Week 42

At the beginning of this past week, Week 42 of being approved and waiting for our precious Baby 2, my facebook status said, "Melissa is ready for this week. No reason to expect it to be different than the last 42 weeks of waiting, but there's always hope that it might be. Who knows what God will bring us this week."  Remind me never to put anything like that for my facebook status again.  Seriously.  


This past week has been one of my most difficult weeks of rollercoaster waiting thus far.  Wednesday, I posted that we'd gotten our bi-monthly update email, which talked about several situations in the works, but nothing that seemed imminent to us.  A few hours after I posted that, I got a call from our social worker!  She told me that there was a 7 month old little boy in Florida waiting for a family and asked if we'd like to be considered.  Previously, we've been kind of closed to out of state placement, mostly because there would be exponentially higher travel costs.  But this situation was pretty cut and dry and it was already clear about how many trips we'd have to take, etc.  So, we knew what we were looking at.  Not to mention that Daniel's mom lives in Florida, and though it was a couple of hours away from her, we knew we'd at least have that as an option of a place to go, if we really needed to.  So, we said yes to the baby boy situation and were told that placement was going to be happening quickly.  At that point, we were prepared to pretty much get in the car and go if we were selected.


Thursday, while waiting for word on the baby boy, we got another email from our social worker (I think she sent it to every waiting family in the agency, as she does most of these special situations) asking if we would think and pray about being considered for a two and a half year old little girl in our area.  Her grandmother has custody of her and wants to put her with a younger family who will help her grow up with the kind of attention, energy, etc. a little girl needs.  The problem is that, although she has custody of this girl, she doesn't have parental rights.  Those are still held by her biological parents, whom she was taken from.  And, though they don't seem to want anything to do with her, they're also fighting the grandma about having the little girl placed with another family.  


Let me tell you, my tender heart just can't handle these situations very well!  Frankly, I want to take in every single child that needs a mama and be that for them.  But, at this point, we can't do that.  I was actually surprised that Daniel felt peace about saying yes to the situation with the little girl, but I was very happy to have a few days to think and talk and pray about it.  I was very conflicted and, despite getting advice from others, couldn't really determine how I felt about it.  Until I broke down.  At that point, I'd just been so overwhelmed by it all, I started crying and told Daniel, "This is not the way it was supposed to go.  I'm sick of the rollercoaster.  I just want our baby to come home."  And that was the point that I decided to listen to myself.  I hate that we can't say yes to every child who needs a home, or at least that we can't say yes to every situation to at least be considered.  But I just know deep down this is not the right time for us to be adding that kind of situation to our lives.  I have hopes that some day we will be able to adopt an older child, or an older sibling group, but I think it's best for us to do that when we're older and wiser and our children are the older ones, and, as a family, we can all come along side someone or someones who are in a situation like this.  


It hurts me to think that some people will read this and not understand our hearts; that they won't understand my heart in this.  But, I remind myself that, made in the image of God, we're to use our minds as well as our emotions.  When we started this process, we set a list of parameters of what we were looking for and what we were comfortable with.  It's not sinful to stay inside those parameters and allow ourselves to be in the situation we see as best for our family.  We know we are safe within God's will and we trust that, following his leading, this process will end with just the right child for our family.  


Then, this morning, I got an email from our social worker who let me know that the family in Florida picked another family from a different branch of our agency for their little boy.  So, both of those situations are closed and we start week 43 where we started week 42, with just a few more tears shed, a few more prayers prayed, a few more steps taken, and a few more days closer to the day it really will be our turn.