Tuesday morning, almost the first thing after opening my eyes, I found a red thread. At first I forgot, but then I quickly remembered. She's not mine anymore. But every time I see a red thread, I'll always remember her. I'll never forget her. She was not here with us physically, but in every other way she was our Viktoria.

My thoughts have been so jumbled and scattered the last few days. I still don't know if I can put words together to make a readable sentence.

It is nearly like a death. It is much worse than a miscarriage and I know how hard miscarriages are, I've had four of them.

Everyone has been so great to us, we've had flower deliveries every day, food brought, little gifts in memory of Viktoria. We are considering having a little goodbye ceremony for close friends and family in a few weeks. At first I didn't think I could bear it, but it is getting a little easier.

We still don't know what we'll do from here.

We have a meeting set up for next Tuesday with our agency staff, including the director. We'll discuss what options we have through the agency. We've paid all that is due to them and we've already paid for two trips to Russia for Viktoria, so we're running out of money. There are moments I'm ready to quit, moments I'm scared of Russia, thoughts of switching to domestic adoption are scary too. But I don't want D to be an only child. I still have a spot in my heart and I just don't feel like our family is complete at 3.

One of the hardest things for me the past few days has been seeing other people all around us living their lives like nothing has happened. Don't they know I lost my baby?! How can they laugh and joke? How can they shop and be interested in the news?

In so many ways it really is like a death, but even harder in a way because I know she is still out there. With another mommy. Not with me. I want her to be happy. I pray that she is happy. I hope they'll love her and cherish her like we would. I hope she will grow up and know God and love Him. I hope they are prepared to deal with her attachment adjustments. Are they feeding her well? Then I think of all the pictures that we have of her newborn from the old databank picture; 11 months from our referral pictures; 13 months from the first trip; 20 months from the second/visit trip. I wonder if I could send the pictures to them? She'll need to know what she looked like as a baby! And I have all these things with Viktoria monogrammed on them. Even in Russian! But did they change her name?

So many questions, no answers.