A New Journey

(Our current family of three!)

We want to share with our friends & family some exciting news -- we have decided to expand our family through adoption! Adoption is something that Tim has always thought about doing and he started talking about it early in our marriage. While trying to conceive Hannah, I came to terms with possibly not having a child of my own and knowing that adoption would be a wonderful way to have children. Shortly after that conversation with myself and God, we got pregnant with Hannah. I feel so blessed that I was able to have a biological child. Hannah is such a joy and we love being her parents.

After what we went through to be able to conceive her, I always told myself if we couldn't do it naturally the next time, we'd look into adoption. Last winter, we decided to give it another chance and started the same fertility treatment again this past spring in hopes to be able to conceive again. This summer, we went through the very hard experience of an ectopic pregnancy and losing the baby we were so hopeful for. It didn't take long to know that I did not want to go through that again. I knew from talking to my doctor that you can get pregnant again with one fallopian tube, however, Tim and I had set our limits as to far we would go with fertility treatments and I vaguely knew what would potentially need to happen to conceive on our own again. It did not sound appealing at all.

During this healing, I knew without a doubt that we should start looking into adoption. When I first told Tim, I think he was worried that I was "giving up" too soon, but as we talked through this, I told him I had this indescribable peace about the whole situation. At that point, I was 100% sure that I was fine if I was never pregnant again or carried my own child. God had brought me through the hardship of the ectopic pregnancy every step of the way and in my heart I know this is what He wants for our family. I felt like what we went through this summer was a big sign from God saying "This is how I want you to add to your family." I can't explain it exactly, but I felt like the weight of the world had been lifted off my shoulders. The peace I've felt from the time I found out about the ectopic until we made this decision is truly life-changing. God has been in control through this whole thing.

So, we started working right away. It is amazing to see the door's God has opened for us along the way confirming that this is exactly what He has in His plan for our family! We first decided on domestic infant adoption and contacted a national agency called Bethany Christian Services. In July, we went to an informational meeting about adoption in general and felt right at home with this agency. We filled out our formal application and got the process started. At the beginning of August, we went to a mandatory all day training that had to be completed before we could complete our homestudy. They only offer it once every three months so we are so thankful to be able to complete it when we did. At the same time, we got our homestudy packet and have been working on it ever since. Currently, we are just a few documents away from sending in the last of our paperwork. Once that is done, we will have a few visits with our social worker and then our homestudy will be complete! At that time, the official waiting begins.

We are so excited about this journey we are on! God continues to bless our little family and we know there is a baby out there for us. We can't wait to have him or her in our family! Please pray for us as we continue on this path. We have the most fabulous friends and family who have always supported us. Thank you for your continued interest and support in our lives and for the prayers that will be lifted up during this exciting time in our life! We will keep everyone posted as we continue.