Off to See the Social Worker

So, tomorrow we are headed to Knoxville to meet up with our social worker. It's hard to believe, but it's time for her to write up our 3 month "progress report" that we have to send back to Ethiopia. We have to do one at 3 mo, 6 mo, 9 mo, and then every year until he's 18! And I just can't believe he's already been with us over 2 months and it's time to write up our first one. Where did the time go!?

In many ways it feels like Addison just got here, b/c he's still just such a peanut. But in other ways, I can't ever remember our life without him. He's definitely our son, and, honestly, I rarely even remember or think about the fact that we adopted him. It just feels like he's always been with us. I can barely even remember going to Ethiopia. It feels like such a foggy dream, and I have to remind myself that it really did happen.

We also finally made an appointment with an attorney for the week after next. He'll be helping us do our TN re-adoption. Addison is legally ours, but his adoption isn't official in our home state (e.g. no US birth certificate, SS card, etc. can be issued) until we re-adopt him in TN. I ventured out the county courthouse last week to pick up petition filing paperwork, and needless to say, that was a futile exercise. I can understand why people would go postal. I was ready to "go legal" after 15 minutes of dealing with Betty and her idiotic co-workers who had no clue in hell what I was talking about and how to be of any help. Even after being re-directed to the "new courthouse where all the fancy offices are", I still ran into nothing but roadblocks as the nasty bi-otches at every counter were like, "honey, I have no idear whatch you'ra talkin' 'bout." I lef there thinking, "Why!? Why!? Why, Wynne, did you even come here!? Why would you waste 1 minute of your work day trying to deal with this?" We're excited for our lawyer's meeting is all I'll say. He was referred to us by our pediatrician who has an internationally adopted daughter, and from what I understand he's even done Ethiopian readoptions. Fingers and toes crossed.

Every thing is going well with the fam. Addison had his (belated) 1 yr check-up this week, so we had to hold him down while they drew even more blood from him poor little arm. Ugh. I hate that more than anything. I just want to burst into tears. They also gave him four shots in his chubby little thighs. :( And I'm not a big vaccine fan, but I just sucked it up knowing it was best for him. :( I hope we don't have to go for a long time. It's just so unbearable every time we're there, b/c he's getting 3 different types of HIV tests, 4 types of Hep A, B, and C tests, checking his titers to see what vaccines "took" and which didn't (so we don't over-immunize him), etc. I hate it, because he hates it.

Ella is doing a lot better with him now. She is acting a little less jealous and getting in the groove of him just being her little brother. She was driving us crazy for a while, but things are calming down now. Radames has this place on 100% lock-down. He's running the house like a military camp. 6am up, 6:30 feeding, 9:00am nap, 11:30 up, noon feeding, 3:30 nap, 6pm feeding, 7:30 bath, 7:45 bottle, 8:00 in crib asleep. He does NOT like his schedule being deviated from in any way. And he pretty much won't let anyone do anything for him. He is in "I've-got-this" mode, and I'm clearly the window dressing. I'm pretty much taking care of Ella as much as I can, so he's not too overwhelmed, but every time I try to take care of both of them he freaks out and tells me he's got it.

I actually had to tell him the other day that he needed to lighten up (imagine me telling Radames to lighten up!), because he's being super hard on himself and uber martyr-like about the chid rearing. I've been working a ton these past few weeks since I've been back at work, and his feeling is "you take care of the business; I'll take care of the family b/c that's my job." How could I ever begin to have to have a problem with that, b/c what woman in the world is so lucky, but...jeez, he's gotta give himself some respite. He needs to call a friend, go to a game, go play some music in the DJ room, something...he's turning into a crazy stay-at-home mom who complains that the bottles aren't in order and that Ella is in bed 5 minutes late. And he's actually quite miserable, b/c he isn't getting his fuel. Work is my fuel, b/c I love what I do and I get to do it with friends all day, but music, movies, friends and sports and solitude are his fuel, and he hasn't been getting any of it. And since we live in a place where none of his close friends live, and it's not a walking city, he's cooped up like a crazy housewife from the 'burbs that's going crazy and complaining about how she can't remember things and how she feels alone.

We're working on it. I've been forcing him to leave us alone and let me do my other job (or being a mom!), just so that he'll go in the basement and watch a game or something. We'll get it worked out. He has to just let go after 5pm; and I've gotta push him outta the mix more often.

Oh, totally random, but if I owe any of you a thank-you card for goodies you've mailed us, I'M SO SORRY. I promise it's on it's way. I've just been swamped at work, and traveling, and then spending every spare minute I can with the kids (did i just say "kids"?!), so I've been writing like 1 per week. We've gotten everything, and are SO thankful. Sorry we've been so rude about that. Well, that I've been so rude about that. Radames isn't really the card-writing type. And he totally get a pass on this one. :)