Obsessed

I'm having one of those nights. I ended up home tonight instead of out with people I'm usually out with on Friday night. I really thought I'd make good use of this time - you know, extra time at home to get things done or read a good book or work on a project.

Well, I did none of those things. As Chuck was walking out the door just before 8 he asked if maybe I could stay off the internet. I made no promises.

Well, nearly 3 hours later I am still on the internet. I got on it right after he left. It is an obsession that I have, brought on by adoption. I didn't even eat dinner, and I rarely miss a meal.

I might be wrong, but I think the only people who can truly understand this obsession are the people who are currently waiting for kids to come home or those who have kids home, but remember the wait. Because I don't have kids at home yet, I'm afforded these opportunities to spend way too much time on the internet.

When you are waiting for kids to come home, any info from said country, your orphanage, or blogs is priceless. To give an example of what this looks like I'll take you on a journey of mouse clicks. I first start with email. Any Cason Adoption specific information comes into my inbox, usually unexpectedly. Once in Outlook, I hit the Send/Receive tab just to be sure that I have all my emails in my inbox. I hit that tab a lot, just to make sure. Next, I go to the Yahoo Groups that I'm involved in. I don't get posts sent to my inbox because that can be overwhelming. I check each group for any new posts. Next I check blogs. I have 15 blogs I like to read, not all of which are adoption specific, but most of them are. A lot of these blogs have links to other blogs, and sometimes (not nearly all the time) I will look at other blogs through these blogs. I usually do this during times like tonight, but I've been known to stay up long past bedtime to read a gazillion blogs. I also check our blog because people can leave comments and I like to read them. I also check our orphanage's website to see if there is anything new there. I google search Haiti. Then, once I've exhausted all Haiti or adoption web surfing I turn to the local news and The Weather Channel. The Weather Channel is important this time of year because of hurricanes. Sometimes I'll check our church's website too. And since we're looking for a new home, I usually look at real estate.

Yes, I know this is obsessive. Now, take the above round of internet surfing and multiply it because I do this over and over again because hey, someone might have emailed me or posted to one of the groups or updated thier blog. It is sick. I agree.

If you are thinking I'm crazy, I don't blame you. I will tell you, though, that the main reason I do this is because I feel closer to the boys when I'm reading about Haiti or someone else's Haitian adoption journey. The other internet stuff is just mindless surfing, which keeps my mind off the fact that my kids are still not home. It is sick. It is my obesession, and maybe one day I'll stop. But until then, I'm just being real about the truth of it all.