My Other Life

I feel like I almost have two lives: my life at home and my life at work.

While I only work about 18-20 hours per week, my job has become a large part of who I am and the things I get to be a part of influence me a lot.

I got my case load all nice and tidied up before I had Jace, so that nothing pressing would need to happen while I was gone. When I went back to work (I only took two weeks off, so its not like it was that dramatic), I was honestly bored for a while since I had done everything I needed to do before I left. I told everyone that I needed more clients and I could help them with whatever they might need help with. Ha. That comes back to kick me in the butt quite quickly.

The interesting thing about my job is you never know what you are going to get and the tide can turn quickly. This week has been crazy and though I feel like I have barely had time to stop and smell the roses (and yet I sit here blogging), it has been a good week.

Saturday I was able to go to the sealing of one of my adoptive couples to their daughter. In Utah, couples wait six months to finalize their adoptions and then can go to the Temple to seal their children. That was a really special experience for me. I love the spirit of the Temple and I love seeing families bound together through the sealing ordinance. This one was particularly special to me because I had been the worker for the birth mom, too, so it came a full circle. I knew her story and I knew this couple's story. The whole thing was just sacred because I felt the Spirit testify to me that this little girl was being sealed to her family, the family she was supposed to be in, despite coming a different way. It is interesting because when her birth mom chose this couple, I was concerned because she literally just picked the family off the top of the stack of profiles without even looking at the rest. I had such thoughts as "what if I didn't put the right family on the top of the stack if the birth mother was just going to choose the first one?" Well, I know now that this little girl was always intended for this family, not matter where their profile would have been presented in the stack. Special experience for sure.

The rest of the weekend can only be described as a madhouse. Before the sealing, I got a text message from one of my couples who said their birth mom went into labor 3 weeks early. After I got out of the Temple, I got another text from a birth mom I was working with that said that she was in labor, 8 weeks early. Wowsa. Suffice it to say that Sunday was insane. I went from texting and making calls during church (don't worry it was necessary and I hid in the mother's lounge so as to not look ridiculous and rude in Relief Society) to a trip to the hospital to see the birth mom I am working with, then to the agency to sign placement paperwork with my couple, then back to the hospital to see my birth mom and go through a face to face meeting with the couple she had chosen (she came in quite late in her pregnancy and we did not expect the baby to come that early, so she had never met the couple...). I was gone basically all day. Most weekends are not like that. I sit home and relax. It just so happened that both of these things occurred at the same time, making it a little crazy.

Monday the birth parents I am working with (the birth father was involved) relinquished their rights to their baby. Relinquishments are always bittersweet to me. While they are incredibly sad and emotionally difficult, there is also a sense of happiness in knowing that the baby is going to go to a family who is prepared to have him/her and it is especially comforting knowing that God does guide this process and that each child is sealed to the family where he/she belongs. I know I have said that before, but I have such a testimony of that.

Tuesday another one of my couples had a face to face meeting with a birth mother who has chosen them. She is due next month. Hopefully her baby comes on time, not this week...that would send it over the top for the most action at once, for sure. Face to Face meetings are exciting as well. This one was particularly funny as both the adoptive mom and the birth mom are hilarious and have similar personalities. The other caseworker and I just sat back and laughed for the great majority of the time. Again, though, it was easy to see that this birth mom has chosen the correct family for her child. Both the birth mother and the adoptive mother shared pretty sacred experiences that have led them to where they are now.

I just think it is so incredible that I get to play such a role in the creation of families. I keep a little list amongst my work things of all the relinquishments I have been a part of and all the placements I have been a part of (relinquishment means I was working with the birth parents and placement means I was working with the adoptive couple) and sometimes I just pull it out to reflect on all the special experiences that I have been a part of. It is just amazing to me that I have been trusted to do this. While I know that my most important role is that of a mother, I feel that this work is also incredibly important and I am blessed to be a part of it. Is it sometimes stressful? YES. Ask my co-workers how I described this week at our weekly meeting. They got an earful. BUT, in the end, I am always so grateful to be a part of the creation of eternal families through the sacred process of adoption.