So... we had our training last Saturday (the 23rd). I've made no secret of my displeasure with the lack of communication that we have received from a certain individual ("Bob") at our agency, and I am fully aware that when you are a "waiting family" nothing can possibly go fast enough, and I probably need to work on my patience, but y'all, what happened on Saturday, I just... I just have no words! The day started early at 5:30am. We got up and got ready to go, and woke the babies up and threw them in the car with their jammies on, and for some reason they were WIDE AWAKE and chatting up a storm the whole way to Memi's house! We got them all settled with a movie and some snacks and hit the road around 6:45, northbound 35. About an hour later we were pulling into a Whataburger for some breakfast, then we headed over to the agency for our training. We had plenty of time and pulled up about 10 minutes before the training was supposed to start... the parking lot was empty... the doors were locked. Awesome. I KNEW for fact that the training was that day, but clearly it was not at the agency. I did not have a cell number for "Bob", only his email, and we all know how good he is a respond to my emails in a timely manner, so naturally, I was freaking out on the verge of tears thinking about how totally screwed we were! By the grace of God, "Bob" called me mere seconds after I pushed the send button, praise the Lord! He was all, "The location was in the email I sent", and I was freaking out frantically trying to find said email and coming up empty, cursing myself for letting something so important slip past me, while also feeling pretty confident that he never sent it. He gives us the location, and after a slight detour thanks to google maps sending us to some random person's house, we finally made it there 5 minutes late. I was disgusted with myself for having to walk into a room of couples all sitting there waiting for us and in we walk, late, like a couple of inconsiderate a-holes, which only fueled my anger more. We got settled in and "Bob" went through the round of introductions and pleasantries, etc and then had us all "open our training manuals to page blah blah blah"... uh, yeah we didn't have one of those. Half the couples in our training printed theirs out and put them in binders, and the other half had their laptops are ready to go in front of them, and again, we look like the unprepared a-holes sitting their twiddling our thumbs. Anger continues to build as I continue to search for the mysterious "email" that was sent a month ago. About an hour into the training, we were given a break. I told Jason I was going to get my sweater from the car and he needed to talk to "Bob" about this whole email situation and have him re-send the manual. I came back in, and sure enough, Jason tells me that "Bob" scrolled through his emails and realized that we were the ONLY ONES left off the group email with details of the training, the training manual, and a few other paperwork items. Can someone please tell me how the hell that happens?!?! We have been signed up for this training since DECEMBER! I was so furious! I seriously think "Bob" hates me, and I can't for the life of me figure out what I have done or said to offend him. So, he apologized to Jason, and resent, or rather SENT me the email so we could follow along the rest of the training. And can I just tell you, nothing irritates me more than assigning something to read, and then proceeding to read said assignment to class - I mean it worked out for us since we hadn't read it - but seriously come on - BORING! and such a waste of time, right?! Anyway, we also discussed the two books that were required, and then heard from a doctor, which was also pretty pointless, as he really didn't tell us anything. Then, just before lunch, we heard from a panel of adoptive families, which was cool, because you got to hear a little bit of their story, although I would have liked more details of their own journey, but whatever, Next was lunch. We were looking forward to eating at Schmaltz's for lunch since every time we go through Waco they are closed! But, instead we got to pay $10 A PERSON for a chic-fil-a sandwich and a bag of chips with a cookie. Seriously? Do they not realize that you can get 2 meals at CFA for about $10 total?! So frustrating but whatever. During this break, "Bob" had plenty of opportunities to come over and apologize to me for not sending the email, but do you think he said a word to me?? NOPE! After a quick lunch, we watched a video and then heard from some birthmothers about their experiences. We watched another video about trans-racial adoptions, talked about the manual some more and were all done around 3:00. Before we left, we shook hands with "Bob" and I told him that we were so sorry for being late, basically setting him up to be able to apologize to me, and I GOT NOTHIN'! Really? Really Bob?! I was floored, and hurt, and pissed! I just could NOT believe that he didn't apologize to me for such a big mistake on his part. Unbelievable. The whole day, I had to chant the phrase, "extend grace" in my head, and even now I am trying hard to think of a sincere way to return an insult with a blessing but am coming up short. We made it back to Memi's house just in time to catch the end of the party and hang out for a little while. We were exhausted. The kids were exhausted. And we all crashed after some much needed baths.
So, we checked it off the list. We have been officially "trained".
Now we are just awaiting clearance from our FBI background checks (including the fingerprinting which I have yet to hear back from yet on whether mine were acceptable or not, 2-7 days my arse!). Once that goes through, we can schedule our homestudy, so we are really hoping to get that scheduled early next week, so we'll see. Last night we had our Noonday Trunk Show, but I'll have to post about that tomorrow, as I have 3 miles and some strength training to do :) #teammiksovsky #chosenmarathonforadoption
