grumpy and moody

Sometimes it is hard to shake what you've lived through;

times when someone is moaning about their children
times when someone announces their pregnancy (on facebook no less)
times when I am forced to go back through our infertility journey
times when I am asked when I felt when I miscarried and how we coped
times when you are tired anyway and sleep will not come
times when you realise that you are changed completely from where you started

I'm looking for some positivity from somewhere, and it's hard to find this week. I've been horrid to work with, because I've been grumpy, and I can't shake it. I've been wondering around unable to settle to anything.

Here's hoping tomorrow will be a better day...

Home study visit 5!

(If you want to read about what we've already covered in our home study click here, here, here and here).

Today's meeting went well, but it turned into the the one I was dreading. We started off with talents, interests and personality. We talked about our relationship, how we met (car crash!), how we got together, how we deal with stress, decision making etc. And then we turned to our route to adoption!

We spent a long while talking about infertility and how that has effected us and how we dealt with it. We talked about the fact that M is aware that sometimes i need him to listen to me rant not be a man and 'fix it'. We talked about what our options were, and why we decided against them. We spent time talking about the emotional impact of the IVF/ICSI cycles. We talked about miscarriage and what an awful time it was. Several things were mentioned and I was struggling with answering questions and the whole 7 years has turned my memory to mush.

I need to think a bit more about it before next week - which was when we were supposed to be having those conversations. I need to get my head back into it - go back through my journals and get some dates and events written down.

We finished with a little thought exercise - which I offer up for you to comment on...
'You've just been contacted by the partner of your cousin Emily, who you haven't seen for about 10years. She has disappeared and no-one knows where she is. She has left her little boy Joe (who's 2) in the care of her partner who is not his father. He wants to go abroad to work. There is no-one who can care for the child apart from you. What information would you want to know?'

So what answer would you have given?

home visit 4

I do like our social worker... even though she was late today! I like the fact that she seems genuinely interested in what we think and do - and yes I know that she gets paid for that, but still. I like the fact that she understands and even respects where we are coming from in terms of the age ranges that we are looking at. I really like the fact that she is honest about how hard it is going to be.

In today's visit we talked about our education, finishing off from last week. And then we talked about employment; what jobs we had, why we'd done different jobs. And we talked generally about the future, what we planned to do when a child/ren are placed with us, and how we would cope financially. We also started to talk about how we might cope emotionally.

And that's it - we talked for over 1 hr 30mins, but that is really all that we covered... because we started off we me asking questions, could she send a letter to school (employment check & reference) before July, whether we could move an appointment, and when she thought approval panel might be - end of Oct/beginning of Nov... which might seem like a long time off, but fits in with our 'approved to adopt' before Christmas plan.

home (visit) again!

We've just had our third homestudy visit... and I was debating putting some pictures up from last week's holiday but that can wait until later in the week. I have to some major catching up to do; no internet access for a week - leaves me debating just pressing the 'read all' button on my reader list!

In our home study visit today we finished off talking about my family, which took most of the 2 hours!!!! I got to talk about how my parents met, and what it was like growing up with them and my brother and sister. I got to talk about how my brother's issues effected life (ADHD and dyslexic). I got to talk about my relationship with my sister; and how that has effected me over the years. In fact I did a lot of talking....

I also spoke about my granparent's adopted daughter - I never met her, she moved Australia when my mum was 18, and never managed to visit. She died from cancer in her 50's. I had to write notes when I spoke to Mum about whys, dates, wheres etc, because to us she has always been one of those mythical people - someone that we know about; but I can't say I know her. I met her husband once, he came to the UK to visit when I was about 20. But it was interesting to hear mum talk about her, and to be able to fill in some of the gaps in my knowledge.

We also started talking about education - which will be picked up next week. M and I have very different stories when it comes to schooling. I went to lots of primary schools, a fee paying secondary school followed by a state secondary school. Michael went to 3 schools - a first, a middle and an upper school. All within walking distance of his home - in fact all within walking distance of our home - although the first and middle school are now primary schools!