Red Beans & Rice Noodles

Censored!

For some reason, this really stings:

As is obvious from all of my recent posts, I'm currently chin-deep in fundraising efforts for our adoption. Our adoption is going to cost about $30K when all is said and done. We've gone through four rounds of IVF without insurance, and the IVF cycles cost about 11-14K each. Yes, I know I'm preaching to the choir on this, but bear with me and I'll try to have a point. ;)

I've been using this medium, my blog, not to ask for money from my fellow infertiles, but to spread the word about the baby pants fundraiser to people who might want to contribute by buying baby pants. In order to further spread the word, I asked several of my bloggity friends to post about our pants fundraiser on their sites, and many of you did (thankyouthankyouthankyou).

So I was thrilled, after asking one of the biggest fish in the IF bloggy world to post about us, when she agreed to post about our fundraiser. Now, this person has been through many, many rounds of IVF before finally being successful, has been going through the infertility BS for years, and has even written and published a book about her struggles through infertility.

The post went about our fundraiser went up, and I got a big response, about 4 or 5 pairs of pants sold in an hour, and I got a couple of very nice messages of support from people who saw it.

And then, within two hours, the post went down. Just like that... no explanation, nothing.

I wrote and asked her what happened, and got an email 10 hours later saying that there had been a ton of drama after she posted it and she was "forced" to take it down, basically that people had complained. This was really surprising and, well, really stung, considering that it was coming from somebody who has been down the IF road big time, and is seemingly all about raising awareness and supporting other infertiles. Maybe I misunderstood.

And yes, I am very appreciative of those of you who did post about me, and I didn't hear anything about complaints from any of you. I really don't understand.

If I've offended anybody through my fundraising, I'm sorry. I've made a huge effort to make this about spreading the word, and not directly asking for money. I know we can't please all of the people all of the time, but the news of the complaints from another infertile made me very confused. And definitely stung.

Fundraiser update

Wow! The response to our fundraiser has been overwhelming.

Love. You. Guys. (sniff.)

So far we've sold about 50 pairs of the Babyrounds, that's $1000 folks! Plus many people donated through our chipin widget – another $1300 or so there. Wow, wow, wow. And there are still about 40 or 50 pairs of adorable little pants left, so please continue to spread the word!

I've said it before, and am sure I will again, (I just made myself think of Horton the elephant "I meant what I said, and I said what I meant. An elephant's faithful one hundred percent!" Hmmm... and that is also about an adoption of sorts. But I digress... what the heck was I gonna say anyway? oh yeah...) it is such an enormous relief to not worry about spending the next several months worrying about how the heck we're gonna come up with the money for this adoption. And the way people – friends, family, acquaintances and strangers alike – have pulled together to help us out. Really reaffirms a feeling of community and that there are an awful lot of gosh-dern-good people out there, and they/you are all over the place.

Thank you so much to all of you who have been supporting our fundraising efforts in thoughts and in deed. You all kick serious ass. :)

We made the paper!

Woot! woot! We got our Babyrounds fundraiser a mention in the online San Francisco paper. Check it out: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/nwzchik/index?

Pretty sweet!

In other news... still another two weeks or so before our paperwork actually makes it to Vietnam. I feel like that's the third time we've been told that, but whatever, I'm not going to stress about it. I haven't really been thinking about "the wait" at all, not yet anyway. I'm just so relieved to have all of the paperwork over with and the "how the hell are we going to afford this" situation under control.

Every once in a while I think, "hmmm... guess I need some sort of book about, well, babies." So I checked out a couple of books from the library, but one of them mentioned adoption once in 400+ pages, and the other may have given it a paragraph or two. So I figured there must be books more focused in on raising adopted children, and advice more related to bringing home an adopted 8-month old rather than breasfeeding a newborn. And of course there are plenty, I was happy to see online. So Saturday I went to the bookstore and bought a couple. As I was browsing one of the first things I turned to in the book Raising Adopted Children was the author talking about how she didn't even want to think about setting up the nursery, and didn't until a friend showed up with a crib and made her do it. And then I realized, sheesh, that's where I'm at. I'm so happy to be done with the paperwork, and to actually have a baby on the way (at some point in the next year), that I could be subconsciously blocking out the "reality" of a baby coming so I don't start putting myself through the hope, anxiety, and wondering cycle that I'm afraid will happen if I start preparing a nursery, etc. So, the fact that I'm happily not thinking about it, and that having a child is still kind of a surreal concept to me is pretty normal for those of us who've been through so much hope and disappointment to get this far.

Interesting. So I bought the book... It further explains how necessary it is to go through this process, and how some people even have their friends and family treat them as they would an expecting pregnant woman, because it psychologically prepares you more for becoming a parent. And I thought I was just excited to have gotten this far in the process, I hadn't considered that I might be avoiding thinking about it so that I wouldn't feel any pain or anxiety. That brain sure is tricksy, and gives one amazing coping skills without a person even realizing it. Don't know if I'm making sense, but I'm very impressed by this book so far, and I'm in the beginning phase of figuring out how to childproof my kitchen... Gotta start somewhere.