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103 pages

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The Journey for Mama's Babies is Melissa Pandolf's heartwarming account of adopting four Russian siblings with her husband, Doug, from the enthusiastic first meeting to the unexpected setbacks.

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Publié par	First Edition Design Publishing
Date de parution	01 mars 2014
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781622875542
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0420€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

The Journey for Mama’s Babies
Melissa

First Edition Design Publishing, Inc.

The Journey for Mama’s Babies
Copyright ©2014 Gracie Brown

ISBN 978-1622-875-54-2EBOOK

February 2014

Published andDistributed by
First Edition DesignPublishing, Inc.
P.O. Box 20217,Sarasota, FL 34276-3217
www.firsteditiondesignpublishing.com

ALL R I G H T S R E S E R V E D. No p a r t o f t h i s b oo k pub li ca t i o n m a y b e r e p r o du ce d, s t o r e d i n a r e t r i e v a l s y s t e m , o r t r a n s mit t e d i n a ny f o r m o r by a ny m e a ns ─ e l e c t r o n i c , m e c h a n i c a l , p h o t o - c o p y , r ec o r d i n g, or a ny o t h e r ─ e x ce pt b r i e f qu ot a t i o n i n r e v i e w s , w i t h o ut t h e p r i o r p e r mi ss i on o f t h e a u t h o r orpublisher .
PRINT VERSION
Copyright © 2013 by Melissa R. Pandolf
All rights reserved. This book or any portionthereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without theexpress written permission of the publisher except for the use of briefquotations in a book review.
Printed in the UnitedStates of America
First Printing, 2013
ISBN :0615865429
ISBN-13: 9780615865423
Library of CongressControl Number: 2013914586
HarPan Publishing,Patchogue, NY
HarPanPublishing@msn.com
With lots oflove to Julia, Kasenya, Zachary, and Jeremy
You willalways be my babies
xoxo

With evenmore love to Doug
Thank youfor loving me unconditionally
xoxo
Prologue

“ What ? An adoption what ?Melissa, what are you thinking about now?” That was Doug’s reaction when I toldhim I had signed us up to attend a seminar on adopting children from overseas.
He shook his head in disbelief, saying, “You’recrazy,” but really, did he expect anything less from me? I mean, my dad did ask him if he really knew what he was getting himself into by marryingme in the first place! Poor guy. Maybe he should’ve listened…
Chapter 1 - Oyster Bay Library - June 2003

It was a Wednesday evening when weattended an international adoption seminar at the local library in Oyster Bay. OysterBay is a beautiful coastal community on the north shore of Long Island, NewYork, and it is right next to my hometown of Huntington. We went to my parents’house for dinner and then attended the seminar, which was hosted by the WideHorizons for Children adoption agency. That was when we first met Charlotte,the social worker from the agency. She was tall and slim, with short, curlyhair that was graying, and she wore glasses. She presented all the informationregarding the international adoption process.
Charlotte spoke about the process indetail. She went through the requirements of each country her agency wasaffiliated with. I got a little distressed when she started to talk about someof the countries’ adoption requirements. You see, most countries setlimitations on whom they allow to adopt their children. Let me just tell you,the word limitations is not in my vocabulary. I was rolling myeyes already.
I just sat there with Doug and a roomfull of other hopeful adoptive parents as she rattled off a list of who could andcould not adopt from each country and how long it would take to get a childfrom the different countries. As far as the time it took to adopt, I wasshocked. Why so long? I thought to myself. Some countries could takeless than a year; others could take two or more years. Ugh, this was not goingto be easy; I knew it already.
Unfortunately, the amount of time andsome of the other limitations she was referring to were things I had no controlover, such as the length of adoptive parents’ marriage and their ages at thetime of adoption. I felt defeated already because Doug and I had only been marriedfor seventeen months, and he was thirty-four to my twenty-eight. Seriously? Notmarried long enough or even old enough? You have to be kidding me! I alwayshear about all these orphans worldwide needing families, and now that I am in aposition to potentially help some of them, these ridiculous limitations are goingto hold me back? I once again rolled my eyes, thinking this must be a joke,but I kept listening.
Eventually Charlotte got around tospeaking about Eastern European countries. She explained that Russia andUkraine were two of the countries that had less-stringent regulations regardinglength of marriage and age requirements. OK, at least it sounded like a couple ofcountries would let me adopt! Perfect! I thought. She also shared herpersonal experience with adopting two children from Russia a few years earlier.She passed out photo albums of the children from when she first met them, aswell as more recent pictures.
As Doug was flipping through her photos,I noticed that he actually had started listening to what she was saying.I remember thinking that maybe I had a shot at getting him to agree to adoption,but I didn’t get my hopes up just yet.
You see, Doug is what I lovingly refer toas my “pretty boy from Holbrook.” He grew up in Holbrook, Long Island. His dadretired from the New York City Police Department and then worked as the head ofsecurity at AIG in Manhattan. His mom was a stay-at-home mom who took care ofher three boys: Doug, his twin brother, and an older brother.
Doug always had good grades, played varsityfootball, and even won the Suffolk County championship football game during hissenior year. He played lacrosse as well (actually, he still plays) and has hadthe same group of friends since elementary school. He is a fitness fanatic, hasbright blue eyes, and a smile that would make any girl’s heart melt.
Doug had every intention of going away tocollege, but a sudden tragedy struck his family during his senior year of highschool. His mom passed away unexpectedly due to complications from surgery. Itleft him devastated, so he chose to attend college closer to home to be withhis dad. He eventually graduated from St. John’s University in Queens and thenlanded a job close to home, where he continues to work today. A homebody, nodoubt.
And then…there is me. As I statedearlier, I grew up on Long Island but in Huntington. I lived with my parents,sister, and two brothers. My parents both worked around the clock. My dad was aunion worker until he started his own business when I was in middle school, andmy mom worked various jobs that revolved around all of our extracurricularactivities. I was an average student in high school and definitely had morejobs during those four years than most people have in a lifetime. Doug stillteases me about that when we pass a store or restaurant and I state that Iworked there. He always says, “Maybe it would be easier to state where you haven’t worked.” Hey, jack-of-all-trades, master of none! I would never starve.
A year after I graduated, I joined the AirForce. I was trained in flight medicine, and I traveled the world, always onthe go. I attended college here and there, but I didn’t get a degree for sometime. One could argue that I was a professional student.
A homebody and world traveler who probablyhad more jobs than pairs of shoes? I wanted to save all the kids in the world;he would have preferred a wife who bore him two children and a white picketfence. Match made in heaven, wouldn’t you say?
So anyway, as the seminar came to an end,people started to ask questions, and Charlotte had an answer for every one ofthem. “Can we pick our child?” “Will the child be healthy?” “How young will thechild be if we adopt from one of the Eastern European countries?” That one piquedmy interest.
Charlotte answered, “In the Ukraine,children are typically over the age of two, but in Russia, they can be matchedto a family when they are a bit younger.”
Hmmmmm…I was already thinking Russia wasfor us. I didn’t care about the looks of a child, but I did care abouthaving as much time as possible with the child. All moms can agree that theygrow up so fast, and I didn’t want to miss any more milestones thannecessary!
After the meeting, we said good-bye toCharlotte, gathered some informational packets, and headed back to our car. Then,to my surprise, Doug started a conversation that went something like this:
“OK.”
“OK?”
“Yeah, OK. I think I can do this.”
“Really? Why? What makes you say that?”
“Charlotte. I mean, just listening to herand seeing those pictures. She was very convincing. We can really make adifference in a child’s life.”
“Wait, you mean all it took to get you toat least think about this was to take you to a meeting? Does this mean Ican fill out the registration form and start the paperwork when we get home?”
“Whoa! Slow down there, crazy lady! Let’sjust go on our vacation and then start it when we get back. I still need towrap my head around all this!”
“OK, OK,” I said, smiling all the wayhome.
And just like that, a family wasconceived.
Chapter 2 - Wide Horizons for Children Adoption Agency Interviews - Summer2003

We returned from our five-day cruise havingmade the decision to adopt a sibling group of two children from Russia. We kneweventually we would adopt a total of four children, but two at a time seemedlike a reasonable way to go about this. The registration packet we received atthe seminar was a bit overwhelming, but we got through it piece by piece withthe help of our assigned social worker, Charlotte. Luckily for us, the sameperson who hosted the seminar was also our assigned caseworker! We completedall the required New York state requirements, such as background checks andfingerprints.
We also attended several parentingclasses that were required. At those meetings, we met a variety of couples who werealso interested in international adoption. Doug and I seemed to be the youngestcouple there, which I found odd. The purpose of some of these classes was tomeet other people who also chose adoption. We were supposed to kind of shareexperiences about why we were choosing adoption and also to network with eachother. This was probably the first time I felt out of place