Ninevah

Twin did an adoption blog last week, so now it's my turn. Let me tell you our story. It's lengthy, so hang in there with me. I married the love of my life in May of 1998. I was all of 20 years old. I couldn't wait to marry this man, have our own place, and most of all, start a family. It has ALWAYS been my hearts number 1 desire to have a million kids. Ok, maybe not a million, but several at least. Once we decided to start the family, I was soooo stoked. Time went on, more time, more time....still no baby. After a few years, it was obvious to us that this was not going to be easy, but I still had the hope of "some day" During this time, we were given the opportunity, no, blessing of adopting our daughter Micaiah. We had no idea where our family was going, but felt that beyond a doubt, this is what God wanted us to do. On September 22, 2002, our little girl came into the world. I was in the delivery room, Tom was right outside waiting. It was seriously the best day ever! We had no idea that it would take 3 1/2 years for her adoption to be finalized. I fought for that baby harder than any person should have to. 3 1/2 years of not knowing what was going to happen with her. 3 1/2 years of worry, heartache, waiting, etc. I will not go into details as to why this took so long. She was always with us, always ours. On March 14, 2005, she finally was "offically" ours. Tom and I both agree, our wedding, her birth, and her adoption day, are the 3 highlights of our lives together. During this time, we also were informed that biological children were not in the plans for us. Again, I do not wish to give personal details as to why. We have gone through all the stages of grief when it comes to this. I still do not undersand why. I may never know. Why would God put such a desire in my heart for children, and yet make it so it's not possible for Tom and I to have them. I have NEVER wanted anything more. Just lots of kids. No big house, no big career, no fancy car. Just my Tom and kids. My daughter is the best thing that ever happened to me, aside from Tom. However,, I still have the ache of wanting more kids. I was meant to be a mom. Tom and I decided to go into foster care. My sister was able to adopt 2 kids out of foster care. Surely we would be able to. We had some kids come to our house, I loved them. Then came little Antwon. I FELL IN LOVE. Head over heels in love with this little guy. He was with us for 9 months, then suddenly gone. Just poof, gone. I thought for sure that he was to be ours. It took a long, long time to move on from him. After he left, we knew for sure that we could not continue with foster care. So what....what God. Why God? Why me? So many people have kids without even trying, why not me? I don't know. I don't have answers. What I know is that I serve a God who loves me. A God who has saved me. Who is righteous and just even when we don't understand. So.....fast forward a few years. We have considered adoption for a number of years, just didn't know if we "had it in us" to go at it again. We let an adoption consultant know that we were open to it, just taking it slow. We were approached concerning a baby that was to be born in October. Birth mom abused alcohol and cocaine during pregnancy, oh, and is HIV positive. Would we consider? Uh...what? seriously? Who would possibly say yes to this? yeah....you know we did. Of course we would take this baby. So, just as fast as we could, we raised money for the adoption. We applied for grants, sold T-shirts, held a garage sale. We were blessed to raise almost $3,000 in 6 weeks. So blessed we had no doubt that this was the Lords will. With a matching grant, we were almost to the $10, 000 we needed to adopt this little one. Baby was to be born in October. We got ready. We applied for FMLA from work, told the family, started collecting baby items. Every single day, just WAITING for the call to drive to Florida and pick up our little one. Now I had my answer! God needed me to adopt this baby, THAT'S why he made it so we couldn't have kids. September came and went.....October came and went. No call. At the end of October we were informed that birth mommy had essentially fallen off the face of the earth. No baby, no mad dash to Florida. What? Seriously? What? Again? WHY? WHY? WHY? I don't know. I don't know why. What I know is that I still serve a God who loves me. A God who has a plan, I just don't know what it is. All I can do is trust him. Fast forward to a few weeks ago. A friend of mine traveled to Haiti. She posted on her facebook that a baby had been abandoned at the orphange where she was volunteering. I saw this post and thought how horrible it is and poor baby and please God find this baby a home. This friend approached my sister and asked if we were still interested in adopting. Of course we are. Which leads us to today. Yes....we are attemtping an adoption from Haiti. Haiti? seriously? Haiti? God...you want me to GO TO HAITI? It's called HAITI for a REASON God! God...do you KNOW how expensive that is? God...do you KNOW how long that takes? Really? HAITI! Yes......Haiti. OK! Here we go. It's with a VERY VERY SCARED heart, and a whole mind of unknowns that I let you all know that this is what we are doing. It is a lot of money. It is a lot of time. The average adoption takes 18-24 months. We have been told that we can do it in 18 months or less since we don't have any biological children. There is the one boy that we want. The one that was abandoned. He is gorgeous. He's 6 months old. His name is Alvarez. However, we were told yesterday that we may not get him exactly. Apparently the adoption agency has a waiting list for little ones and it's pretty much first come, first serve. I feel very strongly that even if we don't get Alvarez, per se, maybe he is just being used to gear us towards Haiti. Maybe there is another baby that we are meant for, and God needed to use Alvarez for us to say yes. Don't get me wrong, Alvarez WILL have a family. It just may not be us, as much as I want it to be. Sooooooo......what can you do to help? pray. PRAY PRAY PRAY PRAY PRAY. This is a HUGE task. Pray we can raise the money, pray that all the paperwork will go through, pray for the safety of all the kids in Haiti. It is a beautiful country with beautiful people. They need so much. I will keep the blog updated as to the happenings of the adoption. Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers. And if someone wants to cut us a huge fat check, we would be willing to take that off your hands. :) Lead us Lord.


Chrissy