Jason and Annie reached out to one of my wonderful adoptive couples (David and Sarah) back in August of last year to talk about adoption. As they began to explore whether or not working with a consultant was a good fit for them, we chatted on the phone several times, and I even had the pleasure of talking with Annie's parents. Right away, I appreciated how seriously Jason and Annie were taking the decision to consider the best approach for their adoption journey; they didn't jump in blindly, but wisely learned as much as they could. We talked about the benefit to having a consultant there as your support, to pray for you and encourage you along the way. We discussed the strengths found in applying with multiple agencies and attorneys to decrease wait time. We chatted about risks and about how I, as a consultant, help families cut down on them. And even more importantly, I was able to hear about their beautiful desire to become parents despite their difficult journey up to that point. It was clear that Jason and Annie had so much love to give!
At the end of September of last year, they got started with me and after a couple of delays in their home study process, they were ready to apply with agencies in February. Right away, I began sending them adoption situations to consider and they began having their profile book shown to expectant moms. Waiting to be chosen by an expectant mama can be an excruciating process. It's so difficult to hear that you are not chosen for a situation that you put your heart into and Jason and Annie were becoming discouraged.
Then, at the end of August, almost exactly a year from when they first started learning about CAC from David and Sarah, and about seven months after they had applied to agencies, they finally heard the words they had been praying for. They were chosen to become the parents of a little girl waiting for them at the hospital! They quickly rushed to their daughter and those months of anguish in the waiting were washed away as they gazed upon their beautiful child.
Here are some thoughts from Annie:
"The waiting process was hard for us as we had been waiting to have our first baby for several years. We were discouraged when we were not chosen. Some days we felt we would never get matched, but still had a little hope that we would soon have our baby. Katie and our families supported us through each situation we presented ourselves to and gave us the strength to keep moving forward through each disappointment. At times, we felt like we wanted to give up but we kept moving on from each disappointment."
"Then, we were finally were matched with the baby we have always longed for. Our advice to families who are discouraged about waiting is to always have faith and hope that one day, they will get chosen. God has a plan for everyone at different times and we just had to wait a bit longer to get our little miracle. As discouraging as it was waiting for several years to have a baby and several months to get matched, we feel so blessed and are absolutely thrilled about having our family complete."
"Katie was wonderful to work with during our adoption journey. She always supported us during the high and low times of the process and gave us hope that we would soon be matched with our baby. She has great knowledge of adoption and offered us prayers throughout our journey. She also gave us several referrals from agencies and told us about one particular law firm that she felt would be great for us. We soon were matched with our baby girl from this law firm and couldn't thank Katie enough for referring us to them. We feel incredibly blessed we were able to work with Katie during our adoption journey and now have our beautiful baby girl as a part of our family."
I am so grateful to have watched God work in this family's adoption story. Seeing their discouragement turn into incredible joy has been so beautiful! Jason and Annie stayed by their daughter's side through the long hard waiting of a NICU stay and just recently were able to come home as a family of three. God's ways and His timing are mysterious, but He is always up to good!
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