Finding my voice

The Voice Within, by Christina Aguilera

Young girl don’t cry
I’ll be right here when your world starts to fall
Young girl it’s alright
Your tears will dry, you’ll soon be free to fly

When you’re safe inside your room you tend to dream
Of a place where nothing’s harder than it seems
No one ever wants to bother to explain
Of the heartache life can bring and what it means

Chorus:
When there’s no one else, look inside yourself
Like your oldest friend just trust the voice within
Then you’ll find the strength that will guide your way
You’ll learn to begin to trust the voice within

Young girl don’t hide
You’ll never change if you just run away
Young girl just hold tight
Soon you’re gonna see your brighter day

Now in a world where innocence is quickly claimed
It’s so hard to stand your ground when you’re so afraid
No one reaches out a hand for you to hold
When you look outside look inside to your soul

Chorus

Life is a journey
It can take you anywhere you choose to go
As long as you’re learning
You’ll find all you’ll ever need to know
(be strong)
You’ll break it
(hold on)
You’ll make it
Just don’t forsake it because
No one can tell you what you can’t do
No one can stop you, you know that I’m talking to you

Chorus

Young girl don’t cry I’ll be right here when your world starts to fall

Superhero

What's that show? Save a cheerleader, save the world.

I was a HS cheerleader. I envisoned signing Ingrid up for Pop Warner cheerleading.

I have a new hero.
http://chew.typepad.com/jenute/

Please feel free to visit her blog. And SHARE it.

Her Guatemala story has a happy ending. Beautiful baby, home safe and sound. I "found" her right when she switched to Guatemala and followed her story. She disappeared after homecoming, as so many people do. I assumed it was because she was so happy, elated, busy taking care of her daughter. Low and behold, turns out she had gotten a referral from China. You probably have heard of her story. Her agency was NOT good to her, suffice it to say.

From the adoption-nightmare stories I know, NONE of us blame our agencies for the problems with our children (or in my case, the problem with my non-process). We understand that International Adoption takes risks, that the children will not be "perfect" and that there are unknowns when you're dealing with government and legal stuff. However, the way these adoption agencies treated their "paying clients" when problems occured, that is NOT acceptable.

BEING BULLIED IS NOT ONE OF THE RISKS YOU EXPECT WHEN YOU ADOPT INTERNATIONALLY. An agency does NOT have the right to lie to you because they are uncomfortable telling you the truth. A potential adoptive parent DOES have rights, even if the contract says you acknowledge there may be some unknowns. ADOPTIVE PARENTS ARE PAYING CLIENTS, we pay the adoption agency to provide a service of facilitating an adoption, to advise us on the process and to walk us through the paperwork and to handle difficulties should they occur. AND PAYING CLIENTS HAVE RIGHTS. I would not pay a repairman to not fix my air conditioner. I would not pay a gardener to not mow my lawn. Why did I pay an adoption facilitator to NOT facilitate an adoption?

DID YOU KNOW, THERE IS A DIFFERENCE IN THE LICENSING REQUIREMENTS FOR ADOPTION AGENCIES AND ADOPTION FACILITATORS? I didn't know that when I started.

I was also impressed to get an e-mail or phone call on a Sunday. Or at 9:00 PM on a Friday night. At the start of my process, I would have been SOOOOOOO impressed at the commitment, at the near 24-hour access the agency has. I NOW SEE IT DIFFERENTLY. Anyone who is so eager to get your business on the weekend is only doing so because they want to HOOK YOU IN before you go somewhere else. NOTE TO MY FUTURE AGENCY - Please do not call me on the weekend. If you're calling me on the weekend, I don't trust you. And moreseo, I'd like to believe you're spending the weekend with YOUR FAMILY.

Did I mention we saw Styx on Thursday?

Don't Let It End, by Styx

What can I do
Pictures of you still make me cry
Trying to live without your love
It's so hard to do
Some nights I'll wake up
I'll look at your pillow
Hoping that I'll see you there
But I get up each day, not much to say
I've nowhere to go
Loneliness fills me up inside
'Cause I'm missing you


(I don't remember them singing this one during the concert. I know they didn't sing "Mr. Roboto," because that's one we were listening for. Today in the car, Doug played this song. I made him turn it off before the tears started. Cause of the dream, I'm sure.

Out of the blue

I had another Ingrid dream last night. Sad. In the dream, I had received a "new" video of her, with her foster family. I was all excited, thinking if she were back with her foster family and the agency had sent me this video, then I could buy presents for her. So I rushed to the store, intending on buying presents for her but somehow wound up in the furniture part of the store (I shop in high-class places if I can buy the clothes and the furniture in the same store). And as I'm walking around, picking out things I knew she would like, I realized the video couldn't be new because of who was in the video. In my dream I got SO SAD figuring out that it wasn't new, it was old, that she's not with the foster family, that she really IS back with her bfamily. And then I woke up and remembered that I can't adopt her.

Your turn to participate (PLEASE)

BUMPING THIS MESSAGE FROM YESTERDAY. STILL SEEKING YOUR ANSWERS...

Anyone else watch Big Brother? I've seen almost every episode since season 2 (I missed a bunch of season 1, when it was on seven days a week). Resa got me into it. This season's houseguests, I just have one question: I didn't know that Tommy Lee was Anna Nicole Smith's father. (If you don't watch the show, you won't get it. Resa and Doug were rolling on the floor laughing.)

I've long thought that if I were to be on a reality show, it would be that one. Nothing to do but sit in a house and gossip. Contests that aren't physically demanding. Prety much the worst things about the show are no Internet, no Doug, and occasional weeks of eating nothing but "Big Brother slop" (which appears to be nothing more than plain oatmeal).

But it got me thinking about what kind of reality show WOULD be good to be on.

PLEASE leave a comment saying if you think these scenarios would be GOOD, in that you wouldn't judge a person too harshly if they did it. And feel free to embellish with details and past experiences. Is it OK, in your opinion, for a person to:
1. Be a contestant on a reality show like Survivor, Big Brother, or the Amazing Race?
2. Be a contestant on a "talent search" like American Idol or America's Next Top Model?
3. Be a contestant on a game show like Millionnaire or Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader?
4. Be interviewed by the local news about a program you're volunteering with?
5. Be interviewed by the local news about an accident you witnessed?
6. Be interviewed by Oprah about some aspect of your life, like your messy house or your boyfriend who won't commit?
7. Be interviewed by Montel or Dr. Phil about your failed adoption?

PLEASE leave opinions. And ask your friends to leave opinions. Please.

I Would Die For That

Mine is about three minutes into the song.

UPDATE: The person singing it is Kellie Coffey. Her website, http://www.kelliecoffey.com/index.asp, says she won the Top New Female Country Artist award in 2003. It does mention that she had a baby in 2005, but it doesn't specifically mention if she herself dealt with infertility. According to the website, "The video of the song I Would Die For That, a song dealing with infertility and a working woman's desire to have a child, is on various sites around the internet now." So I'm not really sure how old she is, either.

I'm still telling people

Before the comp exams last July, my cohort met every week, sometimes twice a week and even more over the summer. I knew so much about these people. It got to the point when we'd get a new professor and we'd have to do the "tell us a little something about yourself" speech, we could guess what everyone else would say.

Since the comps, we're only together once a month. And some months we don't have to meet at all, provided we still meet with our individual advisor. Even when we meet, it's more of a "this is what you still have to do for this part of your dissertation" kind of thing. We show up, say how much progress we've made, complain that we're never going to finish, and then leave. No chit-chat time.

This summer class has more down time, even though it seems like more work. (It's not really more work, it's just that we're doing a complete course in ten days with all of the required readings and assignments for the full course. Plus, my commute is 1.5 hours instead of just 45 minutes, each way. Over the summer, when "teachers are on vacation." Plus the dissertation.) And since there's the down time, we have a chance to catch up on our lives.

One of the girls in my cohort adopted twins from Russia in 2001. She's a single mom, also. She was a lifeline to me during my early research on adoption. She gave me the book "Toddler Adoption," which kind of led me to older children. I had found some Russia things still laying around my house, a tiny doll in a Russian outfit and a Christmas ornament with a matrioshka (nesting doll) inside it. I gave them to her today for the girls.

A little later, she asked me what was going on with my process. "Is the little girl home with you now?" I said no, she's never coming home to me. She smiled one of those, "It will all work out" kind of smiles. The ones I got sick of seeing last spring when I was waiting for DNA authorization that just didn't seem to ever come. I said, "No, really. She's never coming home. AS told me in October and the agency admitted it in December. Then in January they promised me a new referral or a refund and I haven't heard from them since. They didn't even answer the complaint I filed at the Better Business Bureau." She was shocked. She asked what would happen to Ingrid now, I told her that I'm choosing to believe she really IS with her bio family. And then we talked about how in addition to all of the money I lost, it's also the heartbreak. I said, "It's ALL the heartbreak." ALL of it. Every bit. I planned on spending over $30,000 on an adoption. I also planned on being a MOM which basically means never having fun-money again. The money is only important because I have NONE left, and without money I can't pay fees for an adoption of a child I actually CAN be a mom to.

More than anything else, it's the heartbreak. If I got my refund, I'd still have the heartbreak. Even if I got a new referral, I'd still have the broken heart for Ingrid (although I know that actually having a child to be a mom to would help in healing my heart).

Painfully aware

July 3. I know this date. I know it too well.

July 3, 2006 - I asked for a new referral. Actually, first thing I did was write out what I would say to the agency when I called. No answer (of course), so I left a message. Got an e-mail minutes later (coincidence?) saying they didn't hear me. I sent the e-mail. I was told it was my decision to wait (not true, well half true because I was trusting their professional judgement, which is what I PAID them for). "We can certainly talk about a new referral but the other case will be approved in a matter of days." Within days it was clear that the agency would never give me another referral. It was six months later until the agency flat-out started to ignore me. But July 3, that was the date I admitted to myself that it was over with Ingrid. I held out hope for over five more months, even for the two months after Adoption Supervisors told me it was over I still hoped. I hoped until it was clear my agency would not respond to me.