Growing Family

Exhaustion

There comes a point in a big transition where exhaustion sets in. There are still important things to be done, and meaningful goodbyes to be had, but the grueling work of it all starts to take its toll. The knees go weak, the resolve wanes, and lying on the couch with a blanket over the head seems the best possible course of action.

Friday night we had planned a final small group meeting with our church friends. Everyone was to bring a dish and just spend the evening enjoying each other. To my utter amazement, some dear friends currently living in Perth flew in and surprised us! I dropped my bags in the hall, and jumped and squealed with delight. If you know me in person, you know I am not really a squealing and jumping kind of girl, so you know I was excited!

In our early days here in Sydney our connect group really became our family. We'd do holiday lunches and trips to the beach together. These friends saw me pregnant and crowded into a hospital room with our new baby. They helped us when we became foster carers and they have carried us and walked with us for years. 

As life continues that group from the years that glow golden in my memory have dispersed to other towns, other churches, other seasons, but Friday they all gathered (except one dear couple), completely taking me by surprise. They made vegetarian dishes, there was live piano and cello pieces by dear friends, and in the end they played the Phillip Phillips song "Home" that is kind of an anthem in my heart for our children in this move. It was beautiful, and wonderful, and amazing to be loved so well by so many.

 

Today marked our last day at church and we said goodbye to some really treasured people. After an impromptu lunch at our favorite meeting place, Doytao Thai, and stuffing our bellies with some of the best Thai food in Sydney, it was time to say goodbye again. I did the ugly cry driving home, and slept at least two hours on the couch with a blanket over my head afterwards.

Two more hard goodbyes remain. I don't know if I'll make it through them. I might have to carry a blankie around with me!

Sprout has been very emotional and weepy for weeks. I took her in my arms and told her "a move like this is hard physical work, and it is also hard emotional work. It is normal that we are exhausted from feeling so many feelings, and that makes it hard for us to act normal. We'll be okay."

Though it is tempting, I'm trying to force myself to not escape from these hard goodbyes. I'm sitting and feeling the sadness, setting my phone and laptop aside so that Facebook and house hunting and Pinterest don't become a veneer to gloss over this pain. It is a privilege to love so many so much that it hurts to say goodbye. 

Two more days until a 4:30 am wake up for an 8:30 flight. We are all pulling together, comforting each other, leaning heavily on the strong family bond that we carry from here to there.

Fast-Fast-Slow

The removalists are at the house for the second day. They are packing up the last bits and pieces, and getting everything into the shipping container. It is pouring rain, and I'm so thankful they wrap everything in plastic.

We are staying at a friend's house and the kids are letting off some steam, enjoying a place with lots to do (chickens, playroom, cubby house, trampoline, new toys! what could be better?). We are grounded until the movers are done, and the rain makes going anywhere unappealing, so we are enjoying some forced down time.

After going like mad for weeks, really months on end, it feels so strange to sit here and relax. I hardly know myself!

On the other side of the globe my brother is packing up his household and family and leaving Tanzania in preparation to move to Budapest for the next couple of years. We'll all be reunited in Nashville for one blissful weekend, with my sister in from NYC.

As The Captain says, "it's all happening."

Television Spa Treatments

I suppose everyone has their little routines to unwind, a couple steps to take you from dragging to recovery.

Some people hit the spa, have a glass of wine, a cup of tea, or a run.

I watch tv. 

In the last year or so I've built a happy little routine into my week. Several days I try to get Finch down for a rest in his room, and after the lunch dishes are done I sit down and watch a tv show on the laptop. There is usually a piece of dark chocolate involved. Even if I fold laundry while watching, it's just nice to sit down, and get pulled into a story before snapping back to reality 45 minutes later. It's a small little pleasure, but I enjoy it so much!

With this move I've been waking up every morning before the sun, with my belly churning with stress acid, and overwhelm at the day's tasks. I've been falling asleep on the couch after working hard all day until 10, 11, 12, doing necessary things. 

Today, for the first time in ages, I sat down and watched a show. It helped. I felt normal for 45 minutes. For 45 minutes this felt like my life again instead of a total swirl of change. For 45 minutes I wasn't overwhelmed by saying goodbye to treasured friends, or stressed at not having a place to live in Houston, or anxious about getting the suitcases packed, or worried about the dog. For 45 minutes it was just me, on the couch, with a chocolate, and a piece of normal.

I imagine there will be a time weeks from now when I'll be in Houston, sitting on an airbed with my laptop, catching up on several missed episodes. There might be boxes around me, or maybe no furniture, I might be stressed about other things, but I know that finding my regular shows again will help Houston feel normal, and then eventually, it will be. 

Purging to Pack

Oh my goodness, I am tired! The last two days have been one steady stream of people coming to pick up stuff we are selling and giving away.

I meet them at the door, we walk through the house, they take what they've come for, eye something else they like, and end up leaving with a full trunk of our stuff.

The movers come on Friday to pack our container, so I want everything that is not coming with us to be gone before they get here. Movers come in a pack, and there are multiple people working at lightening speed, working like a machine to pack the container. There is no time to stand there and say "not the toaster, it's the wrong current" or "I need those towels to stay out of the box." If it's here, it will get packed.

Sprout is the most sensitive, watching our worldly possessions marching out the door. She's been crying over something or other every day. The thing she's crying about is never the thing she's crying about. Yesterday some people were carrying out a rug and she was crying "I love that rug, it's so cozy and I love to play on it!" I asked her if she would like to look online at some rugs I have been eyeing for our new house in Houston. Two minutes later she's exclaiming, "yea, let's get rid of those old rugs, we don't want those anymore, we'll get better ones!" It's letting go of the safe and familiar that's hard, and I understand that. 

We've got our tickets booked and organized a week's holiday in Fiji to decompress between the intense pack up, and the upcoming house hunt/life set up in Houston. The life we've chosen so far means that we spend all of our travel budget and holiday time visiting family overseas (we do plenty of neaby camping and day trips). We haven't done a proper holiday away since our honeymoon in Turkey almost 13 years ago. I think we're due. 

Our crazy travel schedule lands us in Nashville at nearly one in the morning, and I'm already dreaming about climbing out of the car at my parent's house, after the long ride from the airport, under a big starry sky in the country, and falling asleep with my little family around me and all the rest of my family sleeping peacefully under the same roof. It's going to be amazing. 

In the Thick of It

I don't know if we've got the bull by the horns, or if the bull has got us (see how I'm already working in some Texas lingo?) but this move is gaining traction - which is a relief since we are about ten days from our pencilled in leave date.

Our house sold, in five weeks, for our asking price. Praise be! It was sweat and tears, and my floors have never (EVER) been so clean for so long, but it is done. Can I just say, selling a house with kids in it is hard. I don't know how people have a house on the market for months on end. Cleaning the house became my full time job, which was a problem since I don't really have time for that! All's well that ends well, and now I can start pulling things apart to move!

Good news is followed with even better news. The Captain's work contract FINALLY got approved this morning so he has a job in Houston when we arrive. What a relief.

Now, to answer the question that my American friends keep asking me - why Houston? Why TEXAS? The answer is simple - we wanted to get closer to family, and my husband's Australian company has an office in Houston and they were willing to move us there. No, we don't have family in Houston, and we only know a few people, but having a job and the company move us is massively helpful and we thank them for it. I never thought I'd live in Texas, but I've heard many people who started off feeling that way end up loving it in the end. I am going all in (like I've learned to do) and will make it home for the next couple years.

The doggy's transport is planned, though not quite booked. The movers come in a week. We have to sell the car this week. Bit by bit, half the contents of our house are being marched out the front door with new owners. We have one more goodbye party, and then it is just bits and pieces.

School is really the big thing to secure in Houston. Thank you, Annamarie for your suggestion. I am a fan of classical school, but at this point I am looking for a five day a week setting. So, internet connections, we are looking for a house and school within a 45 minute commute of the city. We want the school to be high performing and ethnically integrated (specifically African American students). I have a list of about ten schools that seem to fit the bill based on my greatschools.org research, so now we have to hope and pray we find a house zoned for one of those schools. 

It's all happening, as The Captain likes to tell me when I'm pulling my hair out. It's all happening.

Fear of the Unknown

There are many things I love about  moving. I am an oganizational junkie, and I love "playing house" so getting the chance to purge and organize everything we own, and then set up a new house actually sounds like heaps of fun to me. Really. 

I'm sad to leave Sydney, and am spending many a teary moment thinking of my wonderful friends here that have made Sydney entirely home for my heart.

My emotions are high, they're low, they are all over the place.

To be honest though, one thing is pretty steady, and that is fear of the unknown. I know that moving is one of life's major stressers, and that it is normal to feel stressed. But really, this is such a leap of faith. We're moving (again), to a city we've never been to, where we know only a handful of people, and are starting from stratch. 

Here are a list of things we don't have at the moment:

A buyer for our house

A signed contract from The Captain's job

Plane tickets

A neighborhood we know we want to live in, in Houston

A school for our children

A church 

Not to mention the little details like two cars, insurance policies, bank accounts, a new dentist, doctor, ballet school, soccer team....................

When we moved to Sydney I had this blind trust, a hope, a certainty, that life here was going to be good. We didn't have anything past a rented furnished apartment. We didn't even have an address to direct our shipping container towards. We said "bring it to Sydner Harbour and we'll figure out where to take it." We didn't even have a job. We just knew it would all work out.

It did work out. Five years later I would say it worked out beyond what I ever dreamed! The blind leap landed us in a wonderful place.

Somehow I am lacking that pure zeal and confidence this time around. The unknowns, and my fear of them, are heavier on the scale than my excitement at the moment. 

We're hoping to leave in three week's time. My entire family is gathering in Nashville and we're supposed to be joining them to spend time together before my brother goes to live in Budapest with his family. 

We're going ahead with our plans, spending precious time with friends, and making special Australian memories.

I just have to put my fighting gloves on, and not let fear get the best of me. 

News

So, I have something to tell you. News that I have sat down to release, then closed my laptop with a definite "click" more times than I can tell. 

I like to tell my news when it is all tied up in a neat little bundle, like a gift that everyone will be happy to receive, not when it feels like a carton of eggs that has fallen to the floor - some having survived the fall, but most leaking out into a clear and orangy puddle on the floor. 

Here goes-

1. We're moving

2. B is gone

Where do I start?

The last year has given us several opportunities to step back and acess where we are at, and what we want for our children's childhood. While we LOVE Sydney, and our wonderful life, we really are SO FAR from both of our families. With the yeras whizzing by, we decided to make a move to get us closer to family, to ensure that fantastic memories with grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and extended family is a more central part of our children's experience.

We made that decision nearly a year ago, shortly after receiving B. We hoped that by deciding to move in roughly a year's time, we had given a more than adequate window for B to transition to his long term care situation, whatever that would be.

Court was set for December, and we were told he would be moved early January...but then court rescheduled to March, then delayed to dates in May and June. Now court has finished, but a ruling still has not been handed down. In the end, the decision was made to move B to another temporary foster family since his case is still unresolved and the move we planned for July is rushing at us with tremendous speed.  Together with his caseworkers, The Captain and I agreed that it would not be good for B to have our house packed up around him; that he needed our full attention to help him transition before we had to switch into full-move-mode.

Our timeline has been shaped by our belief that our children will have the greatest chance of success if we move during the school holidays here, and arrive before the start of the new school year in the U.S. They get to experience the natural close of a term, and then start strong with a new class. 

I tell you this like a confession. I wanted to deliver B into the arms of his long-term mother (be that through restoration to his mom, or to a permanent care family), and to transition him to yet another temporary home (wonderful as the carers are) feels like a failure. This is the knife twist of foster care - balancing the needs of the long term family with the needs of a short term member, and navigating the space when the two diverge. 

I believe that the choice we are making to move is 100% the best one for our children in this season, and that our time frame is spot on. 

The house is on the market. Work contracts are being negotiated. We are spending meaningful time with friends, and gradually shedding layer after layer of accumulated living, in preparation for shifting our life from here to there.

There are so many things to tell, to process, to discuss. I'll start doing that soon. But for today, this is what I am strong enough to tell. We're moving, and B is gone, and we're all jumbled up with elation and sadness.