Not This Month

It didn't even occur to us we wouldn't be travelling, or getting ready to, by now.

You see, our agency is new in dealing with Vladivostok. We are the first family they've sent there (meaning we're the first in line for our agency in that area) and we've been told by other Adoptive Parents (from another agency, who picked up their little girl in June from there) that they were told while in-country that there just aren't enough parents coming through. (You know what a grapevine is like.)

The agency assured us we wouldn't have a long wait, but nothing can be done with assurances.

Our paperwork is still at the Consulate being processed. And further to that, our agency is closed for the week this week, as we were notified today.

So even if the paperwork is waiting for them on Monday, it takes a week to get to Vlad and at least a week, or more, to be translated and have the translation notarized.

Then it goes to the government to meet up with our file.

And then we wait for the person managing our file to re-review it in-depth to be certain nothing else is needed.

Then we wait for a referral.

Our agency had told us at one point this summer that the referral wasn't waiting for the paperwork to meet up. That's no longer the case, if it was at all.

So we are down, and we are sad and we are frustrated and we are anxious to become parents. We are putting our lives on hold waiting for the phone to ring so we can drop everything and go. We make no plans more than 2 weeks out and live attached to our phones and emails.

It was the same way when we were dealing with infertility. We just didn't have it in us to make plans and walked on eggshells while avoiding people with children (or expecting children).

For a long time our lives have been pending. Pending the next step. Pending the next part of our lives. Most people don't understand because they haven't been through it, or are on the other side looking back. Most people say that you have to live your life and enjoy it, etc., etc.. But when you're in it getting to the next stage of life is all there is.

We don't want to travel around the world for leisure. We don't need a house, especially when we can't fill it. We don't want to buy expensive things just for the sake of it. We want what everyone in our shoes wants: parenthood. We want to a child to love, and cuddle and read to. Someone to protect, to teach and to love.

Maybe next month.