Head on over to my new digs for my latest post!
http://missohkay.wordpress.com/2011/12/10/dear-mrs-duggar/
Move
Hi. I moved to WordPress today. I've been wanting better commenting features so I can interact with you more. I will eventually also be password protecting some posts when our baby eventually (hopefully) arrives, so stay tuned for further instructions.
Here are my new digs: http://missohkay.wordpress.com.
Thanks and see you there!
Here are my new digs: http://missohkay.wordpress.com.
Thanks and see you there!
Thanks
On this Thanksgiving, I'm grateful for my dear husband. My family. My blog and twitter friends who've kept me sane and entertained. (And who made me realize that I'm not the only one with a penchant for dark and twisted miscarriage jokes. Hey - it's a coping mechanism. Stop judging us!) Two dear twitter/blog friends who live in my city and offered to throw me a baby shower. (How awesome is that?) My therapist. My career that sucks up all my time but at least allows me to adopt without so much financial strain.
And I'm grateful for the ridiculously adorable pictures of our baby that our agency sent this week. We started the process Thanksgiving week last year. I'll still abide by the rules and not blog it, but I will say this... I really like this guy's story of how he was once trying to explain the process of adoption to someone when he just gave up and said "if the adoption process has 150 steps, we're on step 6." Following that analogy, we're on step 144. Each of the final steps takes weeks, but we're getting so. darn. close. I will have the mother of all "birth" stories to relate when this is over. Missohkay and the Chamber of Secrets: Adoption Story Part 10 coming soon to a theater near you.
Also, one of my posts from a few weeks ago is syndicated on Blogher today! Fun - and frankly a little scary to go out of my comfort zone :)
And I'm grateful for the ridiculously adorable pictures of our baby that our agency sent this week. We started the process Thanksgiving week last year. I'll still abide by the rules and not blog it, but I will say this... I really like this guy's story of how he was once trying to explain the process of adoption to someone when he just gave up and said "if the adoption process has 150 steps, we're on step 6." Following that analogy, we're on step 144. Each of the final steps takes weeks, but we're getting so. darn. close. I will have the mother of all "birth" stories to relate when this is over. Missohkay and the Chamber of Secrets: Adoption Story Part 10 coming soon to a theater near you.
Also, one of my posts from a few weeks ago is syndicated on Blogher today! Fun - and frankly a little scary to go out of my comfort zone :)
Advocacy pants
Welcome ICLWers! I haven't done ICLW in about six months, but since I'm contractually forbidden to blog about my adoption, no one has missed anything! If this is your first time here, check out my About Me page. And now buckle your seat belts for a long post...
I work in a professional industry where 50% of entry-level people are women. Often in this field, two tiers of advancement exist. The first tier is reached after, say, 8 years. It's typically an all-or-nothing promotion - you either make it or you leave. No set time must pass before you go from the middle tier to the top tier. Reaching the top tier is primarily based on your ability to bring in business.
The work can be grueling. Interesting and intellectually satisfying - but the clock is always ticking. One of the most important standards you're measured by (at least in the early years) is how much time you put in. Every Saturday I wake up and debate whether I should blog... or work. Before I go on vacation, I have to plan out how I'll make up that lost time in the following weeks. When I've been sitting in the emergency room waiting to find out whether my pregnancy is viable or lost, the amount of time I'm losing at work weighs on me. This is why I skipped only 4 days of work through 3 miscarriages. Sick, right? And now to over-generalize, when working women have children, much of the childcare burden still falls on them. Or at least they feel the societal expectation that the burden should be on them. So they leave for greener work-life balance pastures.
You can see why by the time the original group of 50% males and 50% females reaches the first tier of advancement, it might become something like 70% males, 30% females. By the top tier, it might be 85%-15%. And the upper echelons of management - 0 to 5% female.
This is a long way of explaining why, in my industry, employers have begun to adopt policies that try to retain women. Generous maternity leave policies, for example. Which - finally - leads us to the point of today's post. I work for a company that - for positive reasons but ones I won't describe for zee World Wide Web - is re-evaluating everything. Management, policies, structure, benefits - top to bottom. Since I learned about this months ago, I've been nervous. Most of the changes are really good. But what will happen to my adoptive leave?
A little explanation for my non-U.S. friends - in the U.S. many employers are required by law to give 12 weeks off for birth or adoption, but none of it has to be paid. Most employers don't pay, in fact. And employers with less than 50 employees don't even have to allow you any time off - paid or unpaid. It's a terrible system. My employer falls in the generous category, and I am grateful for that. It gave a decent number of weeks off with full pay. Weeks that we've been counting on, since mrohkay wants to take some time off too but won't get paid for it. And of course saving up for this time off would be complicated - we're already using that money for the adoption itself. (As so many of you also face after paying out the wazoo for treatment.)
The announcement finally came this week. It was presented as an improvement over our current policies. And for the most part, it was! Men get some paid leave for birth or adoption. The number of paid weeks off for maternity leave was bumped up a little. Everyone benefited - except, apparently, me. I emailed HR to clarify and learned that I was correct: Adoptive moms get substantially fewer paid weeks than they previously got - and six weeks less than birth moms now get under the new policy. It's not an uncommon disparity for employers to embrace, but it's a step backwards for us.
Ouch. I was fighting back tears before the meeting even ended. I cried all afternoon. I couldn't sleep all night. A jumble of thoughts. You fuckers, I gave up three babies for you. (I know stress doesn't cause miscarriages, but when I get irrational, I blame my job.) I will finally get a baby after 3 years of trying and you people are going to take away some of my precious time at home? I'd love to squeeze a baby out my vagina and get six extra weeks! Your coddled little birth babies don't need as long of a transition time at home as my adopted baby does after going through so much in her infancy. OK, you get the picture. I boarded the train to crazy town.
By the next morning, I hadn't formulated a plan, but I knew I needed support. And this is where the fact that I've become fairly open about my losses came in handy. I put on my advocacy pants and emailed a few people at work who I knew had adopted. That was easy - they were all supportive. I emailed a few other women who knew my story. I got some positive reactions and some negative. (Pregnant women should get longer because they have to give birth, they said to me. Oh really? I never got that far, so I had no idea, I sniped back at them... in my head.) And some people whom I didn't even approach either knew my background or knew I was adopting and assumed an infertile backstory, and they were rarin' to go as well.
Two of the adoptive moms shared emails with me that they sent to the decision-makers. Wonderful poignant emails. One mom explaining the importance of leave to adoptive families, pointing out the obvious fact that this was an expense the employer would not incur very frequently yet they'd benefit very much by having such a family-friendly policy on the books, etc. Money line: "Becoming a parent by adoption should not be treated as a secondary or lesser means of forming a family and whether intended or not that would be the unfortunate message imparted by such a flawed policy." The other mom explaining how she'd given the employer so much free PR because of the positive way she'd been treated as an adoptive mom. Money line: "So much of what I do as a mother is to make sure my children - and everyone else - understand that they are my real children and I am their real mother. We have now adopted a policy that undermines those values." Excuse me, there's, uh, something in my eye again.
I don't know how this story ends yet. I've been told the change in policy adoption-wise was an oversight. While I think that's true, it doesn't explain why they doubled-down and confirmed it to me before the uproar. It's being reconsidered now. I've been told that they'll at least make it right for me. Thanks, and I'll take it, but not good enough. I know, I know - most of you don't get any paid time off. I am grateful for what I have. But I had the chance to take a decent (if unfair) policy and make it better. My losses, and this community, have made me passionate about speaking out. And I did not put on my advocacy pants to fix this problem just for me!
I work in a professional industry where 50% of entry-level people are women. Often in this field, two tiers of advancement exist. The first tier is reached after, say, 8 years. It's typically an all-or-nothing promotion - you either make it or you leave. No set time must pass before you go from the middle tier to the top tier. Reaching the top tier is primarily based on your ability to bring in business.
The work can be grueling. Interesting and intellectually satisfying - but the clock is always ticking. One of the most important standards you're measured by (at least in the early years) is how much time you put in. Every Saturday I wake up and debate whether I should blog... or work. Before I go on vacation, I have to plan out how I'll make up that lost time in the following weeks. When I've been sitting in the emergency room waiting to find out whether my pregnancy is viable or lost, the amount of time I'm losing at work weighs on me. This is why I skipped only 4 days of work through 3 miscarriages. Sick, right? And now to over-generalize, when working women have children, much of the childcare burden still falls on them. Or at least they feel the societal expectation that the burden should be on them. So they leave for greener work-life balance pastures.
You can see why by the time the original group of 50% males and 50% females reaches the first tier of advancement, it might become something like 70% males, 30% females. By the top tier, it might be 85%-15%. And the upper echelons of management - 0 to 5% female.
This is a long way of explaining why, in my industry, employers have begun to adopt policies that try to retain women. Generous maternity leave policies, for example. Which - finally - leads us to the point of today's post. I work for a company that - for positive reasons but ones I won't describe for zee World Wide Web - is re-evaluating everything. Management, policies, structure, benefits - top to bottom. Since I learned about this months ago, I've been nervous. Most of the changes are really good. But what will happen to my adoptive leave?
A little explanation for my non-U.S. friends - in the U.S. many employers are required by law to give 12 weeks off for birth or adoption, but none of it has to be paid. Most employers don't pay, in fact. And employers with less than 50 employees don't even have to allow you any time off - paid or unpaid. It's a terrible system. My employer falls in the generous category, and I am grateful for that. It gave a decent number of weeks off with full pay. Weeks that we've been counting on, since mrohkay wants to take some time off too but won't get paid for it. And of course saving up for this time off would be complicated - we're already using that money for the adoption itself. (As so many of you also face after paying out the wazoo for treatment.)
The announcement finally came this week. It was presented as an improvement over our current policies. And for the most part, it was! Men get some paid leave for birth or adoption. The number of paid weeks off for maternity leave was bumped up a little. Everyone benefited - except, apparently, me. I emailed HR to clarify and learned that I was correct: Adoptive moms get substantially fewer paid weeks than they previously got - and six weeks less than birth moms now get under the new policy. It's not an uncommon disparity for employers to embrace, but it's a step backwards for us.
Ouch. I was fighting back tears before the meeting even ended. I cried all afternoon. I couldn't sleep all night. A jumble of thoughts. You fuckers, I gave up three babies for you. (I know stress doesn't cause miscarriages, but when I get irrational, I blame my job.) I will finally get a baby after 3 years of trying and you people are going to take away some of my precious time at home? I'd love to squeeze a baby out my vagina and get six extra weeks! Your coddled little birth babies don't need as long of a transition time at home as my adopted baby does after going through so much in her infancy. OK, you get the picture. I boarded the train to crazy town.
By the next morning, I hadn't formulated a plan, but I knew I needed support. And this is where the fact that I've become fairly open about my losses came in handy. I put on my advocacy pants and emailed a few people at work who I knew had adopted. That was easy - they were all supportive. I emailed a few other women who knew my story. I got some positive reactions and some negative. (Pregnant women should get longer because they have to give birth, they said to me. Oh really? I never got that far, so I had no idea, I sniped back at them... in my head.) And some people whom I didn't even approach either knew my background or knew I was adopting and assumed an infertile backstory, and they were rarin' to go as well.
Two of the adoptive moms shared emails with me that they sent to the decision-makers. Wonderful poignant emails. One mom explaining the importance of leave to adoptive families, pointing out the obvious fact that this was an expense the employer would not incur very frequently yet they'd benefit very much by having such a family-friendly policy on the books, etc. Money line: "Becoming a parent by adoption should not be treated as a secondary or lesser means of forming a family and whether intended or not that would be the unfortunate message imparted by such a flawed policy." The other mom explaining how she'd given the employer so much free PR because of the positive way she'd been treated as an adoptive mom. Money line: "So much of what I do as a mother is to make sure my children - and everyone else - understand that they are my real children and I am their real mother. We have now adopted a policy that undermines those values." Excuse me, there's, uh, something in my eye again.
I don't know how this story ends yet. I've been told the change in policy adoption-wise was an oversight. While I think that's true, it doesn't explain why they doubled-down and confirmed it to me before the uproar. It's being reconsidered now. I've been told that they'll at least make it right for me. Thanks, and I'll take it, but not good enough. I know, I know - most of you don't get any paid time off. I am grateful for what I have. But I had the chance to take a decent (if unfair) policy and make it better. My losses, and this community, have made me passionate about speaking out. And I did not put on my advocacy pants to fix this problem just for me!
The Big Stuff
We didn't start out being superstitious about buying baby things. We hadn't bought any for baby #1, but not out of fear. I wanted to buy a little something for baby #2, but it was gone before we found anything we wanted to buy. By baby #3, we were too afraid to buy anything. After we started the adoption process, we bucked the trend and bought baby a Christmas present last year - a stuffed giraffe. Since then we've picked up a couple of things here or there (though honestly my mom has purchased more than we have).
By now, we can clothe our child for a whole week:
Not to say we didn't start making small preparations before then. We've given Goodwill enough junk - ahem, quality tax-deductible items - to outfit the population of Wyoming. (Yes, I know the population of Wyoming isn't that big... what do you think we are, hoarders?)
We agreed to paint after we finished the home study.
The room is mostly empty now.
And yet we keep procrastinating on buying the "big stuff." First, we said we'd do it after the referral. Then after passing court. Whether it is pregnancy or adoption, eventually a time rolls around when you have to start pretending like you believe a child will be the result of all of this. I say pretend like you believe - not actually believe. Because I've still got a protective coating that mostly prevents me from actually believing - we've been on the shit side of the statistics for too long. Not to say the pretending isn't fun! We're going to look at cribs today, in fact. But only looking.
Many people perceive adoption as a guarantee. Unfortunately, it isn't. The process of adopting is just as fragile and miraculous as any pregnancy. Less stressful on a day-to-day basis, perhaps, but with the potential for heartbreak always looming.
In addition to the usual fears - nutrition, health, safety - we're heading into a time of expected political unrest in the country we're adopting from. The next month or so will be critical to the stability of the government - and hence to our adoption. I've been pretty calm and patient through this adoption (despite the no-blogging restrictions that I mostly abide by), but my zen is fraying at the edges now.
The only thing that keeps me going (other than the cute referral picture that I can't share with you yet) is this:
By now, we can clothe our child for a whole week:
 |
| Note the purposeful pink to not-pink ratio. |
We agreed to paint after we finished the home study.
 |
| "What? It's not like the baby's going to come storming in here demanding dessert-colored walls." |
 |
| Where else would I keep my law books but in the baby's room? |
Many people perceive adoption as a guarantee. Unfortunately, it isn't. The process of adopting is just as fragile and miraculous as any pregnancy. Less stressful on a day-to-day basis, perhaps, but with the potential for heartbreak always looming.
 |
| Oogie Boogie baby snatcher. |
The only thing that keeps me going (other than the cute referral picture that I can't share with you yet) is this:
 |
| Socks that look like shoes are the bees' knees. |
Do you remember the 5th of November?
I try not to focus on dates but they haunt me. I feel a buildup of grief each time I approach one. Due dates, loss dates. I only have 6 landmines a year; I know some of you have many more.
Tomorrow, last year, we lost our only baby that ever had a heartbeat. Flashes of that day are still with me so vividly. Wearing a red dress with a black suit jacket. Riding on the train on the way to work, I smelled french fries. For the first time in weeks, I didn't gag at the smell. At work the sight of blood in my underwear, just a tiny bit... but I knew instantly that it was all over. Walking back to my office and logging onto twitter. Shaking my head: it wasn't appropriate to tell twitter before my husband. Hanging up the phone and turning back to my computer and typing the phrase that I'd been steeling myself to type for weeks. I was shocked, yet I'd predicted this moment was coming and had mentally prepared for it. "Bleeding. Fuck."
The twitter support came pouring in. Slackie O. and ababy4al were especially kind. A partner at my office who I'd recently confided in walked me to my building lobby. I knew she'd had a miscarriage once. She waited with me and tried to reassure me. I told her it was over. I told her we would be adopting.
Riding in the cab to the hospital. Talking about blood. Wondering what the cabbie thought was wrong with me. Walking into the ER. "I'm nine weeks pregnant and bleeding." "And what?" "Blee-ding." "Oh."
The resident who was going to be a gynecologist. Nice to me and sympathetic... but with an unmistakable air of being pleased that he was assigned a patient in his chosen field. Checked me in the stirrups. Cervix closed. Ultrasound machine. Couldn't get it to work. Then it worked but couldn't find a heartbeat. They'd send me down to a better machine. A doctor came by to wish us well. He sought us out because he'd been there before; his wife had IVF loss IVF loss IVF loss IVF triplets. One had a brain tumor and was operated on at birth. Now the triplets are healthy and 16. Encouraged us to keep trying. He was so kind that we couldn't tell him we were exiting this ride.
Waiting and waiting and waiting but we had no anxiety because we had no hope. We knew. "The ultrasound tech found no discernible embryo." We just nodded.
Calling my parents in the ER. Calling them again as we walked home. I still can't believe this was the same day - how did I survive this? Eventually they said kindly, "We heard from your sister. Do you want to know?" I knew the answer that hurt the most would be the correct one. "It's a girl," I whispered. "Yes," they replied. "Okay." Her anatomy scan was that day.
We weighed our options. We had Ben Folds tickets that night. Maybe we should go? As crazy as it sounds, I kind of wanted to go. We didn't go. We bought a log for the fireplace. We held hands and watched the flames. I checked twitter. I had nothing to say, but I silently - gratefully - watched the support roll in.
A year later, I'm surprised it still hurts as much as it does, even while we're thrilled to be adopting and over the moon to meet our child.
And I'm still so grateful for the support that rolls in.
Tomorrow, last year, we lost our only baby that ever had a heartbeat. Flashes of that day are still with me so vividly. Wearing a red dress with a black suit jacket. Riding on the train on the way to work, I smelled french fries. For the first time in weeks, I didn't gag at the smell. At work the sight of blood in my underwear, just a tiny bit... but I knew instantly that it was all over. Walking back to my office and logging onto twitter. Shaking my head: it wasn't appropriate to tell twitter before my husband. Hanging up the phone and turning back to my computer and typing the phrase that I'd been steeling myself to type for weeks. I was shocked, yet I'd predicted this moment was coming and had mentally prepared for it. "Bleeding. Fuck."
The twitter support came pouring in. Slackie O. and ababy4al were especially kind. A partner at my office who I'd recently confided in walked me to my building lobby. I knew she'd had a miscarriage once. She waited with me and tried to reassure me. I told her it was over. I told her we would be adopting.
Riding in the cab to the hospital. Talking about blood. Wondering what the cabbie thought was wrong with me. Walking into the ER. "I'm nine weeks pregnant and bleeding." "And what?" "Blee-ding." "Oh."
The resident who was going to be a gynecologist. Nice to me and sympathetic... but with an unmistakable air of being pleased that he was assigned a patient in his chosen field. Checked me in the stirrups. Cervix closed. Ultrasound machine. Couldn't get it to work. Then it worked but couldn't find a heartbeat. They'd send me down to a better machine. A doctor came by to wish us well. He sought us out because he'd been there before; his wife had IVF loss IVF loss IVF loss IVF triplets. One had a brain tumor and was operated on at birth. Now the triplets are healthy and 16. Encouraged us to keep trying. He was so kind that we couldn't tell him we were exiting this ride.
Waiting and waiting and waiting but we had no anxiety because we had no hope. We knew. "The ultrasound tech found no discernible embryo." We just nodded.
Calling my parents in the ER. Calling them again as we walked home. I still can't believe this was the same day - how did I survive this? Eventually they said kindly, "We heard from your sister. Do you want to know?" I knew the answer that hurt the most would be the correct one. "It's a girl," I whispered. "Yes," they replied. "Okay." Her anatomy scan was that day.
We weighed our options. We had Ben Folds tickets that night. Maybe we should go? As crazy as it sounds, I kind of wanted to go. We didn't go. We bought a log for the fireplace. We held hands and watched the flames. I checked twitter. I had nothing to say, but I silently - gratefully - watched the support roll in.
A year later, I'm surprised it still hurts as much as it does, even while we're thrilled to be adopting and over the moon to meet our child.
And I'm still so grateful for the support that rolls in.
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