The Long Wait Ahead

Depending on the nature of things, four – six months is not a very long time. Six months at a job? You’re still a newbie. Six month married? You’re still a newlywed. Six months practicing a musical instrument? Amateur.

Six months waiting for your child to come home? Eternity.

We left him there. He is there without us, his mama and tati. We will have no contact until we pick him up to take him home. We will fade away in his memories – maybe we already have. He loved us yes – but most likely did not understand the significance of our visit – the significance of our hugs and kisses and love. They were just nice and then vanished. We pray that this is not so – that God revealed to him that we were his family and that we were coming back for him to free him forever from fatherlessness.

God imprinted on our hearts this little boy, with his little giggles and mischievous smile, as our son. We are missing him, longing for him, desperate for him.

We are eagerly working on all the paperwork that will enable us to bring him home.

Once that paperwork is done and we are just waiting for everyone else to complete their part, we will start working on our preparations... setting up his crib in our room so that we will be close when he cries in the night. Setting up his play space with toys and filling his closet with clothes (so excited that he wears a 3T - it means he is a big, healthy boy!). We will toddler proof our apartment. Once all of this is done, we will have a final homestudy visit. Even the State of Virginia wants to know that we are ready for him!

We are also starting to get together the homecoming plan - which doctors to see and figuring out maternity/paternity leave and adjusting our finances as much as possible to enable us to stay at home as long as possible with him to make sure we are bonding together as a family.

We will start preparing for our second trip - what we will bring, where we will stay, and all of those details. 

We are hoping that this will all keep us busy enough to not miss him too much. 

Quite honestly, I doubt it will work. I am going to miss him every day until I have him in my arms again. 

I did not think that it would be like this - I thought that the wait was going to be a breeze. I am not an emotional person. I thought that I could "handle" this. I used to read the blogs of other adoptive moms during their wait crying in the middle of the supermarket when a child reminded them of thier own far distant little one and think - "Not me, I'll be fine." 

I was wrong. I can't handle this. I am crying at the supermarket. I long for the smell of his hair (like puppy dog fur, strangely enough - the little nursery rhyme was right - What are little boys made of? Frogs and snails and puppy dog tails). I yearn for the sound of his voice. I have a gapping hole in my heart - in my life - and sometimes can barely function because of it. 

So if you ask me how I am, and I say I am fine - chances are I am not. If you find me wiping away a stray tear or staring at the little boy on the bus with a pained expression, bear with me. Have mercy and grace and patience with me - I will be ok - when he comes home, that is. If you ask Ian - he is not much better - he misses his son just as much as I do... except he wouldn't cry in the supermarket. So until he comes home... God have mercy on us.