The End Of An Era.

Judging by the title and today's date you are probably expecting a post regarding the new president but alas it isn't so.

Yesterday we had our final visit with our social worker. Barbara has been a part of this family for 8 yrs, yes you read correctly, 8 long years. We started our chase for Lily in 2000 and then put it on hold for 12 months due to a "situation" and resumed again at warped speed. She has been involved in EVERY aspect of our lives for the past 8 years. We got lucky when we found her because I have heard some social worker stories that make my hair curl. She is one of the kindest, friendliest, professional woman you could ever care to meet. We are fortunate enough to now call her a friend.

The first time we met I had spent days preparing our house, nothing was left unturned, dust bunnies had not only been cleaned but exorcised also. The house was so clean and we were trying very hard to be calm as we awaited to have every ounce of our lives probed by a stranger. After she left we realised we didn't feel at all violated and didn't even feel the need to shower! By the time we had met with her for the 4th visit it was like meeting an old friend and once she sent us the report we had no idea where she got all the information about us from because we certainly never felt as if we had been interrogated but she had all the facts.

We waited a long time for Lily, by the standards back then, and one day she called to let us know she had a birth mother due to give birth and wanted to know if we were interested as we had been waiting for so long. We told her, no thank you, we would continue to wait, and were amazed that she would even think of us. Once we did finally bring Lily home she didn't want to wait 6 months to meet her and came by a few weeks later to just visit. After her final post placement visit we knew we would be seeing her again and once we were ready we rang her and she started the proceedings again. She followed the old blog and kept in touch through that and even followed our trip to China for Rosie.

Now, we have to say goodbye. It isn't really goodbye as we will still see her and as she pointed out as she left if we ever need her for anything EVER she is there. I am not sad to be social worker free after so long but I feel sort of strange closing this chapter of my life. It feels a little bit to final for me. I have no intention of adding to my family but knowing we are done is a little rough. Once we receive her final report we will send it to WACAP and then we are done with them too. Of course we will never be done with WACAP, they do such amazing work and we will always support them and I will continue to be on their phone list so that if anyone has questions about them they can call me for references but we won't have an adoption agency waiting for us to mail back papers for the first time in 8 years either.

Here is a photo of Barbara with the girlies yesterday. See, it just isn't normal to have such a wondeful SW.....sigh.

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing

I have to eat a little chocolate now and ponder the big change that has happened. If I can handle going half way around the world to bring my girlies home I can manage this too....right?