The beginning...

Hi! Ugh, I hate that...will come back and fix that later…

And so it starts…

My adoption journey has been, to date, a tumultuous, frustrating, emotionally draining and painful experience. I’m a single, 35 year old Scottish woman living (ALONE!) in Lima, Peru and I have been navigating the government adoption process myself (ALL ALONE! WITHOUT A HUSBAND! DID I MENTION?!) for the past 18 months. It strikes me now that I should have perhaps begun sharing my experiences earlier on in the process when I was tearing my hair out, crying, shouting at people, pleading with admin staff to help, bawling at my friends through the medium of What’s App, actual phone call, in person or other such interface. It may have proven to be cathartic…and may have saved my poor friends the wrath of Marianne.

But here I am now. Single. Alone. Desperate to become a Mum. Well, this is what the adoption people see when they look at me. In fact, I feel far from Alone or Single. I’m surrounded by a close circle of fierce women; some with families who are equally part of my team, some like me, some who don’t choose motherhood but support me, some with families that have turned out different than they planned. And then there is my team who are on the other side of the world from me. In fact, there are people on my team all over the world. From Australia to Venezuela, from Florida to my hometown in Scotland, from my Bestest Friend In The World at home to My First Wife in Italy, from my favourite city Edinburgh to Manchester, London, Dubai, Switzerland and so many, many places in between. I don’t feel alone. I have my village and I’m ready for this. Or as ready as a person can ever be to have their world turned upside down by a Tiny Human coming home (can you tell I’m a Shonda fan?).

The other reason that I’m not Alone is that I have an EXTREMELY loving Furry Family. Bee, my cat, came into my life one hot summer’s night in Koh Samui, Thailand. Well, to be fair, ALL the nights were hot and summer-like. She was a little kitten, walking around our table at a restaurant called Boss. My friend decided she’d like to adopt this friendly, flea-bitten bag of bones and my good pal, Johno, went to speak to the owner of the restaurant in his amazing Thai (no joke - my British ear can’t hear those sounds but Johno nailed it!) and so she was coming home. By the end of the evening, this ‘friend’ decided she no longer wanted the kitten. I couldn’t leave her. I don’t even freaking well like cats. And so started the beginning of the Furry Family. We named her Little Bee because we found her at Boss (B…) and she was a girl. How unbelievably anti-feminist of me. She is THE Boss. I digress. 2 weeks later, Bob arrived. He was the runt of a litter from one of the other teachers at my school. It was love at first sight. My Best Friend In The World and I had decided when we were around 14 that I would one day have a Dalmatian called Bob (our nickname for her and her Daddy’s name!). Bob is most certainly not a Dalmatian but he’s black and white and the best dog a girl could ever wish for. He’ll be 8 on 31st August. I suppose this is where it all began.