A Word...or Two

It has been an interesting couple of days regarding adoption.
We have been anxiously awaiting to receive another update from our agency. We hadn't received one since the end of March. Our minds have been occupied with finishing up school work, but there is always the wandering thoughts regarding our adoption. 

When will we hear some news?

Will we have everything we need when the time comes? 

Will the timing work out for us to spend a lot of time with our child or will we still be working? Are we financially ready? 

Can we really do this parenting thing?

Well, this evening as we were preparing dinner we checked our e-mail and there was an update from Holt. We were happy to read that so many families had been matched with children in the months of March and April....so many in fact that their wait list is quickly dwindling! 

This may allow for us to be matched with a child sooner than the 6 to 9 months that we were anticipating waiting, which sounds like some great news if you ask us! 

We will keep you posted with any new happenings!!!

Two

That is right! We have made it two months in the process of waiting for a referral. It is so hard to believe that another month has already passed us by. We feel as if just yesterday we were happy to have passed the one month mark! It probably helps that we are entering into a very busy time of year with teaching and finishing things up at school. How wonderful would it be if they all passed by this quickly?

We Are Not Alone!!!

We had the first adoption support group meeting today and our fear of no one showing up was displaced. We had four families from the community join us!

We spent the hour sharing our hopes for the group and our desire to connect with other families in the community, not only for our sake, but for the sake of our child as well. It is so important to us that our child know other families who have adopted and understand the diversity of families.

We were moved as we listened to the stories of challenge and hope that others are encountering along the way. In the past when asked how the adoption process is going, we have very loosely described where we were at to avoid taking up too much time or to avoid further explanation. With the families that attended the group, we were able to speak candidly about the constant changes taking place, the ongoing waiting and unpredictable time line, and some of the struggles we have emotionally. We were so encouraged and felt we could breath a little deeper and feel a little lighter knowing there are other families going through some of the same challenges and WE ARE NOT ALONE!

We hope that we can continue to get together at least once a month and continue to share with other families........and to get our dose of encouragement that keeps us moving forward.

In the Works

We have thought long about our desires to be involved with a group while we move through our journey of adoption. We feel that this is such a unique journey that it is so important to connect with others who are in the process or have made it through. These connections help to provide some sense of "normalcy" and give us encouragement to keep moving forward even when we feel that we have taken twenty steps back.
So, despite our lack of knowledge or expertise in this area, we are attempting to start an Adoption support group. We contacted our agency here in Wyoming to see if something already existed. They informed us that in the past it has, but there is nothing currently going on. They are in full support of it and very willing to help in any way. We are encouraged by that and hope that we will be able to connect with some new families in the community through this group.
If you have participated in a support group before and have any thoughts or suggestions for us, please feel free to share with us. If you know anyone that might be interested in joining us, please feel free to pass this information along to them as well!