All Craziness Breaks Loose - Adoption Part 3

Not long after sending our email out to our friends and family, my mom asks me if she can put a flier up at her work. Sure!!! So I make a one page flier in black and white with our family photo and the link to our adoption profile. Then I think nothing of it.

A week or so went by and my mom calls me again. Someone at her work knows someone who's pregnant with a boy due in November. My mom doesn't know what she's going to choose, but made a copy of our flier for her coworker to show her friend.

After that call I felt hopeful again. I decided right then and there to kneel down and thank Heavenly Father. I thanked Him just for the possibility, even if nothing else happened. I still hoped we would be contacted, but later learned this young woman wanted to parent her baby.

In July, I also started to worry about money and where would we get the money we needed to adopt again.

I became very concerned when Ron got sick at scout camp and we couldn't spend the money on his medical care and still have enough money for our adoption. We didn't even have enough money saved as it was! Fortunately we talked with some family members who suggested we go to our bishop about it. Two months later the medical bills were taken care of either by our insurance or the church insurance. What a blessing!

Around this same time we also had this experience. That was a new one for us. This adoption journey was undeniably different. It was testing in so many ways. I never expected to say no to a baby, but we did. We wanted a baby and yet the spirit was telling us "no, not this one." Wow, are we thankful we listened! We don't know what would have happened, but we're glad we didn't have to find out. We moved forward with renewed faith that He was helping us in unexpected ways. The big question for me was, do I need to keep looking for our baby like last time, or is a situation going to fall into our laps? Faith without works is dead, but how much work did I need to do?

Then, another situation came up. Some of our friends had a relative who was pregnant with a boy due in November. Whoa. Another boy due in November! I seriously hoped we could adopt again by the end of the year.

By September we had applied at Heart and Soul. I told Ron I didn't think they'd find our baby, but I felt really good sending our application there anyway. It felt like we were doing something.

I had no idea just how important it was that we applied there. Later, we would find out.

October came and our friends told us their relative went to an adoption agency. It was unlikely we'd be matched. We had also heard about a baby girl already born and we emailed the caseworker to show our profile. Three LONG weeks later, we found out she was matched with another family. We hadn't even been considered because of our location.

The first week of November is when things really got crazy for us. We started networking with more adoption professionals besides Heart and Soul and LDSFS. We contacted a caseworker and had our profile shown to an expectant mother due Jan 7th with an unknown gender. A week later the expectant mother called her caseworker crying because she lost her baby. The following Friday the caseworker calls us because she has no families for another "birthmom who is in labor right now! The birthmom is 90% sure it's a boy!" We tell her she can show our profile and she tells us we are basically the only family. She thinks she may only have one other family. That night we excitedly pull all our baby boy stuff out of the crawl space to go thru it. We also throw together a few clothes for us (just in case she picks us and we have to get to California ASAP). The next day was the November Adoption Celebration at Boondocks and we headed out the door; still hoping to hear from the caseworker. We have fun, but at the same time we're wondering what's going on at the hospital and why hasn't the caseworker called us? This whole time I didn't feel like this situation was going to work out for us, but Ron was excited and his excitement rubbed off on me. After a whole day of wondering and waiting and trying to contact the caseworker, I went to bed exhausted. Ron emailed the caseworker late that night and found out the birthmother had a baby girl and had chosen another family. The caseworker had somehow come up with several more profiles to show her and she chose another couple. Then Monday the caseworker called me again. She said the hospital had messed up on some paperwork and when the birthmother had to go back there she decided to let her mother raise her baby instead.

Other situations came up too and other families were chosen. It was frustrating and stressful. It was also crazy to get this fortune. We started feeling like our adoption was going to happen. We just didn't know how. We wanted it to happen soon, but would it happen by the end of the year like we hoped?

Adoption part 4 coming soon...