Timing is everything

There was a brief...uh...."spirited discussion" on the Dillon list this week about older mothers, initiated by a negative comment about older parents. At 48, I am one of them. Although parenting was always my plan, I had to wait to implement it. There were many reasons to wait. I wanted my situation to be as perfect as I could make it, emotionally, financially. I never felt pressured by time in terms of fertility because I always knew that adoption was an option. .

I have a strong faith that everything happens for a reason and that life takes you where you were meant to be. Every door that closes in your life leads you in the direction that you are meant to go. If life had worked that way I wanted (instead of the way life wanted!) I would have loved to have 4 children within the framework of marriage. That hasn’t happened and I am convinced that the reason is that I was being gently pushed in the direction of adoption, to that child who is meant to be mine.

I spent a lot of time babysitting in the last 15 years., mostly because I get a great deal of joy from the kids and because it has been a tremendous learning experience for me. My experiences babysitting, getting to know these families, and observe their interactions, family dynamics, relationships, and results have been an invaluable experience -- aside from being tremendous fun! I can see the difference between these kids and me when I was young - they are, for the most part, so confident, so sure of who they are, where I was so shy. And I can see what the parents are doing that gets these results. It has been invaluable to me to experience ways of parenting other than what I experienced. My relationships with these children keeps me aware of the wonder of the world -- everything is so new and exciting and wonderful to a child. I enjoy being able to maintain that perspective and my relationships with these children and their families are precious to me. And observing a lot of these marriages, from the really special, to the good, to the nightmares, has also taught me a lot about healthy relationships.

Practically speaking, I wasn't financially ready. The last few years, I’ve made very deliberate decisions in my life with the eventual aim of having a child. The benefits my job provides include $2,000 towards an adoption and they will cover 50% of my childcare expenses. After 10 years of service (July 1 of this year), I am guaranteed health care benefits for the rest of my life. (My company also has an office in Vietnam. I like knowing that I have colleagues in Vietnam who could be of help during the process and make it easier for me to someday return to show my child the land of his birth.)

When I was ready to purchase a home almost 5 years ago, I chose a 2-bedroom condominium in a very diverse neighborhood undergoing gentrification. Jersey City is a vital mix of cultures. There is a public elementary school on the next block and a daycare center run by Franciscan nuns half a block away.

I have several close friends who have adopted – one family has two children adopted domestically, another a son from Chile and a daughter from Mexico. Yet another has a biracial son. The more I talk to people about my adoption plans, the more people I learn are adopted themselves (there are at least 4 people in my office around my age who have shared the fact they are adopted with me. I imagine this unusual number is due to the stigma of unwed motherhood in late 1950s and early 1960s.) They have all been invaluable resources to me. I’ve been able to watch the kids grow up and struggle with their adoption issues, and talk to the adults who’ve experienced it themselves. I’ve been very lucky.

I am confident knowing I have close friends parenting both adopted and interracial children for support and guidance. And that my child will have a built-in network of kids who will know exactly how he feels, because they have been there themselves.

I do understand the concern expressed about lifespan of older parents, but, really, do any of us have a guarantee at a long life? All parents need to make guardianship plans for the children, no matter their age. I have one for mine.

Should I have been irresponsible and had a child when it would have meant financial disaster? Should I have "settled" and had a child with the wrong man? In an unhealthy or unhappy marriage? I did spend several years trying to get pregnant and had two miscarriages. The person I was in a relationship with at the time had a child from another relationship and, as time went by, and she got older, he realized he did not want the responsibility of another child. Should I have have gone ahead and had a childwith a man who did not want me to do so? The very last thing I would do is to have a child with someone who did not want that child. That was a dealbreaker for me and the relationship ended. Should I have had a child before I knew who I was, and knew what it was to be emotionally healthy? It would have absolutely been wrong on so many levels for me to have had children when I was younger. I come from a highly dysfunctional family and needed these years on my own to heal, to learn, to experience other ways of being. Would any of these scenarios be preferable to having an older parent?

The world has changed and older parents are not an oddity. 50 today is not what 50 was 20 years ago. Of all the parents I sat for, none of the mothers was less than 40 when they had their first child, all having established careers in the environmental field. Of my charges that are now in college, one got early admission to Brown, one is at Duke, one is finishing a semester abroad in South Africa. They are lovely, intelligent, politically and socially active children.

So, here I sit. A parent to be who could not want to be a parent more! A parent to be with a secure job, who owns a home in a diverse neighborhood. A parent to be with years of experience with children and families. Who has traveled both within the US and overseas, who is comfortable with and open to the "different". A parent to be who has spent her adulthood getting to know who she is and becoming who she wants to be. Who is happy and secure in herself and her life and her relationships. What could be better?

What a gift

In addition to the beautiful pictures of Adam she sent me, Elisabeth from the Dillon List, who is currently in Vietnam picking up her son Noah, sent me this lovely note telling me about the time she spent with Adam. Pictures are precious, but this is my first glimpse of him as a person, rather than an image:

Hello Kathy!
I wanted to send you a short message and tell you just a bit about your sweet little Adam! He is ADORABLE! When we walked into the room the first day he was very interested in us and our purpose there in the baby room. He did get a little fussy because there was so much going on. It is hard when their day is interrupted. But he soon calmed down and watched everything. It was on our second day in the orphanage that I really got to see his personality! He absolutely LOVES attention. Especially fromt the nannies. He is very attached to the nannies, which is wonderful! He started to get a little upset because he really wanted out of his crib to explore! So when the nanny took him out he was crawling everywhere! He would crawl under the cribs and just sit, then crawl under another crib and just sit. He really was crawling towards us but kept enough distance from us that I could not snatch him up and kiss him. (unless I was willing to crawl under a crib...........which I decided would not be the best. :)) Then one of the nannies took him by his arm and helped him walk a bit! He was very active and loving every minute of it. You need to rest up now because this little guy is going to keep you very busy! On the third day he remembered me and I walked up to his crib and rubbed his face and he REALLY liked it! I actually got a great smile out of him, but of course I did not have my camera. So he likes his head rubbed. I rubbed his head, well his face really, a few more times and he was quite happy. You can tell that he really loves his caregivers and is quite attached to them, however he really wanted to get to know us and was very curious about us. I would suggest when you come, bring or buy when you arrive some sort of small pillow. He always had a pillow in his hand when he was in his crib. He would also crawl towards one if it was on the floor. It was kind of like his security. At least when we were there. It may not be by the time you arrive. You are just going to love him and he is going to love you! I would suggest when you enter the room for the first time you let him get a good look at you first and kind of just make your way over to him slowly. Then just rub his face. He is very gentle and needs to warm up to those he doesn't know, but once he warms up he has such a cute little personality!
I can't wait to follow your journey to get him!
Elisabeth

Wow. What an amazing and generous gift -- especially the time and attention spent on my son. It means so much to me. It will be a priceless addition to Adam's life book. And yet.....

And yet...mixed in with the very sincere gratitude, there came the jealousy. I wanted it to be me! For the first time, the waiting feels painful. There are times when its been frustrating, of course, but this has suddenly become hard.

Its always a happy day...

...when new pictures arrive! Many, many thanks to Elisabeth from the Dillon Board who was kind enough to send me six pictures of Adam, taken on May 14 while she was in Vinh Long picking up her son.

No news on paperwork, but I started my vaccinations today. Got Hep A and the first Hep B and a polio booster. I go back in a few weeks for the second Hep B and tetanus. Better safe than sorry. I have a prescription for malaria meds and for the typhoid vaccine, which is now oral. I am ready to go! I am MORE than ready to go!

The "no update" update

I got the following "update" today - Wanted to let you know that we received updates today from Vietnam. An’s dossier is still being compiled, which can take 30-45 business days or longer after log in date. We will keep posted on future updates. Sigh. So, effectively, its the "no update" update! We're only at day 29 since my log-in date (and I think there may have been a Vietnamese holiday or two in the interim) so I really wasn't expecting the dossier to be complete, so why was the email so deflating? And just how big can the little guy's dossier be anyway? LOL!

.

Nothing new, just more waiting, nesting, thinking....

I'm pretending that I'm getting good at waiting -- but I'm not so secretly awful at it! I go through my day, and do my job, and smile and appear normal -- when I simply want to scream "I want my baby NOW!" LOL! But, that would be less than productive, wouldn't it?

I met a lovely woman last week from my SingleAdopt NY list who was getting rid of clothing her 8 year old son had outgrown -- it was mostly gently used, but some of the clothign was never worn. I got two HUGE shopping bags of clothing, toys, and other items for $45 -- including two beautiful silk outfits from Vietnam. I'm hoping Adam can wear one of the silk outfits for our Giving and Receiving Ceremony.

More importantly, I made my first non-online contact with an adoptive parent. I've been doing all my networking online, which is totally my comfort zone. Time to venture out of it!