Hi Ab,

I have lost my entire nuclear family: mother, father and only sibling (when he was 38, and I was 26), so I can empathize with how you are feeling.

When my father died in 1992, it looked for awhile like my mother might follow close behind. I asked God to keep her with me, b/c I could not bear to lose both of them at the same time. He answered my prayer, and I did not lose my mom until 1997.

I also had to make the painful decision to disrupt the adoption of a severely-emotionally disturbed child in 2002. She was out of control, and we were physically afraid of her. Psychologically she was not adoption material, b/c despite severe, and I mean severe neglect, plus emotional, sexual and physical abuse, from her birth parents, she was very bonded to them.

Long story short -- the adoption was doomed before it started. The State was just trying to get a financially high maintenance, brain-damaged child off their ledger and onto ours.

Please feel free to PM me anytime.