NOOO!!!!

So, it is almost time for me to start using the new breast pump, and guess what? The battery it comes with doesn't work!!! I swear, this happens to me with everything. Last time, it was our dogs training collars and it took 9 weeks to get a new one. I seriously need this replaced and am hoping for a quick and smooth swap. Of course, I don't have the receipt since it was a gift, so I emailed them and will see what they say. Thank God I checked it out before switching to the herbs and waiting for the day that I had to start!

Lactation Induction

Ah, the wonderful world of hormones. As some of you know, I have decided to induce lactation so that I can breastfeed our baby when we get picked. It is something I always had in the back of my head, and have seen a few adoptive moms come though at work who have done it. I met with a doctor a month ago (not my doc since apparently only one or two docs in Dane cty have experience with this). This new doc just happens to be in Mt. Horeb, so not very close, but no too far, either. She had me start taking the pill, along with a drug called Domperidone. This drug increases Prolactin levels, while the pill helps build breast tissue. They basically do the same thing that pregnant women's bodies do.
The best results come with taking this combo for 5-6 months, but since we could get a call any day, I elected the accelerated protocol. With this way, I only take the pill for 30-60 days with the Dom, then take just the dom and add herbs Fenugreek and blessed thistle. I also start pumping every three hours at that point. I am going to try to give the pill 60 days, then start pumping. My wonderful mother-in-law bought me a pump for christmas, and I ordered the herbs already, so I am all set. I got the new Medela freestyle handheld pump that is cordless. This will be very helpful as I will be lugging it back and forth to work every night.
Apparently, most women on this protocol produce half, if not more, of the milk supply their baby will need. Then, they supplement with formula during or after breastfeeding. (if during, you use a Lactina, which is a bottle hung around your chest with a tube taped to your nipple. The baby sucks and gets breastmilk and formula at the same time).
I am nervous and excited to see how this works. I will also be freezing any milk I start getting to thaw and use when the baby gets here.

OFFICIALLY WAITING, AGAIN!!!

Yay! Our lifebook is done, the 10 copies of it are sent in, and we are officially waiting again as of today. Whew! Glad that is all over! :) The past few months have really seemed to drag on, but I think with the holidays and everything, we had other things that had to get done and the lifebook had to be put to the side for awhile. We had gotten a test copy done at Office Max a few weeks ago, but all our captions had gotten moved over and were hiding under the pictures. Eric had to re-format, but then we had christmas stuff to do. Last week, he took the new version to Office Depot, where the copies came out dark and red-tinted. We went back the next day and had them re-do, and while they still don't look as good as the Office Max version, we have no desire to pay to have all new copies done at this point. Last night, I put all 10 copies into report binders, and then I mailed them off today.
What's next??? Well, now we wait to be chosen by a birth mom. Unlike Ethiopia, we have no idea when this will happen. It could be two weeks, it could be a year. However, most people end up getting chosen within 4-6 months.
Thanks to Eric's sister, we now have more baby supplies and clothes! She gave us all her daughters old baby clothes she has grown out of, as well as a jumper, a bouncer, a baby glider and a playmat. Now we have boy and girl clothes through almost their first year.
I have decided to paint the nursery light yellow. I really liked the fisher price flutterbye dreams items and ended up finding everything in that line (which was discontinued) except for the highchair (we already have one from Eric's sister). That line is a light yellow with blue birds and primary color butterflies. Our crib bedding (if we use it) is also primary colors.
I am still getting used to my full-time night shifts at work, but keep telling myself it's for a good cause. :) I was going to be scheduled Mon-Fri nights, but my managed decided to change it to Sun-Thurs nights, so now I will have the full weekend off to do things during the day. This week I only work 4 nights so she can switch me to my new schedule next week. I just bought new curtains last night to help block the light out of our room. The sun sets brightly in our window, which is so not cool while sleeping. ;)

Approved and working on lifebook

We got approved by the new adoption agency last week! Yay!
After that letter, we never got anything else explaining the next step. I called and it turns out they had checked off that we had turned in everything, even though we hadn't. It's good that I called, otherwise we would be in limbo for awhile.
The lifebook is basically a scrapbook with a dear birthmom letter, a profile page about us, and various pics of us, our house, vacations, etc...
We have to make 10 copies of it so that it can be passed out to 10 social workers our agency deals with, and then shown to birthmoms.
My original idea was to make an online book from snapfish, but since we need 10, I think we are going to have to do the old fashioned scrapbook with real pictures and no digital stuff. It has been about 8 years, maybe more, since we had pics developed. (actually, we had some for our wedding). We need no more than 10 pages, but they can be front to back. We also have to turn in our comfort level worksheet. This tells them what medical conditions in baby and birthmom we are willing to accept. Also things like drug and alcohol use and mental ilness.
THEN, we will be officially waiting again. I kind of want to develop some pics at walgreens tomorrow and just get this album done already. Otherwise, I know it is going to drag on and on. Eric and I don't have much time free together, so we have to cram a lot of stuff into our weekends off together.
More new news...I changed my shift at work to Mon-Fri night shifts and no weekends. This will start in January and will help us pay off some debt before the baby gets here. My manager said I can drop down to part time if full time gets to be too much once we get a baby, so that's good to know.

New application mailed today!

We FINALLY got the application for the new adoption agency mailed out today. There were a lot of little paperwork things we were waiting on, but now we can relax and wait to see if we are approved. If we are, then we can start working on our Lifebook soon. First, though, we need a new digital camera. I know there are some pics that we will need to take of our house, and our old camera just stopped working a few weeks ago, so we are scouting for deals. It's hard to decide between a small, easy to carry camera vs. a more expensive, bulkier, but much better quality camera. We'll prob. end up getting the better quality since I forsee our picture taking to increase dramatically in the near future. :)

Moving on with our Georgia adoption plans

After finding out today that our latest infertility treatment did not work... :( ...we are starting on our application for the adoption agency in Georgia. We also have to update our homestudy with our social worker, so this may take 3-4 weeks. Once we turn it in, we then move on to step two of the application which is creating a lifebook that the agency can show to pregnant moms wishing to adopt out. Creating the lifebook will take us a few weeks as well, so we are hoping to officially be waiting, again, by the end of December at the latest.

Yay! No Lymes Disease :)

Hazel officially does not have Lymes Disease. Yay! However, she prob has arthritis, in addition to the hip displaysia. Now, we have to wait and see how she does on the pain-killer and anti-inflammatories. If not better in a week or so, we may have to think about surgery, or try a diff. anti-inflammatory. I'm not even going to go there right now. I can't even imagine caring for a dog after hip surgery...especially with her sister dog being hyper and constantly trying to get her to play. Scarry. :[
As for me, I feel very Non-pregnant. Sad but true. I have no symptoms except my normal mid-luteal phase migraine today. Trying not to feel down, but it's hard sometimes when your body is not doing what you want it to do.
I work the next 4 nights (night shifts) so I am going to try to stop paying attention to my symptoms. I know that night shifts mess with my body and I can't trust how I feel when I am working them. If no period by Thursday, the 23rd, then I will test.