Wednesday, July 26, 2006

Things They Should Tell You At The Intake Meeting

  • You will develop carpal tunnel syndrome and poor vision due to all of the time that you spend reading blogs and surfing the web for rumors.
  • You will develop PRS (pre-referral syndrome) during the second to last week of each month. Symptoms will include stress eating and irritability.
  • You will eventually stare longingly at any Asian child under the age of 10, adopted or not. You will also check out Chinese adults and wonder if that is what your child will look like when they grow up.
  • All of your family and friends will become experts on Chinese adoption.
  • We have absolutely no control over this process and can not predict what China will do at any point in time or why they will do it. (Actually I think this one was mentioned, but it still stinks)
  • You will develop unusual attachments to semi-strangers all over the country. You will worry about their sick child, be heart broken when they don't make the cut for referrals, agonize with them as they wait for their TA after they have received their referral, and cry happy tears when they finally get their sweet little child.
  • You will gain baby weight even though it was your intention to lose weight before you have to haul a baby around China for two weeks.
  • You will learn not to make plans because you have no idea when you will finally travel to get your baby.
  • It will be hard to explain to your five year old that you know you told him he would have a sister when he started first grade, but know he may have to wait for second.
  • You will learn to rationalize positive aspects of a longer wait. For example, "Now you will have one last summer to have fun before you have to deal with nap time and dirty diapers again" or "Now you can get into a schedule with Alex in school before you have to worry about another child being in the mix."
  • You will gather quite a collection of stuffed animals, blankets, and bibs because you do not know what size your child will wear or what season they will come home to you.

(That's all I got!!! Surely you all can add more to the list.)

4 comments:

Lisa~~ said...

Oh so true, oh so true!

M3 said...

Great list! Let's see, one more:

You will develop an impressive vocabulary of acronymns and terms such as LID, DTC, 171, USCIS, TA, etc...

PinkDevora said...

Well done!

Redheaded Chick said...

At least you made me smile! BTW, a delayed "thank you" for supporting the hubs' blogging efforts!