As I was laying in bed last night, starting to drift off to sleep, I realized that I had an experience last year that very closely mirrors our particular stage in our journey to get Grace home.
I have long thought that a journey is by far the best way to explain the timeline of an adoption. Each family that adopts from any given country has a number of "landmarks" in their "journey" that they want to see before they come home. But the time it takes each family to see the landmarks is completely unique and different. So, when people ask, "How long does the journey take?" you will get a different answer from each family because people traveled to those landmarks at different times and in different ways.
Anyways, so on our current journey to get Grace home, there is a memory from Summer 2012, when we did our Yosemite hike, that I think beautifully explains where we are at now. I took this account straight from my blog about that hike:
Here is the most heartbreaking moment of the never ending hike down- miles wise, we were past the point that we thought we could stop and catch the shuttle back to our car, we had been seeing more and more people on the way down, so we knew we were getting close, and then we came around a bend and saw this:I added the bold emphasis, as it is my main point.
It was a bathroom, and we thought (at least my dad and I) we had made it! Time to sit, time to rest, time to ride the shuttle back and be done torturing our feet and our legs!
However... alas... that was not the case. We were still a mile from that point. A MILE. Worse... to get to that magical wonderful stopping place required us to continue to take the trail which now ...went... up... hill. I wanted to cry. I wanted to protest. I don't even know what I wanted, but my disappointment was great. But sitting there wouldn't take away the fact that for us to be done, we had to continue, even uphill. Again.
This was still a very populated area, so as we practically limped our way through that last agonizing mile, we watched happy families pass us (including little kids), and I wished I had a sign that said, "Don't judge me for my slowness, I have been hiking for the last 7 and a half hours." Almost five hours from when we started our "downhill" trail, we finally, blissfully, made it to the shuttle
We knew, when we started out the hike that it was going to be long, it was going to be painful and a challenge, but we accepted that. We knew that the that Panorama trail had uphill portions, and still decided to take on the challenge.
This is like when Blake and I decided to adopt. You can't read a book or personal account about adoption without knowing that it is a long, arduous process. It just is, and we knew that.
The trouble, with both, is that basically, we were mislead. On the hike, we thought it was shorter, based on what we had read online, but the online accounts and the mile markers on the mountain itself were wrong (or at least didn't match my Garmin). With our adoption, we were led to believe that getting passports was fairly quick, and that her passport would be ready in January.
Here's my point- in both cases, I don't think it is the actual length that is the problem. I think it is a result of thinking you're at the end, only to discover you have more to go.
In August, I was totally prepared for the thought that she might not be home until summer 2013, and if we hadn't learned anything otherwise, I think we would be okay with the wait. The trouble comes with the fact that we thought that it was going to be quicker when we got our I-600 approved so quickly. By the way, this logic was not wrong, because many other families who got their approval at the same time have already gotten their children home (because they already had passports).
Our hike was long, but the worst moment was when we thought we were done, only to discover that it was another mile still, and the trail went up. This is the point that we are currently at in our adoption. We thought we were done, only to feel that we have another uphill portion before we can get our precious little girl home.
But there is comfort in this analogy too. On that hike, as exhausted and drained as I was, I kept going.
I started to dread every step, and only kept going because I knew that stopping wouldn't help anything, it would just prolong the agony. I had to continually remind myself that I could only be done if I kept going.
Seriously, like a mantra, I kept saying over and over again, "Keep going, then you will eventually be done," in my head.
We ARE moving towards getting Grace home, even if we don't see the progress, even if seems like we aren't moving. Each day IS one day closer to when we get the news about her passport. It will happen, as we just keep going forward. It might have seemed like forever, but we eventually made it to the shuttle. The hike didn't last forever. There was an end, because we just kept taking steps in the right direction.
Even the longest adoption processes eventually end with the child at home (with the exception of programs closing, like Russia, keep those families in your prayers). I do sometimes think about if she will be home for Easter, or Fourth of July, or the Orange County Fair. But even if she isn't here for those things this year (which would be sad) she will be here for them another year. We have plenty of time to make memories with her, because she will eventually be home.
I no longer make predictions on when she will be home. I will sometimes say, "I hope she is home by ___." But I honestly have no idea. The fact that the passport process has taken this long is unexpected, and I think it is partially due to apparently a new part of the passport process (if I understand correctly). She will be home, someday. I even have faith that when that precious, amazing day comes, we will look back and say that it was the perfect day. At this point, we just see an uphill, after an already long hike. So if we sound tired of answering the question, it is because we are tired of asking that question ourselves.
One step at a time, one day at a time, we are getting closer.
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