Don't Let Me Go

I finished packing up the nursery.

It's done.

Completed.

Finito.

And just in case you have a very good memory and remember me talking about doing it
months ago, why yes, I did wait three or four months to finish it. I started it
a long time ago.

Then I didn't finish.

It's called procrastination.

And I am good at it.

So anyway, we have about 8 days until we move so I figured I'd better get on it.

It wasn't easy. I was thinking that I could just go in there and throw
everything into boxes and that would be it.

Of course it wasn't so simple. I started by taking everything down off of the
walls and toy shelves and out of the dresser and laid it on the floor in a pile.
My plan was to sort it into categories. Toys, clothes, décor, shoes, and then
place each items into their respective boxes and pack them up.

I started with the clothes. We have So. Many. Clothes. Cute little girls clothes. Most with the tags still on them, in a variety of sizes. Ninety nine percent of them were received as gifts.

I picked up each item of clothing. The memories of when and who I received it from came flooding back. I had some awesome secret buddies in the beginning of our journey, and also have received some cute things from friends and family.

Pretty quickly me packing up the clothes turned into me sitting on the floor crying. For a long time. But eventually I got back to the packing.

After the clothes were packed away I started packing up the toys. We have some fun toddler's toys. The hardest part for me was the dolls. I came very close to putting those brand new dolls in the "to give away" box. They are still in their boxes, and they are bulky and take up a lot of room to store. I thought to myself "Surely there is another little girl out there somewhere who would enjoy playing with these dolls?" It seems such a waste for them to sit in their boxes collecting dust". But I couldn't bring myself to do it. So into several boxes the dolls went, marked as "baby things: storage".

Lastly I began to take down the decorations. This was the hardest part for me. Joe and I lovingly decorated this nursery almost a year ago. We never in a million years thought that we would have to move to a smaller place and un-decorate it.

The whole process left me feeling sad. Extremely sad. I wish we had never decorated the nursery. I wish we didn't have a crib. And a changing table. And so many baby clothes and toys.

In fact, sometimes I wish we could let this adoption go so that I could have some closure.

There. I said it.

I'm tired of waiting and I'm tired of not knowing when (or IF) we will get our child.

I am tired.

I feel extreme guilt even typing those sentences. I feel vulnerable too. People can be very judgemental and mean. There are those who would say "You shouldn't 't be pursuing this adoption if you are willing to give it up. You should be willing to walk though fire to get to your child".

(FYI: I no longer allow anonymous comments here, so mean judgemental people BUG OFF)

I used to be willing to fight for it. I used to feel like there was no obstacle that could stand between me and my child.

But the years go by. Holidays come and go. Friends have two and three children.

And still no baby for us.

It doesn't get easier as the months go by. It gets harder. I don't feel like we are getting closer to our child. It feels like with each passing month we are getting farther away.

As I packed up those boxes I could feel myself slowly letting go. Bit by bit. Until there was just a tiny, thin thread to hang onto.

I don't know when I will be unpacking those boxes and (re)decorating the nursery again. Our new lease is for one year so it will be at least that.

I have been finding myself crying a lot lately. Mostly in the car. Music sometimes does that to me. Certain songs can set me off. But also because that is one of the few times I find myself alone. So if you live in the Orange County area and you see a blond girl in a white SUV bawling their eyes out at a red light, don't be alarmed. It's just me :)

The other day I was driving home from work and they played the new song from "The Fray".

It's called "Never Say Never" and the lyrics go like this:

Never Say Never-The Fray

There's some things we don't talk about
Rather do without
And just hold the smile
Falling in and out of love
Ashamed and proud of
Together all the while
You can never say never
Why we don't know when
Time and time again
Younger now than we were before

Don't let me go
Don't let me go
Don't let me go
[x2]

Picture you're the queen of everything
As far as the eye can see
Under your command
I will be your guardian
When all is crumbling
Steady your hand

You can never say never
Why we don't know when
Time, time and time again
Younger now then we were before

Don't let me go
Don't let me go
Don't let me go
[x2]

We're pulling apart and coming together again and again
We're growing apart but we pull it together, pull it together, together again

Don't let me go
Don't let me go
Don't let me go
[x4]

This song took my breath away. Literally stopped me in my tracks. So much so that I didn't see the light turn green and the person behind me honked at me until I moved forward.

I felt like that song was playing for me.

(Stupid. I know. It was on the radio. Playing for everyone.)

And as I sat in my car, driving down the road crying I realized I am not quite ready to let go.

Nobody ever said this was going to be easy. It has been hard from the minute we started filling out the paperwork.

I will have days when I feel like giving up. But I have never been a quitter and I don't intend to start now.

We will ride this out. We will pack up our baby's things into boxes and store them in our closet at our new, smaller apartment until my husband finds a job and we can unpack them and decorate again.

Until our child comes home.

We will wait.

I know that there will be more "bad" days where I want to give up. I think that's normal. I have seen many friends along this journey make the decision to pull out of the China program and while I completely and totally understand their decision, I am not quite there yet. I might eventually get there, if the wait continues to stretch out to longer and longer times.

But I'm not there yet.

So for now we will wait.

I wanted to put the song on my blog but it isn't available yet.

You can listen to it and watch the video here

It's a beautiful song. You might need Kleenex. Or maybe that's just me :)

If you want to see what the nursery looked like last year when we decorated it, go here.

I also have pictures of the boxes that are sitting on the nursery floor with all of these items in them but I don't have the heart to post them now.