Christian Adoption

Christian adoption: sometimes things don't go as you hope and plan.

Christmas day, 1987.

My wife, Deb, was just over two months pregnant with our first child.

About mid-morning, Deb began having some pain in her abdomen. Over the next couple hours the pain intensified.

I felt bad making the call on Christmas day, but I called the doctor anyway. I explained to him the situation and the symptoms. He was gracious and felt very bad. But he told me that Deb was having a miscarriage.

By mid-afternoon, all our hopes and dreams lay lifeless in the bottom of a plastic cup sitting on the edge of the bathroom sink.

A second miscarriage followed several months later.

Then nothing. Nothing for years.

Soon after the second miscarriage our doctor recommend we see an infertility specialist. The specialist proposed a very prolonged plan of action.

First came several months of basal body temperature taking. Then the tests and experiments started.

Shots. Surgery. Tests. More surgery.

Still nothing.

After enduring three years of tests and experiments, our doctor sat us down for a talk. He said that it would be appropriate to assume that we would never have biological children. Christian adoption would be our only alternative.

We were stunned. We were so shocked we couldn't even cry.

How could it all end this way? Wasn't there anything that could be done?

No – there was nothing that could be done.

Christian Adoption: Our Only Option

Infertility treatments didn't help us. So we moved on to Christian adoption. It wasn't something we did lightly – we thought long and hard about whether or not to adopt. But in the end, we desperately wanted children, and adoption was our only alternative.

Christian Adoption: the Process

Adoption is not an easy or quick process. It takes a great deal of time and effort. But a good adoption agency will walk you through each step.

We adopted in the state of Illinois. There, before we could adopt we had to qualify as foster parents. That's because for the first year the baby was technically considered a foster child. The adoption wasn't permanent until a judge ruled it so about a year after placement.

We then had to complete a profile for birth mothers to review. Included in the profile was a letter we had to write to the potential birth mother. She then would be given several profiles from which she could choose.

In our case, we met the birth mother once before the birth. Then, when the baby was born we went to the hospital and visited the birth mother again. It was then that we first held our little girl in our arms. A day later, with tears streaming down her cheeks, the birth mother handed the precious girl to us.

But the process was not without it's challenges.

• The paperwork seemed endless.
• Case workers had to do multiple visits to our home.
• We had an adoption fall through. We met the birth parents. Then we waited for the little boy to be born. When the baby was born, we were told that we would get a phone call from the birth mother inviting us to come up to the hospital. We knew exactly the time when the call would come. But when we answered the phone, the voice we heard was our case worker and not the birth mother. She explained that the birth mother decided to keep the baby. This was excruciatingly painful.

Christian Adoption Conclusion

Though the process was long, expensive, and difficult, we wouldn't change anything. In the end we were gifted with a beautiful baby girl. We are grateful to God for the wonderful blessing of adoption.

See our list of Christian adoption agencies.