Keep Calm and Press On: The Adoption Adventure

This happens to be my motto as of late. I don’t know why, but I’ve been feeling super overwhelmed and frazzled the past few weeks. The adoption process and U R My Sunshine fundraiser is slowly taking flight. I have my days where I shed a few tears as I’m overcome with discouragement. I’m soooo human, right? Regardless of my faith and serving a SUPER BIG God, I allow my human nature to get the best of me at times.

I have been blessed as of late to be put in contact with a family in Oklahoma who is going through the adoption journey. Thank you, Becky Rhoades, for this introduction. The Gobbles are actually getting ready for their journey to end. How exciting!!! Their blog is private due to the international adoption and at their agencies request; however, I have felt extremely encouraged reading through their blog entries and seeing all that they have done to raise their finances. I’m currently in strategizing mode — trying to think of ways to raise whatever I can. Every single dollar counts. We know that we’ll have to finance some of the expense; however, we hope to minimize that due to the IVF payments we’re still making. Many of you might wonder why we don’t just wait. Well, If we could, we certainly would. We’re no spring chickens {smile} and there are age restrictions. Bethany’s age cap is 45. My hubby just turned 43. So, we are on a timeline. We hope to complete the paperwork and process by the new year. We’ll then have our profile go live for the birthparents to view. A match can take anywhere from 6 months to a year for a domestic adoption (would be 4 years if we were strict on wanting a healthy white caucasion baby). It’s a lot to digest, that’s all I can say.

Steve and I sat down to start the formal application last night. WOW! Lots and lots of information that we need to provide and even look into. I will keep you updated as we move through our ‘Next Steps’ check list.

In the meantime, I would ask that you continue to pray with us for the financing, a perfect peace and a smooth application process. If any of you would be interested in being a part of my strategizing or helping remotely, please let me know. Thank you, once again! Be blessed.