Feeling fluctuations

I've been pretty down in the dumps lately. Actually, it's not that simple. More accurately, I've been fluctuating with pretty large amplitude and reasonably high frequency between feeling good about things and feeling depressed about things.

Let me stop and take a side trip first. I have a family member (sibling of a sibling-in-law...which I think makes her...I don't now). About two years ago she got cancer and had very very very little chance of living...but now she's alive and well and cancer free! The reason I mention her is because she is a super positive thinker (I actually suspect there is some darkness down deep down inside since she is human like the rest of us but that's neither here nor there). She borders on "The Secret" which I think is total bullshit mumbo jumbo that basically tells people that suffer failures that it is their own fault for not bringing the positive energy on themselves. Fuck you, "The Secret"! But, I have not had cancer and so she can think whatever the hell she wants and I will just try to learn something from her because she has heroically dealt with a completely unfathomably terrible situation. Ok, where was I? Oh yeah. One thing she says is that she viewed her cancer as a chance, an opportunity, to show the world how tough she was since she admittedly always talked a lot of shit growing up about how much of a hard-ass she was. Cancer was her chance to back up all that talk. An opportunity to show what she was worth and she did and there is no longer any doubt!

I try to tap into her thinking and sometimes I can. Sometimes I am able to tell myself that I always thought and assumed and expected I would be a great father. Well....here is my chance to back it up. Parenting an adopted child is not necessarily for the faint of heart. I've read too much about adoption to think it is a walk-in-the-park (not that parenting is ever easy) or the same as parenting your 'natural' child--ugh...there has got to be a better phrase than that! (I'm sure there is, I just don't know it.) To add to the challenge we will mostly likely adopt a mixed race child that is not either my or my wife's race....we would've produced our own mixed race child but...well...you get the idea. On good days, I relish the challenge and opportunity to be an adoptive parent. There are so many interesting and unique and beautiful situations that await us. The chance to connect to a different culture through adoption...or country...is super exciting. Blah blah blah.

On bad days I just feel too exhausted to step up to the plate and having a baby the 'old-fashioned way' feels like an easy way out.

Unfortunately, I'm fluctuating between these two extreme thoughts quite frequently lately. Hopefully I'll land on my 'good-day' thoughts permanently pretty soon.