Slowly But Surely...

Dave and I continue to make steady progress on our stack of paper work that has to be completed. All of the items that take awhile to process, like birth certificates and finger prints/background checks, have been requested. The progress forward makes me a little less overwhelmed every day. We also had our first home study visit... I was nervous walking in, but it ended up to be pretty fun and interesting. We talked about things it seems all couples should before having children... fire escape plan, guardianship, family history, our roles in our relationship, religion, discipline, etc. Our next visit is in mid-April and then our final visit which will take place in our actual home will take place shortly there after. That pretty much covers the logistical side of things for the time being...

On the fun side of things, Dave started to practice cooking Ethiopian food for the first time. I was on business travel, so he decided to take couple of hours to begin to learn the ropes. The first item he made was Nit'ir Qibe, or herbed butter. I haven't had the chance to taste it yet, but it smells amazing and Dave says it tastes wonderful! This is a basic ingredient in authentic Ethiopian dishes, and whenever a dish requires butter, this is the butter you use. When Dave was cooking, he just got some recipies off the internet and then added an Ethiopian cookbook to our "wish list" on Amazon. Well they very next day that very cookbook arrived in the mail! He was so confused as he didn't order it, but as it turns out, our kind friends Kate and Paul sent it to us along with a couple of childrens books to support us in our adoption process... Thanks so much Paul and Kate! We'll be cooking you an Ethiopia feast soon!

Paper, Paper, Paper!!!!

Before we started the adoption process, I knew there would be a lot of paper work... Little did I know how much paper work there would really be!!!

I remember closing on a house, both buying and selling, and thinking, "Man, this is a lot of paper! I'm glad all I have to do is sign my name 100 times; I pity the poor soul who has to pull all of the documents together." Well, that poor soul is now Dave and me...

Yesterday consisted of reviewing all of the documents we need for the home study and dossier and coming up with the game plan. Having a game plan made me feel a lot better until I realized not only do 99% of the documents have to be notarized, they also have to be CERTIFIED!!! I didn't even know what the heck a certified document was until today. To get a certified document, you first have to have it notarized, then once you have all the notarized documents you need for one state, you have to send it to the Secretary of State for the state in which is was notarized in and have them certified. This means once we get all of our various documents from banks, police station, employers, doctors etc, we have to put them in mail and send them off to get certified to the appropriate states which at the time will be CO, MI, and MN! No wonder they say getting your home study and dossier together can take 3 months... I'm still hoping we can pull it together in 4-6 weeks. :-) Okay, I warned you in my initial posts that some times I would just need to vent... well, today is the first day of that, and I'm sure it won't be the last.

On a fun and exciting note, Dave and I attend our first of 4 parenting classes on Saturday. It was fun to meet other couples going through the same process we are. I think there were about 13 other couples adopting from Ethiopia in the room with us! We also got to meet a sweet little girl who was adopted from Ethiopia about 7 months ago... So cute! To top it all off, we learned about traveling to Ethiopia, raising a child of a different race, and care for African skin and hair. Obviously some topics were lighter than others.

Moving on... Thanks so much to everyone for your e-mails and comments regarding our journey. I've only received one question so far...

Why Ethiopia?
I figured this would be one of the first questions. :-) I guess the question before that might be, why international versus domestic? Well, that decision came about after loving the idea of being able to bring the baby home as a newborn which often comes with domestic adoption, but not being able to stand the idea of a mother or father choosing to parent after choosing us as the adoptive parents. We also decided to adopt internationally after discussing and loving the idea of bringing a child of a different race and ethnicity into our family. For those wondering, we'll be a transracial family (I wasn't sure what the appropriate term was when we first started). This is something not to be taken lightly. In true Darcy and Dave style we already have 4 books on hand to begin to explore the issues that both we and our child/children will be faced with. Okay, I digress... We were drawn to Ethiopia because most parents adopting from Ethiopia have their children home within about 12 months of starting the process, the children average 8 months of age upon coming home, there are approximately 2 children to one nanny in the orphange, women are rarely exposed to alcohol and drugs during their pregnancy, and children are valued overall in the Ethiopian culture. So there you have it... the reasons we chose Ethiopia.

The Closing of One Door and the Opening of Another

After taking a few weeks to recover from our loss, we began to pursue the path we always knew was an option... Adoption! It's actually something we discussed before we were married... The topic of infertility came up and we both agreed we "wouldn't go through extraneous measures to have a biological child", as I said in my previous post, "funny how things change". However, even during the IVF process, adoption was a topic that frequented our conversations both between Dave and myself, our family, and our friends. Over the past several months we have read books, visited various websites at great length, read A LOT of blogs of other adoptive parents, and talked to an adoption consultant. My point in telling you this history is to emphasize this is not a decision we have come to lightly, it's a possibility we have discussed for years and began researching in depth almost one year ago.

This brings us to an exciting announcement... Dave and I have decided to adopt a child from Ethiopia!!! We submitted our application to the International Adoption Network (an adoption agency) in Denver last weekend. It has been approved which now leads us to completing the home study process (our first meeting is next Friday) and preparing our dossier to be submitted to Ethiopia. Our home study approval will be for receiving an infant (0-2 years old) boy or girl and possibly siblings as long as they are both under 2. Right now, we are hoping to have our child home approximately a year from now, but also know we'll have to be very patient as the adoption process can be very unpredictable.

So, I'm sure you have 100 questions... :-) I know we have through out the process and still do! I'll do my best to address the obvious ones without writing a novel, but please do feel free to post a comment with a question, shoot us an e-mail, or even give us a call. We're happy to talk about this exciting journey with people who are interested in the details.

In order to arrive at our decision, we had many factors to take into consideration. The first was deciding between international versus domestic adoption. Once we arrived at the decision to adopt internationally, we had to decide which country. For each decision to be made, we had to weigh the pros and cons of each: wait times, age of the child, travel requirements, possible health concerns, the unknowns we were willing to accept (social history, family history, a birth parent choosing to parent, etc.), and what race and ethnicity we felt we could best support and foster, the list goes on, but you get the idea.

We also had to research adoption agencies... what accreditation they have, costs, references, and experience were the main factors that played into our decision. Please feel free to check out International Adoption Networks web page http://www.adoptioninternational.net/ Thus far we have been incredibly impressed by this agency's organization, friendly people, and responsiveness.

So, there you have it! We are embarking on one of the most amazing journeys of our life! Our eyes, hearts, and minds are wide open as we close one door and open another on our journey to expand the Hurlbert and Wilson clan...

Chapter 1 -- Our Struggle with Infertility -- The Cliff Notes Version

As David and I begin the second chapter in our journey toward growing our family, I thought I'd create a blog with the purpose of updating friends and family regarding our journey, explaining the process, and I'm sure at times I'll just be venting... Before I get started with Chapter 2, I'll give you the Cliff Notes version of Chapter 1 - Our Struggle with Infertility.

Beginning in December of 2006 we began the process of "trying"to get pregnant. Little did we know what this was really going to mean for us. After a year of "trying" with no success, we sought medical help which led to lots of diagnostic procedures and researching our options. Our final diagnosis, or lack thereof, was "unexplained infertility". We did three months of Clomid (oral medication to make me ovulate) and three months of Clomid with Intrauterine Insemination (IUI). With all efforts still unsuccessful, we were then referred to a Reproductive Endocrinologist (RE) who reviewed our history, did a few more tests and recommended a medication called Letrosol (another oral medication similar to Clomid), two rounds of this still did not result in a pregnancy.

After a couple of months of no treatment, we decided to pursue In Vitro Fertilization (IVF). Simply put, this is where they took my eggs and literally injected one of Dave's sperm into each one, let them grow in a petri dish for 5 days, then transfered them back to me . Prior to knowing we'd struggle with infertility, this is something we did not think we'd pursue... Funny how things change. Anyway, after lots of shots, blood draws, ultrasounds, and two outpatient medical procedures, we found out on Christmas Eve 2008 we were pregnant!!! Needless to say we were very happy, but also knew we had a long way to go to our final destination so to speak. Well, after 10.5 weeks of a relatively smooth pregnancy, I miscarried on February 9. I'm not quite sure I can articulate the feelings Dave and I had; Disappointment, frustration, and sadness begin to explain it, but there were many other complicated layers as well that I'll spare you the details of.

The support we received from friends and family was overwhelming, as it has been throughout this entire journey, and lessened the blow so to speak. I can't begin to thank all of you who sent cards, gifts, made phone calls and kept us in your thoughts and prayers. It all meant and still means so much.