Officially Waiting

Our profile has been received, and we are now "officially waiting" to be an adoptive, forever, loving family to a precious little one!

We are so excited! ... and GRATEFUL to the Lord and those He has placed around us to support us during this journey (I cannot stress this enough-we LOVE you all and appreciate you so much)!

Quick Update!

Our home study has been sent to the Bethany office in Mississippi, and all paperwork is in and approved! Our profile book is being ordered tonight, and as soon as we get it back and get it to Mississippi-we will be an option of a family from which the birth mothers can choose. I will let you know when our profile is there!

So again, a baby could be placed with us quickly, or it could be months-but we are trying to be as prepared as possible on our end. We are waiting with joyful anticipation to see God's story for our child and family unfold. We have SUCH a peace about the timing of the placement, as we trust God and know that He already knows the precious little one who will be a part of our family!

THANK YOU to all of our friends and family who are supporting us in this journey...you have NO IDEA how much we appreciate you more than Kevin and I can express in words...truly, we are GRATEFUL. God is loving us through people right now, and we are resting in His goodness.

Who We Are

Who are we? For a family looking to adopt domestically, a common part of the process is making a profile book about yourself to describe who you are to the birth mother or birth family. Sounds easy enough, right? Well, maybe-but maybe not. This is the first impression (and possibly the only) impression that the birth mother gets from you. Then she makes a decision of whether she would like you to parent her child based upon what she sees in the book. So, it is important to communicate effectively through words and pictures what you want her to know. But how do you accurately describe all of who you are and what you are about in a few short pages?

How do you begin to describe... how much you are going to deeply care for that birth mom and her child?... how much you have been dreaming of the day that you get to bring this child home?...how excited you are to meet her, and for her child to know how much she loves him or her?...how much you are going to teach the child about Jesus, and the grace and mercy He gives us?...how you have a community of friends and family who are looking forward to supporting her child as he or she grows? ...how you would do anything in this world to protect her child?...how you will hold and love the child?...how you desire for her to be at peace with her decision?...how you will give her child the best opportunities as possible in life?...how you will make sure the child knows the love their birth mother has for him/her?...how you will be involved in the child's life in a "hands on" way?...how you are not going to abuse the child or abandon the child-that we will forever be his/her family?

THEN on top of all those important issues, there is the day-to-day kind of stuff to cover. What do we do for a living? what do we do in our free time? who will care for the child during the day? what do we like about each other? what kind of community do we live in? what does our house look like? do we like sports, traveling, theatre, arts, music? our favorite food, movie, TV shows? and why are we adopting?

This can all sound overwhelming, but really the most important thing is for families to just be themselves. That is who the birth mothers want to see...someone who is honestly portraying themselves as who they really are. Then that tends to attract birth and adoptive families together who are similar in their views and values.

So, I pray that as we make our profile book, God will show us the right pictures to input and give us the appropriate words that touch the heart of the birth mother He has planned for our adoption story. I have confidence that He will. Making a profile book (and birth mothers looking at it) could be filled with pressure with thoughts such as, "What if she does not like us?" The truth is that no matter what we put in our profile, God already knows the exact child we will bring into our family. We rest peacefully in His sovereignty over this process.

A SELFLESS LOVE...

Words cannot fully describe how much I have been in awe of and humbled by the selfless love I have experienced during my time of working with birth mothers who have made an adoption plan for their child. However, I want to try to give you a glimpse from the hearts of these precious women who choose the loving plan of adoption for their child.

Let me first say that there are many birth fathers who I have personally worked with who love their child immensely, and they choose that adoption is the best plan for their child as well. Most of my experience, though, has been supporting women throughout their pregnancy and helping them to make a plan for their child's future. Therefore, I will focus on a birth mother's perspective of making an adoption plan.

..."I want the best for my child"

..."I can't give her what she needs right now"

..."I don't want him to have to want for all things always in life"

..."I love her so much that I want her to have a mom and a dad...a stable home"

..."I want her to grow up in a Christian environment"

..."I want him to have an opportunity for the future"

..."I want her to have the best life possible"

..."This plan will benefit my child the most"

..."I don't want her to have to go without"

..."I don't want him to have to worry about anything"

..."I don't want her to have to suffer because of my life circumstances right now"

..."I want him to know that I love him so much....that is why I am making this plan..."

Notice that all of those statements were ultimately about the child and not the person saying them. Those comments are a few examples of what I hear from expectant mothers looking at making an adoption plan for their child. In the midst of their tears, grief, and heartache of leaving the hospital without their baby in their arms and the thought of living life without seeing that child daily---they still put their child above how they are feeling, and they choose what they believe will provide the best possible future for their child. Is that not what a wonderful mother does??...puts her child's needs above her own needs, wants, and desires. AMAZING love!!

Please know that women who make an adoption plan for their child genuinely care for their child and they truly love their child more than we can ever imagine or know. These children are not unwanted or unloved. Most birth parents would desire to parent their child if their circumstances were different. They could not make this plan for their child unless they loved their child. Not only did they choose life for the child, but they also are choosing what they decide is the best plan for the child's future. Sometimes that "best" plan is parenting, but other times they decide that the best plan is placing them in a forever, loving adoptive family.

It takes an incredible amount of courage for these women to make this selfless decision for their child. An adoption plan is made out of love. We pray that our child will always know, feel, and believe in the love of their birth mother.

Where we are in the journey...

You may be curious...where are we in our journey of bringing our child home? We have completed all of our meetings for the home study, turned in a bunch of paperwork, and now we are "waiting to wait". By that, I mean, we are waiting on our home study to be written and approved by our social worker. If approved, she then will send our home study to Bethany Christian Services in Mississippi, which is the office that we are going through to adopt.

Bethany will make sure that we have met all their requirements to be one of their families, and then we will officially be a "waiting family". As a waiting family, you are simply waiting for an expectant mother to choose you to parent her child, or for the agency to call and say they have a child whose mother did not want to choose the family, but she does still want to make an adoption plan. In some cases, the child can already be born when a family receives “the call”. With those options (after becoming a waiting family), it could be a few days before we are placed with a child, or it could be months. We truly will not know until we get that call.

Adoption is a journey....for all involved. By no means do I claim to know everything about adoption, yet I have learned a lot in my role as a counselor the past four years. Throughout this blog, I will shed some light on different aspects of adoption from my perspective and experience thus far. I hope you find this a helpful place to learn and to cultivate a heart for adoption.

Our Hearts' Desire

"TRUST IN THE LORD, AND DO GOOD; DWELL IN THE LAND AND CULTIVATE FAITHFULNESS. DELIGHT YOURSELF IN THE LORD, AND HE WILL GIVE YOU THE DESIRES OF YOUR HEART." (Psalm 37:3-4)

God has been so good to Kevin and I by blessing our time together thus far as a married couple. He has now given us the desire to be parents to a precious child. We realize that every child is a gift from Him. As parents, we are simply given the opportunity to share God's love in a tangible way that a child needs and can understand.

Kevin and I are so excited for this opportunity to share God's love with our children to-be! We have learned that God forms families in different ways. One of these ways is through the blessing of adoption. Spiritually, God offers Himself as a Father to us so that we can forever be part of His family. He chose to love us and relate to us in that way!

So, our hearts' desire is to love our children as He has loved us, whether entrusted to us through biological means or through adoption. At this time, God is leading us to begin our family by adopting an infant who needs a forever, loving family. We are thrilled to become parents!

We pray that our family will begin and continue with faithfulness to the Lord. We are trusting Him, and walking by faith in our journey to a precious child. We are delighting in Him and waiting for Him to give us the desires of our hearts.