Adoption Adventures

The Adventure Begins

I always assumed I’d be a mom.  Don’t most of us?  We play with our baby dolls as kids, we dream of meeting Mr. Right as teens.  A family is part of the happily ever after, right?  It’s just what you do.  Everyone does it.  It’s the natural order of things.

Or so I thought.

Life doesn’t always go in a nice, straight line.  Rarely do we get to go from A to B to C.  Sometimes life goes in its own order on its own timeline.  And sometimes certain experiences change your priorities.

Before my husband and I got married our pastor had us fill out a marriage questionnaire.  We had to fill them out separately and then compare our answers.  I remember one question asked, “Do you want children?”  Oh yes, of course.  “If so, how many children would you like?”  3 – 5!  I’d love a big family.  “How long do you want to wait before you have children?”  3 – 5 years sounds perfect.  My husband was thinking more along the lines of 2 – 3 kids but we were pretty much on the same page with our timeline.  Oh the idealistic dreams of premarital bliss!

Then we got married.  And I became a teacher.  And the kids were mean.  And out of control.  And I couldn’t seem to rein them in.  And I began to doubt my ability to manage unruly behavior.  And I wondered how in the world I could ever parent.  And both my husband and I became afraid, very afraid.  And our fantasies of parenthood were shot down in flames.  And we weren’t so sure we wanted a family after all.

And we stayed on the fence about parenthood for over 11 years.

Now I was 28 when we got married.  We both knew full well that we couldn’t procrastinate as long as we felt like it without risking age-induced infertility.  So about 6 years into our marriage we had The Kid Talk.  We decided we didn’t want to enter into parenthood until we were absolutely sure it’s what we wanted to do.  We didn’t want to force ourselves into a premature decision because we were worried about my biological clock.  We wanted to have children if and when we wanted to, and not a moment sooner.

Which led us to the question: what do we do if somewhere down the road we want to have kids and we’re having fertility problems?  For us, that was an easy question to answer.  We didn’t want to pursue any fertility treatments, at all, period.  The quest for fertility can be a difficult, emotional and sometimes heartbreaking road.  We decided we didn’t want to put ourselves through that – we would adopt.

Okay cool, we had a plan.

So life rolled along and The Kid Question was always there, but always in the background, never in the forefront.  Somehow I knew deep inside that I wouldn’t want to live my whole life without ever having children, but our fears of parenthood persisted and the procrastination continued.

And then I got cancer.

Yep.  Breast cancer at age 39.  Now that was a shocker, let me tell you!  Remember how I said life doesn’t go in a nice, straight line?  Well sometimes it takes a swift, unexpected, hairpin turn and it’s all you can do to just hang on for the ride.

My cancer experience is a story all its own, so I will spare you the details for now.  Let me just say that cancer is more than just a wake up call.  It’s a warning siren so loud it’ll knock your socks off.  Facing death has the interesting effect of making you face your life, and what I found was that I was letting fear hold me back in many areas of my life.  It was time to let go of fear and live my life.

It’s been a little over a year and a half since I was diagnosed and a year since I finished treatment.  Cancer’s butt has been kicked and I have an excellent prognosis.  We celebrated our 13th wedding anniversary in November.  I am 41 and my husband is 39.  And we’ve decided to become parents.

Welcome to Adoption Adventures.  Join me while I navigate the adoption process and – hopefully soon – become the mom I was meant to be.

This entry also posted with the Seattle PI. Copyright © 2008 Susan Metters. All rights reserved.
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In addition to being a writer and aspiring mom, Susan Metters also carries the distinguished title of Cancer Survivor Extraordinaire. Some of her secret ambitions include meeting Dr. Phil, hosting Saturday Night Live, and rising to the top as a rock star. You can read more about Susan’s life adventures by visiting her blog with the Seattle P.I., Lemon Margaritas. If you have ideas, questions, rants, or ramblings feel free to email Susan at susan [at] seattlemomblogs [dot] com.