Keeping my Sanity during the wait

[thusadeedoo]

Hey Ladies!

I am so glad to have found where you have all relocated to! I need some tips on staying sane during the wait. We have been waiting 4 months now for a match and are feeling stressed. Our agency doesn't give us any sort of updates, aside from the stats we received a few weeks ago that 90% place within a year and about 47% within 6 months. I am feeling out of the loop and constantly worrying that we will get forgotten about.
Any tips on how to shift focus and be more patient? Should I be checking in with our agency monthly? I don't even at this point know who contacts us once we have a match as we had our home study done with a contracted social worker since we were out of area for our agency.

[gnomesweetgnome]

First, I would definitely find out who you should be communicating with at your agency. After that, I think it is fine to check in monthly. I don't have a lot of advice about waiting, we pretty much just lived our lives, but we only waited for four months. Maybe make a list of all the stuff you'd like to do now before the baby comes and try and see how much you can get done. We had a lot of fun dates and stuff that we did pretty spontaneously while we were waiting.

[jenn]

Ditto gnome. Find out who will be contacting you and just touch base with them. I've become pretty good friends with the office manager for our local branch of the agency so I check in with her when I can.

We're going through the same thing now - we're waiting and we have been for 13 months so we're trying to plan and still live our lives, i.e. planning a trip to Orlando in May. GL!

[shemarie82]

We aren't to the point of waiting for a match yet, but we are still waiting... and it is so tough. We are trying to live life to the fullest. We are taking a trip to Florida in May, partially as a vacation, partially to keep me focused on something positive. We realize that trips will be much more difficult once we have a little one to plan for as well.

[pinkie]

Waiting is the worst. We waited 18 months for number 1 but then only about two months for number 2.

I would absolutely ask about communication. But to be fair, unless there is a match, all you will hear is how many times you were shown. I think checking in monthly is acceptable. It's good to know if you are getting no or little activity in case you feel you need to branch out. If they don't like you checking in, then I would ask how the other families receive info. The stats you listed are very good and having so many matches within a year is fantastic!

Some productive things you can do include 1) creating a list of all the baby stuff you want after bringing the baby home. Cribs, furniture, even things like sheets and towels. Start a registry that only you can see. 2) read a book orm2 about babies. The whole sleeping schedules was so foreign to me and honestly I didn't know what to do with DS1

And everyone who is waiting for child one is going to shoot internet daggers at me for saying this, but seriously try to enjoy the childless time and do activities you can't do with children. My husband and I haven't been out ourselves in I don't even know how long. Go to restaurants, for a drink, to the movies...this is the last time you can do it without having a little person to worry about. Believe me I did nothing but stress about the wait and in retrospect it was not a good use of my time

[sassyirishlass]

Waiting is the worst and being patient is incredibly hard when it's so open-ended. I made myself nuts. I have a desk job, so pretty much every day, I stalked the adoption boards, googled stories about adoption, read blogs about adoption, updated our baby registry, baby, baby, baby all day long. Meanwhile, I felt like a total creeper asking to even hold my friends' babies because I wanted one so badly and they all knew it, so I avoided actual babies like the plague.

It was self-defeating and crazy-making. I wish I'd talked to moms more, and avoided babies less, because the reality of being a mom was harsh and I could have used some prep. I wish I'd traveled more, bought less baby shit (half of it my son hated and we never used, even once), and had more fun staying up late and being irresponsible with childless friends, because half of them fell out of my life once I did become a mom, because we have less in common. Don't self-isolate. Don't obsess. Do remember that once you have your little one, you're going to have new anxieties, and if being a parent doesn't feel exactly like you expected it to, and you're not as blissed out as you expected to be, that's normal, and ok, too.

This, too, shall pass. Hopefully as quickly as possible.

[pinkie]

Mar 24, 2015 11:25:19 GMT -5 sassyirishlass said:

Waiting is the worst and being patient is incredibly hard when it's so open-ended. I made myself nuts. I have a desk job, so pretty much every day, I stalked the adoption boards, googled stories about adoption, read blogs about adoption, updated our baby registry, baby, baby, baby all day long. Meanwhile, I felt like a total creeper asking to even hold my friends' babies because I wanted one so badly and they all knew it, so I avoided actual babies like the plague.

It was self-defeating and crazy-making. I wish I'd talked to moms more, and avoided babies less, because the reality of being a mom was harsh and I could have used some prep. I wish I'd traveled more, bought less baby shit (half of it my son hated and we never used, even once), and had more fun staying up late and being irresponsible with childless friends, because half of them fell out of my life once I did become a mom, because we have less in common. Don't self-isolate. Don't obsess. Do remember that once you have your little one, you're going to have new anxieties, and if being a parent doesn't feel exactly like you expected it to, and you're not as blissed out as you expected to be, that's normal, and ok, too.

This, too, shall pass. Hopefully as quickly as possible.

I love what you said in the last paragraph. During the wait I pictured our life with kids as utopia. Don't get me wrong, it's great and so rewarding, but it is also so tough and a ton of work. Over glamorizing (is that a word) was def not healthy for when reality hit

[sassyirishlass]

Mar 24, 2015 13:19:14 GMT -5 pinkie said:

Mar 24, 2015 11:25:19 GMT -5 sassyirishlass said:

Waiting is the worst and being patient is incredibly hard when it's so open-ended. I made myself nuts. I have a desk job, so pretty much every day, I stalked the adoption boards, googled stories about adoption, read blogs about adoption, updated our baby registry, baby, baby, baby all day long. Meanwhile, I felt like a total creeper asking to even hold my friends' babies because I wanted one so badly and they all knew it, so I avoided actual babies like the plague.

It was self-defeating and crazy-making. I wish I'd talked to moms more, and avoided babies less, because the reality of being a mom was harsh and I could have used some prep. I wish I'd traveled more, bought less baby shit (half of it my son hated and we never used, even once), and had more fun staying up late and being irresponsible with childless friends, because half of them fell out of my life once I did become a mom, because we have less in common. Don't self-isolate. Don't obsess. Do remember that once you have your little one, you're going to have new anxieties, and if being a parent doesn't feel exactly like you expected it to, and you're not as blissed out as you expected to be, that's normal, and ok, too.

This, too, shall pass. Hopefully as quickly as possible.

I love what you said in the last paragraph. During the wait I pictured our life with kids as utopia. Don't get me wrong, it's great and so rewarding, but it is also so tough and a ton of work. Over glamorizing (is that a word) was def not healthy for when reality hit

YES.  It IS so rewarding, and I love my son with every fiber of my being, but when you have months, or years, wishing and praying for a baby, and then you get one, everyone around you (including you) expects you to be overjoyed all the time.  And when you don't feel that way, you feel guilty and ungrateful because, hey, your dream came true, what do you have to complain about?  

I spent the first several weeks after the exhaustion hit wondering if God knew what He was doing when He made me and my hubby infertile, and if we really weren't cut out to be parents.  Now I can look back and laugh at how silly that was, but at the time, it was devastating.  

[thusadeedoo]

Thanks for all the input ladies. We did just come back from a few days away to sort of refresh and regroup. It was starting to get to us and I think the plan from here is to just continue living life instead of hovering and obsessing over waiting for that call. I am sure this is all easier said than done!

[badgergirl66]

I'm right there with you. We've been waiting 3 months.

Things we are doing:
Taking (cheap) vacations
Sleeping in
Planning our life as if we won't be matched anytime soon. I can't sit around and just wait. Example: I make plans for the future with friends or vacations without worrying if I'll have a baby then or be matched then. I'm trying not to live differently. Other than the stricter budget.

Basically, waiting is hard. I'm trying to look at it as time to save money. Time to enjoy a kid free life. Time to work on me and go to the gym.

Hugs.