I found notes that I wrote down in Charleston about our "adventure"...(as I wrote it)
Thursday, May 17, 2007 The Lodge Alley Inn, Charleston, SC 8:55pm
Paul left a message w/Carol, kinda asking how Elizabeth might be feeling about us, one way or another. We took a boat, ended up being us & the guide, out fishing. Shortly after we started the actual fishing, my cell phone rang. Which meant it had to be Nicole, Carol would have tried Paul's phone. She apologized & said that Carol was in training today. Took a while before she finally said that Elizabeth was very comfortable w/us. So Eric Christopher is our son. She will be signing over her parental rights sometime after 10 am tomorrow. Nicole will call around noon. We will be seeing Eric @ Children's on Saturday. Nicole will be in training. So hopefully Carol will be there. Though Children's will know we will be coming. We have to learn how to do his feedings. He will be coming home on Wednesday. A belated Mother's Day for me & an early Anniversary for us. This is just so freaking awesome. Finally...I'm a mommy, almost. After we hear from Nicole that it's official, we'll each call our folks. I'm so excited, I can hardly wait. I was bad and announced it on the PCOS and adoption board. I may blab it to Holly. Need to call her. OK, off to check e-mail one more time. Oh Yeah!
Eric was born 7 weeks early on March 30, 2007 at Good Samaritan Hospital and was transported that day to Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center. He weighed 4 lbs. 7 oz and was 17" long. Surprisingly, he arrived vaginally. But then from what we were told Elizabeth had very little pre-natal care, so they may not have known all the medical issues he had. He had an omphalacele (sp?), that's where the bowls are outside the body. That was repaired 2 days later. Eric was also born with a cleft palate and hole in his heart (VSD). Due to the palate and hole he was fed by an n-g tube. The cleft palate makes sucking difficult and his VSD tires him easily.
Friday, May 18, 2007 I26 somewhere in NW SC 12:16 pm
We are on our way home. Nicole did call. Papers have not been signed. Elizabeth is sick. Nicole asked her if it was nerves or if she was really sick. Nicole said she looked pretty bad. (Nicole went to pick her up and take her to CSS to sign the papers.) She asked if we were still comfortable w/going to Children's tomorrow even though the papers haven't been signed. Still are. Waiting to see if Carol will be able to meet us there. Hopefully just a small delay. Nicole said Elizabeth is making a rational decision, not emotional. She seems to have it together. She should sign on Monday.
Connie called asking about when we would get in. Dad wants to take us out to dinner. We did tell her, but told her not to say anything until it is official. Paul needs to call her.
Need to make a list of stuff to do. And there's a lot.
Haven't made up my mind about my parents. Just don't want to jinx this.
Elizabeth did sign a 30 day temporary custody over to CSS. Children's called to give us a phone # & code to check on Eric (W.) & to set up visits.
1:20 pm
Connie already told "Dad," so I guess that let's me able to my parents.
(List)
move cabinet
paint nursery
sew boppy cover
new baby carrier
shade
crib
hang curtains
sew bumper
sew cootie cover
sew little play yard
frame x-stitches
shop for clothes
tub
LOL, some of that stuff still isn't done, may never get done. Others, I'm not sure what the heck I'm even talking about!
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Friday, January 25, 2008
My Birthday, Part II
Gee, I never did mention much about my birthday. About the same as the past years, with the exception of Eric in my life. We went to the Birdhouse, I mean the Boathouse for dinner. Had my now usual, rib and pork chop combo. Ate the ribs and took the chop home for tomorrow's dinner. Shared an order of calamari with the family. Yummy! Eric was good for being out past his bed time two nights in a row. I did have to take him from Uncle David when I got back from the potty. He was fussing. Mommy's touch got him to calm down. I received a heart pendant with Eric's birthstone and name inscribed on it from Paul. Love it! I kept thinking to myself why is the stone blue and not red? Duh! March is aquamarine! I've got May on the brain since that was when we got him. I had asked about the stone to Paul, who gently reminded me that it was Eric's birthstone.
So, back to my journal about Eric's arrival, so I could have my first birthday as a mama.
We left Charleston on Friday, May 18. The original plan was to stop at Paul's dad's on the way back, but decided to go straight home so we could meet our new son the next day. It was long 10 hour drive plus stops but well worth it. We were trying to come up with an excuse to tell Paul's dad why weren't coming back without telling him about the possibility of us becoming parents. After our first failed match we didn't want to tell anyone until we were pretty sure about it. In other words, we had a baby in our arms! Some how it got out, oh well, he was happy.
So, back to my journal about Eric's arrival, so I could have my first birthday as a mama.
We left Charleston on Friday, May 18. The original plan was to stop at Paul's dad's on the way back, but decided to go straight home so we could meet our new son the next day. It was long 10 hour drive plus stops but well worth it. We were trying to come up with an excuse to tell Paul's dad why weren't coming back without telling him about the possibility of us becoming parents. After our first failed match we didn't want to tell anyone until we were pretty sure about it. In other words, we had a baby in our arms! Some how it got out, oh well, he was happy.
Thursday, January 24, 2008
My Birthday 2008
For last year's birthday, I was hoping to become the mother of a soon to be 12 year old girl named Jessica. This year I am the mama of a 9 month old boy named Eric. Would I change anything about this past year? Absolutely not!
Paul and I took training classes to upgrade our homestudy so we could adopt an older child. We were hoping to get the chance to adopt Jessica, an 11 year old girl who was a "foster sister" to Paul's cycling friends' adopted daughter, Tabatha. We were matched in February and soon got the chance to meet with her officially. I say officially because we did "secretly" meet her when we had dinner at the Wessler's house. She did not know that were interested in adopting her. Jessica flat out stated that she did not want to be adopted. We believe that she was holding out hope in being reunited with her family, which was not going to happen. So, we said we wanted to be unmatched, no sense in trying to force her to do something she doesn't want and then make our lives hell. We continued with our wait for a baby with Catholic Social Services.
May took us to Charleston, SC for our anniversary trip. Monday afternoon, May 14, Paul and I toured the aircraft carrier USS Yorktown. Paul noticed he had a voice mail message on his cell phone, which he figured was unimportant and would check it later. Kind of hard to get cell reception when your traipsing around the belly of an aircraft carrier. I said "hey, who knows, it could be something important." (I had this nagging feeling that we would get called on vacation that we were going to be getting a baby.) He humored me, checked, and it was Carol, our social worker. I get foggy about details here, can't remember or not if she said she had a possible match for us or just to get in contact with her. Well, it was after hours and we could not get a hold of her. Carol called us Tuesday morning that a birth mother had chosen us and another couple to be the possible parents for her son. We were told he had a number of medical issues, all that were repairable. Would we be interested? Of course! She wasn't able to set up a phone conference until the next day. So, we waited on Wednesday to talk with a possible birth mother. While waiting Paul was making phone calls trying set up a fishing trip, we wanted to go that day but the phone call was delayed, so we got it for Thursday and ended up being lazy that day. Finally, Nicole, the pregnancy counselor, called and we talked with Elizabeth. She asked us a bunch of questions, including if we were willing to keep he son's name, Eric. Yes, I said that it had been on my baby name list. She didn't care if we changed his middle name, Christopher. Later that afternoon, we agreed that if we were chosen we would keep the middle name too. Good, I also had Christopher on the list. She asked Paul if he would teach him to fish. Of course. We said were in the process of planning a fishing a trip for the next day. She liked to go fishing with her dad when she was young. Due to his medical issues would we be willing to learn how to feed him a special way. We would do what ever we would have to do for this boy. We really had no questions for her. So, we hung up and waited, knowing she had another couple she was interested in. Thursday brought a hazy day, actually it was smoke from the wildfires in Georgia, and a light rain. We ended up being the only ones on the fishing trip, which was nice. Out in the middle of no where my cell phone rang. It was Nicole telling us we were chosen! I was in heaven riding on cloud nine. All kinds of emotions. Thoughts reeling through my head. We were finally going to be parents!
Paul and I took training classes to upgrade our homestudy so we could adopt an older child. We were hoping to get the chance to adopt Jessica, an 11 year old girl who was a "foster sister" to Paul's cycling friends' adopted daughter, Tabatha. We were matched in February and soon got the chance to meet with her officially. I say officially because we did "secretly" meet her when we had dinner at the Wessler's house. She did not know that were interested in adopting her. Jessica flat out stated that she did not want to be adopted. We believe that she was holding out hope in being reunited with her family, which was not going to happen. So, we said we wanted to be unmatched, no sense in trying to force her to do something she doesn't want and then make our lives hell. We continued with our wait for a baby with Catholic Social Services.
May took us to Charleston, SC for our anniversary trip. Monday afternoon, May 14, Paul and I toured the aircraft carrier USS Yorktown. Paul noticed he had a voice mail message on his cell phone, which he figured was unimportant and would check it later. Kind of hard to get cell reception when your traipsing around the belly of an aircraft carrier. I said "hey, who knows, it could be something important." (I had this nagging feeling that we would get called on vacation that we were going to be getting a baby.) He humored me, checked, and it was Carol, our social worker. I get foggy about details here, can't remember or not if she said she had a possible match for us or just to get in contact with her. Well, it was after hours and we could not get a hold of her. Carol called us Tuesday morning that a birth mother had chosen us and another couple to be the possible parents for her son. We were told he had a number of medical issues, all that were repairable. Would we be interested? Of course! She wasn't able to set up a phone conference until the next day. So, we waited on Wednesday to talk with a possible birth mother. While waiting Paul was making phone calls trying set up a fishing trip, we wanted to go that day but the phone call was delayed, so we got it for Thursday and ended up being lazy that day. Finally, Nicole, the pregnancy counselor, called and we talked with Elizabeth. She asked us a bunch of questions, including if we were willing to keep he son's name, Eric. Yes, I said that it had been on my baby name list. She didn't care if we changed his middle name, Christopher. Later that afternoon, we agreed that if we were chosen we would keep the middle name too. Good, I also had Christopher on the list. She asked Paul if he would teach him to fish. Of course. We said were in the process of planning a fishing a trip for the next day. She liked to go fishing with her dad when she was young. Due to his medical issues would we be willing to learn how to feed him a special way. We would do what ever we would have to do for this boy. We really had no questions for her. So, we hung up and waited, knowing she had another couple she was interested in. Thursday brought a hazy day, actually it was smoke from the wildfires in Georgia, and a light rain. We ended up being the only ones on the fishing trip, which was nice. Out in the middle of no where my cell phone rang. It was Nicole telling us we were chosen! I was in heaven riding on cloud nine. All kinds of emotions. Thoughts reeling through my head. We were finally going to be parents!
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Trying to get started...
OK, it's less than an hour before my birthday, I'm trying to get started on setting up a blog. I'm tired and don't know why I decided to do this at such a late hour, but hey, I do crazy stuff like this. For most, this may not be that late, but I have a 9 month old who keeps me busy, and I have been pretty busy all day.
I think tomorrow I will have to reflect on the past year of my life. Did I know on my last birthday that I would be a mother by my next one? No, but I was hoping and praying. Wait...I said I 'd do this tomorrow, when hopfully I'll be a bit more "with it."
I think tomorrow I will have to reflect on the past year of my life. Did I know on my last birthday that I would be a mother by my next one? No, but I was hoping and praying. Wait...I said I 'd do this tomorrow, when hopfully I'll be a bit more "with it."
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