"The Call"

Last year on Thursday, July 2nd, my world was spinning. I had been laid off from my job the day before. While I still had 2 more months to work, I quickly decided that I needed to start drumming up some business with my side gig, real estate. There was a new listing in our neighborhood and I had a prospective buyer. So I lined up a showing later that day. While showing the house, my phone rang and I looked down to discover that it was Department of Family and Children's Services. Great, they were probably calling to tell us we needed to do one more training class! I hit "ignore." That call could wait. Then they immediately called back a second time. I hit "ignore" once again. Then DFCS called back immediately for a 3rd time! The buyer told me that it was ok to take the phone call as he sensed it was obviously urgent. I blurt out that we were trying to adopt and that I was pretty sure that I was getting "the call." We were wrapping things up anyway and I wanted to talk when I had a little more privacy. We said our farewells and I jumped in the car immediately and called DFCS back.

They had a sibling group of three they wanted to discuss with us. Yep, I just knew it would be three. Billy was already scared silly that we were approved for up to three kids but was going to freak out when I told him we got "the call" about three kids! See, they could have called us about one child or a duo. So immediately, it was kind of hard to get over the moon excited because I was so scared that I would vetoed by Billy (not that I have ever really gotten vetoed by him but this was a HUGOMONGO life decision for us and we both needed to be on board). When I told Billy that the call was about three kids, he was pretty much like "3?" Not like, three? But more like THREE while the blood drained from his face! Being the trooper that he is, he agreed to go along to the DFCS meeting with an open mind and heart.

DFCS shared the kids ages with me: 2, 4 and 6 years old. They told it was two boys and one girl. I was told that there were really no "issues" with them and of course, I knew there were THREE of them! Independence Day fell on Saturday so a lot of people were celebrating and on July 3rd so their office was closed. Our case worker did not work Mondays so we made an appointment to come in and look at their case file on Tuesday, July 7th. Just my luck, I would have to wait over a long holiday weekend. I didn't know why they had come into state custody, their race, if the boys or girl was the oldest, etc. Goodness, I should have asked more questions! Being the pessimist that I am, I kept telling myself that it probably wouldn't be a "match" so that made it much easier to get through the next few days.