Team Harvey

Team Harvey

Monday, August 22, 2011

Baby Preparations 2011

In the four weeks since we were selected to adopt our sweet son and our meeting with our birth mom Jenn, things have been hectic.  We have been up to see her three times now.  We went on August 12th for our 28 week 3D ultrasound.  It was amazing to see him and such distinct features. We are so excited to meet him in person.  We have also begun to foster a great relationship with our birth mom.  She is an amazing person and we get along great.  We also went up this past weekend to help her move into a new apartment.  It is really interesting how invested in her wellbeing we are. It isn't just because of the baby because that is obvious.  We just really care for her and know she has had a terrible time with family and people not supporting her and we have told her we will be her family forever in whatever way she chooses to be a part of our life. It is a beautiful relationship and we look forward to continuing to grow that over the next 11 weeks and for the rest of baby's life.

We have also been preparing physically in the house. Nursery furniture, bedidng, baby showers, baby clothes...our house looks like a complete war zone but we are really enjoying this and are thankful for the opportunity.

We have decided to name our son Asher James Harvey.  Craig has always loved the name Asher and James is my Grandpa Erickson's name.  We think it will be a great name for a little man!

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Could this really be happening?

WOW!  What a difference 10 weeks makes.  It has been 10 weeks since we went into "the book."  May 1st....that book where we slaved away for weeks with a designer to make sure we were properly representing ourselves as fun, loving, caring, and prospective parents while trying to utilize the typical "Harvey humor."  It is definitely a whirlwhind, so where should I start?

After we went into the "book" in May, we looked forward to the day when we got "the call."  Though, through the years of infertility and the management of our expectations that this could take 12-18 months, we prepared ourselves that we would have a minimum of 6 months before we even got invited to the first match meeting.  For those of you new to the adoption lingo, a match meeting is when a birth mother (in the open adoption process) selects you out of the book of profiles of waiting families and wants to meet with you to determine if you may be a good fit to adopt her child as well as creating a relationship through the open adoption process.

On July 1st, we were driving to Indianapolis for the 4th of July weekend and had stopped at a little McDonalds Bloomington, IL.  As Craig went inside to get us some breakfast, I quietly walked Foxy and tried to coax her to eat. My phone rang and it was our social worker from Lutheran Social Service.  I froze but then I remembered they were revamping the adoption program website and maybe I had to send something new or forgot to edit my information as originally asked.  No, this was not the case.  She stated there was a birth mom that wanted to meet us.  I started crying and freaked out, Craig was stilling procuring our McGriddles.  When he came out I quickly waved with the hand not attached to the phone and said "I think they may have a baby for us."  We both were frozen.  The details were still sketchy and baby was not due till Mid-November so we had time.  It was determined that the birth mom didn't want to get together immediately, we set a July 27th date for a meeting.  After a little shell shock, we thought, well at least we have 1 person who thought we are awesome....little did we know what was in store for us.

On July 14th, I was on my way home from work and my phone rang again....social worker.  I immediately thought "oh geez, maybe she wants to cancel since she has had so much time to think or rethink her decision."  No...Rachel (social worker says to me) "Well Jilien, when it rains it pours....there is another birth mom that wants to meet you."  This time, no tears were shed, I think the first time is always the shock and the second time was like "Well, ok, what is the scoop with this one."  Rachel told us the scoop on Jenn which consisted of her living 3 hours north of the Twin Cities in a small town and some other details that I will keep confidential for her.  She then said "She wants to meet on July 18th...up north...can you go?"  I called Craig quickly and he said yes and we set the appointment.  We still had an appointment on the 27th and now we felt like we didn't have all of our eggs in one basket and this might be a way for us to learn how this process went.  We were going into both situations cautiously optimistic about this to protect and guard our hearts and minds.

July 18th came up quickly and we made the 3 hour drive up north to her tiny town.  We met in a hospital conference room with her, her best friend, and her social worker from our same agency.  We were extremely nervous but once I walked into the room I felt a calm about it.  She was bubbly and funny, and much like me, she cussed like a sailor while telling comical stories. We felt an immediate connection. Our conversation lasted 3 hours and ranged from serious topics like our infertility struggle and her troubled childhood and funny subjects like gangsta rap music and Saturday Night Live sketches.  At the end of the meeting, the social worker told us we could exchange contact information if we chose to keep in touch while she was in her decision making process and we both jumped at the chance. We both quickly wrote our email and cell phones and gave each other a hug and wished her well on her journey and decision making process.

We pulled out of the drive way to head back for the 3 hour drive home. We felt that it was a good meeting but had discussed early in our meeting with her that she may have other families she may want to meet to guage the best decision for her and her baby.  My phone rang...I froze, it was her number. I answered quickly and was quickly pointing Craig to pull over. I just had a feeling about what was going to be said next...Jenn quickly said that she didn't want to meet with anyone else and she could not imagine her baby being placed with another family.  She was excited and we both began to sob.  I had waited so long for this to happen and now we were sitting on the shoulder of a road crying speaking on the phone to someone who is about to change our lives.  It is really an indescribeable moment.  After a few moments of chatting about her saving some of the ultrasounds for us and what our next meeting will be.  We dried our tears and headed back down the interstate. 

We called our parents, my social worker, her social worker, friends and just it didn't seem like this could be happening. Only 10 weeks in the book?  Our very first match meeting and 5 minutes after departure?  And on top of that, Jenn is truly  miracle and she is sweet, funny, and very sensitive to our needs and has a non-messy situation which will help us in this process.

With all of this being said, we are now expecting a baby BOY sometime around November 3rd.  I will be blogging more office during this process.  Our next meeting will be August 12th when we will meet up north again to sign some paperwork as well as get to go to the 3-D ultrasound with her to meet our son!

Thank you to everyone that prayed for us during our struggle as well as supportive us when we were sad, happy, or crazy with anticipation.  We love all of you so much!

Stay tuned because Team Harvey is about to be a party of 4 (including Foxy) in November!

Till next time...

Monday, April 4, 2011

The Pressure is On!

The past few weeks have been a complete whirlwhind.  We had both of our Homestudy appointments within a 10 day period, were approved on March 3rd (last homestudy day) and were placed on the wait list to go into the infamous "Book."  For those of you that don't know what the "book" it is, it is profiles that you create that the birthparents can look through and choose you. You only get 4 pages (2 front and back) to get your message across!  SCARY.  We were told on March 6th we were 3rd on the wait list which could be 1 week or it could be 2 months.  I guess it is just dependent on how matching goes.  LSS only has 55-60 families in the book at the same time.  So, we decided we wouldn't worry about it till we heard something!  Well, 2 weeks ago we got the call that we can "go in the book" and that we have 6 weeks to get our profile in. 

I never thought that a 4 page marketing piece about us would be so hard.  We are currently selecting photos and coming up with a theme.  Our friend Dani is helping us out with the design and we will most likely take the entire next 4 weeks updating the profile and creating a website to include on it for birth parents to also look at.

It feels good to have gotten this far so quickly.  We have an "outreach" training this week to teach us other ways to network and find birthparents outside of the "book." 

I will come up with something more cerebral when I am done with this profile!  It is taking a lot out of us!

The other bonus to all of this:  I know feel comfortable walking through the baby section at Target and going to Babys R Us without wanting to burst into tears....baby steps but it is something!

Smooches!
J

Friday, March 11, 2011

We are Approved!

We are happy to announce that our homestudy has been approved and we are on our way to Baby Harvey!  We had two home study visits:  one in the office and one in our home.  They were only 9 days apart and we were crazy between the office and home visits painting, cleaning, and reorganizing the house. I know they were coming to learn about our personalities and family rearing capabilities but I really wanted to do some projects around the house so it was a great excuse!

We answered so many quesitons about our lives:  What did we do with our family as children, favorite memories, jobs we have had, schooling, how we handle conflict.  It was a great experiencec to have to think through all of these things and we both actually learned new things about each other.

Now...we are #3 on the list to go into the "book."  We are starting to look through photos and discuss what our theme and marketing will be.  It seems so strange to have to "market" yourself but I understand why it is necessary.

We are really excited and are ready for the next step!  Here is to the next "waiting period" and hopefully it isn't too long!

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Since we last spoke....

I know it has been some time since I have added anything to my blog.  The past 7 weeks has been a complete whirlwind from personal issues (Grandpa in hospital and many subsequent visits) to work, adoption training, and of course..our cruise.

In a recap of what has been going on in the world of Team Harvey and a potential new member of our team:
We have completed 10 hours of online training that is required through our adoption agency.  The training covers everything from Multiracial families post adoption to how to talk to your child about their adoption story at all levels of their life, to my personal favorite...dealing with people that say insensitive things either about you, about your child or about the way that you came to be placed with this new addition to your life.

I think the latter does require some thought.  How would those people that have a biological child feel if a complete stranger came up to you at the store and asked how much you paid for your car. It would be the same as asking an adoptive parent "How much did your kid cost?", other items on the DO NOT ASK list are:
1.  Didn't you want to have your own? Umm..of course we did, for some of this, it is not as easy and is a very insensitve  comment from both strangers and family members.
2.  If you have a multiracial child..."Where did your kid come from" or other questions regarding their race or ethnicity.  Do we ask you "Why is your hair a certain color or if your child has different parents?"
3.  Do you know who the mom is..birth family is etc..
This list goes on and on.
As someone sitting on this side of the fence speaking to some people who understand our journey and others are just curious, I just caution you to be very careful about your choice of words.  There are some things that people feel is their right to ask and I will tell you right now...they are NOT your right to ask.  If we want to tell you something personal, we will, if not, do not intrude.  It is rude and dissrespectful to us, our child, and the family and situation we have chose to create.

Immediately after vacation, we had our 1 full day training required in the classroom.  There were 15 other couples that all were in the same stage in their process of adoption.  The training was great and taught us everything from how to still manage our grief and loss of infertility as well as more in depth training on multicultural families and what that means in society.  It was interesting to us the demographic of people that attended, most were 40+ so we were in the minority, as well as most were from rural MN.

|Our training was February 17th and we got an email on the 18th that a social worker had been assigned to us and they would be in contact in the next two weeks.  We got a call on the 18th from our social worker to set up our first Home Study appointment.  The home study is required for the process and is two appointments (1 in the office and 1 in your home) to discuss personal and in depth items regarding your life (not just parenting questions).  Our first home study will be on Wednesday, February 23 and we are very excited and slightly nervous. The second should be sometime in the next two weeks and then we will be approved.  THE process has moved quickly and after training we are hopeful the wait won't be too long once we are approved. They of course tell you 12-18 months but the families that were on our panel at training only waited 6 weeks and 6 months respectively which really isn't that long.

Once the training was over and we had our home study scheduled, it was amazing the since of hope that I now begin to feel, that this thing is really happening and we could be parents sometime this year.  It is scary and exciting all at the same time.  What is interesting, I found myself on Sunday at Target finally walking the aisles of the sections I have avoided during this journey....the baby section.  I was looking for items we may want to purchase once we go in the "book" on the off chance we ge one of those late in the night calls.  It is amazing how one step in the journey changes your mind from avoidance to acceptance and hope.. 

That is it for now..I am sure there will be more after the home study tomorrow!

Peace and Love!

Tuesday, January 11, 2011

And the Paperwork ends....

We have completed and submitted all of our adoption application and homestudy paperwork. I should have taken pictures of us doing it but the majority was us typing on the computer as well as signing a million documents. 

We are now on to our 10 hours of online course training.  We need to have it all done before we leave for vacation on February 6th~  In class room training will be February 17th, we will be tanned, toned, and ready to learn!

This weeks thought or advice is: If someone calls you and says "Did you hear the news" please don't use the phrase "You got pregnant?"...it is inconsiderate ....Just saying...

Monday, December 27, 2010

Christmas is done...Now What?

We have made it through Christmas....now what?  That seems to be how we live our life from day to day...we filled out all paperwork that is currently due..now what?  We have online training and a classroom training...then what? 

The paperwork does ask you so many in depth questions I wonder what the world may be like if those conceiving a child naturally had to assess every question in your life to know if you are ready to be a parent.  We are currently filling out our home study questionaire and they ask everything from your finances (specifics) to questions such as "What type of discipline did you encounter as a child", "What type of discipline will you give your child" and "How do you handle interpersonal relationship conflict"...this questionaire is 10 pages of detailed questions and essay responses.  We each have to fill one out and it is rather daunting.  It makes us think about everything we hold near and dear and think about those things that we wouldn't give a second thought to on a daily basis.

This week will be the finliazation of this questionaire as well as beginning our online training module.  Nothing too exciting for us but it keeps us moving along the path.

Martin Luther once said "Everything in the world is done by hope."
Team Harvey agrees and couldn't have said it better ourselves. 

Now What?