Six months

Today is the six month anniversary of Miss I.'s arrival to the United States.

Today is the anniversary of the day a man I hadn't seen in a week (but who had experienced a lifetime in that week) met me at the gate wearing a little girl I'd loved from afar. The day she had practiced "Hi Momma" as she waited in customs and fell asleep before she could share it. The day her Adadda had to leave her with a woman she wasn't too sure about as he got the fastest (but most needed) shower ever, and in her panic she pooped and then in greater panic pooped again mid-diaper change and then panicked that she'd done the wrong thing to someone she'd only just met. The day she decided to cling to me with everything she had in her.

Also the day I first heard her laugh.

Happy six month anniversary, Miss I-of-mine.
It feels like just yesterday we met, but like I've loved you my whole life.

Where is she from?

AMH's (Of Hope and Hormones) Peanut has been attracting alot of attention, too. She writes of that "I'm down with that" kind of behavior that we've often experienced, followed by the worst (to me) of the rude questions -- Is she yours?!

"So our waitress was partaking the same over-the-top attention when she suddenly stops and asks "Is she yours?" I wasn't sure how to respond?? Mine as in biological? Mine as in my daughter? Mine as in my child but not my husbands? I did't get it. So I just mumbled a "Yes" and then she proceeded to ask how long we've had her? I responded with a "Since she was born."

I get asked about once every other day, "Is she yours?" and I generally clearly and sometimes wearily say "Yes." Enough with this question already. She is mine and I am hers -- ask her who I am and she calls me not just "Momma" but "My Momma." This is in no way intended to invalidate her first family in order to validate ours, or to deny her other belongingness to people who loved her with their lives.

My family has taken their cues from me, sharing little of her story with strangers who ask, not because it is secret or shameful but because it is private and her very own. Left to our own devices, we could probably all proudly share that she is OURS after much difficulty and many years through a process so improbable, in the way that part of me (us?) wanted to proclaim to people who complimented our infant son that he was the survivor of labor so early, delivery so traumatic that this child, that we, had defied death. But in either case of course we wouldn't.

So when my sister had Miss I. with her for a few moments at Disney World and another park guest approached and asked "Where's she from?" Sis answered "[Blooms]burg," as are we all -- factually correct and nonrevealing. Miss I is indeed from both [Blooms]burg and Ethiopia, and my son is "from" New York and [Blooms]burg. She is indeed mine (and I am hers) and she is her family's and they are hers and they are in her.

As it happened, this woman was in the process of adopting internationally, and so had real questions and because it was clear she was invested in adoption, I was happy to share some (that is, my) parts of the story.

I want Miss I to see me comfortable with a range of answers in a range of situations so she can decide to whom she'll say "Bloomsburg," to whom she'll say "Ethiopia" and to whom she'll say "Why ever do you ask?"

(Smacking myself on the head wondering why I didn't ask "why do you ask?" at the mall today, but knowing exactly why she did ask).

And Your Name Is?

So I have lots of more important things to blog about, but this one has really been bothering me, and it'll just take a second:
You all know I am the queen of "Why do you ask?" both in terms of using it and recommending it for use to transracial/multiracial/adoptive/open/nontraditional in anyway families. It works for most questions, and it helps guide our answers (or stops more questions from being asked). But here's one I can't figure out:
"What's her name?"
Rarely did people ask my son's name when he was a baby or toddler. "Hey, buddy." "Hi, little guy." "Hey there, handsome."

But everyone wants to know Miss I's name. Sometimes it's an attempt at a subtle way of acknowledging their acceptance of a family of our construction, a question in which one can casually use "your daughter," both to test it out and validate it: "What's your daughter's name?" (See, I get it, and I'm okay with you -- and if it's a mistake, it's a mistake in the enlightened direction). Or it might be a way of asking a question that is personal but not TOO personal, trying to get me to offer more than is asked, as if I'll blurt out "HernameisIandshewasadoptedfromEthiopiaandhereareallthepersonaldetailsofherrelinquishment." Or maybe it's a way to feel admitted into our inner circle, because we emit such a warm glow. Maybe they're taking a survey -- I like to hear about, and complain about, baby names too.

The problem is that I always feel compelled to answer, and they never forget. Add this to her incredible beauty and electric personality, and you have an intensification of our fame/infamy. I go to the grocery store a week later: "Hi, Miss I!" The clerk turns to another clerk. "This is Miss I. Check out those lashes!" (which, by the way, really are to die for). In another store, "Miss I! It's you!"

I'm not totally comfortable with strangers calling her by her first name, as if she knows them and they know her. I know that most people are harmless, but for the same reason that I don't sew ds's name on his backpack, I'm not comfortable with the world knowing Miss I.

But I can't exactly say, "Why do you ask?" to that, without seeming like a paranoid freak. (You'll probably all chastise me for ever having answered in the first place. Or maybe now I'm being the paranoid freak).

Arrival at the Queen of Sheba

We worried a bit over taking Miss I to an Ethiopian restaurant, for a couple of reasons.

First, we were concerned about her response to my Ethiopian embroidered shirt awhile ago. Would she panic when surrounded by familiar sights and smells?

Then there was the possible perception by Ethiopian Americans that this was the limit of how we would share her culture and history with her.

When we were reading through our first application many moons ago, when we thought we would find our daughter in China, when one or the other of us jokingly replied to the question of how we would celebrate her Chinese heritage that we'd have takeout once a week, the joke was not on the question, but on us and our hubris in even thinking about a transracial, transnational adoption.

There was no getting around, it seems to me, the fact that in the abstract we're the fifth best thing, and no one we meet at a restaurant could know us any more intimately. If our first thought had been our insufficiency to the task, surely it would be others', and well it should be. And then there is the fact that families like mine are a painful reminder to a very proud culture of Ethiopia's present inability to care for its own children.

But we really wanted her to have really good injera, which she had loved not so long ago (has it really only been four months? Was dh ever really in Ethiopia?). So we went to the Queen of Sheba, skipping nearby Meskerem, which is considered more crowded (like Addis) and less flavorful.

When we first arrived, Miss I was very shy before the beautiful waitress who seated us, and she hid her head in my shoulder. Dh was enthusiastic, eager for me to try everything including the honeyed wine (phenomenal). Ds, ordinarily a very wary diner, looked forward to his injera. Miss I. still hid. As soon as I tasted and enjoyed things, Miss I became more confident, and wanted to share her growing enjoyment with familiar flavors, and gestured excitedly to textiles hanging on the wall. Beeful. Prebby. Beeful, Momma, see, see?

Her enthusiasm caught the attention of the party behind us, and began one of the most affirming conversations we've had yet. Mr. E. raved about my beautiful daughter, then gestured to my son. "Is he your own?" I wasn't certain I had heard him over the small crowd or through his accent, and I indicated that. He tried again, twice: "Is he your natural son? . . . Your son as well?" "Yes," I replied. "He is my son as well." He smiled broadly. "You know, I am Ethiopian and I am adopted as well, and what you have done is a blessing."

Mr. E shared that he hails from Addis, that he was not familiar with Miss I's village to the south, that he thanked God for the gift we were to Miss I, and that he was even more thankful because we (protested and) considered her the gift to our family. Then he asked what ds thought of his new sister. "He's so thrilled with her he's already talking about his little brother," I said. This was met with great enthusiasm and many congratulations: "but I only meant he was talking about one. He isn't having one." And they discussed among themselves when we should return to Ethiopia for a son, how much time to allow our own Queen of Sheba to remain our little princess. (They thought not too long).

When we were ready to leave, Miss I kissed our waitress on the cheeks and waved fondly to our new friends.

Dh had told me that Ethiopians were the most beautiful and most gracious people he had ever met, and while this seems like a sweeping generalization, it also appears to be true.

If you're ever on tenth, have the dabo, vegetarian sampler, and honeyed wine (but make sure your companion orders the Ethiopian beer to taste).

Happy Anniversary

Dear Miss I.,
Tomorrow you will have been home three months. The changes in you in these three months are astonishing -- how tall you've grown, how full your cheeks, how secure you seem (most of the time). You are a bright, brave, beautiful babe, ready to take on the world. In some ways, you already have.

You don't say much, though you have a deep belly laugh, and I love to hear you say "Momma aye-yuh," especially now that I know that it is a possessive: Mommamine, you say. Miss I-aye-yuh, daughtermine.

But this anniversary, like all I suppose, is a bit melancholy, too. I remember so well the pain of your absence -- why do they tell us the pain is gone as soon as you come home, just as they tell women who've delivered that they'll forget the pain of delivery? I forget neither, can still feel both physically. I think each day, but especially intensely at these moments, that I while I was longing, someone was losing.

This week, we'll prepare an update, complete with pictures, destined for Ethiopia. We're required to provide this update, and an update each year for eighteen years. I have so much to say that it feels like silence. What can I say that can translate simply? You are well, and you are cherished, I-aye-yuh.

I have to run. You've woken, and you're calling me. You do this many nights, only tonight, I feel its sweetness.

Answers to a Momma awaiting her toddler, from three months' perspective

What were the greatest challenges?
She didn't want anything to do with dh when he first arrived. She's known in her travel group as having been trouble.

Sleep. She woke every hour for a long time, and screamed (like I've never heard screaming before) before falling asleep. I wish I had been prepared (emotionally) for such sleep troubles. She didn't have any in ET, so I thought we'd skipped over midnight wakings by skipping over infancy.

Fifty minute (literally) tantrums during which she positively could not be consoled. This was most difficult because her usual personality is sunny (see joys).

I (also literally) got dehydrated, because every time I had a glass of water, she begged for it and cried if I didn't give it to her. And then I'd forget to take care of Momma (one thing to do differently!) She would also scream when other people ate -- she was convinced at first that there would not be enough. We started right away leaving sippies of water and cups of cereal around at her reach and that helped. But oh that screaming . . .

Now, a bit of communication difficulty. She went from speaking kembatinga and amharic to not speaking but biting to babbling English sounds to speaking a bit of English. One morning she said a whole string of what I believe is Kembatinga and then laughed. I wish I knew what was so funny! Perhaps that I didn't understand.

Our ongoing (losing) battle with ringworm.

What were unexpected joys?
Oh my. For dh, the day she finally laughed with him was one of the proudest moments of his life. Milestones are very different with toddler adoption, but there are so many to celebrate!!!!

When she's happy, she is the happiest person I've ever known. She can light up a room just by being in it. She is incredibly smart and funny, and remarkably healthy -- she's two sizes bigger than when she came home three months ago. She sings to herself, and has fabulous pitch (thank goodness).

Did you co-sleep? Do you still?
We did at first. One night she just couldn't settle, so we put her in her room and she fell right asleep and slept soundly. I had enjoyed cosleeping with my son, had expected to cosleep for attachment, and advocated for it for others. Now I advocate flexibility!

Did you stick to Ethiopian food?

No. We have an injera basket, though, so for the first month or so she'd look in there and seem a little disappointed. Now she just looks for sweets.

Have they branched out in their tastes?

She loves pizza and "Doduts" unfortunately, yogurt and crackers with peanut butter or cream cheese. First month she ate anything, now she's practicing being picky (right on schedule, really).

As an aside, had I known she'd already had peanut butter (thanks, dh) I wouldn't have enforced that waiting to avoid a potential allergy thing, and served peanut butter (which I now know she loves) to her brother in front of her (see fifty minute tantrums, above).

What really surprised you?

How much she remembers that she can't communicate. Her "happy" memories -- we framed paintings on false banana leaves and when we first got them back she happily chattered away about them. But just last week I tried on one of the embroidered shirts dh brought back for me and she screamed and cried and tried to tear it off of me. Very strong happy and sad responses.

How much this girl loves shoes and shoe shopping!

How pressured I felt to hide the difficulties in order to advocate for toddler adoption. How I hated being a poster family in those first months.

How I already can't imagine my life without her.

Has the attachment gone well?

Very. At first it was a lot of work, and quite stressful for me. I couldn't leave her sight without her breaking into a sweat of panic and breaking down. Then it became hard to separate out "I really need you, Momma" from "I just _want_ to be held" behavior. I'm still not so good at discriminating that, or she's still really good and conflating them, or she just has me wrapped.

How have they bonded with other siblings?
She bonded with her big brother immediately. Her acceptance of me followed from her trust for him. She adores him, and he adores her. She still tries to shove him off my lap, though, and insists that I'm "Me-me Momma" and that he's _her_ beebee. Hoping that she will start to see that there's enough love to go around.

What would you differently?
I need more time with this one. I thought maybe answering these questions would make me realize what I wish I had known. Only if we ever knew how hard things were going to be, we probably wouldn't ever do them. So thank heaven for our lack of foresight.

On Behalf of the Adult Miss I.

Some families have recently had success with a search agency in Ethiopia -- they've received photographs and detailed information about their children's lives before coming to the care center. In some cases that information has conflicted with referral information (referral information is only as good as the information given by the person who relinquishes the child), but the families believe the new information to be accurate. They now have to come to terms with what is in some cases a drastically different story than they believed their child's story to be. Miss I.'s story as we've been given it is much more complete than the stories many children have. We have many names, several places, and much sadness.

But I'm saddened for her by the possibility (likelihood) of not knowing any more than we know now; I've lamented the fact that we cannot have an open adoption. Yet are we ready just yet to find out that what we know now might not be quite true? Or, more importantly, can we disrupt her first family's lives like this without their permission?

But how could I tell her we didn't do everything we could have? Someday she will want to search, and before she can, the trail will have gone cold. Maybe it already has.

We've started to talk about number three. This is not because we're in any way ready for a third, as I barely have a grip on parenting two nor am I over my present baby being the baby (though someone at the grocery store called her a big girl!). But since the whole process takes awhile and requires a whole lot of intentionality -- you can't accidentally adopt -- we're starting to try to imagine starting the process again.

More on this later -- right now it's just backstory to what's really on my mind:
We'd been considering traveling together next time, whether that trip was for a third child or a first family (attempted) visit. Ds would be six, I'd be in the position healthwise (if we planned for it now) to travel, etc. Those were our two biggest concerns.

We are worried about how ds would travel, and how he would worry. This is the child who worried incessantly about death when he was three and decided at four that a good God wouldn't let people be hungry, and would make sure everyone had a home. We're not sure we can prepare him for what he would see and experience, and we certainly can't make sense of it. Dh, considered by many "unflappable," had a difficult time moving forward here knowing what's happening there. This can be a productive stress on an adult, but I really worry about what it would/will do to a sensitive child.

But now we're really worried about Miss I.'s reaction, too. We know she remembers some things, but couldn't possibly know what she was doing with those memories. We know she expects to be hungry again, can't tolerate being thirsty, worries that all large groups of children signify care center. She enjoys looking at the paintings of homes from her region, loves sharing her life book and pictures of the other children and nannies, wants to "talk" about ox carts, wants me to understand the problem with the wild African dogs at the zoo. But she doesn't want me to be any part of it.

I tried on one of the beautiful embroidered shirts dh brought back for me (he brought one for Miss I. as well and she's seen them here before.) As soon as I did, she screamed and sobbed, and tried frantically to rip the shirt off of me. She calmed down soon after I
took it off, but my heart broke for her.

An international adoptee and family friend (home at 4, now 18) says she, too, remembers wanting to be an "All-American girl." But -- and perhaps this is only because of her developmental stage -- Miss I. seemed most concerned that I would no longer be her All-American momma?

And on some level, she's keeping her emotional suitcases packed, as the analogy goes. What if we were to pack our real bags? Someday, an extended trip will be a wonderful thing for all of my children. But not as soon as we'd thought.

Potty Words

Miss I. had joined the potty line-up in Ethiopia, but hadn't successfully trained (she was 17 mos!)
But now she's been interested in using her potty chair here. Today she wanted to stay on it pretending to go for what seemed like forever, occassioning the following sentence from ds:
"Miss I., ca-ca or keum [stop] the po-po!"

Many Things

I don't have enough time to organize this post, but here's what's going on at Chez Bloom:
Miss I. slept through the night last night, awoke with the sunniest disposition, and was a joy for most of the day. She also napped for two hours, which gave me

Playtime with ds. We played the March of the Penguins-inspired board game he invented himself months ago. Journey to the ocean and back. Tomorrow we are going on a date - alone - to see Monster House. Reviews are great, though anyone with a child under five considers it frightening. Those with kids over five said the ending is satisfying and resolves those fears it generated. Words like archetypes and catharsis have been used

so I sent dh to the movies by himself tonight to preview it. He hated to sacrifice our time together, since it takes a lot of work to make that time (I work a ft job in pt hours - so guess which hours I try to cram it into?) but I really think he needed a date with himself, too. That fact is easy to overlook when I've been home all day with the kids and am ready to hand at least one over when he gets home. I should be using this time productively, to buy us another evening later

but I'm blogging and ruminating and thinking less seriously about what we will wear for family pictures tomorrow. In eighth grade we "pictured" our future lives in a collage. Mine included a career as writer and artist, a gazebo, a springer spaniel, and a curly-haired daughter (why I would ever have imagined that, considering my straight hair, I don't know) and son in a sailor suit. Dh always insisted "No sailor suits," long before the arrival of our actual children. But my mom got us great outfits for ds and I., navy and white stripes, and I'm struck by the similarity of my life to that picture - yes, of course, and more importantly, by the wonderful differences I could never have anticipated at 13. (Miss I.'s alone picture will be in a Chanel-inspired pink dress with black and white accents.)

and finally, in the most personally revealing post I've ever written (don't read if easily disgusted): I have ring worm on my arm and I can't get it off. I contracted it from my daughter's scalp. After failed attempts at topical treatment, we are both on oral medications for a long time.

And now I understand those tantrums: the humidity makes it a thousand times itchier. You know how when you have a blister you can think of nothing but your foot? This is worse. It makes you hateful, makes you plan dramatic ways of removing it or removing the arm.
The good news is, the oral meds have 100% cure rate - just doesn't say after how long.
Hope it doesn't show up in the family picture.
Because I have to tell you, that wasn't in my collage.

La Famiglia

I missed Five Ingredients Friday again.
Actually, I missed Friday. I have no idea where it went.
As I looked through my recipes at 5 to midnight (I was up, so why not), I was reminded of all the things I'll never have the time or free hands to cook again. This includes anything from vegetable fajitas with papaya salsa to anything in the Death By Chocolate cookbook. A long time ago I had hoped to go to culinary school. Now the closest I get is Hell's Kitchen, and we eat out of cans, boxes and yogurt containers.

---

But the family reunion:
We took ds and Miss I to the dh's family reunion today - a very large annual gathering of very Italian Americans. (Does it count as a reunion if it happens every year?)

Last year we thought we were attending our last, and today we were pleasantly surprised.

Years ago when I was first dating dh, the reunion's long-running rituals were still in place: the men of the oldest generation in attendance (excepting of course, the non-Italian men who had married into the family), would gather at tables while the women prepared dinner, the younger men played bocce, and the children played. Anyone who wasn't a bit Italian felt a bit out of place, no matter how welcome, but it was always fun and strange and anachronistic, and the food was wonderful (this is not a stereotype, people).

Last year, however, we were waiting for our second child (whom we were still expecting through a transracial domestic adoption) and while we (dh and I) had never placed much importance on "blood ties" (and to be honest, we went to the reunions nearly annually more out of my curiosity than dh's interest) we were more than usually struck by how strange it was that a little bit of shared dna rated an invitation to a picnic. Family, to our minds, was so much a matter of choice. So we could just as happily have gone to that family picnic as to the aa family birthday celebration at the shelter beside. We teased that the next year, we'd be just as welcome there and would likely have more fun.

This year, though, we realized that while family is indeed a matter of choice, mil and fil chose this family every year. Plus I'm still pretty curious.

The new joke was that Miss I. would not be welcome given Ethiopia's on-going celebration of their defeat of occupying Italians (and the Ethiopians have plenty to celebrate - while once occupied, Ethiopia managed never to be controlled by Western imperialists). But we were proud of Miss I. She didn't mention the Ethiopian/Italian conflict, Mussolini or Haile Silassie once. Instead she smiled at everyone from the safety of the hip carrier and later as she tried to join the still exclusively (now older) men's bocce game.

And we were proud of them.

Certainly things have changed now that a new generation is the oldest (ggma is the only one of hers still healthy enough to attend). But we weren't sure how they would take to the newest Bloom or the idea of adoption at all (we are not close enough for them to have known of our plans in advance, and except for this one skippable day per year it never really would have mattered).

We arrived late, and mil had gone armed with pictures, so most everyone had had time to process. Still we heard nothing but praise for her beautiful dimples, hearty congratulations to her grandparents, and "She has our curly hair," in contradistinction to myself and ds, as we have the straightest, blondest hair of anyone "in" the family. No one was unenthusiastic, and no one was over-enthusiastic (which to be honest sometimes feels worse). Strangely, it seemed as though they found us very normal.

Miss Independence Day

We didn't really celebrate Independence Day (though we had a lovely day with my parents): This year July 4 is squished between work days. Ds has an ear infection. And no one in our house slept last night (ds's ear infection awoke him, Miss I. went ballistic when he tried to join us in bed, dh tried to rock I. back to sleep while I lay down with ds, only to be shoved out of bed and on to the floor and then to be asked sadly, "Momma, where did you go?!") And it's rainy here, as it is in 43 other states. So no celebration.

But today we didn't-celebrate with our newest family member (who was, despite our lack of festivity, decked out in star spangled pants). She's already become American in some not-so-good ways: "No." "Mine." Picky eating and refusing to eat from the spoon I've loaded with yogurt and choosing instead to dump it because hey, she can. Shock at Toys R Us (her huge non-blinking eyes and head all a-swivel cracked us up) quickly dissolved into a love of shiny plastic crap with noise and lights.

But it really struck us all day that she is here, with us, now, in America! and that while it only seems to my sleepless brain that I have been both snuggling this little girl and exhausted forever, it was only a little over two weeks ago that she got off a plane, got in line for Immigration and Naturalization with a sealed brown envelope from the US Embassy in Addis, and was on the road to becoming a US Citizen. And that struck us as insanely weird and funny and also wonderful.

Happy first Independence Day, Miss I! I promise we'll see fireworks next year.

****
Coming soon - a rehashing of the Italian/Ethiopian conflict in honor of and preparation for an upcoming family reunion. Now there's some fireworks.

Fifty Minute Tantrum

Dear readers,
I kid you not and I do not exaggerate. I do know she's a bit shell shocked. I know she has to grieve her losses and learn to accept permanent and unconditional love. I know the shots yesterday have her feeling out of sorts.
But still. Fifty minutes of unrelenting screaming.
The last time this happened (last week, an hour) ds asked if he could have his ears surgically removed so he wouldn't have to hear it. Then he settled for earplugs instead. But what's a momma to do?!

Even Quicker Update! (I think)

Sometime soon I will post about the travelers' adventures, the homecoming and first meeting, attachment, toddler parenting mishaps, and our first two days together. I can't do any of that until the pictures are uploaded and the suitcases are unpacked. But I can tell you this:

Right now, in my room, sleep two of the most precious children in the world - ds, who loves his little sister fiercely already, who makes me prouder and prouder all the time

and I., whose happiest place is on the hip of her Momma, whose smiles are almost always for her brother (certainly kisses are just for him!) but who can't fall asleep without Adadda holding her, and who sings an "Adadda" song of her own invention.

Tonight, dh, absent for what feels like an eternity (and with experiences that he says have, in a good way, aged him) and I will sleep there as well.

I love them so much my heart hurts.

Tomorrow

I wish I had something more profound to say right now:

DH leaves in the morning. We spent all day trying to distract ourselves, and now we're finishing the packing.

So much will happen in this week. For the first time since high school, dh will go on an adventure without me. We've been nearly inseparable since that time, with the exception of a couple of business trips. We hope to talk three times on the phone, and we hear email may be a possibility though it is very slow.

When dh gets back, he will have been someone else's Dad already for almost a week, and I will still have to introduce myself to her and learn how to be her Momma, and ds will have to learn how to share Daddy and Momma.

I. will have left everything she knows with someone she's only known for a week. She will be leaving so much behind, and she isn't old enough (truthfully, thankfully) to understand that. But we will know, and it will break our hearts, even as it brings us incredible joy.

And in a week, our family will be more complete.

It might not have been this way

When I became the parent to a very healthy, tiny little boy after preterm labor and his near-loss during delivery, I wondered if that feeling that it might have turned out otherwise would ever leave me. It didn't, really. I often look at him and have the awareness that there was the very real possibility that it might not have been this way. But that feeling isn't so painful, or quite so fresh for me anymore.
But today I learned that families whose dossiers were accepted relatively close to ours will not make the June 15th cut-off. They won't receive referrals before the Ethiopian courts close for the rainy season. I am brokenhearted for them, though I know that this still means a much shorter wait than the families with daughters in China.
I am also having that familiar real feeling of potential loss: If our documents, already so late, had been just a little later. If we hadn't been open to a toddler. If she hadn't arrived in the care center just when . . . I might not be waiting 16 days for my beautiful, playful, running!, loving to be cuddled daughter. I might just be waiting. I feel very fortunate, but also very sad: that it might not have been this way is so painfully real.
I wonder if it is always that way with adoption.

(The flipside of this is, of course, that had things been ever so slightly different, my 16 month old might have become Miss Jolie-Pitt instead of la petite Bloom. I wonder if my daughter will find that "might have been" painful or amusing. Perhaps a little of both, as all those viable alternatives - and some imagined ones - surely register as losses at some stages).