Overwhelmed.....

Do you ever feel overwhelmed? Like there aren't enough hours in the day or just not enough of you to be all the places you need to be during the day?  How about like if one more thing gets added to your "to do list" you will scream?  I assume most everyone reading this is answering yes, yes, YES!  If not, good for you. You must have learned the elusive "balance" everyone talks about.  For me life is usually a juggling act where I am just trying not to actually let ALL of the balls hit the ground, but usually a few bounce off the floor every now and then anyway.  I am not sure that there is such a thing as "balance" for me because I just don't give everything the same amount of weight.  Some things in my life will always out weigh other things so I am usually struggling to keep that ball in the air while I will let others fall.  You know - the things that no matter what else has to give you simply will not compromise on?  Maybe it's your work, your family, your spouse, your friends, your time at the gym, your faith, God.....different things weigh more or less during different seasons in your life, perhaps.

Lately for me I have been trying to focus a great deal of my efforts and time on our adoption process.  There are piles (and I mean PILES!) of paperwork to be filled out, meeting after meeting to attend. Numerous appointments with doctors to determine our mental, emotional and physical well being and so many other things that I just don't want to go into.  The above has been filling my every week and nearly every day since August 11, 2011. 
Prior to beginning this process (back in July) my days and weeks were filled with play dates for my boys, lunch with girlfriends, attending various classes at my gym, working with Derek in our real estate office, jogs with my dog, shopping for,preparing and serving my family dinner, volunteer activities, time studying God's word and His direction in my life, etc., etc. Since then I have struggled to get to any of my classes at the gym, spend little to no time at all in the office helping Derek with our business, rarely prepare a from scratch meal anymore, have missed out on too many volunteer opportunities and the jogs with my dog are spaced way too far apart and I feel like I more less pass by to say "hi" to God on my way to the next "thing".  While I struggle to keep the things in my schedule that makes my life mine  - and one that I truly love and enjoy living - I feel that I am starting to lose the wheel. You know that feeling when it feels like life is getting away - verging on out of control and into something you didn't want and never intended - and you aren't sure how or when you will be able to get it back? 

Anyway, kind of got me thinking.....a few weeks ago was probably the peak of this feeling for me.  I was just so overwhelmed.  I had felt like I was breezing through this process and even our adoption agency said we were. They even said they were going to have to slow us down because we were too efficient!  I thought, "wow! we are just going to breeze through all of this and we will have our daughter home quicker than we even imagined!"  I was naive and way under estimated the amount of emotions and fatigue that was waiting just under the surface for something to trigger them. 

It was at that time that we had finished up all our interviews and reports for the Home study portion.  Now while our social worker wrote up our family biographies to present to the Chinese authorities and powers that be, we were to begin working on all our final dossier paperwork (please refer to my last blog entry to learn more about that process).   With much enthusiasm I began all that I needed to do for that.  Then we received a call that a close family member had a life threatening emergency and would likely not make it more than a few days on life support.  We had family flying in, people to meet with, doctors to talk to, a nephew who needed support and guidance and, of course, we dove into this situation without hesitation. The adoption paperwork could wait - this, our family, was top priority. 

Meanwhile, our real estate business was relentless (as it has been for several months).  Everyday more clients, new contracts and more closings being set up.  18 total closings set up for December alone right now and more on the horizon!  A blessing we give God all the honor for, but overwhelming none the less.  Unlike the adoption process this is not something we can set aside and say, "oh, it will wait".  It became the juggling act of all juggling acts to be sure! 

Once we got through the difficult week of losing our brother-in-law, laying him to rest and seeing our  precious nephew off back to California it was time to start preparing for Thanksgiving.  So I decided to leave the next steps in our dossier paperwork wait a little while longer.  Now here it was a couple of days from December and I have clearly just been avoiding going back to the process and not just because of the calendar that we keep.

Every time I started to think about picking everything back up I started feeling very anxious and overwhelmed.  I realized how big the mountain was before me and how small I really am in the whole process.  Emotionally I sometimes feel defeated. I often have pity parties for myself and ask why? Why does there have to be SO many steps?  Why do I have to go back to the doctor for the same test and paperwork twice? Why do I have to ask our police department to run new reports on Derek and me after I just had them do it once 2 months ago?  Why do I have to re-visit all the seminar classes I already passed and got certificates for?  Is this all worth it?  Are my boys suffering because I am stressed out?  What kind of mom does that make me? Am I stepping over what I have now just to get to what I want in the future?  Is Derek under too much pressure and stress and we wade through our busiest December ever and I am not even able to help? Why can't Derek give me more assistance on this - I am not supposed to be doing this alone? What is "it" exactly that we are going through this for again?! Aaaaagggghhhhh!!

Well, after many hours of pity parties, crying out to God and finally being quiet long enough to hear Him remind me why I have a renewed strength. I am not actually sure what the answer is to most of those questions with the exception of one; the "it" is our daughter.  She is the little girl that God knows and has set aside for us.  She is the little girl who was born into an impossible situation, by a woman who loved her so much she risked everything to try and see to it that she would find a family to love her and cherish her - OUR FAMILY!  That is why I HAVE to keep pushing forward.  That is why I have to take a deep breath with I start feeling sorry for myself or feel like I am lacking as a mother to my boys or a spouse or business partner to my husband or when I feel like I just can't take one more step forward. Anything worth doing will not be easy and I know that with God walking beside me even when I fall I won't be down long because it is He who lifts me up.  I have to remind myself that when I feel out of control it is because I AM!  Ha - I was never in control to begin with!  God is.  He never promises us that things will be easy, but that when He is in them He will see us through. Of course, we are coming up against opposition - we can't expect anything less. The enemy is ticked that we are following God's plan for our life and will be adding another little warrior to our family and who knows how many more souls she will win for Heaven!   He is good at playing with my emotions and filling me with doubt and fear, but God is better at reminding me who I really am and who He was called me to be. When I feel guilty that I don't have as much time to spend with my boys right now I have to remember that we agreed as a family that this process wouldn't be easy, but we all agreed to make sacrifices to bring our little daughter/baby sister home.  Our condition right now is so temporary, but the end results will last for eternity!

Thank you all for reading our blog and for being a support network for us.  I know that soon all this will be a distant memory and we won't be able to remember what life was like before our daughter came to our family. 

For now I am going to step away from all the paperwork and enjoy a Christmas celebration tonight in downtown Montgomery with my husband and my boys. One that most likely we will be attending next year with one more person in our family :)
God bless!

Joshua 1:9-11 Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go.”