Changes

With news of potential corruption and attendant slowdowns in the Ethiopia program, we moved to the Korea program. We hadn't yet been married three years when we started this process, so we weren't eligible for a Korean adoption. Now we are; now we've been married four and a half years. Sigh.

We've been matched with our little now-eight-month-old boy, Seong Joon Francis. We'll call him Frankie but always leave his Korean name as his rightful first name, should he choose to use it as he grows older. He's in foster care right now, with foster parents. We won't be able to travel to get him for around a year. Meanwhile, I delay sending him a care package. We can send only one, I think, so that's all he'll receive from us. When he gets it, our contact is over. It's breaking my heart.

We started our adoption process three years ago February. This whole thing has broken my heart. I was prepared for the ups and downs, the roller coaster of emotions. I was prepared for things to get out of my control and to have my own issues with that. But this has been so incredibly much harder than I'd ever imagined. And due to our ages, I think we will have to be content with two children in our family.  My husband doesn't know this yet, but that's a hard pill for me to swallow right now. Family planning has been taken out of my control in more ways than one. And it's painful.

I keep repeating the word painful. Seeing Seong Joon's face has been joyous as well. Knowing he is ours, that we are merely biding our time until we're united with him has been joyous. Knowing he's safe and spending his first years in his native land is a sweet relief and a sweet melancholy (he's bonding with a woman who's not me!).

I'm going to try to "grow" this blog but I'm still feeling so shy and hesitant about it. Even this little teeeeeeensy bit of the blogosphere makes me feel very unprivate. Yet I'm all about Facebook. Lord. Showing my age here, I guess.

I'd like to blog about the Twin Cities adoption community and how welcoming it's been to us in my next post.