Worries and wishes..

For some reason I get so many comments on how we must be perfect...supermom.  I'm not sure if it's just because where we live 3 is getting to have a larger size family and with 5 people are just astounded.  Usually when they find out I work fulltime too I get the 'saint' comments and looks.  Further from the truth, you think?  Oh Lord, if they could just be in our house some days. 

I'm human and I have the same problems in life.  I'm content and happy with my life.  I have the kids I want and need and the husband I want and need.  We make the money we need and survive for necessities in life; nothing more, nothing less.  Do I want?  Sure.  I want someone or something to rescue us from my worries.  My worries of the kids ever going to college, really getting to go to Korea as a family one day, the kids (some anyways) surviving school and life.  Some days just worries that we will be able to pay all the bills that popped up that month or I will have enough leave to always take off when my kids are sick and need me. 

I have wishes too.  I wish we could have a laundry room big enough for a family of 7 and enough time to actually do all the wash of a family of 7.  I wish I could work parttime and be with my kids just a little more than I am now.  I wish we didn't have to watch every single penny because we're worried our washer or dryer or car will break down.  (can you tell I've been having laundry issues tonight?) 

Wishes and worries are different.  Worries are for my kids' safety and well-being and near and dear things to my heart.  Wants are materialistic things that we don't need to survive life, but would make it easier.

I try to just count our blessings and focus on that.  I try not to let things with other people ruffle my feathers.  My favorite saying is 'it is what it is' and you go on and accept your life and make the best of everything.  And quite honestly, I have most of the best.  As long as God keeps us all happy and healthy, it's the best.

So all I pray everyday is that each hurdle that's given to us is able to be cleared with relatively little trauma and harm.  I pray that God just keeps us all well, together and loving and good people.  I pray that 1/2 of what I try to teach my kids sticks.  I pray that our two salaries, together, are always enough for us to pay our bills monthly.  I pray that I remember and the kids remember the simple things in life are some of the most important and money cannot make up for that.  I pray that we remember that life is what you make of it sometimes, not what it makes of you.  I pray that I ALWAYS remember that when I think I have it bad I can always remember there is always someone who is going through something worse and surviving.

ThirdMom blogger

If you're out there, can you send me a message?  I was hoping to be able to read your blog now that you locked it up.

Thanks.

Lisa

priming for the big post

Just to forewarn, I will be posting a gushing, sweet post about my baby boy's 1 year home next week.  But, until then, because I'm in the mood, I just have to say how darn lucky I am.  He may be rough and 150% boy, but I love this little boy more than anything.  He is one of THE cutest boys in the world on top of everything else.  He's just so funny and so sweet and so cute and so amazing!

I love, love, love my Jaemin!

Adoption Plight through the Years

I'm not an enormous fan of the New Yorker, but I did enjoy this article....though a little too long.  http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/05/10/100510fa_fact_seabrook

It actually talks about how adoption began and is still brought to other countries because of the plight of orphans and a human need to save.  It discusses how it went from saving children to the children becoming a commodity for parents who cannot conceive.  It discusses how Korea was the first country to begin international adoption due to Harry and Bertha Holt and how, later, other countries followed.  I'm sure some due to the push from US citizens. 

I can't help but wonder why there's not more of a push to internationally children from the US out of the US?  I mean from other countries.  Most articles and media show that non caucasian children remain in foster care due to their race.  I know that intercountry adoption from the US to other countries does exist, but I think it's very few.  Maybe these children would find homes if there were more of a push?  I don't know, but I do wonder.  In the end, isn't this what most are saying is the argument for adopting out of country is that it doesn't matter where they're from, just that they find their forever families?

I can't help but wonder how many children have not been truly relinquished in intercountry adoptions when it's due to war and disaster?  When the Korean War and Vietnam Wars ended, kind of not really, I think so many people and children were displaced that it was hard to prove whether children were truly orphaned or not.  What about Haiti too?  How many children may end up in orphanages to be placed with US families, but are not truly orphans or relinquished?  I know children need families as soon as humanly possible, but I can't imagine the loss of a child just due to separation through something like this.  Flip the coin and think if something happened here and they just started placing children assuming you were not coming back.  I know when the tsunami hit years ago families were coming out saying they wanted to adopt from India.  People are work were even talking and asking why I wasn't for people rushing into adopt these children.  For one reason...the chance that their families are/were displaced and just haven't had enough time to find them back yet.  I don't know what that time allocation should be, but I would move Heaven and Earth if my child were separated from me and when things like natural disasters and war occur there are not always choices to move as quickly as one would like.

But, nonetheless, it's a great article. 

How do I love thee?

Let me count the ways.
1)

2)

3)

4)

5)

Sounds crazy,

and I think I eluded to it in a previous post, but I almost feel like I knew about Jaemin.

I mean after each kid, starting with Cole, I always felt like there was something more.  I horded my leave at work and never took anymore time than I absolutely needed to.  You have to know me.  Leave time is money, so I had to always know I had enough there in case I needed it for maternity leave.  This feeling and anxiety kept coming back after Cole was born, Kaelin came home and Chelsi came home.  Though, I convinced myself that Chelsi was it because I didn't think we should adopt again.  We should just stop and be thankful for the 4 kids we had and just live our lives.  But, I still felt this anxiety.  I don't know how to explain it and I know it sounds crazy, but I absolutely felt a real anxiety about the possibility. 

When we got the call for Jaemin it was so surreal and so stressful, yet it felt somewhat right and familiar because I felt like it was that something I had unconsciously planned for.  Now that he is here with us I no longer have that feeling.  I don't think I ever will again.  I finally feel like I can go with the kids on their school field trips and not feel bad taking off work to come home early for a birthday party.  It's so good to feel this way too.  Feeling like you just know your life is complete with the people in it. 

Now, I do not believe that God intended for my son's Korean mother to be pregnant with him and place him for adoption just to fulfill my life.  He happened out of human, free, will and somehow God knew this was going to happen and he ended up with us.  I can't help but wonder about how things work and why they work like they do.  I don't believe, ever for a second, that either Korean mother gave birth for us or that God planned these children for us.  I mean He didn't intend their creation for us, but knew they would be created in their circumstances they were in and then planned. 

I can't help but think back to Chelsi's adoption.  We went back and forth with a couple of agencies.  When we finally settled on the one we did it was out of specific circumstances why.  Afterall, it was not the same agency we used the first time.  Then, right after the home study process was done and almost written we found a little girl online waiting for adoption with another agency, in Korea.  We applied for her and ended up turned down.  I remember feeling so sad.  I really felt like she was meant to be ours, but after we found out she would not be our home study was ready to be sent to Korea by our original agency.  But, they had two waiting children that we could review.  We immediately felt comfortable with Ms. C's needs and she felt right out of the two little girls.  And you know the rest of the story with her.

What I find is amazing is that we ended up being led right down the path to her even though we tried to detour more than once.  Sometimes we look at Jaemin and wonder how we got so lucky.  Things could have been so very different for us and we're thankful they are not.

Christmas in May!

That's right, it only took the agency 5 months to get Jaemin's Christmas presents from his foster family to the US.  I won't complain thought because a) we're lucky to correspond with his foster family and b) if they put getting those kiddos home first, that's okay too.

So, we got a Christmas card (and translation) written by Youn Su, Jaemin's foster sister.  The letters and emails from Youn Su are always so sweet.  They sent him a Jenga game (written in Hangul), a Hangul learning poster and a Pororo airplane toy.  They actually sent two Hangul learning posters, so the girls now have one hung in their bedroom and I wrote the letter sounds so they can start learning a little.

For those that aren't fluent in any Korean culture, Pororo, the penguin, is HUGE!  He's kind of like our Mickey Mouse, etc.  Jaemin loved his Pororo toy.  We turned it on and he started getting so excited and waving his hands.  He's almost worn the batteries out already. 

Youn Su, if you and your family are reading I truly hope you know how much your correspondence means to us and Jaemin.