Hi, my name is Shelley. The journey for us started about 9 years ago. I was diagnosed with endometriosis after having surgery to remove a huge cyst on my ovary. This was a pretty traumatic diagnosis as I knew it was a leading cause of infertility and I had always wanted to be a mom. My doctor advised that if I wanted to get pregnant, right after surgery would be the best time because she "cleaned up" as much of the endometriosis as she could. My husband and I had not been really trying to get pregnant but had not been trying to prevent it either. Being that we both wanted children, we began to try. The doctor advised that since it was stage 4, we only try for 6 months on our own before seeking medical help. Six months later we started to see a fertility specialist. We went through lots of testing and lots of procedures but could never get pregnant. After spending a couple years and LOTS and LOTS of money, we decided to look at other options. Adopion was an easy place for me to get to since there had been a lot of adoption stories in my extended and immediate family. My husband was new to the adoption idea though and was unsure of how his very traditional parents would handle the idea. In a short time, we both were in the same place with it and decided it was our path.
We started with an orientation and then classes and lots and lots of paperwork and home visits and background checks and finally we were approved to adopt. The process alone was a lot to go through and for those lucky enough to have successful pregnancies, you can't imagine what it's like to need a stranger's approval to tell you that you are good enough to parent. It's a very invasive process.
So, now we were approved and waiting, and waiting, and waiting. It was over a year that we waited before we got our son. He is now 6 years old and the greatest kid in the world. We are now trying to expand our family. We went thru the special needs adoption program this time and have been approved since June 2010, so we are waiting again. We are currently getting licensed to foster so as to have all of our options open since we are stil waiting. We know that the perfect match for our family will come to us in God's time. It is a true test of faith to go through this process. We have definitely learned that God's time is not usually the same as our time, but His is the right time and are confident that our match will happen. So, that's a little bit about who I am and I'd love to hear your stories about adoption, fostering, or any related topics.
Thanks for reading!
Shelley,
ReplyDeleteWe have known each other almost our whole lives and our stories are so similar. My husband and had tried to get pregnant on our own for 2 year with no luck. We were in to our 2nd month of fertility treatments when I got a phone call that my cousin who had a 3-year-old girl was in trouble due to substance abuse and her child had been removed to live with family. We watched the progress of the biological parents and having been so close to my uncle (Uncle Don who had departed) we could not let his grand child go into the foster system. We decided to offer this child a temporary or permanent home which ever was needed. My fingers will cramp if I had to write about the ups and downs for the next year. The one thing I can say is that the State of Michigan protects the parents in more ways than it protects the children. (my opinion). We had a happy ending and was able to finalize the adoption of our daughter 2 years after she first came to live with us. Trust in God, we do not know the plan but when it is revealed everything seems to make sense. At least it did for us. We loved spending time with you and your husband and would love to have reconnect. Take care.
It's crazy how many people we know with similar stories. Thank God she had you two to take her in and love her and so glad that it worked out the way it did for your family.
ReplyDeleteWe enjoyed hanging with you two as well and would love to get together again soon. Love ya!