What is the journey like? Part 1

I was asked recently what the journey of adoption was like. There are so many ways that I can tell you about this. One thing that I have noticed is that there is not very much information or background on the story from an adoptive father's perspective. That was hard for me because the books that we read, the blogs that we would read, and the people we talked to many of the sources were written by adoptive mothers.

As I am thinking about how to write this I feel that it would be good to break it down into three areas application/situations, getting matched/meeting the child, and post placement/early months. So here we go, I hope that if you are thinking about adoption this might help or if you know someone who has adopted this might help you understand them a little better.

Application and Situations
Imagine if you are wanting to get pregnant but before you can do this you need to have a background check, submit a application in which you need to tell them about your medical history, financial background, and job situation. Are you good enough? Do you pass all the needed steps in order to be a good parent? Then you have to do a homestudy in which someone comes out to your house looks around and talks to you and your spouse to see how you to interact with each other.

Now I understand why they do this because not all people should adopt. Not that it is an elite club or anything but some people are not wired to adopt a child. Could you imagine though if each parent had to go through this before they were allowed to have a child? When going through this I just would think to myself that this was the process for us to be a family and I wanted to use it as a time for my wife and I to grow stronger and get to know each other better.

So after all is said and done you have a packet given to you that tells you all about yourself and your family. How you would raise a child and how each of you relates to the other. This was very interesting to read through and insightful to have an outsiders view of your marriage and family.

Next is the situation phase and this is fun yet very emotionally draining. Once you have your funds and homestudy completed you can start to receive different potential adoption situations. I remember our first situation that we received it was around 6 in the morning and I had not been up all that long and I checked my email. I had a message that was from our case worker. It was about a child that was going to be born in one week and had not been matched with a family yet. As I scrambled to wake up and run down to talk to Sarah my mind was racing with all that needed to be done. We had to pray it through and seek what God has for us, all in about 3 hours. In the end we said no because we did not feel the peace in it.

So this is what we had going for us for the next 4 months. Waiting for your phone to buzz to say you have a email. You check the email to find that it is a situation detailing another birthmother and her child. We had anywhere from a day to 1 hour to pray it through and sense God's leading. One thing that we decide to do was set up a list of things that were our (as Terri Comfort would say) deal breakers. Things that we knew that if the things were in the paperwork from the birthmother we would say no. For some of the cases that we received it was easier to say no to them but I remember a number of cases that we looked at that really pushed us to the brink of saying yes too. But in the end we did not have a peace from God that would allow us to say yes to them. I remember looking them over and thinking can I father this child?

It remember getting a few different situations and getting really emotional because I started to bond with a child that I was only reading about. I think that this happened because I was reading of a child that was in need of a father. It broke my heart to know that I was saying no to a child that was in need. I did not want to say no to any of the kids and wondered if every time I said no to these children was I saying no to something that God had for us. A friend of mine shared something with me that really broke me and set my heart anew. He said, "Ryan, God has already chosen a child for you. He has just the right child picked out for you." The idea of this put heart at ease as much as it could.

Throughout the next 2 months we kept getting emails and phone calls of potential babies for us to look over. It was in April and I was packing my bags to go on a youth event with our church. We had gotten a few cases over the last two or three weeks that were so close to what we felt God had for us. Sarah made the comment that since I was going to be gone for three days that we better not get the situation God had for us. Of course this is what happened right? On the trip down we received an email of a baby boy in Georgia. Of course my phone did not have any reception so when we stopped my phone start to buzz with calls and text messages from Sarah trying to get a hold of me. As I raced around the campus trying to get coverage long enough to download the paperwork to read over I kept thinking of course this would happen when I am in Kansas and Sarah was home in Minnesota.

After reading it all over, praying about it, and talking it over together we said that we wanted our profile shown to this birthmother. This was the first time that we had ever said yes to any birthmother so we did not know what was going to happen. I remember for the next 5 days or so I could not get this little Georgia boy out of my mind. Names kept coming to mind and it was hard to get things done. What kind of father would I be? Would he love me? Would he bond with us? How would I support Sarah as a new mother? It was like we had taken a pregnancy test and were waiting for the results for the last 4 months. Knowing that the answer was coming but we did not know when. This is part 1 the rest of the story will continue later...

Our story

In December we were asked by The Micah Fund to share our story for their newsletter. We put something together and submitted it for their paper. This past week it was put out in their letter and it was really cool to see our story out in the public. At the beginning both Sarah and I had said that we wanted to help people if they had questions. We were willing to share what we went through and how we got there to those that might be searching for some answers or just needing someone to speak grace and hope into their situation like we had people do for us.

Last Friday we received an email telling us that someone had read our story and wanted to contact us to talk more about what we had went through and who we used. I can say that I was surprised and honored that God would let us be used to help another couple. For those that did not get a chance to read some of what we have went through you can read it here from a post when we were the Featured Family by GCAA.

https://www.facebook.com/GodsChildrenAdoptionAgencyInc

Go down till you see a funny looking guy with an awesome beard.

Our son is almost two years old now and I cannot imagine a better match that God had in place for us. I pray that our story can be used to help others that are in need. Life is tough and things do not always go the way that WE want them too. We have had people try and bring our spirit down and our experience down over the last three or so years. What I try and remember is that sometimes people say things in hurtful ways because they are in pain themselves. Our story is what we have experienced and dealt with what has God done for you?