I was writing this post when I realized that our vision has changed a little. This process will change anyone, but it has already worked on us. I felt I owed it to you all to share again why we chose adoption. Why we chose the kind of adoption we did, and what kind of adoption we want to do in the future!
I will start from the beginning I guess. Howie and I got married at 20 and started trying to have kids right away. We didn't tell a lot of people we were trying because I have Endometriosis and Poly Cystic Ovarian Syndrome. I have had multiple surgeries for these two things that have left my reproductive system in a scar tissued mangled mess. I was told it is possible to conceive but learned I have sporadic ovulation as well so it would be a shot at luck. So we faithfully tried to conceive for 3 years. Nothing happened. So we went to a fertility doctor to find out why it wasn't working. Well turns out the problems don't just rest in my reproductive system, but Howie's too. When we got that news we were devastated. We started researching adoption (my dad was adopted and I always wanted to adopt because of him so I had a small file of info already).
We looked at Embryo adoption first, but with all my problems being pregnant just didn't sing with me. I felt uncomfortable with that option based on instinct. Next was domestic infant adoption, but what birth parent would choose a 23 year old couple who were still in college? So we felt that wasn't right for us. Then I found the US adoptable children photolisting and spent many hours on that website waiting for "the right face" to pop up. That's when we decided to try foster care. We went through all the classes but one. We missed one of the last classes and when we sat down the Saturday after the last class we talked. Being foster parents is hard. Adoption is general is hard but if the bio-family stepped up and met their goals and the kids went back our house would be empty. I especially thought the idea of going from active family with kids to just the two of us on a regular basis would wear me so thin I may break. So we decided we needed to adopt first. The International aspect jumped out at me when a woman came to speak at our church about orphan care. She and her husband had adopted internationally multiple times and her testimony rattled my bones. I knew we needed to adopt internationally.
I got home that night and looked up online every single one of the long list of good agencies that she gave us. All God's Children International stuck out the most. They provide excellent services to adopting families and are a great agency for a "beginner" at international adoption. The two programs we qualified for were Bulgaria and Ethiopia. We have some family ties to Ethiopia (my second cousin was a missionary in Ethiopia where he was matyred) so we chose that country. Now that we have settled with this (we flip flopped a while with foster parenting more on that in a sec) I feel confident it is what God wanted from us all along! Our homestudy will be scheduled soon and we'll start putting our Dossier together then too! Can't wait (we send our contract in tomorrow and we'll schedule our homestudy and dossier run through probably Friday)!!!!!!!!!!!
So what are our plans after we bring our first child home? Well we want to adopt from Honduras and have a missionary contact there who can help with that (Adoptions Honduras). We also desperately feel the need to foster. The kids in the foster system get bounced around from one mediocre house to the next and we want to be one of the few good homes for these hurting kids to find healing and rest. I cry whenever I think about being taken away from all you know so often and we want to stop the cycle. It's a passion God's given us and hopefully we will see it through!
We also someday may try the Embryo adoption. My belief is that these "snowflake babies" are humans, they are living things that will just be discarded if no one adopts them and helps them experience the joys of life outside the amniotic fluid. Someday. Maybe.
I feel like God gave us this burden of infertility to steer us to the family he had in mind for us all along. We were just too blind to see it for 3 years! I can't imagine bringing another child into this world when there are so many hurting children waiting for a family now. So I encourage you to consider adoption or foster care. It will NOT be easy but will be so well worth it when you see the effect you have had on a child's life!
*steps off soapbox*
I will start from the beginning I guess. Howie and I got married at 20 and started trying to have kids right away. We didn't tell a lot of people we were trying because I have Endometriosis and Poly Cystic Ovarian Syndrome. I have had multiple surgeries for these two things that have left my reproductive system in a scar tissued mangled mess. I was told it is possible to conceive but learned I have sporadic ovulation as well so it would be a shot at luck. So we faithfully tried to conceive for 3 years. Nothing happened. So we went to a fertility doctor to find out why it wasn't working. Well turns out the problems don't just rest in my reproductive system, but Howie's too. When we got that news we were devastated. We started researching adoption (my dad was adopted and I always wanted to adopt because of him so I had a small file of info already).
We looked at Embryo adoption first, but with all my problems being pregnant just didn't sing with me. I felt uncomfortable with that option based on instinct. Next was domestic infant adoption, but what birth parent would choose a 23 year old couple who were still in college? So we felt that wasn't right for us. Then I found the US adoptable children photolisting and spent many hours on that website waiting for "the right face" to pop up. That's when we decided to try foster care. We went through all the classes but one. We missed one of the last classes and when we sat down the Saturday after the last class we talked. Being foster parents is hard. Adoption is general is hard but if the bio-family stepped up and met their goals and the kids went back our house would be empty. I especially thought the idea of going from active family with kids to just the two of us on a regular basis would wear me so thin I may break. So we decided we needed to adopt first. The International aspect jumped out at me when a woman came to speak at our church about orphan care. She and her husband had adopted internationally multiple times and her testimony rattled my bones. I knew we needed to adopt internationally.
I got home that night and looked up online every single one of the long list of good agencies that she gave us. All God's Children International stuck out the most. They provide excellent services to adopting families and are a great agency for a "beginner" at international adoption. The two programs we qualified for were Bulgaria and Ethiopia. We have some family ties to Ethiopia (my second cousin was a missionary in Ethiopia where he was matyred) so we chose that country. Now that we have settled with this (we flip flopped a while with foster parenting more on that in a sec) I feel confident it is what God wanted from us all along! Our homestudy will be scheduled soon and we'll start putting our Dossier together then too! Can't wait (we send our contract in tomorrow and we'll schedule our homestudy and dossier run through probably Friday)!!!!!!!!!!!
So what are our plans after we bring our first child home? Well we want to adopt from Honduras and have a missionary contact there who can help with that (Adoptions Honduras). We also desperately feel the need to foster. The kids in the foster system get bounced around from one mediocre house to the next and we want to be one of the few good homes for these hurting kids to find healing and rest. I cry whenever I think about being taken away from all you know so often and we want to stop the cycle. It's a passion God's given us and hopefully we will see it through!
We also someday may try the Embryo adoption. My belief is that these "snowflake babies" are humans, they are living things that will just be discarded if no one adopts them and helps them experience the joys of life outside the amniotic fluid. Someday. Maybe.
I feel like God gave us this burden of infertility to steer us to the family he had in mind for us all along. We were just too blind to see it for 3 years! I can't imagine bringing another child into this world when there are so many hurting children waiting for a family now. So I encourage you to consider adoption or foster care. It will NOT be easy but will be so well worth it when you see the effect you have had on a child's life!
*steps off soapbox*
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