127 of 365...My Turn

So I guess it's my turn to have a little panic attack about the fostering/adoption process. I think it all started around 11:30 this morning when several of our friends and family received a reference letter from our Family Specialist. I happened to be with one of my friends when she received the email and I got a "sneak peek" at what was being asked.

I really do feel like this whole process is guilty until proven innocent. I immediately started doubting myself as a person and a parent. I wear my emotions on my sleeve so people generally know when I'm stressed out. How do I handle stress???? Depends...I can shut down all together. I can yell and scream until I get my point across. I blog. I Facebook. I turn to my friends for advice. More often than not, when I'm stressed out and feel totally lost, I call Geek Boy because he is my true sounding board. He is amazing at handling stress. He is great at calming me down and just listening. Are any of these traits productive in raising a foster child? I don't know but I feel I'm totally screwed in this area.

So when my friend let me see some of the questions, my heart sank and I got sick to my stomach. She has seen me stressed out and more often than not I have not handled myself appropriately. I can remember totally losing it and she literally had to hold me up and walk me to her office to calm me down.

How am I going to handle myself in these stressful situations? I'm sure in most fostering situations I will have to handle and deal with stress right on the spot. So I really have to dig deep and figure out how I'm going to be prepared.

There is just so much to do before the home study and I'm just sick of it. I'm sick of filling out paperwork, which will not end after we become licensed. I'm sick of second guessing every conversation I have with my girls wondering if they'll talk about this or that during the home study and how it will be perceived by our Family Specialist. I'm sick of worrying about putting together a damn scrapbook so we can do a match adoption. I'm sick of worry about locking up all of our medication. I'm sick of thinking about how we can provide structure to a child that is in the system. I'm sick of trying to figure out what age child we want to take in. I'm sick of worrying about Geek Boy getting the man cave ALLLL cleared out. I'm sick of worrying about finances. I'm sick of not knowing the unknown.

Well my laptop is about to die so I better wrap up this blog and try to get some sleep.

126 of 365...Sassy

Older Drama Queen got her hair ALLLLL cut off today.

Before...

After...

125 of 365...Big Man on Campus

Another picture taken by Oldest Drama Queen...

We do have another cat, but she is a DIVA cat in all aspects and will not let us take any photos of her.

124 of 365...Ever Wonder How Geek Boy Got His Name???

Yes, this is Geek Boy hanging out at the lake with his iPad!!! Never leaves home without it.

123 of 365...All American Kitty

Older Drama Queen took this picture of Plato. I love how this photo turned out...

122 of 365...Miscarriage Was A False Alarm

After a very stressful couple of days, Geek Boy and I went ahead and went to our 5 hours of training today. I really was expecting the worst because we hadn't fully gotten over the traumatic experiences of last week's training. So I went into this class fully expecting a total "miscarriage" and we would just go adopt another cat or something. But to my surprise this training was pretty light hearted. The other couples in our class are GREAT and we ask a lot of questions, which our Family Specialist loves. The 5 hours really did go by quickly and by the end of class several of us were exchanging phone numbers and email addresses.

The Family Specialist was giving Geek Boy a hard time because he was challenging her in certain areas and told him she has our file FLAGGED and would make sure our home study is very thorough. It was all fun and teasing, though.

Just to give you an idea how stupid this system can be, let me give you a scenario. We CAN NOT under any circumstances have a trampoline in our yard. If our neighbor were to have a trampoline and our foster child wanted to go next door with the rest of the kids to play on the trampoline, there would need to be EIGHTEEN (18) TRAINED SPOTTERS to watch our one foster child. However, I don't have to lock up any of our alcohol. The alcohol can be at eye level to where the child can reach it.

Next week we have 8 more hours of behavioral training and WE ARE DONE WITH TRAINING FOR A YEAR. Our home study will be the week of August 7th. Crossing our fingers we can get our fingerprints done by that time. If all goes well, we could be verified by the end of September.

However, I did find out we have to provide healthy food and provide 3 meals a day along with snacks for our foster child. I really need them to define healthy. Cherry Pop Tarts instead of Chocolate Frosted ones????? 3 meals???? Seriously...LOL I'm good with going to McDonald's 3 times a day.

Now, there could be some snags and I am fully aware that I could still miscarry. But I'm going to tiptoe around here and try to be the cool and relaxed one and calm Geek Boy down when he has a full fledged panic attack. BTW, I'm the one on Prozac...not him. After last week's episode I was ready to slip him a few.

Oh and on another note, I had to have my doctor write a note stating how long I have been on Prozac, what is my diagnosis, and if I was fit to be a parent. I will be happy to report that my official diagnosis is not for depression. It's for PMDD (Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder). Basically I'm a bitch and need to be on medicine...LOL And he also said that up to this point he has no reason for concern regarding my maternal capabilities. Yes, I have framed this letter and posted it so my girls can see it at ALLLL times.

121 of 365...Foster/Adoption Miscarriage???

A few days ago I was writing a blog in my mind regarding Foster/Adoption conception. I had planned on using analogies on how the beginning of the foster/adoption process is a lot like conceiving a child. But then something hit me head on yesterday afternoon and come to find out I will be blogging about a possible foster/adoption miscarriage.

For a few days or so, I could tell something just wasn't right in our household. I kept putting it in the back of my mind thinking, "Oh he's just tired and cranky from work," or, "Oh this homework is pretty detailed so he'll get to it when he has Friday off and has time to really think in depth about the answers."

But about 11 am yesterday, Geek Boy called me and confessed that he doesn't think he can do the whole foster to adopt thing and has a lot of reservations about adopting through the state. After the initial shock, I asked my boss if I could leave work a little early to try and meet with Geek Boy to go over these issues.

I mean, we have come sooooo far in this process. He has moved out of the man cave; we have decluttered and organized our house, we have announced this process to our friends and family, we have spent 20 grueling hours in training and not to mention all of the paperwork that comes along. We're soooooo freaking close!!!!

After meeting with Geek Boy and talking for about an hour, we kind of left things in an unresolved situation. About two hours later the anger, the mourning of this possible loss and the resentment hit me. I cried, I stomped my foot, I took a shower just to try and rinse all of the hurt I was feeling away. I shot out emails and texts to my friends for support and prayers. And all of this is being done without Drama Queens knowing what is going on.

Finally I decided to put my big girl panties on and talk rationally to Geek Boy. He has some very logical concerns. He is scared of the unknown. He went through the same 20 hours of training and heard the same horror stories of the abuse these kids have gone through. Our life is stressful enough raising two "normal" children so what's it going to be like to add a child who has is now in the system and has been abused or neglected? Normally I'm the person who says the glass is half empty and everything is doom and gloom, but for whatever reason my heart keeps telling me we are doing the right thing and that we need to continue on. I've talked to enough people and read enough blogs to know all of these feelings are normal and if you can get passed this stage, it will be fine.

There are a lot of other issues he is scared of like having to answer to the state and caseworkers about everything that goes on in his home. I keep telling him that in training, they are giving us worst case scenarios and I've talked to enough people to know we would not be subjected to all that. Will we have home inspections quarterly? Yes. Will we need to leave work to take the child to a visit with the parents or to the doctor? Yes, but we have to do that with our own children. Could we have an unannounced inspection? Possibly, but not probable. If we don't give them reason to show up unannounced then they probably won't.

So where do we stand? I'm not sure. We are going to finish our training classes. We are going to meet and talk with some friends who know the system and who have been through this process. Please stay tuned...

120 of 365...Where In The World Are Diva and Geek Boy???

Can't believe it's been over a month since I've blogged.

So June pretty much came an went. It was a pretty uneventful month, with the exception of Geek Boy's 41st birthday, our 16 year anniversary and Father's Day. Oh...and Little Drama Queen was vacationing all over the country with her grandparents. But as far as the adoption process, it was pretty uneventful. Geek Boy did some cleaning of the man cave. I did a little painting. We discovered Ikea!!!!

This past weekend we attended about 18-20 hours of training. My mind is still on overload from all of the information. What an emotional rollercoaster. The main thing I learned that in this process you must have PATIENCE, FLEXIBILITY AND FAITH. Those of you who know me very well know that I have little to no patience. As I get older the flexibility becomes easier to handle. We have a teenager for goodness sakes...you have to be flexible. I strongly believe that everything happens for a reason so I have to have faith that this process will work itself out.

I don't want this to turn into a long blog and I will try to blog more frequently as I think of things to share, but please understand that this foster/adoption process is not something you can just pick out a child and it's done. The state does not move fast with anything. There is tons of paperwork to complete, background checks to look over, financial records to be approved, fire and health inspections, home studies by case workers. So if you ever ask me if we have a kid yet, and I scream at you, please don't take it personally. Please know that the process is long and grueling and very evasive. I still think it would be easier to go find a high school girl who is knocked up and ask her if she's interested in putting her baby up for adoption, but then I would probably be kicked out of the school and the PTA needs me too much...LOL

Now for those people who have thought about fostering or adopting through the state and they ask me if I would do this process knowing what I know now, I would say absolutely YES. There are children out there who need love and need advocates for them and if you could just save one child from the system, I would say go for it. If you're a married couple considering doing this, you have to have each other's back and have a strong marriage. Both parties have to be on board with this. I can honestly say that Geek Boy and I could not have started this process 3 years ago. Not sure what it would've done to our marriage but I can assure you it would not have been in the best interest of any CPS child to be in our home. And I'm not saying we were on the brink of divorce or that a child would've suffered in our home. I'm just saying that we could not have given the love and attention to a child in CPS. We didn't have the committment that it takes, but we do now and are very excited to move forward.

This week we will finish up more paperwork that has to be turned into our case manager and then we attend 5 1/2 hours of training next Saturday.

As always, please keep us in your thoughts and prayers. I promise to blog more. There's just so much to say and I get overwhelmed.