Feeling a bit overwhelmed

So the hubby and I have recently decided that we are going to pursue an international adoption. We've looked into a lot of options, and I think we've come to a final decision that we are going to try to adopt a child from Ethiopia. The last major piece of the puzzle is to settle on an agency; right now we've recieved preliminary approval from two different agencies and until the moment when we have to start putting down the big bucks, we're kind of following through with both agencies. This means that we're duplicating a lot of things, especially when it comes to filling out forms.

I hate filling out forms. Hate it. Particularly forms that have to do with family history.

For those who don't know much/anything about my family history, my younger sister passed away a little over 5 years ago. She struggled with anorexia and bulimia for over 10 years, and in the end her heart finally gave out. She died on New Years Day; I was the one who found her in her apartment a few hours after she died.

About a year and a half ago, my father died of a heart attack at age 59. My dad was probably the person I had the most in common with in the whole world. He collapsed at a movie theater and though they were able to get his heart started again after working on him for almost 2 hours, very soon after that he passed away. We had actually just gotten home from the hospital when the doctors called us to come back because he was going downhill so quickly. My stepmom decided not to go back, so I was the one who was with him when he died.

I say all of this because filling out these stupid forms is like being slapped in the face with all of this stuff over and over again.

Siblings? Check.
Living or deceased? Damnit.

Father: living or deceased. Damnit again.

Oh, and while we're at it, we need a letter from any counselors that you might have seen ever in your life saying that you're emotionally fit to adopt. So that means getting in touch with the counselor that I saw after my sister died and getting him to sign off on my emotional wellbeing. That ought to be fun.

So right now, after spending the evening filling out a stack of lovely forms, I've decided that I am going to sit on my butt with a glass of red wine and watch Intervention. That's a great way to make myself feel like my life is normal;)

And....I'm back

Yeah, so it's only been about 6 months since that first post. I'm really on a roll here, huh?

I'm really truly planning on keeping up with this here blog this time around, though. The hubby and I have made some pretty major decisions recently, and he's actually decided to start a blog for the family. I've been writing a bit over there, too, but I also realized that I need a space to be able to work through my own thoughts and feelings in a more anonymous way. The family blog is watched by all sorts of friends and family members, which means I can't truly open up about things that involve those friends and family members:)

So here goes nothing...let's see if we can make this whole blog thing stick this time around, shall we?

First post! First post!

Looking at this blank page reminds me of all of the journals I bought when I was younger. Notice, I didn't say all of the journals I *kept*. I loved the thought of journaling. I would spend hours picking out a just perfect notebook and tote it home with a head full of pithy comments and philosophical rants. I couldn't wait to sit down and start writing. But then, after an entry or two, I'd get discouraged and quit. I moved recently and found a stash of these barely-started journals and thought for a bit about why they all withered on the vine. (Maybe it was my over-fondness for using metaphors?;)

I think the problem was that I found it difficult to strike a balance between an hourly diary of what I did during the day (how I was "taught" to journal when I was young...write it all down so you'll never forget!) and trying to come up with something profound enough to write down. I skimmed some of those first entries recently and they're all so similar. A quick personal intro followed with a statement of purpose and a promise not to let this journal fall by the wayside like all the others had done.

Another pitfall was my perfectionist nature and the need to say something absolutely perfect. I had fantasies (yes, fantasies. I was a weird kid) about someone stumbling upon my journal and being blown away by my wisdom and the sheer genius of my writing. Looking back on it, some of it's decent, but I'm not sure that even I would use the words "wisdom" or "genius." But I would feel all this pressure to come up with something magnificent, and that pressure would ultimately keep me from writing anything. There are things that I kind of wish I had journalled through now. Maybe it's the historian in me, but I'd like to have something tangible to go over as a representation of major life events. I wish I had journalled through my pregnancy and the first few months of my son's life so that I could share some of those thoughts and hopes with him when he gets older. I wish I had journalled through the early stages of my relationship with my husband, so that when times get bumpy -- as they always do -- I could go back and reread some of those butterflies-in-the-stomach moments of early infatuation. I even wish I had journalled in the days and weeks immediately following the death of my sister and my father...just because those were the days when I was living immersed in memories of these beautiful people and as time marches forward I worry sometimes about forgetting.

So this time I'm starting out with no promises of profound thoughts, no plans for comic genius, not even a promise to write every day. Just a promise to try to remember to jot thoughts down now and again, and maybe even figure out some of this juggling act called life along the way. (Too profound? Sorry, that's not a good start, is it?:)