Part of the process of adopting a child through foster care is waiting for the outcome. I suppose that waiting for something to happen is very much part of any adoption process, but when you adopt a child through the state's foster care system, you are usually taking in a kid who is not legally available for adoption. Whether or not you'll be able to adopt the child is something that may take months or even years to sort out. It's a gamble.

It's not something that I'd recommend to every parent. To us, the idea of having a child come into our house, fill our home with baby and kid stuff and then to have that child leave would be heartbreaking - that is, assuming we had our heart set on that child's adoption.

With our first child, we knew we would be hugely emotionally invested in the outcome. I think it would have been different if we had other children in the home, but if Anna's adoption hadn't gone through we would be left emotionally and physically empty.

When the state called us with Anna's case, I had a long talk with several people on the phone regarding the details. Everyone involved was very confident that it would go through to adoption. And it did, thankfully for us.

Then we had a foster son about two years ago - a case that we knew from the start would not go through to adoption.

Adam is our third long-term placement. And though it seems that the case is leaning towards adoption, it's still too close to call and as far as I know a trial date has not yet been put on the calendar.

It's frustrating. What's more frustrating, honestly, is the pace at which the state moves and the fact that one hand doesn't seem to talk to the other. It's frustrating that his caseworker has no new news for me one way or the other. It's frustrating at the lack of communication between all the lawyers and state workers. It's frustrating that in just over a month, Adam will have been with us a year - he actually arrived the day before Rosh HaShanah (the Jewish New Year) and I feel like we are no closer to a permanency plan for him now than we were then.

So we wait. And I'm giving you this non-update to tell you... nothing.