I can remember the moment when I decided that I really wanted to be a mother. I was 37. It had taken me a long time to decide to get married, and that had been the bigger decision to make. I had been ambivalent about having kids. I'd told myself that if I had them great, if I didn't that would be fine too.

I awoke one morning in an actual sweat.
Truly like my biological alarm had just gone off. Like tumblers of a safe clicking into place, my life shifted at that point and I knew beyond doubt that I wanted very badly to experience being a mother. Something must have also shifted for Perry, because he supported the idea wholeheartedly, and had also been ambivalent before.

We tried to get pregnant for 2 years. We had tried numerous fertility treatments. In August of the second year I was trying for the last time. As I sat waiting to hear how many eggs had shown up on my sonogram, after a month of daily fertility shots, I listened to the conversations around me. One woman had been trying to get pregnant for 11 years.

I ended up with 2 eggs that month - I'd had that with no drugs some months. Others around me were elated to have "harvests" of 8 to 12 eggs.

Some think it takes a lot of strength to go through the adoption process. I think it takes more strength to go through the fertility process. Where each month can be the emotional equivalent of a miscarriage. In the best of fertile conditions the chances are never more than 20%. The adoption process is just that, a process with a beginning and an end. It will happen if you stick with it.

It was at the fertility clinic, that I remember deciding to adopt. The thought I had was "I love my cat, and I didn't bear him". I am amazed to this day that I remember that thought at all.

So in the fall of 92 we made the decision to adopt.

In October of that year we attended an adoption seminar called "Resolve" in Tyson's corner. I can remember being on the way to the seminar and Perry saying "I sure hope they have classroom seating so we can take notes". Suddenly I was filled with the horror that there might be one of those horrible ice-breaker things where we go around the room and tell everyone why we were there. So it was initially with a great sense of relief that I entered the hotel ballroom where the seminar was being held to find a couple of thousand people there. "I can be anonymous here" I thought.

My second sense was one of horror as I thought: This is 1 conference, on 1 day, in one city. There could never be enough children to go around.

In fact there are millions of children waiting to be adopted from the former USSR alone. There are difficulties in the adoption process, but the world's lack of supply is not one of them.

The first speech given was one about changing the dream. The speaker spoke of the dream we all have growing up. That we will carry a baby, our bellies will swell with it, we will suckle it from our breasts, and we will be amazed at what traits of our own we will see in the child.

She further spoke about changing the dream. Letting go of those parts of it, but creating and knowing that as adoptive parents, the parental miracle we experience, is no less of a miracle then the other - Just a different kind of dream, resulting in a different kind of miracle.

I can't remember her name, but she changed my life.

In December we had decided on a liberal agency called New Family Foundation. By the end of January we had completed all paperwork and started the home study. By the end of February, Dimitri had been referred to us. In August, for my 40th birthday, almost 9 months to the day, we flew to Russia to pick him up.

The adoption process took us two weeks. Once we had him I remember "Mother Fright" (kind of like stage fright) setting in in a big way. We had had Dima for a day and were visiting friends in Moscow before our return. Dima had his first horrible, horrible, fit of crying. Our friends took he and I to the bedroom, and left us there, so I could do the mother thing and comfort him. I tried to coo-him into calmness (which he could not understand), I tried to physically console him (which he didn't want). And I had no clue in the world of what to do. So I cried too.

The plane ride home was best explained by Perry when he said "Now I know I've lived my worst nightmare". We had a crying kid for almost the entire 10 hours it took us to fly home. At one point we found brief entertainment for him. From our meal, he found a sort of entertainment in pouring the cherry tomatoes we had gotten with our meal from one cup to another. This seem to calm him. At this point I still am very unsure of myself, and Perry says he's going to the bathroom. I say OK, but hurry back. As soon as he leaves the tomatoes fall to the floor and go rolling back in the compartment. The calmness is ended and the crying begins anew.

There is a life lesson here. That is: the worse things get, the more you will look back at them and laugh later.

Having Dima opened up our souls in new and wonderful ways. I remember 2 things that my father told me. The first is: To your amazement you will find that you have a well of tenderness inside you that you never existed. The second thing he told me was that children had always been a lot of noise and distraction to him. Until he had his own. Then it was like a veil had been lifted from his eyes, and he saw the beauty in all children. These 2 things turned out to be true.

A year passed, and we decided that we really wanted to have 2 kids. I wanted to have a girl this time. So we began again with pretty much the same expectations.

The first attempt for a girl named Katya failed. Her mother would not relinquish her (Children can spend their lives in orphanages in Russia if the parents so choose). We went to the agency to restart the process, but there were no small girls available at that time for us. Lois (the director) said, "while we're waiting I want you to think about your third", and she brought out a picture of Masha (7 at the time). We laughed…hahaha…yeah 3 right. But we took the picture.

At home, Perry who had pretty much been allowing me to be the lead choice maker, said of Masha - "I can't think of one single reason why we shouldn't adopt her". I had the thoughts of being sad that I would have missed so much of her life. Perry responded to that by saying: "You were sorry that you missed the first 2 years of Dima's life - but you never regretted it - did you?"

And he was exactly right…. Never had I regretted it. Plus we laughingly said we might even make it to being grandparents this way.

Masha's adoption got real complicated. There was a Kazak law in fact that went into effect during our process which led us to believe that again we might never get her out.

So we began that third attempt for Lucy. But the agency at that time asked us to leave the adoption for Masha in process. We knew what this meant when we were asked this….maybe 3 kids after all…yipes! It was a serendipitous moment, and we only looked at each other for about 20 seconds and started laughing. You see she (Masha) had been told about us. And there really was no other answer, but yes.

Fate took over then, as fate always does.

Within the same week in June we were told that the Kazakhstan lawyers believed we could get the law changed and we should come immediately, and that Lucy was ready to go.

Perry spent 2 weeks in Kazakhstan and got the law changed (actually getting a diplomatic note issued to change a previous one). I met him in Moscow where it took 2 more weeks to adopt Lucy.

As a side note, this whole process can make you feel pretty damned good about America and the way things work here. If you think we're bureaucratic - you ain't seen nothing yet.

When we were getting passport pictures for Masha and Lucy we ran into another couple bringing home 2 kids. We said "So you got 2 kids too", and they said "Yup. More guts then brain cells we like to say". We immediately adopted that response as well, and use it to this day. Not just because its cute, but because its true.

So life is full now. In fact it couldn't possibly get any fuller, or richer, of more fulfilling. It could get less complicated and that would be ok.

I want to make a few more remarks about adoption.

On the subject of adopting older children….

It is not for everyone, anyone adopting must be absolutely comfortable with the concept. However, there are a lot of public statements which say that kids can't form connections after the age of 2. I want to tell you that I think it is BS. I'm not saying that I don't believe that there are never problems, because there are. But neither myself, nor any of the numerous adoptive parents I know, nor anyone that used our agency have ever been contacted for an assessment. The publications focus in on the problem cases, and make general statements from them which supposedly apply to all.

Children are remarkably resilient in a way that most adults can't fathom. They can form bonds, and love.

I believe a child's life can be changed (in this way) whether adopted at 2, or 5, or 6, or 10 or even later. It is a half empty, half full way of looking at it.

On the subject of saving the world . . .

I don't believe anyone should adopt because they want to make the world better. They can believe that and its okay, but I think that as a potential parent you must have a fundamental need you need filled. I met an adoptive parent once who talked on and on about how terrible the Russians were, and how she had to take them away from these horrible "devil worshippers". And what struck me was that these children were some sort of badge to her, they made her in her own mind some kind of great person. I guess she did have a need, but it wasn't the right one.

I'm saying that selfishly and personally, you should need the kid.

Of course laughingly sometimes I ask myself….what exactly was that need? ….and although it may be difficult to understand what I mean by these passages, for me they exemplify some of what I get back…

I pick Dima up from school and he's been studying native American Indians all day. He says "Mom did you know that some people believe that the Sun is the eye of God and He is watching you. I say, Really, how do you know God is a he? He says, "Oh Mom, god is definitely a he", and I say "how do you know?" He says (In sort of a Duuuh sort of way) "Mom, because God is a boys name".

Again Dima, the most likely to be quoted out of the 5 of us. I take them to get haircuts and then the burger king for dinner. Dima has been studying the solar system for the whole summer. Upon entering Dima says, "Mom, I really have to go to the bathroom" he says. So I take him to the men's room, and his head pops out almost immediately, and he says in his really loud voice "Hey Mom, there's a Uranus in here just my size".

And it is those moments that I need, though I can't really express why I do. It makes me laugh at life, at me, at things I make overly complex and hellish. And it makes me remember what's really important.

On the subject of loosing out on the whole birth thing….

It is just a different kind of miracle.

I believe in the web of life. I believe with all my heart that I was meant to end up with Masha, Dima, and Lucy as my children. I believe I arrived where I was intended to, and I have no regrets about it.

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