Overwhelmed

Brian with our niece, Amari, at our rehearsal dinner.

Just a glimpse of what a great dad he's going to be.

We have been so overwhelmed with support in just a few days since we "officially" announced our intent to adopt out of the foster care system.

I mentioned to Brian last night that this decision was, in some ways, like a birth for us. It seemed a long time in coming and painful in the process. But, here, on the other side of it, we are filled with joy and anticipation for the future.

Now it is hard to believe that I was so hesitant to announce. I was so fearful of criticism. It will probably come, but not from the people who's opinions I truly care about.

I'm going to do my best to share the goings on of this adoption process here. Many women share their pregnancies on a blog. Here I will share our journey to parenthood.

The first step we made was to contact our local Department of Children's Services. Since I'm an internet type, I just Googled it. I already knew that there would be some training classes involved, so I looked up the schedule of classes. In Tennessee, the classes are called PATH (Parents As Tender Healers). We registered for a class that meets twice a week for about a month. There are other classes that only meet once a week for I'm guessing about twice as long. I also went ahead and asked for an application packet to be sent to us. However, I know that this info will be given to us in the classes as well - I'm just eager.

In an effort to mentally shift toward parenthood, we've begun to make some changes in our house set-up. We (Brian) moved the office stuff to the bonus room so we can use that room as the nursery. I have a list of things I want to do. Move stuff, paint, steam clean the carpets, get furniture, etc.

That's where we are for now - excited, delighted with the support we're receiving, and making some changes!

A New Direction

I wrote the following e-mail to my family this past week. Since it pretty much sums up where Brian and I are right now, I thought I would just re-post it here.

Hey family,

It seems like a bigger deal than it is with me e-mailing this, but really I wanted to tell you guys our decision all at once and wanted to be able to let you know what we've been thinking lately.

So...Brian and I have decided to not move forward with fertility treatments. We are choosing to pursue adoption through the foster care system. Our training classes begin October 26 (just after the 3Day) and will be complete November 30. It is entirely possible that we become parents before the end of the year. Then again, God is in charge, so we know we'll have to trust His timing on this.

I'm going to do my best to share the process that has led us to this decision. Bear with me, you're about to enter my brain...
---Brian and I have talked about adopting out of foster care and had intent to do it. Up until recently we had said "not now"
---I have had what I can only describe as a stirring in my heart towards fostering and adoption.
---(this one may sound weird) Recently, I read a book called "A Million Miles in a Thousand Years" which is an excellent book. The author talks about our lives as stories. He challenges himself and the reader to live a better story. One day in particular while I was reading that book, I was asking God what my story would be. I remember I was praying as I was driving back from Maryville (I'd been on a Mobile Crisis call) and God spoke so clearly to me that our story would be about fostering and adoption. He was so clear that there would be joy and pain and "nitty gritty" involved, but that would be our story. That was mid-August and I struck it up to a "later" thing.
---We've had a growing sense of discontent with fertility treatments. We were incredibly disappointed in May after the second IUI did not result in a pregnancy. We decided to take time off and re-evaluate. A friend of our said that she wouldn't discount having biological children until we saw Dr. Keenan. And at first we were hopeful with Dr. Keenan. But we had agreed that we didn't really want to do more "procedures." As this past month has gone on, my heart just hasn't been in it. After one test result, Dr. Keenan recommended that we do IUI this next cycle. Since he said that, I've known that I don't really want to do another IUI, but have been somewhat resigned to it. Then this past Tuesday (9.21.10) I began to search myself to find out why I was intending to go through with this procedure that I did not want. I came up with a lot of what ifs: What if this is the only way we'll get pregnant? What if we only have to do it one more time? What if other people think we're quitters for not following through on treatments? These reasons were all fear based. Basically, I was going to do it because I was afraid of not getting pregnant. I realized that being afraid is not reason enough to do something I'm not comfortable with. And God doesn't lead with fear.
Then (still Tuesday), I was driving from the church to small group and I thought to myself "I want to be able to tell our child that he/she was a choice. That he/she wasn't a last resort, but that we consciously stopped and chose to pursue adoption." That night, Brian and I sat down together and I told him all the things that were going on in my head. This was not the first conversation we'd had on the topic by any means. One statement that Brian made stands out to me. He said, "I believe God has called us to be parents. It doesn't matter how He brings children to us." With that, we decided to close the door on fertility treatments and open the one that leads to adoption.
--That night I finished up my BSF. We are studying Isaiah. This verse jumped out to me: learn to do right!
Seek justice,
encourage the oppressed.
Defend the cause of the fatherless,
plead the case of the widow.
-Isaiah 1:17
I took it as confirmation.

Okay, so that's my long-winded thought process. We welcome your input, encouragement, questions, and support. (although if you do have questions or criticisms, please address us personally and not on the blog)

love you guys!
Teagan