Our "Why"

I felt the calling to adopt from the very beginning.  When I played with my babydolls growing up, some of them were adopted.   I can't remember the first time I had learned about adoption, but I knew from the very start that that it was a very normal way that helped form many families.  My great aunt and aunt were both adopted so it's possible that this is where I was first introduced to adoption.   I hope our kids will say the same one day.. That adoption was just a part of everyday life and something that always just WAS. <3

Fast forward many years...
When C and I first met, I was teaching 1st grade and I invited all of my students and their families along with us for a foster care awareness walk in the nearest big city as a service project to serve in our community.  Coby said he would love to go with us and help.  We had not talked about our future and our children, but he could see my heart through this project and little did we know God was also showing him something new about his.  We collected luggage for the kids to use to transfer their belongings when they had to move to a new placement. I had learned the year before that many foster children are transferred without many belongings and what they are allowed to take sometimes has to be transferred in a trash bag.  Now that sends a message that I'm not okay with so as we went, luggage began to fill my tiny apartment and classroom.  My students began bringing in their piggy bank money for me to count and use toward more luggage.  I was amazed at these kiddos and their hearts for others.  Through this project, Coby was exposed to fostering and adoption and gained a better understanding of what a blessing adoption was and how we as Christ followers have a job within adoption.  It might not always be to grow our family through adoption, but He was very clear in how we are to step in and make a difference through support of some sort.  We'll talk more about this later.
   
We attend the same foster care and adoption awareness walk every single year and bring new people with us.  Now we walk beside our parents and our kiddos and dream about our complete family walking together. (:

Our Pregnancies: 

I was diagnosed with Hyperemesis Gravidirum (or HG) and was very very sick throughout three pregnancies.  One ended in miscarriage, but the others were a slow and torturous form of starvation.  My whole life, I wanted to be a mom more than anything else.  I felt like that was my big Purpose. Here I was in the middle of high risk pregnancies and I was dangerously sick.  
(For a look into HG, you can read more --> HERE )

With our last pregnancy of our youngest daughter, my hair was falling out.. My eyes were dark and sunken in.  I was vomiting so much that my teeth were damaged.  My eyes were bloodshot from the force of the vomiting.  I couldn't drink or eat.  I couldn't make myself swallow spit that my body made.  Eventually, I was so dehydrated that my body stopped producing urine for days at a time.  I became very depressed and had to ask for help with the second pregancy.  It was no longer just me, but I had a toddler to take care of and I was in really bad shape.  My mom moved in with us and took care of me and my family while C worked.  We bounced in and out of the ER and tried every medicine known to man. Each trip to the ER spent poking and prodding until they could find a vein because I was so dehydrated. I tried a cocktail of a medication given to sick chemo patients mixed with other things and nothing helped me.  I was stuck in the middle of feeling guilty for being so sick and miserable and being a financial burden and an emotional drain on my family members that were caring for our family.  I kept trying to remind myself that some people would've killed to be pregnant.  I missed my daughter and longed for time with her, but I was so sick that I didn't want her to see me that way.  It scared her and broke my heart.  

 In my first pregnancy, I handled much of it alone.  C was working a lot and I was trying to teach.  I carried bags with me and taught with a trashcan beside me because I was always getting sick.  One night when C got home from work, I was passed out in the floor because my body was overheating and the last thing I remember was laying beside the toilet because the floor felt cool and I didn't have the strength to stand back up.  He picked me up and got me dressed and we went to the ER for fluids. I got home in just enough time to change into work clothes and went back to my kindergarten classroom the next day.  No one knew just how bad it had gotten.

Thankfully during my last pregnancy, I found out about the HER foundation which helps women that have HG by offering emotional support.  They sent me a doppler machine so I could hear our baby's heartbeat.  Many HG pregnancies end up with abortion, miscarriage, or PTSD without intervention. Every night after work, C would put it to my stomach and we would sit and listen to that sweet heartbeat and it would carry me through another day when I felt like I had no more fight left.  Women from all over the US sent me cards and I laid them in bed beside me and tried to remind myself that we had made it through once before and we could do it again.
 

I began researching.  I signed up to be a part of a study on HG to figure out why people get it and what it is so they can find a cure.  I realized in my own research that I was not with a doctor that advocated for us and I was withering away.  We knew something was wrong so we switched doctors.  At my second appointment with the new doctor, I had lost 14.6 lbs in less than 2 weeks and she kept me at that appointment.  We went directly to the labor and delivery where I was admitted under a team of high risk doctors.  I was so scared that we were going to lose another baby and it was a very dark time for me.  My time in the hospital is a blur of groups of people coming in trying to empathize, not having answers, trying things that didn't work, talks of PICC lines and feeding tubes, and reassuring me that we wouldn't lose this baby.  What I do remember very clearly is overhearing people talk about being scared that they were going to lose me.  This period of time isn't something I can easily talk about to this day.

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I gave birth to our second beautiful babe at 40 weeks and 4 days.  She was healthy and perfect and my heart doubled in size.  Our oldest settled in perfectly from that very second and we never witnessed one single second of jealousy or growing pains.  She was meant to be a big sister and God had knitted our family together in a way that worked.  I looked at C not five minutes after she was laid on my chest and said "I hope she isn't our last."  We both knew after talking with our doctor that more biological children weren't in our future, but we both hoped that our story was not over.
 

   

Fast forward 20 months after that day, and we were sitting in church while far into our adoption journey and our pastor said "There is purpose in our pain.  We might not see the 'WHY' at the time, but one day, we will be able to look back and see how God has used our pain and brought us through to fulfill His purpose."  It was all so clear.  I found my peace.  What if I hadn't had HG? What if I hadn't had the door closed for me and decided I was too scared to adopt? What if the risks would've seemed too big and paralyzed us? What if we would've been financially scared or let all the unknown and big scary bumps in the road stop us? This door has closed for a reason.  God knew the depths of our hearts and He knew our desires and also that we would need help getting there.

   

There was purpose in the pain. 

   
The journey of adoption can definitely also be painful and unknown at times, but every miracle of a pregnancy and path to a child is just as dangerous and scary and unknown. Adoption isn't a second best. It's not a consolation and I'm less sick and MORE able to be excited in this season than in my pregancy.  How amazing is that?!?!

 There is beauty in our weakness and pain.

Through that door closing, we were able to open the chapter of adoption.

To NOT miss out on the child(ren) God has intended to give our family to.

He is greatest at our weakest and this is another beautiful rainbow after the storm.  

     

B.