Training

We headed down to St. Louis on Saturday morning for our full day of adoption training and it was...awesome!  There were so many good portions throughout the day.  We really enjoyed the video of Karyn Purvis talking about points from her book The Connected Child.  We learned so much in the hour video that we have already signed up to go to her conference in September.  (And thanks to Focus on the Family, Gus and I will be attending the two day seminar for $25!!!  And I finally get to go to Nashville.)  Did you know that ALL adopted children go through trauma?  Even if you take your adoptive child home from the hospital, all of the time spent in utero with the birth mother while she was stressing about her decision to place the child for adoption is enough trauma to cause issues down the road.  I didn't know that.  She teaches techniques on how to build a relationship with your child that builds trust instead of just focusing on disciplining the child when behavior becomes an issue. 

There were all kinds of panels too, which were awesome.  There was an adult adoptee, an adoptive family whose children were in high school and college now, an adoptive family who just adopted this past year, and a birth mother panel.  The birth mother panel was by far our favorite part, but they were all really good.  And eye OPENING!!!  The birth mothers talked about their adoption story, what they liked, what they didn't like, what they wish they had done differently, and we could pretty much ask any questions we wanted.  (The asking questions part was true for the whole day, we got a lot of answers, not just for the birth mother panel.)  There were so many things that came up that we hadn't even thought of yet. 

There was also a whole section devoted to multi cultural and trans racial adoptions.  That was very well done and brought forth some points we hadn't examined yet as well.  All in all, it was a very good and informative day and I'm so glad they require it.  We also got to meet the social worker we will be dealing with, which was really nice. 

Gus and I both have interviews later this week for part time jobs.  We both feel we need to be doing everything we possibly can if we are going to be asking other people to help us out financially.  I'm pretty excited about my opportunity because it would be a lot of extra hours and the discount would be really nice, but I'm just worried that it might be too many extra hours.  It would put me at working 70 hours a week total, which would be awesome for our little adoption fund, but I would be scarce from the world and may get burnt out too quickly.  Decisions, decisions.  Winning the lottery would be a good alternative, but since I never play the lottery, that isn't going to happen. :)

WE HAVE RECEIVED OUR FIRST DONATIONS!!!!!   We received a donation through our pay pal account and friends of ours who are moving are selling some of their personal items and they have pledged the profits from one of their items to our fund!  So if you know of anyone looking for a vespa scooter, let me know. :)  I'm hoping to have our fundraising plan out to family and friends soon so they can decide if they want to help out and in what capacity, if they even can.  God is definitely working on our pride in this area.  Neither of us have personalities that like to ask for help.  We understand that our problems do not belong to anyone else.  And we also understand that we can not afford to adopt on our own.    I've already gone through hell and back to become a Momma, and I would do anything to hold our baby in my arms.  We are willing to make sacrifices and if it means working 70 hours a week and swallowing our pride and asking for help until we meet our goal, then so be it.  It will all be worth it when we bring Baby Martin home!