Baby Showers

How do you all feel about baby showers? I hate them. I never want to go to them, and I rarely do. (I didn't even really like wedding showers all that much either, but I'm old enough that I've passed out of friends/family having wedding showers and have moved into baby showers.)

It's weird. I'm always happy for the people having a baby. Having a baby is a great thing and definitely worth celebrating. I just don't like to go to a party and ooh and aah over a bunch of baby stuff. Or ooh and aah over a pregnant lady.

Quick catch up for anyone new - Mister and I were married in 2003, TTC 2004-2006, and started our adoption process in 2010.  So it's been a long road without children. A friend who was married the same weekend as me and started TTC around the same time as us now has 3 kids and her oldest is halfway through kindergarten. It's been a long time that I've been without children. I know it's not a race, and everyone finds their way at their own pace and I'm OK with that. Except at baby showers.

A long time ago, I drew the line that I would not go to baby showers. Except for the showers of certain very close friends or if either of my 2 SILs had baby showers. Otherwise, I send a gift and make alternate plans for the day.

Mister doesn't understand why I've drawn that line, why it's hard for me to go to showers, why it makes me sad. While it's true that (fringe acquaintance/colleague/family member) having a baby has no impact on our ability to ever have a baby, it's somehow related. I can't quite explain why they're related, but they somehow are.

I've always said that I don't want a shower when it's my turn. I hate being the center of a party like that, I hated it at my bridal showers, I hated pretending I was happy and excited to open another set of bowls or towels. I mean, I was happy to get the stuff, of course, but really, they're bowls. Or towels. And I made a list and said, "Buy me this." and then they did. How excited can I be about it? Part of me not wanting a shower also goes along with the uncertainty of domestic adoption. There's a part of me that won't believe our match or placement is true until a year has gone by. I don't want to open boxes of clothes and monitors and whatever else people need for a baby and then not have a baby, you know?  So it's not likely that I'll register, I'm really hoping that I won't have a shower, and that's kind of how I want it.

But this all comes up today not because I'm thinking of a shower for myself anyway. I talked to my dad today and he told me that my aunt is looking for my address because this cousin's baby is due in April. And April is soon. And my aunt is having a shower for my cousin. And before my dad even told me what the date was, I was making plans to be out of town that day... I'd prefer to send a gift and make other plans for the day. As I do. But I know that Mister will want me to go, which is all fine and good since he won't be invited, so we'll see. And I know that my dad would never understand why I don't do baby showers. I think the only way I'd go to this shower is if my SIL is planning on going. And I bet she isn't. At least I hope she isn't.

Please tell me that I'm not a terrible person for:
1) Hating baby showers in general
2) Not planning to have one for myself when I have a baby
3) Not going to my cousin's baby shower

When to tell people

Way back when we first started our adoption paperwork, we didn't tell anyone. It was a few months later when we asked our 2 closest friends to write reference letters. They were both thrilled and excited for us. It was easy and exciting to tell them our news, and they both said they were honored to write letters on our behalf.

Connecticut has a weird requirement that 1 reference letter come from a family member. We decided we'd ask my brother and SIL to write a letter for us. For some reason, it was a little more nerve-wracking than to tell our friends.

As an aside, I'm going to tell a funny story about my brother and SIL that made it much easier to tell them about our adoption plans. I'll get back to my original point shortly.  One day last spring, my brother sent me an e-mail in the middle of a weekday. He said, "Is _____ still your phone number? I called and called and no one answered." I wrote back to him right away and said that it was, but I hadn't answered because my phone was upstairs and I was downstairs. He wrote back and said he'd call again in 5 minutes, but he really needed to talk to me. Of course, I spent the next few minutes with my heart pounding, absolutely convinced something was wrong. We don't call each other that much, let alone at 1 PM on a Tuesday. So swirling in my mind was death, divorce, destruction, something awful. 


So the phone rings a few minutes later, and my brother said, "Don't worry. Nothing's wrong." and he proceeded to tell me that the reason for his call is that he and my SIL have just begun the process to adopt! And that their agency requires family information, so he wanted us to help him fill in the paperwork that would pertain to us. 


Always composed, (NOT!) I crack up laughing and say, "Wait, you're adopting?" 
"Yes," my brother said.
"Well no $@$!" I respond, "Us too! And we need your help to fill out our paperwork too!" 


Obviously, we both agreed to fill out paperwork for each other. We laughed, and still laugh that we told each other about our respective adoptions on the same day. I love that that's part of our children's adoption stories. I love that our children will have cousins who were adopted. Even though they'll have very different adoption stories, they'll have adoptions in common when they won't share common DNA and genes.

I'm getting off track though. Back to my original story. So my brother and SIL's agency made them fill out paperwork about each member of their families. They told everyone in their families very early in their process. We didn't. For a long time, we didn't know from where we'd be adopting, and it changed several times before we decided to do a domestic adoption. We didn't want to tell people one thing and then change it shortly thereafter. We knew it would take a long time, we didn't want to answer a lot of questions when the answer was just going to be, "I have no idea. No, really, we don't know." So we didn't tell anyone except our three references.

Fast forward to Thanksgiving, and we told my brothers and my dad. At Christmas we were going to tell Mister's family, but somehow the conversation never happened.

So one side of the family doesn't know, Facebook definitely doesn't know, and any friends outside of those 2 sets of friends who wrote our letters don't know. Or so I thought....

Our old friend who recently reappeared in our lives knows. I told him way back in 2007 that we would adopt someday, and I think he may have understood that to mean that we had started the process back then. Shortly after he and I e-mailed about adoption in 2007, he e-mailed Mister to congratulate him on adopting. Mister was like, "Huh? What?!" So I assume that he probably asked Mister as they've talked more recently, knowing that it was something that we were talking about 3 years ago. He asked Mister last weekend on the phone how it is going and what's next in the process. So he's supportive, he cares, he's happy for us. Which is really how everyone has been that we've told.

No one's said anything rude or annoying or asked intrusive questions. Which is not too surprising, since only about 10 people know, and 5 of the 10 are family! But still. It's all those other people who don't know. I don't really know how to handle them.

I asked some people on an adoption forum once, and so many people said they told early, wished they hadn't told, and had to deal with months or years of annoying questions. Some other people said that they didn't tell at all, not even family, until they were traveling to their child. Some people said they waited until they were home with the baby. No one was mad that they hadn't been told because how could you be mad when you're playing with a baby.

But I can't help feeling like I'm keeping a big secret. It feels weird to tell people now, because really, there hasn't been any news to tell. Yet, I feel like if I tell people when we're matched, or when we're home with a baby, that might be too shocking. I don't know.

I guess if I were pregnant, there'd be all kinds of people  - people we'd tell when we were TTC, people we'd tell early in the pregnancy, people we would tell later, and then people who would just see me and figure it out. Then there would be people we hadn't seen in a long time and they'd see us in a year with a baby.  I get that. The difference is the timeline. If I were pregnant now, while I wouldn't be 100% confident that I'd have a baby born in the fall, I'd have a rough timeline in mind. For this adoption, I have no rough timeline in mind. Maybe sometime within the next 3 years. Maybe. But that's kind of a lame timeline.

So for those of you who have adopted, when did you tell? How did people respond? Have you had unexpected annoying or intrusive questions and comments? Also, if you told some people and not others, how seriously did they guard your secret? I worry that someone might tell someone that I didn't want to.

Adventure in NYC, or "There's a 2 o'clock in the morning now?!"

It's a multi-part story of an adventure in NYC.

Good - Mister met a bunch of friends this weekend for a happy hour in the city. We drove down and it was really easy. There was hardly any traffic (strange for a Friday at 6 PM.) We found a parking spot on the street. The best part is that the meters are active until 7 PM and you pay in 12 minute increments. We pulled in at 6:48! So we paid 50 cents to park for 12 minutes, but really we could stay as long as we liked. So we did. We went to the happy hour and drank some wine and ate some tapas. Good deal. (I will admit, however, that I got kind of bored after an hour or so and I texted my SIL who lives in the city. I told her where we were, and she said, "Come out with us!" and she told us where she and my brother were.)

Better - After a while of texting, Mister and I decided that since my SIL and brother were on the Upper West Side and we were in the Village, that's kind of on our way home. Can't get from the Village to Connecticut without going all the way through Manhattan. We left the happy hour to head uptown to have drinks with my brother and SIL and their friends. We found a parking space right in front of the bar where they were. We had a great time hanging out with them, and it was completely impromptu.

Awesome - Has anyone ever gotten 2 on-street parking spaces in NYC exactly where you want them at the exact time you want them? This is incredible. We usually drive around the block for ages. Or park really far away and walk.

Crazy - We were at the bar with my brother and SIL until 1 AM. We got home around 2. I'm reminded of a favorite Simpsons episode. Bart gets in trouble with Principal Skinner, who punishes him by making him do the Principal's astronomy research. In order to do the research, they have to observe the stars at 4 AM. Skinner tells Bart he wants to meet him at the observatory by 4 AM. Bart says, "Whoa... they have a 4 o'clock in the morning now?!"

I find myself saying that whenever I'm awake at a surprising time. So pulling into the driveway, I thought to myself, "Whoa... they have a 2 o'clock in the morning now?!" 2 AM is a little late for me these days. I'm not 20 anymore!

Disgusting - I wore jeans to these bars. We went out on Friday night. Saturday morning when I got dressed, I wore the same pair of jeans. I wore them around all day.

(Here's the real disgusting part.)

Later, maybe around 6 PM, I was sitting on the couch with Mister and I moved my leg and I saw something on the back of my pants. It looked pink. And weird. And not like anything anyone wants on jeans.

I touched it. I shouldn't have. It was gum. EEEEEEEWWWWWWWW! Someone's chewed up gum was on my pants!

These things always seem to happen to me and no one else. I guess it happened when we were sitting at a booth in the 2nd bar. Maybe it was stuck on the front of the booth and got stuck to my pants. It stuck to my calf, so it's the part of my leg that would have rubbed up against the front of the booth. I was really grossed out. Stupid bars.

I ran upstairs and put on some different pants and attacked the gum jeans with an ice cube. I was able to freeze the gum off my jeans in about 10 minutes. It wasn't too bad. But still. EEEEWWW!

An otherwise fun trip to the city though. On the other hand, this was all Friday night. It's Sunday morning now, and I've slept twice since then. Why am I still so tired?! 2 AM is ridiculous.

And if I can't even handle staying out until 2 AM without 2 days of recovery, how am I going to handle the sleep deprivation that comes with a baby?! Oh boy...

Today is Steelers vs. Jets. I am from MA, but I hate the Patriots. I live in CT, but I'm not rooting for the Jets. Mister grew up in PA, so Let's Go STEELERS!!!!!

Did you do anything fun this weekend?

A Good Holiday Weekend

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas. Mister and I had so much fun. For the first time this year, Mister and I had Christmas at home. By ourselves. Usually we alternate holidays and years with our families, so if we spend Thanksgiving with my family, we'll spend Christmas with his family and then the following year we'll do the opposite - Thanksgiving with his family and Christmas with mine. It works, sort of. That way we spread out the holidays with different sides of the family and end up having time with everybody.

However, what I've always wanted is to have Christmas at home, in my house. Of course, I've always sort of fantasized that we'd have kids in this scenario, but whatever. One thing at a time I guess. This year, Mister found out that he will be doing some traveling to work over New Year's. He'll be working in PA, about 30 minutes from where his parents live. So once he knew we'd have to be there for New Year's, he didn't want to spend 8 or 9 days at his parent's house. His parents are great; we all get along, but let's face it - 9 days is a long time to spend together. So we'll go down later this week and stay for the long weekend.

This Christmas was exactly what I wanted. We were together, it was quiet and fun at home. Connecticut got slammed with a blizzard on Sunday, so we were snowed in for a while. But we cooked, we ate, we watched movies, played games, drank wine, shoveled the snow, ate some more, drank some more wine. I'm telling you, it was exactly what I wanted from a holiday. (Mister did, by the way, get me the necklace I wanted in this post. It's not this exact one, mine is smaller, but it's similar. I'm so excited. I keep touching it and thinking about the baby who will someday join our family.)

This Christmas was so strange for me. I've turned an emotional corner on holidays, and I can't quite understand why. Christmas in 2006-2008 were so hard for me. I was so sad for the babies that we didn't have, for the family that I really wanted. I just felt like our family had a big hole in it, so between my mom not being with us anymore and no babies either, there are just people missing. My mom's not coming back though, so it's a different kind of hole in our family from the babies who have not yet arrived. But this year, I just wasn't as sad. In other years, I haven't wanted to decorate, to send cards, to travel, to bake cookies, any of those things that people do. This year, I felt like a cloud was lifted off me. I wanted to do all of those things. (Except traveling, which we didn't do... yet. And because we already had our Christmas together, I won't mind traveling a bit.)

We had not ever celebrated a holiday together with just the 2 of us before. If we had had a baby early in our marriage, we probably would have wanted to stay home together for holidays before this. Since we haven't had any babies, we had never talked about just staying home. It was like it didn't exist as an option. I really never considered it. I loved it though. I wonder if we can figure out a way to do it again next year!

2010 was really a great year for us - we moved to our new house, which we love, Mister finished grad school, we finally finished our home study and are now on a path to become parents. In one year, that's really a lot to accomplish. Because those are all really happy things, I was able to feel fairly content this year. For the first time, I've been able to look back and some really wonderful things that happened to us this year and feel proud and happy for all that we've been able to do, and not only feel sad for the people who are not here with us.

So I'm in a good and peaceful place after the holidays. A good place in our marriage, with our families, with the adoption, with everything. I hope that everyone feels this calm, peaceful and happy in 2011.

And of course, I also hope that we're matched quickly and that I'll spend most of 2011 being someone's mom. That's my Christmas/New Year's/Every Single Day until we're matched Wish.

This is one of my favorite ornaments. And you know, you're supposed to wish on a star, so I'm making my Christmas/New Year's/Every Single Day until we're matched Wish on a star!

Extended Family

I am the only girl in my family and I have 3 brothers. My mom was the oldest of 4 kids in her family, and they never really got along. My dad was one of 5 kids, and he always seemed to get along well with his brothers and sister. The cousins I grew up with are the cousins on my dad's side. As kids, we would get together several times a year. We were kind of in the middle of all the cousins - one group lived about an hour north of us and another group lived about an hour south.

As we were growing up, it was really important to my mom that my brothers and I would get along and love each other and enjoy being together. She wanted us to enjoy each other's companionship as kids, but also that it would carry over and that we'd enjoy each other as adults as well. Quite honestly, we really do. I love my brothers. I love my brother's wife. Happy, happy. I love my immediate family. (Are my brothers always my immediate family, or is immediate family only the people who live in your house? I never really knew the official designation on that one.)

So I have a bunch of cousins, all about my age. They're all late 20s-early 30s. I don't really know how to categorize how I feel about my cousins; it's kind of weird. When we were kids, we enjoyed playing together 3-4 times a year. Anyway, my cousins are fine. This is where it's kind of weird to describe the relationship I have with my cousins. They're fine. I don't dislike them, but I'm kind of neutral on them. Now, as adults, we've all sort of moved away to whatever different places we live. Maybe we see them once a year. So yeah, they're fine, I'm happy to see them when I see them, but we're not like the BFF cousins that some people are.

At any rate, of these cousins, only one is married. They were married 5 years ago. (See where this is going yet???) I can't really remember when I saw them last. Maybe 2 years ago. Anyway.

So I just got this e-mail from my dad. Forwarded from my cousin who sent a mass e-mail pregnancy announcement that his wife is pregnant. But he didn't have the e-mail addresses for the cousins, so could all the aunts and uncles please pass along the news. So my dad e-mailed all 4 of us. No comment, no note, just passed it along. (Now that I think about that, I wonder what my dad is thinking. The whole ripple effect of IF...)

I have 2 observations on this pregnancy announcement.

1) When people I dearly love get pregnant, I think it's the greatest news I've ever heard. When my closest friends have told me (even by e-mail) that they're pregnant, I am truly, genuinely thrilled for them. When people I'm kind of neutral on are pregnant, I'm not really sure how to react. It's happy news; I hope everything goes well for them. But that's pretty much as much brain space as I would like to give this. "Wow. Great, good for you! That's happy news and I hope everything goes well." And that's the extent of the brain space on this. But there's the gut-punch and the heart space. I'm pretty much a selfish jerk, but I WANT MY TURN!!!

2) My older brother is a much better, kinder person than I am. (Or a better faker.) He and his wife are also adopting. (This falls into the category of being truly, genuinely thrilled for other people. I already love my little niecephew (like that word I just made up?!)) so much. So they're walking this IF/adoption road. They get it. Which just makes our adoption that much more extraordinary. Upon receiving this e-mail from my dad, my brother replied back to all of us and said, "What awesome news for A&J! So exciting!"

That was not what I was thinking. Not the e-mail I would have sent, which is why I have not yet replied. My brother is a better person, or a better faker. Either way.

Am I a terrible person for not wanting to reply to this e-mail to congratulate my cousin on their functioning body parts? Am I a terrible person for not wanting to e-mail all my brothers right now to say that I'm thrilled that my cousins' bodies work? I mean, it is good. I'm glad for them that their bodies work. And, of course, I have no evidence of how well their bodies work. I've not asked them, nor will I. I have no idea what it took for them to achieve this pregnancy, so it's possible that they don't particularly feel like their bodies do work.

Meh. Who knows. I guess I'll send my cousin an e-mail congratulating them on their news. It is good news.

Someday I'll have good news too. I hate that that's my takeaway from everyone else's good news.

D'oh!

I completely forgot about ICLW. I forgot to sign up and now it's too late. But maybe that's OK - I'll do free form ICLW and post and comment when I can. Feel free to leave comments (or not) if you like.

We are moving along right along with all the adoption stuff. Mister went to the doctor for his physical, and we are so close to being finished with the profile book. We're still working on the closing few paragraphs and then that's it. I can't believe we're really this close. (Of course, this is before I have to wait up to 3 years or whatever. I'm sure after years of waiting being "this close" will seem funny.)

This weekend, Mister and I are going to my aunt and uncle's 25th wedding anniversary party. My uncle is my mom's youngest brother, and he was a very young uncle. He is 13 years older than my older brother, and 16 years older than I. When we were very little, we had a teenage uncle! Kind of funny. (It's not really that funny, I suppose. My uncle was born when my mom was 12, and so my mom was 25 when my brother was born and 28 when she had me. Not that unusual at all, really.)

At any rate, we're going to my uncle's party. My mom wasn't really close to her family, so we didn't really see them all that much, and I'm not sure I've seen them since my mom's funeral.

None of my brothers are going; they all have other things they're doing. So it's just me and Mister and my dad. I still feel weird about going though. Just because I haven't seen them in so long. And because I haven't seen them in a long time, I really hope this party won't turn into a "when are you going to have kids?" spectacular. Because while I can write my little paragraph up there about how much progress we've made on this adoption, we still have no idea when we are going to have kids. And we're not "out" about this adoption AT ALL (like no one except the people who wrote our reference letters knows) so I won't even tell them how much progress we've made.

But, the good news is that on the way home from my uncle's, we are stopping to see our friends who had a baby recently. I think she's like 7 weeks old or something. So I'm kind of psyched about that. Knowing that I will get some baby cuddles is going to be the carrot on the stick to get me through this (probably very boring) family party.