The Road of NEVER

The Road of “NEVER”

There are many times that I wonder if God is sitting on His throne laughing at things that we say. I bet there are times when I was listing off my list of adoption demands that He was saying, “Oh just wait and see.” 

When Justin and I started our adoption journey in January 2009, we had a list of things that we would NEVER do! Little did we know that we would walk down the road of “NEVER”. 

One of our very first things that we swore we would NEVER do was to have an open adoption. We stood firm on this until a few months before we knew about Hannah’s birth mom. We saw how beautiful and wonderful an open adoption could be. God slowly started to change our hearts and our minds. By the time that Hannah was born, an open adoption was a perfect fit. Not only do we keep in contact with her birth mom, we also visited her this past summer. She will always have a place in our life.

After the long journey to Hannah and holding my sweet girl in my arms, I said I was NEVER going through another adoption. Early on Justin kept saying that he wanted to have another child and I stood firm that I would not walk this journey again. However, God had different plans. I remember the Sunday that everything changed. I stood next to a dear friend during praise and worship and clearly felt the Holy Spirit moving. As they were singing, I had tears pouring down my face when I felt the Holy Spirit tell me that our family was not complete. In that moment, I knew I had to walk this journey again. I am so glad that I didn’t know how painful the next few years were going to be because I honestly do not think that I would have stepped out in faith.

After losing our birth mom and baby in September 2013, I swore I was NEVER going through another adoption. A few months later, I was on Facebook when I saw a woman post about her adoption agency on a post that I had commented on. For some reason I felt the need to contact her. I eventually called her and told her our journey. We sent her our home study and figured that if it happens then great but if not, we would be okay. We had been with her for over a year when she called me one morning. She had a birth mom that was giving birth and we had about an hour to make a decision. We finally decided that we were not going to peruse the adoption. I NEVER imagined myself saying “No” to a baby. That “No” spared us from major heart break. (See Thankful for God saying "No")

We have been on this journey for so long and many people said that we should look into fostering. We have said that we would NEVER foster, however, I did start to have some questions. We talked with our adoption director and realized that there was another side of the fostering that we could do. We would not do a traditional fostering but could adopt a child that their parent’s rights have already been terminated. We talked a bit about it and decided to go for it. We have now completed our home study and are waiting to be licensed. We always said that we would NEVER adopt out of birth order and Hannah would always be our oldest. Well…. We will be licensed for up to 8 years old. EEK…. Makes me nervous but I know we are where we are supposed to be. In the coming months or year our family will probably grow.

I am so glad that we are walking this road of NEVER. If we had stood firm, we would not have the life we do now. God has changed us on this road and we are stronger because of it. My God is so good. We are about to start a chapter in our life that I thought I would NEVER do and I could not be more excited. I cannot wait to share our next journey with you as we are hoping to add another (maybe 2?). It might be time to change this blog title. Journey to Baby Number 2 does not seem like it fits. J

Please join us and praying for our family as we are walking this road. I will update with more information as I can. As of now, we are waiting.