Crash

Back in college, I used to GoGoGo, and do absolutely everything. Then, as soon as exams were over, I would crash. I'd get sick with whatever the bug du jour was, and do absolutely nothing for anywhere from a day to a week (or two).

This was never what I would call a healthy pattern, but it was me. It was my way of making sure I didn't miss anything until I could afford the downtime. Lots of my friends did similar, but I tended to crash a little harder than they did. Sometimes I even crashed mid-semester, in March. Freshman year I had a knee fixed in March, sophomore year it was appendicitis...you get the picture.

I thought I was done with that.

Apparently not. Because I'm crashing today. I'm home form work, sick, after too much GoGoGo.

I plied seven skeins of three-ply worsted and spun 3 novelty singles for the knitting shop.

That was my relaxation.

I delivered them to said shop (Miles and Miles of Yarn, Wyandotte, MI) and took the obligatory pic of a new project by a shop patron whose name I couldn't remember if you tortured me.
The GoGoGo has been for this:
I devoted a large portion of the last three years to trying to adopt a little girl. (Well, she was little when it started, but I wouldn't say that now!) This is "her" bedroom, otherwise known as the spare bedroom in my house. On the advisement of the head social worker in the case, I fixed it up and maintained it for the last 2 years. I have done mountains of paperwork, countless phone calls, a security background check, medical exams for both me and my Little Boy...and the list goes on.

Thing is, she lied. More than once.

And I didn't know until last Friday at the big "child placement" meeting where I found out all kinds of stuff that had been withheld from me, and I left four hours (!) later feeling more betrayed and humiliated than ever before in my life. So many people, one hapless child, three years unsettled, and all because of a social worker trying to avoid paperwork.

There's only so far I can go. I can stretch myself only so thin before I break.

And now I'm crashing.

I still have only one child.

I used to proclaim to anyone who would talk about it that if more people would pursue domestic adoptions we'd have fewer kids in foster care, fewer abortions, fewer abandoned babies, and less of a stigma on giving children up for adoption when the parents are unfit/unable to care for them. It's a basic function of supply and demand, complicated by human emotions. I've wanted to adopt since I was in high school; it was always a part of my life plan and goals, and I wanted to adopt American kids, not go overseas and bring more kids back here when there are so many kids here in need...

I'm not sure I can do that anymore. I've been burned pretty deep. All of a sudden I understand why American parents avoid domestic adoptions, and I completely sympathize with their desire to import children.

Somebody please give me a reality check if I ever fall down this rabbit hole again, k?