I suggest if you have never seen the mountains (I mean real mountains not Granite Peak in Wausau or one of Wisconsin’s ski hills) you have to see them.  To take in the beauty, majesty and grandeur is awe inspiring. I’ve seen mountains before as a teen but what I saw this time as an adult I wasn’t prepared for.  You see, I have had a little more life experience now and am able to appreciate the beauty seen in the mountains.  But this also means that I can know, and feel, the enormity that is there as well.  I don’t mean “oh, those are some towering peaks.” I mean take your breath away, crush your chest, wonderment.  Almost to the place of fright and trepidation.  It’s almost unexplainable.  I liken it akin to space…you can see it, know it’s there, understand it to an extent, but can’t fully comprehend the enormity.  It makes me feel small, makes my problems feel small. But guess what?  I’m a small person, and to feel that chest crushing weight of life, similar to the mountains, is not only normal but unavoidable. 

Today for me was one of those days.  I can’t really put my finger on what seems to be crushing my chest.  Probably just life in general.  Like many I had a busy summer, busy fall, and now the holidays are quickly approaching.  Like many life just gets in the way.  Things I want to do, people I want to see, places I want to go that I just want be able to make happen.  Adoption…adoption…adoption.  It hasn’t been an easy road.  I’m not saying that in a take pity on me, support me, do something for me sort of way.  I don’t need it, not now.  But I recognize it’s been long, exciting, sad, happy, inspiring, challenging, and long. I know, I know for some it isn’t that way.  Most have a brother’s, uncle’s, cousin’s, friend who started the process and it happened in a month. And that’s fine, great, and wonderful-I truly say that with the utmost sincerity.  But for some it’s a different story.  That’s the lane I’m in.  

Please don’t take this as me throwing a pity party for myself-not happening.  Just saying it’s long…today I feel it.  I feel the chest crushing enormity of it all.  It’s like looking at a mountain, there are some things that you just know are bigger than you.  This is one of those things.  It’s about a child’s life…let me repeat that…a child’s life, for the rest of their life.  We aren’t talking a dog, cat, hamster or ferret.  Not the same.  It’s a big honking deal.  Today I feel that.

I feel the weight of trying to be an “instant parent.” There isn’t a grace period that my child will just be in a crib, stroller, or pack and play.  (I understand there are challenges to that as well, not taking anything away from anyone) I won’t have time to read up, ask others how they did it, or freedom to do other things while my child can’t really move that much. It’s on the go from the get go.

I feel the weight of my future child’s past.  I feel that already.  My child is going to come to me with a past.  That past will have already, and will in the future, affect their personality, how they think and how they react.  I have prepared for this weight but that doesn’t mean it can’t crush me. I can prepare to summit a mountain too but that doesn’t me it wouldn’t crush me.  Once that child is in my home I will feel that weight even more and I know that.  When you summit the mountain you still have to get down right?

I feel the weight of the process.  Packing for an Everest summit attempt isn’t easy.  It’s part of the overall challenge.  Preparing for adoption hasn’t been easy.  The process itself has been daunting.  Today I feel it.  The home studies, preparation, education, more education, inquiring, tracking, sending our home study, hearing no, tracking again, did I mention education? It’s all right, it’s all good, it’s all needed…but I feel it.  

So I guess all that to say…it’s one of those days that the mountain of life is right in front of you…you feel its enormity, its grandeur.  It is awe inspiring and wonderful but the weight of it is crushing. You prepare for it, hope to summit, and hope to come back down alive in one piece. But we can’t be 100% sure that it’s going to happen.  Those are the days that feel more COMPLEX than simplex. 

~Eli