Leaning

Us, that is - we are leaning heavily towards a temporary move back to the US in order to adopt. I did have a couple of good and helpful chats with KAS, who put us in touch with another couple in our position, with whom I also had a lengthy helpful chat. But although selfishly we are pleased not to be alone - and especially pleased that the other couple is further ahead than us (and hence has wasted more time), and also we are not completely ruling out trying to (as a group) get the DCSF to change their rather ill-formed policy, which seems DIRECTLY a result of the US ratifying Hague - it's too much of a coincidence otherwise....

but still... it would be a lot quicker and possibly cheaper to do the overseas move.

Mr Spouse worries about my job if we do that. I get the standard UK allowance of just over a year's adoption leave but we need to be abroad for at least 18 months. I know, however, that if we adopted from the UK I'd need to work very part time after the first year - if not also to take extended leave (I have heard of several people adopting in the UK being "told" by agencies to request this). I am wary of telling work detailed plans as no-one is particularly discrete - but I think I need to ask sooner rather than later. I'm debating whether to do this all at once with my annual review (due soon) which is likely to touch on return-from-sick-leave (thankfully we have done return-from-sabbatical); or whether to try and drip-feed it. Either way I am going to keep it general and just point out some slightly relevant precedents. Currently I am thinking "worst case scenario, I resign and find another job - or reapply for mine". How good a prospect this might seem down the line I don't know.

Anyway, mind on other things, seeing v. well known Irish band in small (and rainy) Scandinavian city tonight. Woo hoo!

Still waiting...

...to hear from KAS, who has assured me she will call back today.

While I've been off work I've been at least catching up with friends on the phone - something I'm often bad at - but easier to do than typing for me at the moment.

FET twins friend is doing OK but completely broke. She is my inspiration if we do end up with more transatlantic moves - the twins & older sib moved over here from the US when twins were, I think, 3 months. She took a step back in her career to have a life with the family (in-laws are here & she prefers living here).

ICSI no 2 friend just got a positive test. After 2 FET miscarriages she isn't even cautiously optimistic - just cautious. She's also getting over a brush with OHSS and banned from going back to work as swine flu is rampant where she works so is just a bit fed up.

Called Central America adoption friend but haven't heard back. Depending on the outcome of the call from KAS, I definitely need to talk to her about adoption leave negotiations with our mutual employer.

So just waiting to hear at the moment. At least I've just found out how to get police clearance from the two African countries I've lived in.

Ow 3

Still here. Still armless. No pins but improvement frustratingly slow & typing FAIL. No news from KAS. Mr Spouse out at job interview. Me in pyjamas.

Confused? You will be, after this episode

I know we are.

So, to try and tell this in order, and not quite remembering what I've already said:

1) DCSF say no non-Hague adoptions from Hague countries
2) Kick-ass Solicitor says this is news to her, but she has other families in similar situations & will get back to us in about 3 weeks (2 weeks ago)
3) Supposedly helpful adoption advice organisation discusses situation at length by email and does not comprehend any of "birth mother can make best decision for child", "US feels placement with citizens abroad EQUALS placement in country" or "no agencies in US seem to want to do Hague outgoing" (18 months approx now and no cases have been through). Definitely not of same mind as KAS (i.e. client right).

4) We find agency in US that will attempt Hague outgoing. Not ideal demographic or location - you'd be truly stuffed if Hispanic - v. pricey and have never processed any cases, but we tell UK agency and KAS.

5) UK agency gives us place on August course. I have by now broken arm so not keen to sit still in pain for 4 days in July anyway.

6) Still crossing fingers DCSF will show pity/ be intimidated by KAS and not make us be guinea pigs with no choice of agency and no US precedent. Selfishly feel a non-US couple should be doing that. Bemoan not having done this 2 years ago. Point out to each other we were busy grieving 2 years ago.

7) Do many sums and conclude it would be cheaper for me to take approaching 2 years (to make immigration of child legal) off work, move back to the US, and get Mr. Spouse his green card so he can support me/us. Would also be cheaper. However wish to keep job/career, continue residence in long term in Small City In North, and have health care especially for Mr. Spouse that doesn't involve deterioration of his diabetes. Feel immediately post 6-week sick leave not best time to broach long term absence with employer.

8) Tired now.

(afraid Mr. Spouse is keen to leave this blog entirely to me - he neither reads nor comments)

Ow 2

So, a week on, I can now just about type both-handed on my phone - slow, but not limited to words containing letters on the R side of the keyboard (oil, kin, jim).

I've been signed off work for 6 weeks but am waiting til Friday to find out if I'll need an operation to put in a pin. I've broken my humerus right at the top, L side. In the meantime I can read t'internet but not really write (only Blogger really works on the phone, and sitting at the 'puter for too long is pretty uncomfortable anyway), can read hardback books (paperbacks don't stay open on their own), write by hand (remember that?) and can watch TV. Lots & lots of TV.

I will try and muster the strength to post something about the complicated adoption situation, later...

Ow

Have outdone Mr. Spouse and broken arm in similar bike incident - but with ambulance, and mention of surgery, and signed off for 6 weeks. Cannot really type.

Do not disturb

Yes, I am in a hole. No, I do not particularly want rescuing.

Phone call on Friday from agency. DCSF have got back to them and will not be prepared to issue a certificate of eligibility - not entirely clear whether they would be prepared to if we were telling them we'd be going through a Hague adoption from the US, or whether they'd put conditions on it if so, or how they would know what the US agency had done. Also not at all clear why this is at odds with what our reputedly kick-ass solicitor has said. Rang KAS immediately but she may be KA but is rubbish at responding so have not heard back yet.

I think I'm not so much despairing that this may not be possible for us, as either a) in denial or b) just depressed that once again things are more complicated and slower than they need be.

One good thing, I suppose, is that Mr. Spouse has not immediately said "well, let's just give up then". He is full of plans to write to the press and write to our MP, and was very excited when I suggested writing to the Foreign Secretary - not in his capacity as the Foreign Secretary, but in his capacity as a parent who has adopted two children from the US and as the British husband of a US citizen wife. Funnily, a good friend of ours was doorstepping with said Foreign Secretary a couple of weeks ago (pre-election). Apparently he is very nice and polite (well, he'd have to be).

I'll go back in my hole now. At least we have not booked our holiday to clash with the next preparation group, which was a possibility. And we are accidentally going to see U2. Well, we didn't realise they were playing, but booked travel dates to coincide with their only Scandinavian gig, and the tickets are quite a bit cheaper than they are in the UK, too. So of course it would be impolite to be there, and not go and see them, wouldn't it?

Do you think I've matured?

Or perhaps I've just got more shallow?

I was chatting the other day to lovely friend J, who I've known since university, and who is the single mother of a 9-year-old (er, I think), an "accident" on the mini-pill, and who she didn't know she was pregnant with until about 20w. But I digress.

She was asking how the niece(s) were and I realised that I have more or less managed to stay out of the whole palaver recently. Both my mother and my brother are behaving like drama queens, but I am happy to leave them to it. I have come to the conclusion that it upsets me much less when my nieces are sitting all day in the house my brother's building, watching DVDs, and not going to school, than it did when the younger one didn't see her dad for 3 months and her mum for 6 weeks, and they were planning that the older one wouldn't have seen her mum for 3 months (they were about 15 months and 3 at this time); the older one was faced with a maximum of 24h with her mum in the middle of that time and was begging with her mum to come and see her for longer.

I'm not entirely sure whether this is because it is intrinsically more upsetting to see the girls tiny and missing their parents than to see them older and stagnating at home (they are now 3 1/2 and nearly-6 - in theory they are being home schooled but my brother does nothing with them that could constitute schooling - his philosophy is that they'll ask for the education they need, but he doesn't exactly encourage them either), or if it's because it feels more likely we'll have kids so I am less invested in the girls. Or perhaps it is that, even if we do end up with children who have experienced some difficulties before they come to us (whether that's before birth, or with their birth parents) I'm pretty sure we're going to be giving them educational advantages that my nieces will not be getting.

I am already a competitive parent, and I don't even have any children yet.

(no news from the DCFS or on the adoption preparation course, but it's likely to be next month, though if I haven't said so already, we are OK to go ahead with the process without hearing from DCFS first).

Jealous

Mr. Spouse is not working at the moment. For different reasons, he hasn't been working since August last year. He is sort of looking for a job at the moment, but he's likely to be going back to university in October* and there isn't much temporary around at the moment - particularly not that would allow him to take random days off for adoption courses etc. So he may do some volunteering instead, which is what he was doing in the US; we are actually OK for money for the moment, though I don't feel like we are. He also has some Open University courses to finish before the full-time study starts.

Right now, though, he's feeling a bit sorry for himself - his arm is not back to normal, and he's not able to do any of the DIY stuff we need to get done, but he's also not really done much of the lighter stuff around the house, partly because tidying up also involves lifting. And I'm feeling pretty sorry for myself too - I've had a virus the past few days (I am worried it is the pleuritic thing I had last year, unfortunately), have loads of marking to do and a grant deadline.

But in general he has been enjoying working less (I say less because he's been very committed to his volunteer work and has spent quite a bit of time at it) and I have only slightly felt that I'm benefiting from having a stay-at-home husband (he does, to be fair, do a reasonable amount of cleaning, but he is not one for elaborate or particularly imaginative cooking). And I know it's because I'm jealous. I would really quite like to be at home, at least part-time, preferably with kid(s). I am worried we won't be able to afford this.

This is a slightly irrational fear - we can definitely afford for me to take a good chunk of adoption leave, and if it's appropriate for me to go part-time after that, but money is an issue, he has a good pension from his old job that he can take early. I think it's partly triggered by various discussions that are ongoing on a website I frequent which main centre round how much, or little, women make after paying for nursery fees. In fact, I suspect that even if the answer was "nothing" for me, I'd still work. I enjoy my job, and if I stopped until a child was school age, that would really be it for my career. I do also slightly worry that what a colleague with older children says is true - that working part time also means curtains. In either case I don't want that. Work is not just about money for me. But life is not just about work, either.

*I say back, but in fact he never went when he was 18 so it will be to university, but to retrain in a subject he really enjoys and which is pretty marketable, but in which he has no formal qualifications.

Persona

That's my public profile, not the Clearblue-marketed contraceptive monitor, in case you were wondering.

I have just started another blog, which is very embryonic, and is intended to be a "communicating science to the public" type thing. I'm not hiding it, but it's not something I'm desperately promoting yet, either.
However, if I link to that from a non-IF site or blog that I read, I wouldn't mind people knowing it's there. I don't necessarily, though, want people to find this place - it's possible I may ultimately go public at work with the new one.
So, I reset my Blogger profile for Dr. Spouse to only show the new blog, not this one. Now, if I comment via Wordpress or Typepad I just put in the drspouse url and you can get here via that link. But if I comment on someone's IF-related Blogger blog then you get to the new blog, no longer here.

I'm assuming people can google Dr Spouse and find this blog, anyway*, but really they could find me that way if they were desperate - I tend to use Dr Spouse as my alias on some work-related sites too.

What with keeping friends and (more particularly) family away from this blog, I'm getting confused. Any suggestions? The one I've just come up with is, when commenting on non-IF blogs, just enter "name" (Dr Spouse) and the new blog address. I have a couple of friends' blogs where I just put in my first name, no address or login, though I caught myself out once by accidentally commenting as Dr Spouse while I was logged in, and had to go back and delete and recomment.

It's so confusing having multiple personalities!

*Actually, I just checked, and although there is an unfortunate British academic who is really called Dr. Spouse, this blog doesn't come up anywhere near the top.

And a bath bun

With, er, lemon curd?

Anyway, we went over to the latest adoption agency today as I said and had what was a pretty productive, but lengthy and tiring, chat. It was almost all focussed on the adoption process and our story to date, and very little on what we do and enjoy and are like, but that will no doubt come later.

The social worker we spoke to seemed relatively knowledgeable about both inter-country adoption in general (as she should be, but this part is going to be very helpful as the arcane windings of the DCSF are no doubt going to become part of our own personal family swear-words) and US domestic adoption ("please don't say in your profile you are hoping to 'complete your family circle' as I will have to strangle you". "No, that's OK, and we also promise not to say 'we think God has brought you into our lives'".). There were a couple of things that might be slightly concerning - because the law is different in the two countries about things like TPR, we'll have to tread carefully on our opinion of the two, and also since we won't be doing a Hague adoption, but everyone here has Hague firmly planted in their heads, we may have to keep reminding them, for example, that we are allowed to be pleased about birth parents, rather than agencies, choosing us - this is a Hague no-no.

Anyway, they don't do the CRB check now because, as I hoped, they sensibly do it later in parallel with other things; we may (fingers and toes very firmly crossed!) not have to do all of the preparation course, having done our fostering course; and even if we do have to do it, then dates in July are perfectly possible given the time frame (there's also an August one that would clash with a trip we're planning).

So, we are supposed to go away and "think", and I know we've been "thinking" for about 3 years, but I suspect we're not supposed to ring back this afternoon, perhaps next week will be soon enough, and while we're doing that, and she did say it would be today, she'll ring DCSF and say "this is an unusual case, is it OK with you", which is not a question you want after you've shelled out for a home study. But she was very impressed with the name of our UK lawyer, and said if we need people at DCSF to quake in their boots, it's the right name (many thanks, 3rdculturemum - old blog link, I'm afraid).

And yes, we will need criminal records checks from the US (easy to do as per instructions from US Embassy website) and from the two African countries where I've lived for longer periods of time (er... will they accept dodgy PI website court report summaries, do you think? There are lots of those about!), and our referees will need re-poking, and convincing that indeed, this time, we are serious, yes, honest. As she said, it makes you feel like you are doing something. Here begins death by paperwork.

So, we came home on the train, it is raining VERY hard, and I had to go and run a couple of errands, though I was supposed to be getting on with some hard writing this afternoon - but I feel like someone hit me with a big stick. So I bought a bun and had a cup of tea. But I've never had a Bath bun that had lemon curd in it. Strange.

Me too

I'm reminded by the Stirrup Queens pair of posts about an internet sympathy scam that I was the subject of a few years ago. It turned out that the scammer had perpretrated a previous scam on the same group of people, an extremely friendly, non-IF bulletin board. It's very much a community and includes some dear friends; it's where I met Mr. Spouse.

Although the scammer was not primarily IF-related, it is clear they sought, and obtained, sympathy for similar reasons to IF-related internet scammers. This person had several sock puppets on the message board and those personalities "suffered" from brain tumours, long-term illnesses, and finally two of them "died", one in a motorway pile-up. Along the way one of the characters caught my attention as they claimed to be going through the adoption process. Together with another friend (who, yes, I have met in real life) who has two young children with special needs (I think this was after the first was born but it was definitely before the second was born), and who lived near where this person claimed to live, I got very very caught up in this person's tale, including exchanging emails and promising to chat on the phone (but never quite going through with it, not surprisingly). This deception was very lengthy and complex and drew people in much, much more than the single claim made by someone scamming the blogger Niobe - it was on the scale of some blog scams, though probably more short-lived

This person was caught out by repeated use of the same IP address, or something similar, I believe; this is easier to spot on bulletin boards I think, where the owners have some degree of control. I know that other scammers have eventually confessed or been found out in some way; but although ultimately I do retain my faith in human nature, I guess I find myself thinking "but what if?" when I'm drawn into some stories. As I usually only think this after becoming emotionally invested, I then beat myself up for again becoming potentially emotionally scammed.

And a minor technical question

Although my ratio of commenter:visitor is tiny, I have reached the log size limit with the free Statcounter.com accounts. It's not like we have spare cash to spend on a paid-for account - is there a free alternative with more generous limits that anyone knows of, by any chance??

Could this actually be...

... a sensible adoption agency?

We were told by the social worker we are meeting on Friday not to bring our identity documents to complete our criminal checks as "we don't do those at this stage". I was a bit puzzled, to be honest, as the previous agency had done them at precisely this stage, and normally agencies and local authorities love to introduce waits into the process, and seem to particularly like it if absolutely nothing is happening, especially when you have no real way to check that the thing that is supposed to be not happening, is in fact not happening. Hence the obsession with not moving a muscle, making any appointments, or being able to see you until they have completed the CRB. I am worried there will also be a "thinking stage" at this point.

However, on enquiry, I find that some agencies - shock horror - do these in parallel with the other parts of the process; so that the wait for the checks to come back can be filled with actual activity.

Although for some overseas adoptions, any criminal convictions are a total no-no, for a UK adoption you can be approved with anything short of assault or child abuse. You'd hope most people have some kind of handle on their criminal record, and in fact it's common for people with minor drug convictions e.g. possession age 18, to assume they can't adopt when in fact they can. So frankly, you'd have to be a bit deluded or forgetful to say "OK, go ahead and check my criminal record" and hope nothing showed up, when there was likely to be something there. I don't know what situation that would leave the agency in, whether they would be entitled to ask for their costs back from someone who'd failed their CRB.

I haven't watched them yet, but there's a series on Channel 4 this week about adoption. I registered some hollow laughs on a message board I read at the adopters saying "it takes MONTHS". Try YEARS.

What a waste

Today is our fifth wedding anniversary. It's horrible weather, but we're headed out for dinner in a country pub with gorgeous food - our default Lovely Food location. It's about CD13 and my body is saying "go for it now". However there will be almost no drinking and no nookie, because a) I haven't sorted anything out about seeing the GP and b) much more importantly, Mr. Spouse has cracked a bone in his elbow.

He was riding my bike (yes, he is taller than me, and not very good on a bike, why do you ask?) and fell off onto his arm. In mitigation, he was riding it back from the bike shop where it had been serviced. This was on Monday but nothing looked better by yesterday so we had a record quick trip to A&E (makes a change for me to be driving him there) and a rapid X-ray, and an appointment at the fracture clinic today. It will probably take 4-6 weeks to heal and no driving (so I'll be driving), not much typing, no leaning on ones arms during sex, and sadly (given the state of the house) not much cleaning or tidying too. And painkillers (so not much drinking for him, either) Gah. I'm trying to throw myself back into work so feel extremely disinclined to run round evenings and weekends like a mad thing putting away stuff from our travels or getting out stuff from the loft.

I don't feel as disappointed as I might, especially having looked back at my three previous wedding anniversary posts (ignored, just had miscarriage, and 5w pregnant but miscarried obviously, respectively) and thinking that now I feel much calmer and more on track, and that perhaps being pregnant is not very good for me. Or at least, knowing I cannot possibly be pregnant is better for me than wondering if I could be and if there is any way to keep me that way.

In other news, after a bit of phone tag and a broken phone line (theirs) we are seeing the adoption agency on the 15th. I am not quite sure what they think the next step would be as when I asked if I should bring our documents for the CRB they said "ooh, not just yet" and finally admitted that it might be easier if we brought them in and they then verified they'd seen them and photocopied them. Apart from "go away and think about it for a while" I'm not sure what can come between "initial chat" and "check you aren't a criminal" in this process.

With that, I will leave you with something I'm sure you're dying for, but which I've somehow managed to omit thus far.

The church (also where we had the reception - the tables are behind the white drapes. A mile of fabric is a lot cheaper, and less allergenic, than flowers when you are decorating what has been called the Cathedral of Non-Conformism, which seats 1000):

And that's me just got out of the taxi outside the church (plus my best woman, and fellow infertile/miscarrier's left leg). That is a pawn shop in the background, in case you are curious.

Do you have any children?

I'm just catching up on a series I love - the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency. It is incredibly evocative, with all kinds of little things that make me feel like I am really there - I have never been to Botswana, but I have visited Namibia and Zimbabwe (the latter back in the day when it was almost as rich as Botswana) and lived in the region. I look at the furniture, the gates, the roads, the signs, the kitchens, the way people wear their clothes, the gardens and the trees, and I'm back there. I know just where the girls in the Go Go Handsome Man's Bar get their clothes and how the beer tastes, and the ketchup on JLB Matekoni's table, and what the detectives are drinking, since they aren't drinking beer themselves, and how Mma Ramotswe's tailor makes her clothes, and how Mma Makutsi is squeezed in the minibus, and what the bush smells like (and, sadly, how the dust in such dry places stops me breathing properly, and hence why I could never live in that corner of the world - only on a humid coast).

As some of you may know, the series would have to be (under my rating system) rated M, as Mma Ramotswe lost her newborn baby while she was married to her violent ex-husband. I believe there was at least a hint that he had caused the baby's death by beating her up though I don't particularly want to go back and check*. In one episode she helps an American woman find out what happened to her son, who had been living in Botswana, and she tells the woman that she, too, lost a child and knows what it is like. At the end of the episode we find Mma Ramotswe at the baby's grave**, and we also find me in floods of tears.

In the next episode a father is worried about his daughter and he asks Mma Ramotswe whether she has children. She does not answer but pauses and looks down, and he says "well, take it from one who has". I do find - and stop me if I've harped on about this before - oh, yes, that's right, you can't stop me - OK, stop reading if I have - that my friends and family divide into those who believe that no-one can possibly know what children are like until they have had their own and that their own children are so special and unique that I cannot possibly even comment on their development, and those that accept that I know something about child development, and are interested in the topic in general and although they are the ones that know what their child is doing right now***, ask for my opinion or explanation of this (they've spotted he is crawling backwards/thinking you can hide by closing your eyes/spelling words with letters missing and want to know if this is common or why it happens).

A perfect example of the former is, as we know, my brother. 'Nuff said. A good example of the latter is my primary-teacher-trained uncle's wife - she has 3 children aged 5-13 and although she knows about the school stuff, we've had many lovely conversations about them when they were preschool, and also about spoken language things which at least when she trained wasn't a major part of what they studied.

I didn't mean to get this on to a rant about people who think you know nothing because you haven't any of your own, 25+ years' experience of working with children notwithstanding. I was actually wondering about something that, again, I may have waffled about before: if you have lost children, what do you say when people ask how many you have? Do you acknowledge the ones you've lost? Or only some of them? If you have children living, do you also mention the ones that are not?

*Another not-for-the-squeamish story: When I was doing my PhD I was working on speech and language disorders and some of the individuals I worked with had had strokes. The youngest was a woman in her 20s who had been pregnant when her boyfriend karate chopped her on her neck, causing a clot to move to her brain and a subsequent stroke. The baby, happily, was fine (I think she was very near delivery) and she survived, but with severe speech and langauge problems. When I met her she was worrying that her baby's language was soon to overtake hers, and that she couldn't read his books very well. Apparently pregnancy is one of the commonest times for a partner to first become violent to a woman. Lovely.

**I hadn't seen the little grave shelters before, as where I've lived they tend to concrete grave stones, and the little baby-sized one was heartbreaking.

***In fact, this is a big theme in my research - the abilities of parents to report on and assess their own children's behaviour, and how to get accurate information from parents that isn't either wishful thinking or ultra conservative.

This is the problem

with having an easygoing, relaxed Spouse.

Another cycle started - and I have to say, without nearly as much angst as some of the previous ones, so perhaps knowing we can't get pregnant (because we knew we'd miss the window) wasn't such a bad thing. This does mean though that we needed to think about whether this next cycle would be one in which we Try or Don't Try.

If we don't, I think for the moment we'd be either abstaining over a relatively large time-slot or using old-fashioned Protection. My only other idea for the moment is properly using the Persona (or using it in conjunction with Protection) but I don't have any sticks for it just now.

If we do, I need to see the GP (and, potentially, the Big Hospital) for some more progesterone supplements. I could probably survive a month on what I have left of the nice ones, plus the nasty ones.

And, of course, I'd also have to start taking the mega folate again (I'm taking my regular women's vitamins which have the normal dose), ditto baby aspirin, watching the caffeine, alcohol etc. (there is a whole post on this, I think).

I'm not sure what to think. I really, really don't want to have another miscarriage in the middle of the adoption process again, nor do I want to put it on hold because of another pregnancy, only to have another miscarriage and (likely) a break in the adoption process because either we or the agency are unwilling to continue so soon after a loss (it's just as likely to be us as the agency).

But then I don't know how far we are into the process, how long it is going to take, what the gaps are likely to be, and also whether there is any chance of us ever getting pregnant again.

I am pretty sure we'll have a six month or so wait after agency approval while the UK government gets its act together. I am also quite sure I wouldn't want to be holding off for all that time. Likewise, if we're waiting for a placement, frankly, I think I would take a placement if we were newly pregnant, and just let people think what they think if the pregnancy works out, while hoping I'm too sleep deprived to care if it doesn't.

Until we get to those stages, I have a feeling there will be a lot of "hurry up and wait". But as I have said, even the fact that we are talking about taking a break seems huge. I actually thought that I would be getting to our five-year point - which would be in September - and going "just another month, let's give it one more". And I'm not. I really want to forge ahead with the adoption RIGHT NOW. But Mr. Spouse is no help at all - all he has to say is "I don't know" and "It would be really stressful if we got pregnant".

Phew!

I actually slept last night (7 solid hours), though I'm not betting on that being the last of the jetlag, and my mother is making coffee, so I'm pleased. Although her laptop seems to think I am moving the cursor randomly from line to line and typing in odd places so if you find any incomprehensibility, don't blame me.

Yesterday I escaped the maternal clutches and took my life (and our car) in my exhausted, LH drive, automatic-accustomed hands and gingerly made my way down to the top of the hill where the Hairy Farmer Family live. It's about 10 miles from my mother's house and very beautiful it is too. And of course they are a very lovely family, with a very gorgeous (and yes, he is verbal, just not very good at pronunciation, honest!) child, and it was delightful to meet them, and refreshing to talk to someone who knows exactly where we are coming from in so many senses, even down to the school system and local knowledge and geography and, well, I hope I'll be back. Especially if there is cake.

In a bit of a rush before we left CA, we finally heard back from the Nice Agency in state - who (yay!) think they can deal with us. Now, these may all be prejudiced positions, but I can't help feeling that we will do better with this agency for a number of reasons. One of them being that you can actually look at the website without going blind (in the case of one agency) or feeling someone knocked it up on the back of an envelope (in the case of the other). One of the others being that this agency takes gay couples, unmarried couples, and singles (I think cluttered-website-agency also does but blank-website-agency only takes married couples). Although we do not fall into those categories, I think we are probably more likely to appeal as a family to someone less conservative.

I also had a pleasant chat with the UK agency who were very surprised we hadn't received their information pack (frankly, I wasn't) and promised it would be sent out immediately, and asked nice but not too difficult questions about where we were in the process and what we were thinking of doing, to which I gave the right kind of answers ("yes, we do want to adopt from the US because we're more likely to get an infant but also because we want to try and have some degree of openness which might not be possible elsewhere"). Middle-class, high earning families are the ones that adopt internationally here, but generally there are at least a few who don't want any contact with birth families and that's why they choose international (certainly there were some on the course our friends were on, who chose China over Central America for just that reason). So at least we'll get social worker brownie points for that. I didn't ask if we get let off part of the course for having done the fostering course, but I will at some stage.

Numbers

• Months spent in Southern California: 7.5
• Miles on our year-old car when we bought it: 6,000
• Miles we've driven on our year-old car: 7000
• US$ amount lost on the sale of our car: not telling
• GBP amount lost on the sale of our car: considerably less owing to more favourable exchange rate at purchase
• Amount made on sale of random goods on Craigslist and at yard sale: approx $700. Guess people are buying second hand goods these days. But not clothes, even some of our stuff that's in really good condition, strangely.
  
• Trips outside the Californias: 1 (and that last week, to Colorado for a conference. Brr.)
• Trips within the Californias: 6 - 4 in SoCal and 2 in Baja.
• Useless OPK sticks: many, many.
• OPK sticks that actually worked: about 6
  
• Useless pregnancy tests: about 4
• Progesterone supplement tablets left over: about 30 i.e. a month's supply
• Months spent trying to get pregnant: 6
• Months spent NOT trying to get pregnant: 1
• Days till I leave work: 2
• Papers written since I have been here: approximately 5
• Grant proposals written since I have been here: approximately 3
  
• Days till we leave SoCal: 3
• Days till we leave NoCal where we are stopping over: 7
• Adoption agencies contacted: approx 20
• Adoption agencies in the US who have replied to us to say they cannot work with us: approx 8
• Adoption agencies in the US who have not replied to us: approx 10
• Adoption agencies in the US who have replied to say they CAN work with us: 2
• Number of these that are in California: 0
• Social workers who have said they can do our US home study in the UK: 1 (and that's the only one I contacted)
• Adoption agencies in the UK who have said that they can work with us: 1 (the non-UK work is parcelled out geographically so it's not too surprising that there is only one)
• High today in SoCal: 18C (low 12C)
  
• High today in NW England: 13C (low 4C)
  
• Approximate winter low in SoCal: 4C
• Number of radiators in our house in SoCal: 0
• Number of radiators in our house in NW England: er, 10?
• Approximate thickness of walls in our house in SoCal: 0.02mm
• Approximate thickness of walls in our house in NW England: 1m

Can't buy you love, or can it?

I was having coffee (well, chai latte, if you must know) today with the very delightful Sam, and the topic of money came up. I have not spoken at all about our new plans to my mother (regular readers will have an inkling why), but I know she was on the verge of offering to pay for IVF at various points in the past, and I have a feeling she will be more pleased about our new plans. In some ways that is why I am not mentioning them - especially not until they become more concrete. But her mention of David Miliband gives me a clue (and incidentally, at the time he adopted, there was nothing to stop non-US citizens going down the same route), and I think she realises it costs a fair bit and she often says "well, you'll have it anyway some day".

When I left home my parents paid my maintenance until I graduated from my undergraduate degree (there were no fees in those days) and my grandparents gave me a credit card while I was volunteering as a high school teacher in Zambia (I used it to buy dollar-priced sugar, at times the only kind we could get, as well as chocolate, cheese, and biscuits. Oddly I lost about a stone that year). I then fell on the mercies of the Medical Research Council, who funded my PhD, and after that have been gainfully employed, or for a couple of brief periods have had savings to draw on. I have not lived at home since I was 18; Mr. Spouse lived at home till he was, I think, nearly 30, but paid his parents rent and after about 5 years working was earning more than them.

My brother on the other hand seems to have been on a rubber band until about 6 or 7 years ago; he still keeps some books at our mother's house, and alternated between the two parental houses for the first 5 or so years after undergraduate. I don't know about his financial affairs after that and before getting married but I do know he has my mother's credit card (he is 39), has been known to use it without asking (the understanding is that it's for locally bought presents for the nieces, almost exclusively), and she often pays for his flights to see her.

Now, my father has also offered to pay school fees for the nieces to attend a bilingual school in their area. I could not work out why I thought this was a good thing - perhaps just because I approve of the school - but not of the smaller amounts for the credit card in particular, and for the odd other payment he "can't quite make". But a wise friend in the computer has suggested perhaps it is because it is a big, group-type thing - the ultimate education of my nieces being important to the family as a whole, and not something any one section of the family may be able to accomplish. So perhaps if it is offered, help with adoption costs would not be such a bad thing to refuse.

I'm very curious, though, about my readers (hello, I do have some, don't I? Or is Google Reader/Bloglines failing to update my feed? I know Reader takes hours if not a day sometimes). Do you receive financial help from your family, or do you give it? What are your parameters? What do you see yourself doing for your own children?