Legals

James' legals arrived on Thursday so we were back to the "hurry up" part of the process. You see in adoption you have two phases that you repeat over and over again. 'Hurry up" and "Wait." Sometimes, if your like me, you stalk a little too.

Over and over we have hurried and waited. We hurried and filled forms, medical clearances, got references, made copies, more forms, more copies and then waited. Then after the agonizing wait more forms and paperwork comes and we do it all over again.

Well, I am happy to report that we have officially completed our USCIS paperwork. We mailed it off with James legals and guess what we do now - if you said WAIT you catch on quick. :0) This is the last approval we need from immigrations so we can bring our precious boy into the country. I am hoping approval comes quick since we have been pre-approved through the I600A.

Unfortunately, so much still has to happen in Korea before we can bring James home and so much is still unknown in regards to the EP situation. I know everyone wants to know when he will be ready to come home and let me tell you we really want to know too. The waiting is harder then I imagined and each day it only gets harder.

So, back to those legals. Late at night on Thursday I took them out again and studied them. I looked them over and over and I understood very little because so much wasn't written in English. One thing stood out to me, a fingerprint.

The fingerprint of sweet baby James' birth mother. In my hand I held a piece of her. I imagined what it must have been like for her to place her print on the page as she prepared to say goodbye to our son. What she must have been thinking or feeling. Was she numb from the pain of her journey or had she found any peace in her day?

Seeing her print reminded me of how lucky I am ..... how blessed. I have so many wonderful people supporting us on this journey. So many people who love baby James and he is still half way around the world. James' first mother had nobody. No support. She placed him for adoption because essentially she didn't have much of a choice. How could she raise a baby alone, by herself, in a country that does not accept children born outside of wedlock.

Someday, I hope to meet her. I hope that James will have a connection to her. I hope that he will know that he has two mothers that love him very much. I hope he will understand that his birth mother wanted to give him more, that she wanted him to grow up in a world where he was accepted. I hope that I can be the kind of mother that she hoped for him. Most importantly, I hope he knows that she loved him very much.