No news is bad news
Dec. 5th | Posted by Nicky
9 comments
I haven’t posted since last Friday… following the old adage: “If you can’t say something nice; don’t say anything at all.”
Friday was really rough on me – this wait is really hard. I’m not sure how I’m going to cope through the coming (gulp) months. And today we got an email from our agency, Kidslink, saying that the referral wait time for siblings has been extended to 6-10 months (instead of the original 6-8 months.) Doesn’t seem like much of a difference, but…
So I’m not sure what to do. Apparently, referral times for siblings 3+ is only 2-3 months. Maybe we should reconsider our age request of a child under one year old and 1 child under three. Jrock and I said we’d have this conversation if Xmas rolled around and no referral had happened… but now I’m not so sure.
Long sigh…………….
I keep wondering if we should change as well. But DON’T if you are only doing it to go faster. I keep telling myself, “what is a few more months in the grand scheme of things.” If you really would like a baby, make sure you keep it that way. You can never get back the stages that they have already passed. I did not realize that the waiting would be hard, especially when we put timelines to it. I have decided to tell myself to wait ’till Easter (which is in March this year). Enjoy Christmas – most likely your last as a family of 2 – and when you look back on this time 5 years down the road, you will wonder “what were we thinking” it wasn’t soo bad. Well that’s what I’m telling myself. I see that I am telling myself a lot of stuff. I may possibly need a shrink. hee hee
Merry Christmas, and I will be thinking of you and all the waiting families this year!! God Bless.
The wait is hard. Really hard. We waited almost 13 months for our referral, and when we began the process we expected to have our child/ren home within a year. It was very difficult to watch KL families that had began the process after us get quick referrals – but we truly believed that we had made the right decision and we held our breath and waited.
We stated talking about changing our age request about 6 months into the wait. Our reasoning was – since the process was taking so much longer than we had originally anticipated, we may not actually be able to adopt a second time. We thought about it for months and when we finally changed our request we had a referral almost immediately, but I’m sure our original referral would have been close behind. The ironic thing is that we had originally asked for under 18 months assuming we would be placed with a toddler, but because of the change we made, one of our sons is only 5 months old. So, in the end the change was a blessing and I am glad that we waited or we wouldn’t have made the change.
I realize this isn’t really giving you any insight! I only want to let you know that as long and difficult as the wait is – YOUR children will come home to you and when you see that picture, the long wait is forgotten(for the most part!).
Kindly,
Shauna (trying to patiently wait for a Christmas Eve court date)
I was thinking of you on Monday… sure that you were receiving good news and then when someone posted that they had received a referral on Monday I thought for sure that you had too… I’m so sorry to hear that you haven’t yet, but I bet that it will be soon.
Waiting? It sucks.
I didn’t get that email, since we’re only allowed to ask for one here in Ontario. But I can imagine, with how impatient I am right now after barely 2 months of waiting, how devastating it would be to be told I have to wait MORE. It’s like the worst of tortures.
I can’t say anything to help other than I am sorry for the sucky news.
I’d make you a pumpkin bread if I could. And we could have tea and a pity party together.
Thanks Jody, Cin, Shauna and Courtney;
I was really hyped after last weekend and thought maybe, maybe… (I thougt too that my lack of blogging you would think I had a referral, Courtney! So I thought I would post anyway!)
I appreciate your support!!!
I didn’t know how hard this would be when I started. I had no idea. Not that I wouldn’t do it… but I just wasn’t prepared. (If you ever can be.)
Anyways, thanks for your kind words.
Nicky
Hi Nicky,
Older kids are great too. My daughter was almost 5 when I adopted her and my son will be 4.5. There are so many wonderful things you can do with an older child – play with them, watch them experience all the firsts and be AWARE of what they’re experiencing. Take them to museums, go the playground, play simple games… Sure you can do a lot of that with a baby or toddler, too, but it’s more YOU doing it whereas with an older child THYE are so much more aware.
Sure, you can never get back those early months and years you didn’t have with them, and that’s a loss. But there is still joy in watching them and interacting with them at a pre-school age, or even school age.
You could still possibly adopt a second time and ask for a baby that time, if you really want to experience looking after and mothering an infant.
Adoption isn’t just about finding a child for you, it’s also (and moreso, I’d dare to say) about finding parents for the many children who need them. Some of those children are infants, but many more of them are toddlers, or pre-schoolers, or even school-age children. Children whose birthparents have died after caring them for several years, or who have become too sick to look after them.
No, don’t change just to shorten your timeline. But I’d encourage you to consider that older children are precious and wonderful, too, and in just as much need of parents as the sweet little babies.
From a few comments I’ve heard from KL, the orphanage our children come from is full of older children. The babies never spend more than a couple of days there, as they are in such demand that they are referred and sent to the TH to await their parents. But the older kids (toddlers, preschoolers, school-age kids) wait, and wait, and wait.
You are sad and tired and frustrated after waiting 3 months. Some of those kids may have been waiting for 3 years for a family to choose them. And the older they get, the less likely it is.
I hope I’m not going overboard here and pressuring you – you have to do what is right for your family.
But sometimes I think of those older kids and my heart breaks.
I’ll stop now.
Best wishes as you take time over Christmas to think about your options and come to the best decision you can for your family.
Sigh. We got The Email today as well.
And from the looks of it — 1 year to 16 months from receipt of homestudy to travel — it’s technically impossible to adopt an infant. Which sucks for us, because we are adopting an infant. Or, closer to reality, an infant when they match us up, but a toddler by the time we actually get to bring our child home.
It’s like a kick in the gut.
Believe me the wait super sucks!! We’re at almost 5 months and CAFAC says 8-13 months for a referral for siblings under 36 months. Yuck, yuck, yuck!! I don’t know how to cheer you up, but just know you’re not alone, there’s others in the same boat. Just a bit of advice: don’t just change your age ranges because you want it faster, make sure that’s what you really want….When we changed to siblings from an infant, my friend asked me,”are you changing because you want siblings, or because you think you’ll get a referral faster”…… Something to ponder…
Rhonda
Well, guys… I really appreciated your advice and sharing. I’m going to write a post post-pondering!
With thanks
Nicky