It’s not about me!

Written while waiting for a match

It is, of course, a good reality check. The Council are not looking for a child for us – that is not their job.

In an ideal world there would never be a child for us – because for there to be a match for us some very sad things need to have happened. Unlike approval – which can be a win win situation allowing everyone involved to be pleased with how things have turned out; when it comes to tracking and matching – a huge loss is at the heart of each and every hand played.

So this whole thing is not about me. BUT….

Just because this process is not about fulfilling our desires, that doesn’t mean that we don’t or shouldn’t have those desires. Those desires are exactly what the child we are waiting for deserves. The process needs to be child centred, but that child needs to have expectant parents at the end of the process. And that is us lot – the approved prospective adopters. Whatever the path that has lead us to this point – pain and loss, altruism, conscious choice or having choice taken away from you… – the point we are all at now is that we want to be the adoptive parents of a child who needs us. And that is good! Remember – we don’t need to have poker faces – we’ve played our hand! Impatience, excitement, fear of not finding a match, anticipation are all perfectly correct emotions for approved adopters to experience while they wait for a match.

While it certainly isn’t all about how we are feeling; how we are feeling is a vital part of the process. After all, should we really be offering ourselves up as parents if our intentions were totally dispassionate? Meh is not the appropriate attitude at this point!

If we felt just the same as we wait for a match as we would if we were offering our spare room to a friend’s brother on a ‘it’s there if the need arises, but we aren’t too fussed either way….’ basis would that not raise some troubling questions?

Would that be better than the ache I feel inside?

I don’t think so and nor do I think I should feel guilty about feeling deeply about this. I just need to learn to celebrate the ache and the anticipation while not feeling rejected or bruised when those emotions are given a back row seat in the proceedings.

And it is OK that that is hard. During the Assessment stages there are always marker posts ahead – even when progress is at its slowest each day that goes by is a day closer to where you are aiming for – and eventually the process takes you all the way to Panel. Once out the other side however, Panel remains the main reference point – it is just that now you are looking back at something getting further and further away. All future* marker posts that lie ahead of you are the ones that tell you how long you have remained unmatched since Panel.

So what with the emotions themselves, the awareness that they need to be kept a bit quiet while the professionals do their stuff and the unknown stretch of waiting ahead of you – well it all adds up to a very vulnerable position to be in. And that is not such a bad thing – what better way to prepare to nurture with empathy one far more vulnerable than I will ever be, whose little life may well have been a series of one unnerving experience after another?

*That is until that all important conversation with your ASW which starts “So there is some news…” Read on….