If You’re Reading This…

… it means that Nathan and I have announced our desire to adopt! This decision has come through many, many hours of prayer and discussion as a couple, and we are beyond excited for this next chapter of our lives. For those of you unaware, here is a little (well, long-ish) backstory…

Nathan and I were married in 2009: it was a magical wedding and the best day of my life. We began our life together with the intentions of spending three years as a two-some, and to begin our family around 2012–2013. It’s funny (now) how we as humans think we are somewhat in control of what happens in our life.

2012 came… and went. 2013 came… and went. You see the pattern here, yes? After one year of unsuccessfully trying to conceive, my doctor threw out THAT word: INFERTILE. What?! Not me. Not US. Seriously? Everyone we know can just “look” at each other and get pregnant. Why wasn’t it working for us? My doctor had no diagnosis for me since everything looked normal, tested normal, etc. We were still young at this point (24–25 years old), so we decided to just keep trying naturally. If it happened, it happened! If not, well, we would cross that bridge when we came to it. And we would. Keep reading.

Now we are in 2014. It’s been two and a half unsuccessful years of trying to conceive naturally, so my doctor suggested a teensy-weensy test to make sure my (TMI, get ready) fallopian tubes were open. If they were, great! If not, that meant my eggs weren’t getting through to be fertilized. Went in to the hospital… they did the WRONG procedure. Ugh. So I had to go back later that day and get the actual procedure done. This involved a big room, an extremely cold/metal table, an odd doctor to complete the procedure, and two precious nurses who gave me sympathetic looks while I writhed in pain and made some pretty unattractive faces during said procedure. But lo and behold, my tubes were clear. Another item checked off the “infertile” checklist. We decided to keep truckin’ along, trying to conceive naturally.

Next up, 2015. Three years of infertility (year six of marriage, if you’re keeping track). My doctor suggests infertility meds: without going into the logistics of it, we tried it one month and it didn’t work. I never got sick from the medicine, but it made my hormones freak out to where I was burning up all the time. Nothing major, but it was around the holidays when we attempted this route, so we stopped at one month and called it good. I may go back to it at some point, but alas, we are planning to adopt, so not anytime soon.

At this point in my life, many of our friends/FB acquaintances have already given birth at least once, and some were already pregnant with baby #2 or #3. I’m not sharing all of this to get pity, but boy were we having our own pity party every time a sonogram appeared on our newsfeeds. Of course, we were overjoyed for our friends… but if you haven’t experienced infertility before, well, it’s just hard to explain. It stings. It hurts. It chips away at that part of your heart that longs to be a parent.

Luckily, or rather should I say, mercifully, we had Christ on our side this entire time. His presence gave us so much peace and comfort, we know we couldn’t have mentally survived month after month of disappointment without His grace to cover us. Yes, it can make you question God: why does SHE get to be a Mom and not me? What did we do? What CAN we do? Lots of this. Over and over again. But that’s how God works: no matter what we do or how we question His authority, He is still good. He allows us to be frustrated and doubtful and HE LOVES US ANYWAYS. Y’all, that’s the best news ever because I can be a big ol’ baby when I don’t get my way. And it did help that Nate, my Christ-loving knight in shining armor, reminded me of His truths anytime I had the grumps.

Now, to the GOOD NEWS! Nathan and I began our adoption journey in May 2015. We both wholeheartedly believe that adoption is a biblical concept that runs throughout the Bible. We, as believers, believe that we were “predestined…for adoption as sons (and daughters) through Jesus Christ” (Ephesians 1:5). And we’re told in James 1:27 that religion that is “pure and undefiled” involves taking care of orphans and widows in their distress. Since we have been unable to have children naturally, we believe that the Lord has perfectly positioned us to be able to do our part in taking care of the orphans through adoption. We’re excited to add to our family the child/children that God has for us.

We attended a few training classes that summer to get our credentials that approved us as a prospective family. However, the fall season was extremely busy for us with church, family, and travel, so we fell off the wagon of attending the remainder of our training courses. The agency we were working with allows you to complete everything within a year (courses, home study, application, etc), so we weren’t too worried. But again, it’s funny when we make plans and God’s like, “Nope. Not like this. My way.” Our agency had staff turn-over at the beginning of 2016, and the gal we were working with went to grad school… so the training courses that we were waiting to complete were no longer offered until later in the spring.

If you haven’t met Nathan or I in real life, please know that we are both Type A personalities who like to have a plan, schedule, have to-do lists, with matching pens and highlighters… so when our training courses weren’t going to mesh with our upcoming winter/spring calendar, we were peeved.

But at that VERY moment (a tag line from one of my favorite childhood books), we were informed of a new agency who we could work with that worked close with Nathan’s parents at their church. Umm, can we say “God-send”?! It is a home who takes in pregnant teens/young mothers and trains them how to take care of a baby/themselves, or who helps them with the adoption process (if they choose that route). Without giving too much information, we now know of a few prospective birth mothers who will be choosing adoptive parents this year. Wow!

So this is where we are at (on February 3rd, 2016, 4:05pm, as I type this): we have completed our family profile book using Blurb. This will be sent to the home and the birth mothers will look through this to get a glimpse of our family and this is how they will choose. Needless to say, it took me about 45 tries to make it “just right”. And I have another book on stand-by in case we get this one in the mail and it doesn’t look good… Type A, I told you.

We are awaiting to contact our “agency” (it’s really a home that does private adoptions, but alas…) and receive details on our trainings with them, the home study process, and all the additional bells and whistles that come with adopting.

I wanted to create a brand new blog that follows our journey to building our family. This will all come by God’s grace, in His time, following His will. Nathan and I know that anything could change in an instant, but we are both confident in our God. Whatever happens, we know that it’s by His design. Who wouldn’t want that for their lives? So, we ask for your prayers as we start down this long, long road. This adoption could take place in months, or it could take years. I’m sure there will be struggles, frustrations, disappointments, and anxiety. But if at the end of this road, we meet our precious son or daughter, it will all be worth it.

Looks to be an exciting 2016 (and beyond)!