It is now 3:00 am and I can't sleep. Neither can Mr. Job. We had all kinds of confusion getting our call to go through, we could not get a translator lined up and the operator just put our call through. Much to our surprise we were put straight through to the desk of Nelly, the woman who spent a week with us last summer.<P>She was glad to hear from us and it was good to hear her voice. She does not work directly in adoptions but rather she is a ciriculum developer for the Dept. of Education in the state where the boys live. The woman who is in charge of adoptions in that state is on vacation until 9/20, but her boss the Deputy Director Adoptions will be back on Sep. 3rd. She said to call her back then. <P>In the meantime, she will try to find out for us if the boys are still available for adoption and if there is another agency that we might go through instead of our agency. <P>We will call her back on 9/3 and we will email her tomorrow with some of the details of why we aren't going through the agency she met us through.<P>What else did I want to say? I can't even remember.<P>Oh yes! She has been getting our email and faxes over the past year but has been too busy to respond. (Remember she doesn't work in adoptions so this really isn't her offical job. We are just asking her to help us out as a favor.) Now I know that since we have spoken she will continue to stay in touch. Four months ago she did do the favor we asked of her and contacted our agency telling them that from what she observed in our home last year there was a real bond between us and the boys. Our agency obviously chose not to give much credit to her opinion and never told us that she had contacted them.<P>Mr. Job feels it went well. I am not so sure; it hurts too much to hope too much. He said it could have gone a lot worse and she could have just refused to speak to us instead of trying to help us find out about the boys.<P>I'll keep you all updated, but you knew that already didn't you?<P>MJ<p>[This message has been edited by Mrs. Job (edited August 22, 2001).]

I hope Nelly follows through. It bothers me that she has not responded to any of your e-mails or faxes over the past year. What is up with that? How busy can she be? The urgency of your situation calls for her involvement and help.<P>I'll pray the boys are safe and available for you and Mr. J and that somehow, someway another agency can step in and secure the adoption for you. I keep thinking of that petty mis-traffic ticket thing being so lame to be the reason the adoption was denied. It wasn't anything that was covertly hidden...it was something so innocuous that it slipped your mind, was it not? I don't understand where that would be an 'embarrassment' to anyone or any agency. So what? Big deal. <P>Prayers are coming fast and furious on your behalf, Mrs. J.<P>Love<P>Catnip =^^=

MJ,<P>I justed wanted you to know my thoughts and prayers are added. I hope everything works out.<P>Unsure

too soon to tell...<P>Prayers for you guys<P>and <P>{{{{{{{{{{{{{hugs!}}}}}}}}}}}}}

Actually Catnip it was something that we didn't want to come out. We thought that we were technically correct in saying that he hadn't been arrested. Actually Mr. Job's lawyer then told him we were under no obligation to ever disclose this as the record had been purged. Our current lawyer says that this is accurate but that if we had consulted her first she would have encouraged us to divulge every skeleton in our closet and then give the pat answer "It was a difficult time, we did A, B, & C to fix it, we learned from it and now we are better people and our marriage is stronger than ever.<P>Of course, no one knows about Precious born of Mr. Job's affair so we are not as honest as we should be. When we filled out the adoption application, I didn't know of Precious or H's affair. Precious hadn't been born yet so Mr. Job felt OK saying that he had no other children. I will tell you that this is one skeleton we are not going to disclose. ex-OW and OC live 2,000 away, they have never been to court and no paternity testing has been done yet (but it will be next month).<P>I hate lying, I feel bad for it, but I also feel that we have a right to some privacy in our lives and adoption violates every bit of your privacy and personal dignity. Sometimes I just want to stand up on someone's desk and shout "We are fit to be parents. At least as fit as all those 17 year old who keep poppin' em out and all those OW who get pregnant of an affair. A good friend reminds me that "pulling a nutty" is not going to help our case.<P>MJ