Pieces of paper no 4

Oh yes - forgot about this - form from what is now the Department for Education to ask who is our notary (and I have lost the quote from Experienced But Distant Notary so we are having to go with Local Notary) and who is our agency overseas. That will be piece no 19.

Still working on the agency form but making photos a priority. Appointment to pretend our neighbour's cot is ours at 6pm.

I had something else... oh yes. In typical husband fashion, Mr Spouse now says that he has always said that he is fine with saying we'll hope to adopt a child who is either white or Hispanic* - which is not actually my memory of the conversation, but whatever.

*and I have recently discovered this is not actually an ethnic classification on the new US census but it is there on the agency form. So.

Spinning

The wheels, my head, something.

We're off on Saturday for a week's holiday and then I have the first part of my Being Slightly Famous placement, plus a conference. So I won't be back here for 5 weeks.

This creates lots of last-minute tasks, though it's a bit easier to plan to be away from the office for about 4 or 5 weeks than to suddenly find oneself landed on ones back with a broken shoulder and no way to pick up the pieces for 6 weeks (like last summer).

At the forefront of my mind is however a very important issue - what to pack. Last summer the weather was mainly rotten and I could only wear a very limited range of clothing - I remember some agonising changing room sessions trying to put on front-buttoning blouses. So I've, erm, splurged a bit this year (though the post office are getting very used to me sending back returns, too). But I can't fit it all in the one and a half cases I'm allowed! I'm reduced to standing in front of my wardrobe gazing longingly at brand new, over the head, dresses.

Too much information?

This is from Open Adoption Roundtable no 17 - which asks:

Are there any things that you don’t want the other members of your triad to know—or that you don’t want to know about them? I’ve heard first mothers talk about not sharing their birth stories with adoptive parents because those are for the adoptees and for themselves only. I've also heard of adoptees concealing their reunions from adoptive parents so as not to cause them pain. What don’t you want shared in your adoptive relationships?

We don't have our adoption yet but one of the things I've thought about a lot is how much to share with future children about our miscarriages. And if we have an open relationship with our child's biological parent(s) then this is something we'll need to share, or decide not to/how much to share with them. Plus we'll need to talk, I assume, with any expectant parents who are considering placing with us, about why we don't have biological children (and I've just read A+A's post).

Although I am very much for openness with children it's also not surprisingly something I find very upsetting to talk about. I think I'm more wary of making a child feel responsible for our happiness - in the sense of making us feel better when talking about something major and upsetting, rather than in the sense of having "made our lives complete". And I actively avoid talking about miscarriage with pregnant women - even though I often feel they are oblivious and complacent.

Though I did recently become Grumpy Old Woman when someone was ranting about how "everyone in the past used to X when pregnant, what's with all this crazy new medical advice". Yes, I said - and they lost babies. That's why the medical advice. I don't always try and spare people's feelings.

The other side to the story that isn't really mine to tell completely but which is very relevant, is some of the circumstances behind A and my fostering him. I can share that he came to us under very random and upsetting circumstances and that I had to find another placement for him and how difficult and sad that was for me. But I can't share all the things that have happened to him, or some of the things he may have done. And if I share exactly how he's done, recently, well it doesn't sound like a major success story - but compared to the alternative, it is.

Cheating

It is a beautiful day and we are thinking of photos, of our house and of us, for our "hello we are lovely people please think of placing your baby with us" letter, which I don't like calling a "dear birthparent" letter. Profile. That's the word.

We have decorated our back bedroom in a child-friendly style but we don't have any appropriate furniture - we are working on it being less of a dumping ground though we have loads of toys. One of my colleagues lives on our street and has two under-4s so, since I have to tell her some time that we're adopting, I thought I'd ask her for the rather unusual favour of borrowing a cot.

We spent quite a while discussing the whole adoption process - she knew a bit from our mutual colleagues S & M who are the ones who adopted from Central America - I didn't go into the horrible history of our miscarriages, and she did make the usual "now you'll get pregnant" joke though she wasn't offended when I said "it's not funny when you've heard it 50 times!".

Their cot is not really very portable - but she had a bright idea - we're going to bring some props and photograph it in situ. Happily the lower part of their nursery walls are the same as our back bedroom so I feel a little Photoshopping coming on...

US 1, England 1

Well, something like that. You've got to make it topical, haven't you?

We had a long phone call with a lawyer tonight - quite productive and reassuring - though of course now we have more homework.

I'm in the middle of cutting out some red-eye from some pictures of us with the nieces, and then going to have an initial look at the form for the lawyer. We'd like to work with another agency as well though they recommend doing some networking ourselves. I am not quite so sure about that but I suppose it gives me something to do. I have a large number of contacts in the US of course (just looking down my Facebook list) and some of them are just the kind of people to hand out letters for us.

I've put Mr Spouse on to finding us a notary and picking more photos...

I am relieved to hear that: we don't have to do more than one application form (they will forward all our information to the other agency); we don't have to do a new home study (updating the home study seems to just involve a letter from our agency here saying nothing has changed/we've got a new cat/Mr Spouse has finished his course); we probably have to find one new referee but already have a candidate; we probably have all our other paperwork in order.

Later - I've got to page 12 out of 23 and am flagging...

Because it's there...

I avoid Mother's Day and we don't really do Father's Day but there are some lovely posts I've been reading today:

Cheese and Beans got some beer and camped out on the school field.

Mr Luna seems to be walking very, very slowly.

A is a great dad and has a great father-in-law too.

Production not Reproduction is thinking about a blank space on a birth certificate, and some other fathers, some absent, some not.

My favourite non-adoption Dad, Daddy Types, got a hand-painted mug.

I didn't ask Mr S what he thought of Father's Day (we don't do it, as I say, he didn't do it when his dad was alive so I know it is not particularly sad for him) but today, he worked out, is Bring Your Screaming Toddlers To The Supermarket Day. I told him he can take ours when we have one.

I hate skinny doctors

I guess it should have given me a clue that this particular GP has loads of spaces.

So - and I suppose this is marginally logical - I'm either having much, much shorter cycles getting shorter all the time (26 days going down to 22 days going down to 12 days) or I'm having slightly shorter cycles (or randomly fluctuating cycles) with mid-cycle bleeding. Or, of course, I'm having completely random cycles. And, since I've only had one 12-day interval, we don't yet know which it is. What happens next is probably worth recording, and I'm to go back and see her in 3 months' time if it's still screwy.

Oh, and could I be pregnant? Well, technically, perhaps I WAS pregnant but do I want to know if I had another miscarriage? But it wouldn't be a disaster if I was? Well, not a disaster, but we know where pregnancy goes for me, and we're in the middle of adopting. So it wouldn't be a disaster?

Clearly someone who has no idea of the process of adoption in the UK (though to be fair we were a bit blase about getting pregnant during adoption a couple of years ago, although for us it was mainly because we thought it wouldn't happen).

So, shall we do a pregnancy test? Well, no, because I'm clearly not pregnant any more EVEN IF I EVER WAS.

Well, if you are bleeding in the middle of your cycles, we'd want to worry about that, but I'm not going to tell you why. But if you just have reeely reeely short cycles that's OK (is it? not OK with me thanks!). Not much we can do about it - we could put you on the mini pill but that tends to cause spotting. But you're over 35 and then there's your weight... so we shouldn't really put you on the combined pill.

Now maybe I look completely HUGE to this woman (estimated BMI about 18). But I am actually no longer obese, I may still be in the overweight bracket but I'm damn fit and I'm 2 stone lighter than I was when someone said that to me before (aged 35 and about 2 months). And the next doctor who saw me took one look at me and said "erm, overcautious much? you'd be fine". And she didn't even BLOOMIN' WEIGH ME! Do they bring all the skinny GPs in and say "look, if they appear to have eaten any cream cakes recently, or are fatter than you, don't give them the pill".

I didn't actually want to take the combined pill (unless this gets worse and there's no other treatment). But now of course this makes me want to just to spite her.

I'm facing it

CD 12 and more bleeding. I am assuming this is really the beginning of the end, unlike the other times when I thought it was the beginning of the end. Mirena has been mentioned. I don't know what to think. Except to feel a little sad.

Flashbacks

I am not normally too bad, but at the moment on the forum I frequent there is a very lengthy thread by/about/to a much-loved poster who is waiting to find out if she is miscarrying. I am repeatedly drawn back to it and yet it is giving me awful flashbacks.

I need a distraction - and the rather sloppily-written paper I'm trying to review isn't helping.

I would dearly like to know what is up ...

(though if you don't feel like examining the contents of my M&S briefs, click away now)

1st observation: my last cycle was 26 days long, much shorter than my normal 28-30, though otherwise normal.

2nd observation: normal fertile CM at a normal point (10-14ish days)

3rd observation: a little bit more, possibly, around 20 days.

4th observation: around 22-23 days, a whole bunch more, but blood-tinged. Have never had that before except bang in the middle of a cycle after a miscarriage

5th observation: day 23, spotting, followed the next day by full bleeding

6th observation: hair-tearing on account of not really wishing to have much, much shorter cycles

7th observation: day 3, the fertile CM is back. Erm, what???!

I've got a notebook and I'm not afraid to use it...

I just bought a shiny new notebook* to use in my new role (over the summer) on my media placement. We had our induction day today; the various interns are going to different papers and media outlets but we all got together today, and chatted about our varied experience with science and the media. Most of us either do a lot already or are very keen about interacting with the media though there is one old codger who was cynical about the value of science and media and who grumbled about how the media "make things up". And who was told off for adding "facts" to a story-writing exercise we were given...

I'm thinking about anonymity. I told most of the other interns about my semi-professional blog and people are very interested and obviously I want readership; I have Web presence both in this pseudonym and also in my real name, with only a few people linking the two. I suppose I can link to that blog from pieces under my real name, but change my posting moniker on there (it doesn't link from there to here, though I've posted a couple of links under the Dr Spouse handle to the other blog).

I really don't want this particular blog public, and especially don't want my family and colleagues finding this (and it would be a complete nightmare if anyone from any of the adoption agencies found it), but I'm keen for readership to be open. It's a poser.

*Paper variety. Lack of electronic variety daily source of woe.