I lost it . . .

Today I was not feeling so great. I feel a bit down in the dumps. I really didn't think it showed that much, but perhaps it did. We had a carry-in today at work for both the daycare and the church staff. Our office staff sets it up and mans the tables. One person after another asked if I was okay. I suppose more of my angst shown on my face than I thought. I simply said I was tired and smiled.

Most of that is true. Dustin got up approximately 20 times last night. Each time he got up, the door alarm went off and I was incredibly tired in the morning. I also found out later after talking with Robert that I had a bad dream last night and was freaking out. I don't remember it, but that apparently interrupted my sleep as well. He said I was quite upset so that could have contributed to my mood for the day as well.

Anyway, towards the end of the carry in I plopped down at a table with the children's pastor in the church where I work. He asked me how I was and I responded, "Tired." He lowered his head and looked me directly in the eyes and said, "Sheri, I know it is more than that. How's life with Dustin?"

I lost it.

I hadn't really realized how stressed I was with our current state of affairs until that point. His wife is very kind and asked genuine questions and just listened. They were both wise enough to say that they could not comprehend our life. He said, "I could not possibly understand and I probably cannot change things, but I can listen." And it felt fabulous. We talked and I cried some more. It was nice just "barfing" out the stress and having someone different listen. We talked about a book he recently read written by an adoptive family and even mentioned RAD. I totally appreciated his honesty and his caring words. It was nice hearing that he understood they probably could be of no help, but that they were willing to listen and to pray.

He asked me, "Where do you go from here?" My only answer was, "We just keep moving forward. We have no other option." That's basically how I function. I absorb all the stress, the worry, the trauma and then I dump my stress and things will get better. We can always rely on that, it does always get better.

It will get worse later, but first it will get better.