Entry #13 Mother's Day 2020!!

Today is Mother’s Day. Needless to say, my first as a mother so this day takes on a whole new meaning for me.

Just last year, I stood in church, asking for prayer for a child with my family gathered around me. I couldn’t have imagined that one year later I would have a beautiful baby girl. I still tear up when I think of the amazing way God worked out the details of our daughter for us to be a family.

And now on Mother’s Day, I ponder the hopes and prayers I have for being my daughter's mom. I’ve had a place reserved in my heart for my own child that I had hoped would come one day. My heart now overflows with unconditional love and awe at our baby. At any time during the day, I can be heard saying “you’re so cute” or “baby genius” or “I’m so thankful God brought us together”. While my heart is in constant dreamland, I hope I will be the best mom possible to our daughter.

With that being said, here’s a letter to my baby girl.


My dear precious sweet baby girl,

I am forever grateful to have you as my daughter. From the moment I met you, I thought you were absolutely beautiful. You were smiling since week one, I just knew yours were genuine smiles. And now seeing how you are at six months, you smile and laugh constantly. The smile you wear on the outside is the smile you put on my heart inside.

Your smile and laughter brings happiness to others too. I hope to help instill in you a love for God and people. A love that comes from God and shows His love for us.

I hope to love you in whatever way is necessary for you to be a strong, confident, intelligent and compassionate person.

I hope to give you various opportunities at different talents so we can find the ones you like, enjoy doing and excel at.

I hope I will forever remember how grateful I am to be your mother. Mother’s Day originated as a day to celebrate mothers and visit them. I have heard many women's challenges of their paths to motherhood, and some still wait. Since I have personally experienced this, I know that coming into motherhood isn’t easy, as being a mother isn’t either.

However things don’t need to be easy for me to appreciate them. When I change a poop diaper, I’m happy to know your excretory system is working. When I wash your clothes, I’m thankful to have appliances to do so and many clothes that were gifted to us. When Daddy washes your bottles, we’re thankful you’re growing at a healthy rate. When you spit up on my clothes, it’s funny to know what mothers meant when they’d say your clothes will reach a new kind of dirty. When it’s bath time, I know we are fortunate to have clean water.

Baby girl, I hope to pass on the knowledge of the power of prayer. On Mommy Mondays, you and I get to pray together. We have some friends who want to be mommies and we pray God will lead them on the path to motherhood too. We also pray for your birth mother. We are thankful for the choice she made to give you life and we pray you can meet her one day, if you want.

Baby girl, I hope you and your sweet cousins will continue to grow in love. You get so excited to see them and they love you so much in return.

Baby girl, I hope I will always see the positive in every situation. And in every situation I hope you’ll always see my love for you.

Our first Mother’s Day together is being spent in the same way the day originally originated, enjoying time together. Time, as we know, flies by. I hope I make every moment of the time we have together,

With love,
Mommy

Entry #12 Adoption Day!!

Today is the day our daughter officially became legally ours! She’s been ours since we met, but now, it’s legal and we will soon have a birth certificate with her name and us as her parents. 

I haven’t written a post since we first adopted our daughter. Mostly due to time and wanting to cherish every moment with our little bundle of love and joy. Partly because I haven’t wanted to say it out loud, almost like walking on egg shells, that we are officially her parents. The months leading up to Adoption Day were a little nerve-wracking for me.  I was continuously amazed at what God had worked out, and while I was hopeful it would all go just fine, there’s that little creeping feeling of doubt that loomed in the back of my mind. I just pushed it away until today. I am now shouting our daughter is ours! We are her Mom and Dad! 

My sister told me she was surprised to learn that I was nervous this whole time. She said she was too, but that I was playing it cool and she didn’t know. I told her that this whole thing was almost too good to be true. And you know what nugget of wisdom she came up with? “It’s too God not to be true!”

The last three months have been amazing, full of love, new experiences, learning curves, adjustments, and thankfulness.  Having been heavily involved with my younger sister and brother and two nieces from their birth, I knew a lot of what to expect, so I feel like I was above average prepared for the changes.  Each time I think back to the call we got about our daughter and those first few weeks, my eyes tear up at the immense happiness that brought. And since then, there have been so many awe-filled moments.

While out of town, we stayed with our cousins.  They were extremely gracious hosts, helped in any way they could, kept their fridge stocked and let us borrow their truck for trips back and forth to the hospital.  It was a cherished time of being together. The night we flew back home with our baby girl, our family surprised us with the nursery better than I could have dreamed of. Our daughter absolutely loves it and we love being in there with her.  During Thanksgiving week, we went on a road trip up to NYC and shared some wonderful memories. My sisters threw our family a “Welcome Home Shower” with details that were only matched by all of the love shown to us by all who attended. Our first Christmas as a family of three was a dream come true.  We spent New Year’s at Disney's Fort Wilderness cabins and ventured into 2020 together with our family. My 41st birthday was the best one yet, my first one as a mommy. So many lovely opportunities with our daughter, our family and lot of love.

And don’t get me started on the cuteness of my two nieces and how much they love our daughter. My six-year-old niece recently read three books to my daughter, in the same fashion that I read them, making them interactive and having her put her hands on the touch and feel parts of the page.  My niece also asks a lot of deep questions, like when are we going to tell our daughter her adoption story. When she’s older, she said she wants to have a biological baby and adopt a baby and that she wants to be a great mom like me. She gives great compliments! And she is getting well acquainted with vocabulary like birth mother, adopted, biological and trusting in God. All this from a six year old!  My three-year-old niece loves baby dolls and my daughter is a live baby doll to her! She loves running for her pacifier, shaking the formula mix in her bottle and feeding her, kissing her, hugging her, holding her hand and helping me change her diapers. Recently, she said she would like to help me give my daughter a bath and try helping with a poopoo diaper! The other day, my six-year-old niece asked me if I was going to have another baby and I told her we will trust in God for that. She said, but she needs a sister! And you know what the three year old niece said? She said “We are her sisters!?”  Since my daughter has arrived, I have said how important it is for them to love her, not just as cousins, but as sisters and I want the three of them to be the best of friends. To hear my three-year-old niece get this concept filled my heart with joy. They love her so much, as I love them so much too!

I love reflecting back on the timing and perfected details of this journey. 

I started this blog about our Journey to Parenthood and opened up for the first time about the pain of loss and desire for a child in March of 2019.  Our daughter had just come into being in her birth mother’s womb within a month or two of me starting my blog. The whole time I wrote new posts about having hope in God for us to become parents, our daughter was being wonderfully and fearfully made in her birth mother’s womb.

The first miscarriage I had would have resulted in a baby being born in October 2018. Our daughter came to us exactly one year later in October 2019.

I started 2019 with kicking off my 40th birthday, knowing our last attempt at IUI didn’t work. I finished 2019 as a mom and started 2020 by celebrating my 41st with my daughter!

When my husband and I first started the paperwork process for adopting, and we learned of the high cost, I told my husband and my sister, something I felt God revealed to me.  Instead of stressing about not being about to afford an adoption, I felt that there would be a couple at our church who would step in and help cover the cost of it. This was way early in the process.  After going to a meeting at our church, the person in charge of the foster and adoption care ministry called me to say that there was a couple who has been looking to partner along with a couple wanting to adopt.  Can you believe that their donation to our adoption account, matched by a $4,000 grant from our church, covered most of the lawyer’s fees, so much so, that we were easily able to pay the rest of balance without having to take out a loan?  God is amazing. And this couple will testify that when our pastor called for those to help with this ministry, they just wanted to be obedient to God and do their part. They will forever be a part of our daughter's life.

Which just adds to our daughter's story and God’s goodness and the power of prayer and hope.  I will admit, it got tough at times and sometimes I wasn’t sure if I was doing all that I should be doing or if I was doing too much. I just kept going back to trusting in God with hope and asking close family and friends for prayer. 

You know the saying, life is a journey or how people say they enjoy the journey, not just the destination? This journey to parenthood had a lot packed in, and the destination of getting our daughter to be in our family was so worth it.  As I write this, she’s sleeping in my arms and my fingers keep resting on the keyboard so I can just stare at her beautiful face, her tiny fingers, her peaceful breathing. My husband and I recently exclaimed how good she is at just being on the go with us. My husband hesitated to say it out loud because he didn’t want to jinx it.  I said, it’s okay, we can say it as much as we want because when this phase ends, we will be grateful for what comes next.

On this next part of our journey, I hope and pray that we will have the wisdom, strength, guidance and love for our baby girl.  And that I relish in each phase and enjoy each moment of our beautiful gift from God. It’s too God not to be true. 

Entry #11 Our baby girl is born!

Soooooo...quite a blog to write. My favorite one yet. Our Journey Towards Parenthood has become Our Journey Of Parenthood.

Just one week ago we got a call from the fabulous and highly recommended home study lady who has been helping us. She called us to tell us a baby girl was about to be born and asked if we wanted to adopt her. I asked if I could take a moment to call my husband, as he was at the school’s volleyball game. He was in a state of shock on his way home. During that time I called my sister to tell her and she told us that we’ve been wanting this for two years, we were ready! Go get that baby! I knew I wanted to say yes but wanted to make sure my husband had peace about the decision too. Once he got home and had a moment to process, he was more than on board as well.

Isn’t it funny how life goes? Just a month ago I wrote blog entry #11 and asked for prayer for peace about a decision going to be made in October. What I didn’t share was that we were going to try IVF. We had attended several appointments and just needed to call when my next cycle started. We got this call before we would start IVF and are amazed at God’s timing. The decision many of you prayed for was designed by God for us to adopt this baby girl.

Once we found out, we were advised to fly out the next day, which we did. Baby girl was born during the night and we flew out that day!

The birth mother was passionate about making sure her baby was adopted by a loving couple. She made a decision to give her baby life and we are eternally grateful to her. We got to meet baby girl when she was 24 hours old. On our plane ride, we decided on her name.

We picked a first and middle name with several special meanings to and in our family. Her cousins helped pick her middle name, without even knowing it!

Our baby was born in a stressful state and was in the NICU. The amazing nurses helped so much with her care, a speech pathologist and physical therapist visited as well. Each person gave such helpful advice to help. My husband and I held our baby girl all day long, for the next 6 days. We swaddled her, held her hand, swayed with her, read to her, talked to her and prayed for her. Soon, the nurses were commenting on her improvement and her stressful state was decreasing.

She was discharged on day 7, when she was one week old. It was much quicker than anticipated and the doctor was impressed with her improvement.

All this to say, God chose us to be her parents and we were able to provide what she needed. Other situations didn’t work out. It wasn’t a "no" to being parents, it was just a "not yet". Our daughter came at just the right time, as always is with God’s perfect timing.

We have gone through a roller coaster of emotions, most of them filled with joy and excitement and tears of happiness. Our hearts are content.

Our hope stayed strong in knowing that we would be parents. It was difficult at times. It was trying. It wore us down. But the prayers, support, and encouragement of our family and friends rallied us on.

And now that we are parents, the excitement you all have for us makes our hearts burst with happiness.

We still have more paperwork to go and a few more legalities. But for now, we will let our hope turn to joy. Our hearts are at peace. And the decision we asked for prayer came to fruition in the best way we could imagine.

Today, our baby girl is one week old, made strong through love.

Entry #10 Prayer for October

It’s been just over a month since our last update through this blog. So many of you kindly ask for updates and continue to let us know you’re praying. We are still in the waiting stages, where we are listed as potential adoptive parents with a lawyer’s firm.

However, I did want to share an update in the form of a prayer request.

We may have the opportunity for another door to be opened in our Journey toward Parenthood. We will know more in October, but in the meantime, we are asking for you to pray for God’s guidance, that He prepares the steps towards this path, if it’s His Will, and that there is peace. The kind of peace that tells us this is truly from God and with His approval.

Just thinking about this possible door opening has had me so excited this past week and at this time, I feel peace about it, but I want to make sure it is peace for the right reasons.

Therefore, we are asking for your prayers that we have peace whether this door is truly being opened or if it ends up being closed. Again, we will know more in October and will hopefully get to share more then.

Thank you again for reaching out and investing your time in our Journey toward Parenthood. With God and the people He places in our lives, we can stay strong in our hope that one day we will be parents.

Entry #9 Meeting with Lawyer

This past Tuesday, my husband and I met with the adoption lawyer and WOW. There was A LOT of information to take in and process. The lawyer was extremely knowledgeable and explained the whole process of what we are to expect during each of the next steps. This next step being the waiting period. We gave her our profile books and wrote up a little blurb for them to post. Now, we wait for birth mothers to view our profile and hopefully pick us soon!

Once we are picked, we will meet with the birth mother to get acquainted. Before this meeting and during this time, prospective adoptive parents have to communicate what kind of adoptions they are open to – closed, semi or open. This describes the different levels of communication the birth mother would have about the baby, after birth, from the adoptive parents. It could be pictures, letters, email and/or visits.

After the initial meeting, the birth mother and adoptive parents can continue with communication until the birth of the baby. Sometimes the adoptive parents can be present at the baby’s birth. Part of the reason why newborn adoptions can range from $35,000-$45,000 is because the adoptive parents cover the cost of living, transportation, food, phone – the necessities—for the birth mother during her pregnancy and six weeks after birth. Then, there are the lawyer’s costs, which ours will be $15,000. Plus other legal expenses, such as court filings, legal representation for the birth mother and other related expenses.

At this time, our prayers are hopeful that God will lead a birth mother to choose us as her baby’s parents, that this happens in His timing, and that we are patient during the waiting period.

At this point, there are nine entries in this blog. As we continue to share this blog with women who desire to be on the path towards motherhood, I am continually awed by their reaction to what I have shared. Please, if you have any women in your life in a similar situation, feel free to share our journey with them. When other women have reached out to me in return, it has been very encouraging.

Thank you for joining us along this journey thus far. We hope we will be able to write a future entry about a birth mother choosing us!

Hope is strong!

Michelle

Entry #8 Meeting with a Pediatrician

During our home study visit, we were advised to meet with a pediatrician to find out about various medical conditions that an adopted baby can be born with. The amount of time it takes to be matched with a baby can be affected by how open adoptive parents are to various conditions. My husband and I were just able to have a meet and greet with a pediatrician and it was very informative.

The medical staff was very kind and gave us a welcome packet about their office. Then, when we met with the doctor, she answered all of our questions in such a helpful way. We asked about the long term effects of drug use, including meth, heroine, marijuana and crack. We also asked about the effect of alcohol use, commonly known as fetal alcohol syndrome. We asked about a baby being born to a birth mother with HIV, various mental illnesses, defects and life threatening conditions.

The doctor explained that many of these conditions can be treated, initially with the birth mother’s potential access to prenatal care, and then after birth with monitoring, medical care and a nurturing, loving home. We felt that this meet and greet answered many of our questions and helped calm our nerves down because it is better to be informed and know how to care for the various conditions rather than go off of hearsay. We understand we will encounter challenges, but that goes for any child, adopted or not, so we definitely recommend setting up a meet and greet ahead of time. The doctor said we were her first couple to ever meet with her before having adopted the baby, so I’m happy with our progress.

Now, we ask for your prayers for our meeting with the adoption lawyer on July 30. We have our profile books ready to go and are excited for the next step that will hopefully lead us closer to our future baby.

We thank you for your prayers!

Entry #7 VM about lawyer and $4K grant

I have a couple of exciting updates to share, but first I need to confess once again how my anxiousness continuously creeps in. Last week, our family was on a road trip and throughout the week I kept waiting to hear back about the two applications we sent in – one to the lawyer’s office and the other for the financial assistance. Last Friday, during one of my driving turns, I set aside the anxiousness and started to pray and ask God to settle my heart, give me patience, and trust in His timing.

What do you know, but later that day I received two voicemails while we were in the St. Louis Arch! The lawyers looked over our applications and wanted to set up a consultation! The second voicemail informed us that we were given a $4,000 matching grant! As I write this blog entry, it is quite fitting that today’s verse of the day on the Bible App is, “do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God” from Philippians 4:6.

We will meet with the adoption lawyer at the end of July and will know much more then. As of now, all of our paperwork is all set so there isn’t anything else to prepare. In regards to the financial assistance, we have to set up some logistics, so more will come on that later. Lastly, we will continue the process of applying to work with our second option, an adoption agency. We were playing a little bit of phone tag, so completing this step will be our next goal.

I just wanted to share a quick update on God’s goodness and why I continually know I can keep my hope in Him! As always, your prayers are greatly appreciated!