloudscome at my grandparents old farmhouse. Our boys were a good match and while they spun leaves into the air and climbed a fallen tree, we snatched at conversation the way mothers of busy boys do.

I'm glad to know that I'm not the only one who lies awake at night, concerned about the implications of current adoption practice. Glad that I'm not alone in sometimes feeling panicked at the immensity of being a white mother with black sons in a culture that does little to help them, glad that another person wants to write seriously and get blog recognition but doesn't have the time to carry it through. Glad I'm not the only one that can have too thin a skin. Glad that in the world of adoption, where other adoptive parents are supposed to "get it" but miss me, that she and I could share an afternoon of talking, not explaining.

I'm thankful our boys took so quickly to each other. Thankful that they played the piano loudly, all three on the bench. Thankful that they climbed up on the couch under quilts to hold hands and read books. Thankful that they enjoyed the indoor fort we built, desperately trying to stretch their cheerfulness so that we could keep talking.

In the space of a holiday and family that leave me feeling conflicted, I am so glad that Clouds came. Thank you, for driving all that way.

Off Again

I'm sure you won't mind me going silent for the week while you are all trying to keep up with NoPloBlaMo or whatever it's called. I might not be able to catch up with all of your blogs after I've gotten a whole week behind!

I am heading out, bright and early, to go with my parents to visit my sister, then we'll meet up with the Captain for the ride up north. Fourteen hours in the car with kids? It really doesn't scare me anymore. We are traveling heroes.

The only thing that is slightly scary is the potty training... I don't know if Small Sun's car seat cover is removable/washable...I'll get back to you on that.

Everyone have an excellent Thanksgiving. We'll see you in seven.

Looking at Longing

This week I took the kids to the playgroup that our agency hosts for families with children adopted transracially. Since the last time we went they have opened the group up to families who are waiting to adopt, not necessarily transracially. They have also begun to require waiting families attend three agency-based meetings before they are approved, and made this group one of the meetings that could fulfill the requirement.

Typically the room is packed with "mis-matched" parents and children and it takes awhile to sort out who is who, and with whom. It is a lot of fun.

This week I walked in to a new room, a room full of quiet pre-adoptive parents. The facilitator welcomed me and explained the new policy and who all these couples were. She said "you're the only one here who's been through the process!" and turned to the couples and said "you can ask her all of your questions!". She just chirped it out like it was the greatest thing.

I gulped and looked around, wide eyed.

I used to facilitate these meetings. I used to coordinate the waiting family meetings as well. The thing that I so poignantly remember is the sheer vibration of longing in the waiting families, most of them choosing adoption after relinquishing hope of fertility. I remember the vacuum of energy that sucked out the door each time a family came to the meeting with their new baby. I remember the way the waiting women simultaneously wanted to cuddle the baby and know all the details, and turn their heads away because of the pain of it not being their baby. The quiet, internal, agonizing question of "will I ever be a mother?"

For about five seconds I thought about getting on my soapbox and telling these people, leaning forward in their seats, ogling my happy children, the WHOLE TRUTH about adoption. Then, I settled in my seat, got out a snack to distract the kids, and told them, in simplest terms, the story of our adoption. I put in a little bit about unethical state laws for birthparents, maybe something about the injustice of closed adoption records, but really, I just answered their questions and gave them the facts.

I know not many adoptive parents are asking the questions that I am. I think that hardly any pre-adoptive parents are. And I have to say, I can't really blame them. The questions I am asking might possibly be the deciding factor in becoming a parent, or not. For a woman aching to mother a child, I think it is nearly impossible to consider. I'm starting to think that it is for the love of a child, the love of my Small Son, that I can ask these big questions.

Sometimes, as a first choice adopter (meaning I can carry and birth children, by the grace of God, AND I'm choosing to adopt as well), I am cautious to voice my concerns with adoption to those starting out on their paths to adopt. If they ask, I tell all, but I feel so bounteously blessed with two children, and the ability to have and adopt more. I am grateful for the readers who come here, before they adopt, to listen and learn. That is a brave thing. Many of the questions I ask pain me, but I can only imagine how they must pain a woman whose only avenue to becoming a mother is adoption. I'm beginning to understand why a lot of people can't hear what I have to say. Believe it or not, sometimes I hold my tongue and simply talk about the wonders of how my son came to me, for their is wonder and magic in our story.

What a Friend I Have in Amie

Tonight I got together with my friend Amie and we talked, nonstop, for almost four hours! All about adoption and the challenges surrounding it, and about raising our black sons. It was so cathartic and rejuvenating and now I feel momentarily light and free, having dumped all my brain baggage at the coffee shop. We agreed that it should be a regular event.

Having my mind thus decluttered, I want to write about something that is important to me but was less important than the things that were piled up in my mind. I want to talk about Small Sun's hair.

For a mixed race family, or a family that has adopted transracially, hair is an important factor in helping to raise a confident child. Any mom who is out in public with a child whose hair is disheveled exposes herself to criticism, and that is magnified when their is a difference in the mother and child's race. When a white mom is out with a black child and the child's hair is unhealthy, unruly, inappropriately styled, or unkempt, she may be judged as not knowing how to care for her child's hair by both the white and the black community.

We didn't cut Small Sun's hair until after his first birthday, in keeping with a common practice in black American culture. In that first year his hair was long and soft and moved in the breeze. Now his hair has a thicker texture and his curls are tighter. I have been cutting his hair relatively short for awhile now because it looks very neat and handsome that way. His hair is not coarse enough to hold braids, but has several different curls textures so it can look a bit wild when it is longer.

The Captain and I both love his long hair and we would really like to grow it out. However, no matter how healthy and cared for it is, it will still look pretty wild when it is long. After I comb it out and put product in it, it will stay neat for about an hour but if he is playing outside or wearing his hoodie, it will get crazy. It won't tangle that fast, it will just get big.

Right now I am choosing to keep his hair short because I don't want to look like the white mom who doesn't know who to do with her black child's hair. I don't want Small Sun to look uncared for and I don't want to look neglectful of his appearance. Also, I think that letting his hair grow out would accentuate his ethnicity, while it is understated with short hair. I think if his hair was long and lovely it would draw more attention to him than he currently has. I don't know if that would be best for him right now.

So this is my question to you all - what would you do? Would you disregard the fact that some people might think his hair is too wild, and disregard the fact that most black families (judging by the children in our neighborhood, church, etc) would not let their sons have long hair that wasn't confined in braids? Am I doing Small Sun a disservice by keeping his hair short when I like it long, or am I doing him a favor by giving him as low a profile as possible in our high-profile family?

Do you have ideas for hairstyles for a boy that work well on medium-texture hair? If I had a son with a fine texture to their hair I would feel comfortable letting them grow it out to chin length, even if that is not a style many of my peers let their boys wear. We like funky style and value individuality. I'm just not sure how that works when you are making choices FOR your children and when there are numerous cultural expectations that all happen to coincide on my son's head.

What do you think?

Searching for the bottom Line

When is it okay to adopt someone?

I ran into my friend Amie at the park today. (Hi Amy *wave*). Seeing Amie always releases a kind of waterfall effect in me. All my pent up adoption questions and turmoils come boiling to the surface and spilling out in incoherent questions. Right now she's a friends who, even if she doesn't agree with me, will really listen to my questions and help me mull them over. I appreciate that so much.  We didn't get to talk much. I was with another friend, and Amie's kiddos were sick/recovering and confined to the stroller. So, I'll have to try to work out here what was rattling around in my brain when I had the possibility of a good, juicy adoption discussion waved under my nose!

So we want to adopt again in the next two years or so. We want another child (we want to have a big family), and basically, I'd like to mother a child who is in need of mothering. Doesn't that seem very simple? If only it were! I am divided between envying families that don't exhibit any evidence of an ethical dilemma when pursuing an adoption, and hating on them because they don't. Just being honest here.  It seems so nice to say "this child needs a home, I'll be the mommy, do the adoption paperwork, begin happily-ever-after." Simple. Done.

I'm trying to find a situation where it really is that simple. Where the child's need for a family can justify my desire to adopt a child. That is, without adopting a child with special needs. Again, just being honest.

So the move to Australia is looming closer and I begin to think about, "if it would be possible, would I want to pursue a domestic Australian adoption?" I know that Aboriginal children are disproportionately represented in Australia's child welfare system, just like children of color in ours. I think about the absolutely messed up history of Euro-Australian oppression and injustice perpetrated on the Aboriginal people and I conclude - no, I couldn't get involved in that. Just like I don't think I could really feel confident in pursuing the adoption of a child with First Nations heritage.

But is there any situation that doesn't involve the baggage and injustice that are the after-effects of colonialism and Europeans and Americans messing things up on a global scale?

Someone asked me, in real life, if there is something going on with Small Sun that has contributed to my recent bout of questions. My first response was "no, he's fine."

After they asked, I began to think some more. Before we adopted Small Sun, I didn't know that there were adult adoptees that wished they had never been adopted. I knew "some people" were against adoption, but I didn't know who, or why. Now that those details are getting filled in, I am scared sometimes. Scared that Small Sun will grow up to say "I don't belong here, you're not my people" or worst of all "I wish you'd never adopted me." I never had that fear before. I'm struggling with it right now.

Before I thought Small Sun's adoption narrative was leak-proof. Now, I see room for all sorts of questions to spurt out. I feel pressure, both from my existing adoption, and from my potential adoption, to find the  solution. The answer. The JUSTICE. The HEALING.

The other day I had that thought, those of you who have adopted will know it well, "The child we're going to adopt could be out there already! They could be conceived! They could already be born!" The first time around I thought that with anticipation and excitement. This time it was mixed with sadness and pain. What are the circumstances that will drive my child's mother to conclude that they cannot stay together? How is she doing? Is my child grieving?

I know those questions are more common for a family adopting a child internationally, rather than a newborn in America. I just can't seem to separate the difference between relinquishment (a loss) and adoption (a gain), as Nicole described it. Right now I am only seeing the loss, and it is so painful.

I'm sorry for the big jumble of thoughts and topics and emotions. I'm glad I have a place to tumble them out and sort through the pile. 

2nd Installation

Clutter in my Brain

There has been a lot going on around here lately. Every time I think about writing something I kind of wimp out. The ratio of bloggable events to non-bloggable has been pretty low. That is to say, there's a lot going on that I am not free to comment on here, but that is taking up my mental capacity to use this space effectively.

Monday morning the kids had been awake in their room for a good hour before we went in to get them (confounded daylight savings time, mfrm framuha). The scene that greeted us included a Little Sprout, painted all over her head and even IN HER EARS, a crib covered, and a table and toys covered with permanent marker. Small Sun stood on the table next to The Sprout's crib, like an artist showing off a painting. He had even put the lids back on the markers and put them back in the cup that contained them. He is, after all, a small boy who likes order.

The day proceeded to include eight (count them), eight accidents on the part of Small Sun. I call them accidents but what actually occurred was Small Sun spreading his legs, peeing on the floor and saying "mama, I pee pee." Oh really? I thought that was a leak in the ceiling that somehow channeled right down your leg! Finally I asked Small Sun "are you going pee on the floor because you're upset that Pappa went back to work today?" Without a moment of hesitation he looked me straight in the eye and said "yes".

Mondays are hard for Small Sun. Right now especially so. In general he prefers the Captain right now and he has a REALLY hard time when he goes back to work on Monday. This weekend we had The Sprout's birthday party and The Captain took Sprouty with him to run an errand and left Small Sun behind. He screamed hysterically and would not get off of the chair, watching out the window, for the Captain to come home.

If adoption loss profoundly affects the mother-child relationship, why is Small Sun so hung up on the Captain right now? Maybe because he's distancing himself from me and he needs his Pappa relationship to be secure? He feels pretty distant right now and I feel pretty tired. I'm not sure what I should be doing.

We had hit a sweet spot with the two kiddos. Maybe it was the relief that came after the first grueling months. I expected things to get progressively easier, but right now we're just in a tough spot. There is so much going on and I don't have the emotional energy to be supermom. I am preoccupied with griefs and disappointments and my children are suffering because of it. Again, I don't really know what to do.

Have you ever seen on t.v. a pack of animals confined in a place too small? They all start stepping on each other and biting each other? That's the way me and the kids are right now. I'm frustrated that I don't have any time to myself or any creative outlets, or opportunity to exercise. We're cooped up in the house because getting out takes so much energy. The kids keep wanting the same toy and I feel like the referee, my greatest task is to reset the timer so that they can wait for the "beep" to announce the next one's turn. Small Sun is restless and plays too rough with The Sprout. She cries, I feel angry at him, I feel guilty for feeling angry.

Bright spots in my life right now? I'm really loving our Beta fish. Seriously, he is so beautiful and he swims up to the glass when I go to say hi. Doesn't that sound like the most lonely pathetic thing in the world? Lonely housewife finds comfort in a fish while her children snarl in the background. Please, laugh with me. Let's all laugh together. If I smile some more, things will start to change.

From First Cry to Wobbly Steps, It's Been a Beautiful Year

This week I've been listening to Dave Matthews' Some Devil, Mindy Smith, Coldplay, and Gnarls Barkley, recreating the soundscape that helped me bring my daughter into the world. I've been watching the weather, wondering if it would follow the same pattern of a bright labor day and a dreary birthday. Last year the leaves were mostly off of the trees, this year many trees have yet to change color.

We celebrated yesterday with a small party of friends and family. I held The Sprout in my lap as she opened her presents, holding fiercely onto a new rattle, and laughing as she bit a stuffed chicken on the beak. She toddled around in her new shoes and she smeared icing in her hair.

My baby girl doesn't smell like baby anymore. I didn't notice the change. She hardly nurses these days. Just a little wake up snack in the morning and maybe a drive through drink once in the day. She's walking with the jerky, haphazard style particular to babies and the inebriated. She says "hi, uh-oh, mama, and corn" yes, corn. Sometimes she'll give me kisses but most of the time she won't. Unlike her brother who was always quick to obey, she is stubborn and likes to repeat the same inappropriate behavior ad museum.

Far past bedtime she is in her crib babbling and growling her throaty little growl. I love her so much it makes me ache sometimes. She may not smell like baby anymore but yesterday she smelled like pound cake all day (after having close physical contact with it during her cake eating experience) and I just buried my nose in her delightful little softness.

It was just yesterday that we were meeting face to face for the first time.