Questions that Pluck at My Heart Strings

   I'm sure that every pregnant mother, and "expecting" father, have had the questions run through their minds of:                     

                                      "What if our child isn't healthy?"

                                      "What if our child is born with a disability?"

                                      "What if our child has 11 toes?" 

   I have been struggling a little bit with the control part of being an adoptive parent.

 I know that if I had the sweet privilege of caring for a little blessing growing inside of me, I would do everything in my power, to make sure that I was creating the safest, healthiest environment possible for the little bean to grown in. 

                                      That being said, I know you can follow the text book to the "T"

                                      but the Lord may have other plans for our children that
                                      are not always our own. 

                                      The Lord knows our children, and he knows our/their futures.

                                      He knows what personalities to give them and what talents. 

                                      He knows how they will enrich our lives, and how they will test us.

                                      He knows what is Perfect. 

   As we have been working through our paperwork, we got to the section on...hmm...("how to say this")...basically it gives you a 'Check the box if you are willing to adopt a baby with'... and then lists for about 2-3 pages all the things that could possibly happen to a baby while in or out of the womb - many of them due to the choices of the birth mom. I struggled with this in our first adoption knowing that the birth mom was doing things that were harming our baby that was trying to grow inside of her. I knew that God was bigger, but I couldn't help but want to scream at her: "How can you be so selfish to this child, and to us?" "Don't you understand what you are doing to him?!?"

   I can't help but feel a little jealous at times when I see a pregnant woman, or a woman nursing her baby and think: "You don't know how lucky you are". You are your baby's protector. You choose what nourishment your baby will get. As your precious, healthy baby is nursing from your breast, you truly are their Hero. To you mothers reading this who have loved and protected your children. Who have made sure your babies are as healthy as can be, who love your children unconditionally ~ you truly are Heroes. I hold you in such high regard. May the Lord Bless you and your children. 

   Sometimes I struggle with giving this to the Lord, and fully trusting Him to protect our baby even though I know, and I have SEEN his protection. I think that most 'parents to be' worry here and there about the health of their unborn child. I think I would worry from time to time if our child were growing inside of my womb. I have just never faced those questions, written bluntly on paper, and then given a choice on which box to check. It seemed strange, and kind of scary. 

   All this being said: Jesse and I have placed those 3 pages of questions that have plucked at my heart strings in the Lord's hands. We know that he has our child already picked out for us. He knows which birth mom will choose us. We trust his blessings in our life. We have committed our hearts to fully love and protect the child that is chosen for us, No Matter What. 

Lord, I know that you love your children and want the best for us. Lord, I pray and ask your blessings on our baby  wherever he/she is. Lord, you know exactly who our child is - whether or not he/she has even been conceived yet. I pray for your hedge of protection around our child and our child's birth mom. Please give her wisdom to provide a safe, healthy home for our baby to grow in. Please keep mine and Jesse's hearts excited and full of trust, peace, and praise. Lord, I thank your for this journey, and for your blessings.

QUICK UPDATE:

Our training was supposed to be in January sometime, but they have enough families ready to go earlier so we will be heading to Denver November 9-10 for training. I believe that next stage after that will be our Home Study Visits. Those will probably take place sometime after the New Year or early spring. I feel like we are finally rolling along, and it is so exciting!

Thank you all for your support and prayers!

God Bless!

Our Journey...From Cat's Heart.

Hello Family and Friends~
   
       Thank you for loving us. Thank you for taking time to read our blog. Thank you for walking this adventure with us. 
        It might be obvious that I have never blogged before, but I wanted to share our Adoption Adventure with you from the way my heart has felt it. 
        Jesse and I were married in May of 2009. Before we got married, we talked about our future, our life... our children. We talked about the idea of having children of our own, and adopting a child of our own along the way. After a few years of not being able to conceive, we started to wonder if we would be able to have children. 
      In January of 2012, we were contacted by a young lady in Minnesota who had heard about us from a family friend. She was pregnant and wanted us to adopt her baby. We felt as if God had led her to us, and we were so excited for the opportunity at our hands. In February I flew to Minnesota where I met this young lady and went to her first ultrasound. This was breathtaking. I had seen them on T.V. and in movies, but I had never seen one in "real life." Seeing this tiny baby and hearing his heartbeat, along with the birth mother telling me "this is your baby," was surreal. My heart was overwhelmed as my eyes welled up with tears of joy. After returning to Colorado from my visit, I was excited and nervous. I was scared to death that she would change her mind. After about a month of no communication with her, we felt like she might have. Holding onto hope and praying that she would call or write, I received a text message from her telling us that she had had a miscarriage. The words oh my phone had brought all of my fears to the surface, and then she sent a picture that crushed my heart. A picture of a tiny little baby boy, that I had hoped would one day be ours. His perfect form lay lifeless and bloody in her hand with a hospital table in the background. This was caught in a photograph snapped from a cell phone and can be found in the back of my mind to this day. 
       A few months after this painful experience, Jesse and I decided to go to a fertility specialist recommended by our doctor. This also ended up being an awful experience with a disheartening ending. We felt like we were being viewed as dollar signs through the weeks of "more than awkward" testing. Our fertility doctor was more than insensitive, and the facility that we went to was less than impressive. In the end, we were told that we had a 3% chance of being able to conceive. Again...a devastating blow. 
      This was an extremely difficult time for me. I became very angry at God, and at the world around me. I was angry because I felt like WE deserved to have children. I was angry because these dirt-bags who Jesse arrests every night, who are strung out on drugs and beating each other up, were allowed to have children. I was angry because it seemed like everyday someone who never wanted children found out that they were pregnant. I was angry because this just wasn't FAIR. WE have been trying for so long, WE have been crying, and praying, and yearning. WHY Lord? WHY can't WE have a beautiful blessing?
       After my anger subsided a little, I thought...Okay, NOW WHAT?
      We met with some friends who have adopted through an agency here in Colorado. After hearing about their experiences, we decided that we would contact that agency and begin the journey. We filled out the application rather quickly, but did not have the money to turn in the application. I had just started CNA school in Colorado Springs and was only working at a coffee shop on the weekends. This made money tight. A month or so later, some dear friends of ours gave us a gift for Jesse's Birthday. They gave us the money to send in our application so we could get started. This was such a blessing to us! We put our application into an envelope, prayed over it, and mailed it off the next day. One day later the agency called us. They had received our application and our payment, but they "regretted to inform us that they would be sending it back because they stopped taking applications two weeks prior, due to the large amount of families that were still waiting to be placed"......crushed....again.....
        I thought, Really Lord?!? Really?!? 
        What I wasn't hearing through these months was Him asking me....
        Do you trust Me? Do you REALLY trust Me?
        I had moments of trust here and there, but I wasn't fully trusting. I was grasping at strings trying to make this all come together. Trying to figure out our next move, what we could do next. In this time, I hit my lowest of lows. I didn't see the blessings the Lord was putting right in front of me. All I could think about was what I didn't have...and what I wanted. Others around me felt this too. I wasn't myself. I wasn't waiting on the Lord, I was walking by myself...or running, for that matter. 
          After many prayers from loved ones, and council from our wonderful pastor, I began to feel healing. I felt my clenched fingers start to open, and my heart say, "Okay....here you go God...take it." I felt the sadness I carried from losing that precious baby boy start to dissolve. I felt the anger I felt towards these strangers who I believed didn't deserve their children start to fade. I felt Gods hand upon me saying, Do you trust Me?
           During this time, I was told by a friend to go to the pregnancy center because there was going to be an adoption representative there from Bethany Christian Services. I thought it over for about a week, and never called to tell them I would be coming. I didn't think I was ready to go.  The day she was there, I happened to have some free time in my schedule at work, so I decided last minute, that I would go check it out. I learned a lot about the legal side of adoption, and how their agency facilitates an adoption. I was very impressed with what I heard in that meeting. A few days later Jesse and I discussed looking into this agency, which led to us contacting them. We will be adopting domestically through Bethany Christian Services. They sent us a short preliminary application, along with a 16 page state application, and a 70+ page application for the agency. 
           WE HAVE NOW, BEGUN OUR JOURNEY! 
   All of our paperwork and our first payment of $4,500 is due by January. I decided that I would hold a yard sale to try to raise a little money to get started, thinking, "We have until January to raise the rest. I can make and sell Beanie's, we can do a bake sale, maybe a spaghetti dinner...." We were MORE than blessed through this Yard Sale. Our family and friends donated, and donated, and donated, until we had a garage FULL of wonderful things to sell. After many hours of setting up, with much appreciated help from family and friends, we prayed for shoppers to come...and the Lord made them come! Not only did they come on Saturday during the Sale, they came on Sunday while I was packing up the Sale and pretty much cleared the yard. I went to the bank on Monday morning to donate the money from the Sale, a few donations from others who couldn't make it, and an I.O.U. of $200. What do you think the total was? $4,500! That's right....we made EXACTLY enough to cover our first payment in January. 
          I heard the Lord ask me that morning as I left the bank..."My child....Do you Trust Me? 
           Lord....I TRUST YOU. 

            We still have a long way to go, and a lot of money to raise but we feel the Lord's hand in this. We have already been so amazed and blessed by our families, our friends, and our community! We cannot even begin to tell you how thankful that we are for each and every one of your through your prayers and support. 
          We are so excited to bring such a precious blessing into our home. We trust that the Lord is faithful and that His plans are best. We look forward to walking this journey with you.         
          We would love it if you would please continue to pray for us and our child. 

                                                                                                         Thank you for reading, 
                                                                                                                                 Love, 
                                                                                                                                  Cat