One Year After The Referral - Six Months Home!

One year ago, finding time to write a blog post was no big deal.  Despite a fairly busy work schedule and time spent running a household, there was plenty of “me time” to indulge in blogging and other pursuits.  Not so much free time these days!

One year ago today, life changed with one phone call.  One year ago today, I found out I was going to be Francis’ mother, and life hasn’t been the same since.  Two days ago marked the six month that Francis has been home.  Honestly, we haven’t marked the day even once since he’s been with us.  (Though I know the one year anniversary will certainly be a celebration.)  Each day with Francis feels more and more like he’s always been here with us.  While I’ve yet to forget about the pain of that seemingly-endless wait, it’s hard to remember life without Francis.  Hasn’t he always been part of our lives? 

This morning, Gregg and I tried to tell Francis the story of the day one year ago today, when we found out he would be our son.  After a minute or two, he hopped off the bed and said “See ya later!” and went downstairs to play.  For right now, in Francis’ mind, his life started the day we came to get him from his RSCC.  Anything before that is, essentially, null and void – it just didn’t happen.  I’m sure one day he’ll want to hear about his history again, but for right now, we’re living and loving in the present, and every day is getting better thanks to lots of hard work and having the right team of people to work with us.  Our Francis is a trooper.  He is working so, so hard to form attachments and learn to trust and to love.  We see progress every day, and I am so proud of how far he has come in such a short time.  

One year later, this is the ongoing story of a little boy who really did want a mommy and a daddy and was willing to push past his fears and prior traumas to let them into his heart.  This is the story of a mommy and daddy who waited endlessly for the gift of a lifetime and found that love takes time and patience, but is a gift worth waiting for.  I can’t wait to see how this story continues to unfold – it has already been the most amazing chapter of my life. 

 

The first picture we ever saw of our boy.

Francis on the day of his Baptism, March 10, 2013.

Oh, how I love this boy!

How it all happened

Did you see the big announcement?  You might want to view this post first.

I could have imagined writing this post a thousand times over the last three years, but now that it’s finally time, I’m at a loss for words.  I’ve spent the last week looking at pictures of the most gorgeous little boy I have ever laid eyes on over and over and over again.  I just can’t get it through my head that this time, it’s for real.  This time, there are no “take backs.”  This time, in roughly five months, I’ll be on a plane heading for the Philippines, ready to become this little boy’s mother.

In reality, I’ve been holding out.  I’ve known about Francis and the possibility that he could be ours since January 3.  There’s been plenty to blog about – I just couldn’t do it.  I couldn’t go there again, opening my heart, letting him in, letting other people know what was going on.  It’s the old “fool me once…fool me twice” saying.  I wasn’t going to get burned again.  The total number of people who knew about the possibility, including Gregg and myself?  Ten.  The only family members we told were my parents.  We just couldn’t go through the explanation all over again - we couldn't hurt our family again.

If there’s one thing we know for certain, though, it’s that God had His hand all over this match, which was proposed by our agency’s adoption coordinator when she found him on the special home finding list.  Ever since Gregg and I took in the first litter of kittens, we’ve said that the patron saint of our household must be St. Francis of Assisi because of all of the animals.  “What a funny coincidence,” we thought, when we opened the file and saw that his name was Francis. 

It took us some time to go through the records and go back and forth with the doctor at CHOP.  The day we said yes and had our match meeting with the social worker, it was January 21, one year to the day that we lost our sweet Oreo cat.  The day I dropped off all of our signed paperwork was the feast day of St. Francis de Sales. 

Time dragged on and on and I just could not understand what was preventing the match from being presented to the Board.  I told the program coordinator that March 4 was coming up, and if we got bad news around that date I wouldn’t be able to handle it.  Really, two big losses in exactly three years?  It would be way too much.  Sure enough, she called on March 1 and said that we needed to provide more information.  We gave them six pages worth of information and asked our confidants to start praying.  The paperwork went off to the Philippines on the feast day of St. Frances of Rome.

I finally heard on Tuesday, March 20 that the match would have been presented to the Board the week before, but there had been a quorum and the Board did not meet.  The decision was coming that week, unless something happened.  Wednesday night, Gregg and I went to evening Mass and I pleaded for peace and resolution.  Nothing on Thursday.  Nothing on Friday.  Friday afternoon I was swearing up and down they had not met over the match and I was pulling my hair out.  We went to a favorite country store to spend the afternoon on Sunday after I spent Saturday in bed with a migraine. 

And then there was Monday morning.

I woke up convinced that the only thing we would hear on Monday was that the Board had not met about our match the previous week.  I went to the mailbox and realized I would have to deal with the insurance company.  Then the dog got sick.  Oh, boy, did the dog get sick!!! 

I ended up on the phone with the company that makes this supplement Lakota had to start taking the week before.  They wanted to file an “incident report” about how sick the dog was since there was nothing about that particular symptom in their database.  Exactly at 9:30 a.m., my call waiting started to beep.  Just as I was getting into the nuances of how sick the dog was with the very lovely representative from the supplement company – and I couldn’t hang up on her!  I waited for my cell phone to ring, but it did not.

I finished up with the dog supplement lady and sat down to try to get some transcription done.  9:47 a.m. the phone rang again and Pearl S. Buck came up on the caller ID.

“Hi, Jennifer!  I just called to say ‘Congratulations!’”

Cue tears.  My first words?  “Are you serious?”  That’s what a three year, three week, and one day wait will do to a person.  Cause you to respond to the call informing you you have a son by saying, “Are you serious?” 

I called Gregg at work and told him – he just couldn’t believe it.

I called my mother in tears and she thought the answer was no because I was crying!

And in the middle of all that, I stopped dead in the middle of my living room and said “Thank you, God, for this amazing, wonderful gift.”  The most incredible blessing in my life finally has a face and a name – and I just can’t wait to be able to give him hugs and kisses.