Making Room

So, we have this room.  It's called the "Baby Room" because frankly there's no better name for it, although it has had several names...

When we moved to our house, we were pregnant with Sam, our second child.  The baby room was always envisioned as a nursery, and that is what it became: "The Nursery."  It quickly filled up with all the baby things, (even though he was our second child and we were "wiser" and knew not to get the pee pee tee pee).  Then, Sam was born and it quickly became "Sam's Room," complete with his name on the wall.

When Sam was 10 months old, I got pregnant with Hannah.  We didn't know what we were going to do with Sam...he was nowhere near ready to for a big boy bed, and probably not ready to sleep in big brother's room.  (Ok, let's face it, he had only recently started sleeping in his crib.)  So the baby room was on hold until we figured it all out.  It was called "The Baby's room" because we didn't have a name for her.

Then, almost four years ago, we lost Hannah and the room became "Sam's room" again.  Those four years brought us two more losses, and two more hopes for the "The Baby's room."  Each time, we would set it up to get ready for baby, only to clear it all back out again.  At some point in all that turmoil, Sam grew up and was ready for a big boy bed.  So, Sam is now sleeping in a bunk bed in Noah's room.  It was not an easy transition, but we thought at the time it was necessary, and I'm happy to say that they are now both very happy with the situation (except for when they're cleaning their room!)

So what has become of the Baby Room??  Nothing.  I tried to think of a creative way to use the space, but I could never get it together.  Maybe because the room is too small to be a gym.  Or maybe because it's too far out of the way to be a toy room, or a game room, or an art room.  But maybe because I am too hopeful that one day a baby will sleep in that room again.  For awhile, we called it the Extra Room, but I felt like I was kidding myself.

When we got the news in December that our baby girl might be coming home to us, I rushed frantically to get the Baby Room ready.  We bought second-hand furniture, and a ton of used baby gear was donated generously to us.  The shelves got filled with (very organized) pink clothes.  Even the rocker was set up in hopes that it would be used soon.

We waited for news every day to find out when she would come home.  Months passed, but news never came.

It's a very hard thing to hold your breath for such a long time.  Time dragged on, and at some point in February, when it became clear that the state of Rhode Island was going to stand in our way, we decided not to wait any longer.  You may judge us for backing away from a child without a home, but trust me when I say I did everything in my power to hold onto hope.  But while we were holding out hope for one particular child, we weren't able to open our hearts and minds to anyone else.  We just needed to be able to move on, with our hearts open to the child God would give us.  We literally needed ROOM in our hearts.

So now we're back to waiting for an unknown child, which feels very much like waiting for a known child except you don't have a name or a sense of urgency.  It has been almost seven months since we began this process, so it feels very much like a paper pregnancy.  Our agency has been great about getting us prepared for every possible disappointment, and prepared for a long wait.  They suggested that at this point we should set up an online profile on their website.  You can find it at:

https://waitingfamilies.bethany.org/massachusetts/mike-and-davina

We are encouraging our friends to share the above link to our profile on social media, in the hopes that an expecting mom or dad that is interested in placing their child for adoption might see it and get the counseling they need to make such a monumental decision.  Our agency, Bethany Christian Services, is nation-wide. Clicking "Inquire About This Family" on the profile page will direct them to a pregnancy counselor in their area.  (Please cut and paste, and share JUST THE LINK and not this whole blog post.  We have to be careful who we share our last name with.)

In the meantime, we fill our days and count our blessings.  Some days are exciting and fun (like camping trips, snowmobiling and basketball tournaments).  Some are not so fun, and downright mundane.  On those quieter days I catch myself wondering if this is all worth it.  Second-guessing God's plans for our family.  But then I stop and think about my girls in Heaven, and I think about the little girl who almost came home to us, and I remember that it's not our plans.  Not our timing.  And one day, I have faith, we will be looking at our baby in our arms and we'll just know.

It was worth it.

Holiday Reflections- Finding Peace in the Waiting

So, I guess pretty much nothing is new.

A few weeks ago, we got approval from the licensing agency to go ahead without our fingerprints, so we are technically "homestudy approved."  This was great news because it meant we can accept a baby into our home at any time!  Then, we got our actual fingerprints in last week.  Good news- we're not criminals!!  We are now considered Paper Pregnant- which is a cute way of saying we're officially in waiting mode.

The problem with the home study process going as fast as humanly possible (with the exception of the darn fingerprints), is that the waiting after seems comparatively slooooooow.  And incredibly quiet.  EVERYTHING is now out of our control.

There's a lot of excitement when you tell people you're Paper Pregnant, and it's welcome excitement. We've been very vocal about the process, and we've loved all the questions and prayers and well-wishes.  But for some reason I haven't been entirely into it.

Maybe it's because being Paper Pregnant is not a whole lot like being Pregnant Pregnant.

For the last few years, I've been pregnant all winter.  It just happens that way.  I get healthy over the summer, I get pregnant in the fall, and then I'm pregnant through the holidays and into the new year.  And then, just when I start to feel those tell-tale flutter kicks, just when I start to believe THIS TIME it's going to work out, it's over.  I've taken great precautions to make sure we don't accidentally get pregnant, but there's still something about this time of year that makes the muscle memory of my body wake up and ask- "are we doing this again?"

So I'd be lying if I didn't admit there was a longing...a visceral, maternal yearning to carry life inside me.  Or at least in my arms.  As the days get shorter and the temperature drops, all I want to do is sit on the couch in front of the fireplace, and maybe dream a little of having a baby by Christmas.  A little Christmas miracle to make the heartache worth it.

Because I deserve it, right?

Then last week, we got news that that miracle might happen.  We had hope again.  To me, hope feels like a tingling excitement that almost overwhelms me, and makes me cry in joy and in sadness.  But we couldn't fully enjoy it. Because of the situation, we had to guard our hearts and anticipate the worst.  I can't share what happened, but it is a time sensitive situation, and as the days tick by it looks like our Christmas miracle is not going to happen.

So now we're back to waiting.

There's something about the holidays approaching that makes us all stop and take stock of the year.  To look back on the months, and tick them off one by one...labeling them with the emotions they carried:

January- excitement; hope
February- devastation
March- frustration; depression
April- anger
May & June- healing; restoration; peace
July & August- discernment
September & October- excitement
November- excitement; frustration
December... Meh
(You know how "meh" feels...  It's partway between yeah and nah.  Not uncaring, but also not excited.)

Maybe because I've been waiting for so long, waiting seems like a normal state of being.  Another year has elapsed and here we are, still waiting to complete our family.  Like the end of the year is some unfulfilled deadline.

And my Facebook news feed seems filled with pregnancy announcements, new baby pictures, happy endings and messages of promises fulfilled.  #miracleshappen

So when is it going to be my turn?

If we're honest with ourselves, we're all waiting for something.  To be loved by someone special.  A home.  Understanding.  A job.  Physical and emotional healing.  There's always something.

Advent is the period of time between Thanksgiving and Christmas.  It is meant to be a time of reflection, anticipation and waiting.  But it's not meant to be that same anxious waiting.  It's joyful anticipation.  And so at this time of year, we feel the waiting even more acutely, in contrast to the coming Joy.

There's an irony to all this emotion caused by Christmas and I don't think that's an accident.

At Christmas, we celebrate the gift of hope found in a baby- the baby Jesus.  Every time I think about this story, I am bowled over.  Every. Time.  Knowing God came to earth to be with His people, to live alongside us in our joys and in our pain, to experience His world through our eyes... and he did all this so we could know Him and trust Him and feel His love, even when things don't work out the way we had planned.

So that even with all the waiting, the disappointment, the trying and failing, I still can still have room for hope.

"I trust in, relied on, and was confident in You, O Lord; I said, You are my God.  My times are in Your hands..."  Psalm 31:14-15.

May you find peace in your waiting.

And may your Christmas be joyful.

Failed Matches and Roller Coaster Rides: A Love Story?

I'm sorry I haven't published anything in awhile.

Part of that is because I wrote a piece after the yard sale about where we were in the process, and it got picked up before I could publish it myself.  It will be published by an adoption consulting company just before Thanksgiving as part of an Adoption Month awareness campaign.  (You can read all the guest blogs here.) Really, it's not a big deal, but I had to promise not to share it with you all until it was published there!

Then, it was kind of hard to do any writing, because we have been on a roller coaster ride.  Not a literal ride, but a metaphoric roller coaster that has kept our hearts outside our chests, and had us on our knees pretty much 24/7 for two weeks.

What happened?  

About a month ago (before our home study was done), our social worker told us that she was meeting with an expectant mom that would "be a great match" but since it was a "long shot" she would recommend we keep our hearts guarded.  We rushed overnight to put together an electronic mini-profile of sorts to have something to show her, knowing we would be "competing" against other couples with prepared books and their home studies completed.  But we wanted our social worker to have it if and when she saw the expectant mom.  After a week or so came and went, and we heard nothing, we pretty much wrote off the possibility.

Then we found out she had picked us.  She wanted to meet us.

We found out a little bit more about her and the baby, and for her sake I'm not going to share that here.  It is safe to say, however, that this was a perfect match.

Unfortunately, as scared expecting mothers tend to do, this one then dropped off the face of the earth.  She cancelled not one, not two, but three meetings.  Our social worker warned us that she thought there was a good likelihood we'd never hear from her again.

Then last week, out of the blue, after finalizing our real profile book, we did.  A meeting was set for last week.  We got excited, but again, our social worker talked us back from the ledge.  She said things like...

"I think there's a real likelihood she will wind up parenting."

"Please don't get your hopes up."

"I may not know her well, but I know adoptions, and I think she's going to parent."

Despite all this, as you can imagine, there is always a piece of your heart that escapes the confines of reasonableness, and dares to hope.

In preparation for our meeting, Mike and I made a tie-fleece baby blanket to give her.  It was Winnie the Pooh theme and gender neutral, because we didn't know the gender.  I stayed up late the night before the meeting and made fall-colored M&M cookies.  (Because what pregnant woman doesn't like cookies?)

Then, the day of our meeting, she cancelled.

Now, I know what some of you are saying.  "How unfair!"  "She is totally manipulating you!"  And I don't disagree with you completely.  I felt manipulated, even though that wasn't her intention.  Quite simply, it wasn't fair to our hearts after everything we've been through.  And so I got pissy.  And I ATE THE COOKIES.  I washed them down with some wine, and put my tender self to bed.

The next day I put away my bitterness, and decided to pray for her instead.  My prayer was:

 "Lord, please help her to overcome her fear, and give her the wisdom she needs to be a great mom."

Three days later she had a baby girl.

And then she asked to meet with us again.

I won't drag this out any longer than it needs to be.  The long and short is that we met, but she had already decided to parent.  She was in the Hospital with her baby for two days, and fell in love with her.  She is an amazing young woman with a huge mountain ahead of her.  She has no resources, and very little support.  But her heart is clear and she knows she loves her daughter too much to let her go.

What I didn't tell her, was that I remember the pain of leaving the Hospital without my baby girls.  Being wheeled to the door to wait for the car, without the infant carrier on my lap.  That feeling of emptiness in my womb, and in my arms.  I wouldn't wish that on anyone.  And my heart just broke for her.

At the end of our meeting, after we gave her the blanket, she turned to me and tearfully said "I really like you guys. I'm so sorry I decided to keep my baby."

And I got it.  I didn't know maternal love until I had my first son, and I've been keenly aware of it ever since.  So in that moment, I understood her decision completely.

So, yeah.  Roller coaster.

You know that moment when the coaster goes over the top of the hill, and you feel your stomach come up to your chest, and your heart come up to your throat?  You know how it's scary and exciting and awesome and totally terrifying?  That's kind of how I've been feeling all the time...never knowing what is on the other side of the hill.  And that's been hard.

But you know what's even harder sometimes?  Love.

For one crazy day, I was able to slow down and love on another human being.  For no reason whatsoever.  For no personal gain, and in fact, anticipating the pain it would bring.

It's scary, and it's difficult.  But nothing good comes easy.

And it felt so good you guys.

Love is so, so good.

For the Love of One: the tale of an epic fundraiser

You know how there are times when you're like "why am I doing this???"  

I'm embarrassed to admit, last week was one of those times.  I was at home on Friday.  I had spent EVERY SINGLE NIGHT that week organizing and tagging everything in my garage and my basement to get ready for our EPIC yard sale fundraiser that weekend. I was starting to wonder if the boys even remembered who I was (other than being the crazy lady that puts stickers on things in the garage).

Mike and I had been picking up a generous amount of donated 'stuff' for the yard sale for the past month.  Lots of really nice 'stuff' that I was committed to honoring and selling.  But lots of 'stuff' means lots of work.

We have some experience holding benefit yard sales.  This yard sale would be our biggest yet, but I couldn't help reminding myself that our last multi-family benefit yard sale was also our biggest yet- and it netted just under $800.  That's not small change for us. I would have been VERY pleased with that number, so I just kept plugging away, hoping that we could get to at least $1,000.  That was my secret goal!

But even though I had a tremendous amount of help from some truly incredible people, by Friday I was tired.  I was burned out.  And then I got the mail, and found out Quest Diagnostics billed us over $600 to process our urine drug screens.

Pee.  They tested my pee.
And now we owe them $614.  

Of course, this is not covered by insurance because it is not medically necessary to have drug tests done.  But I was not prepared for the cost.  This was all part of our medical clearance required by our adoption agency as part of our home study, and honestly I thought our doctor's office had absorbed whatever expenses were associated with it.  They never charged us for our office visits, the forms they completed, or the TB test we were required to take. They were amazing!  But they didn't do the drug screen- they sent it to Quest.

So what else could I do but sit in my car and cry?

The only thought that went through my head (over and over and over) was that I was doing ALL THIS WORK and it was going to pay for a pee test!!!

After my pity party was over, I realized I was loosing sight of the forest for the trees.  ALL I was seeing was the trees.  The hundreds of dollars were trees.  The hundreds of things in my garage were trees.  Even the yard sale itself was trees!  I needed to focus on the forest: our unknown child, and bringing him or her home to us!

Happy I got my priorities straight in time for the yard sale!

The end of this story is, of course, a happy one.  Our Yard Sale and t-shirt fundraiser was a HUGE success.  SO MANY PEOPLE showed up to support us.  Many gave some.  Some gave much.  But ALL gave readily of their time and effort and money.

My favorite quote of the weekend: "I don't want your crap, but here's a donation." (From a man who literally just opened his car window and handed us cash).

At the end of the day Saturday, after our 1pm end time came and went and there were still people coming...after our 4pm cutoff came and went and there were STILL people coming, we decided to have a second day.  And on Sunday after 4pm, when everything left went into the donation pile, we were sitting on top of t-shirt sales, yard sale profits and outright donations totaling over $4,000.

That's a lot of pee.

We're looking forward to getting our home study approval this week or next (God willing), and thanks to this fundraiser and our youcaring fund, we now have enough saved to pay our next agency fee!  I'm outright humbled with gratitude.

Adoption is not an "easy" road.  There are many difficult twists and turns, and the hard work of fundraising is only one of them!  We love that our community has gathered around us, and we very much appreciate your support.  We pledge that our adopted child will know that all this was done through the help of many, "for the LOVE of ONE."

Almost sold out of t-shirts!

 Please share our fundraiser (youcaring.com/owensadoption) on social media, and please continue to pray for our baby- whoever he or she may be!

So, are you getting a girl???

I can't even begin to tell you what's wrong with this question.


Ok, you know I love you, right?  But let's be real.  You don't "get" a baby when you're adopting.  If it were just that easy, I could whip out my checkbook and go to the barn and get one (like Noah suggested in my last post).

So let's put terminology aside and look at what you're really asking: can you choose gender when you're adopting an infant domestically?  The simple answer is yes, and it is called

GENDER PREFERENCE.

Much like you can choose the age of the child you're adopting, and the country you're adopting from, you can also choose the race and gender of the baby you want to welcome into your lives.  It makes sense.  But does it make you uncomfortable?  Do you know why?  I've been grappling with this from the get-go.

If we're being honest, as soon as I knew adoption was an option for us, I assumed I'd be adopting a girl.  I mean, having lost three baby girls in three years, my heart was really set (and re-set) on having a girl.  Each pregnancy, my friends would load me up with pink and purple, all of us secretly hoping this time I'd get to use it.  I've dreamed of brushing hair before school, and picking out matching outfits.  Teaching her to apply makeup, and crying with her on her wedding day.  I don't think anyone would fault me for wanting a girl. I think a majority of my friends assume that if we can, we are stating a female gender preference.  But, here's the shocker:

We're not.

While I would love to have a baby girl to call our princess, and FINALLY use all that pink and purple stuff in the basement, after long hours researching online and chatting in forums and praying about this issue, I decided I just didn't feel comfortable enough to do it.  What I didn't realize were the moral and practical complexities within this issue.  

I don't want to buy a baby.

To start with, did you know that baby girls are a hot commodity in the adoption world?  Because of this, many agencies charge a premium to "find" girl babies of $5,000 or more.  Now I don't know about you, but that just sounds like buying a baby to me.  Hitler-esque.  In his article, "Why Do Adoptive Parents Prefer Girls" John Gravois points out this distinct statistical anomaly inherent in adoption.

"Numbers vary, but it's pretty safe to say that somewhere between 70 percent and 90 percent of parents looking to adopt register some preference for a girl with an agency. It doesn't matter if they're adopting from China, where girls far outnumber boys; from Russia, where the numbers are about even; or from Cambodia, where there is typically a glut of orphan boys and a paucity of girls. Everywhere, demand tends to favor the feminine."  

Gravois and others have theorized that the reasoning for this could be because in most couples seeking to adopt, the driving force is female.  Most women looking to adopt are experiencing infertility struggles, and many have never had children.  Therefore, they seek to replicate themselves in some bizarre psychologically complex way.  I can understand wanting to parent a child that is a "known" versus one that is "unknown", but speaking from experience, I just don't think we ever know our children all that well!  I certainly don't think my husband anticipates my sons' antics any more than I do, just because he's male.

(I may roll my eyes more though.)

Another theory behind Gravois' statistics is that women think boys are just harder to parent.  This makes sense if you are new to the parenting scene and many of your friends have young children.  Probably you've been to the playground with them watching little Johnny shove a stick up his nose, while Lucy sits politely on a bench playing "tea" with a make-believe bunny.  I get it, and that may have been me to some extent or another at one point.  So, one might assume that I would agree with this theory.

Sure, I've had some difficulty with my boys' unruly behavior at times.  For example, here's what happened when I tried to take our awesome "we're adopting" announcement photo:

Yes, that is a superman cape.

Not to be outdone, Noah decided to contribute this lovely photo:

The red dye on his tongue may have contributed to the difficulty I was having.

People, I've rescued toothbrushes from toilets, had the "nice hands/use your words" talk more times than I can even imagine, and refereed arm-farting contests.  (Ok, and currently there are "curing" squirrel tails on top of my fridge because Noah has decided he likes taxidermy.)

I know from boys.

But in reality, what I've learned is that boys and girls (if you want to gender-categorize behavior) tend to trade off "difficult" behaviors throughout adolescence.  So if I'd had a girl hoping for a simple childhood, I might be sorely disappointed when 13 came around!!

And I also would have missed out on this.

Simple math.

Then, there's the reality of what gender selection would mean.

At least 50% of the expectant mothers that come to our agency seeking to place their unborn babies do not know gender.  Either it's too early, or they've elected not to know during ultrasounds because it's too difficult.  Or, they simply haven't had adequate prenatal care.  Either way, half of the possible "matches" out there are listed as "gender unknown".

(Huge point of clarification:

 If we state "girl" we will not be shown to "gender unknown" situations 

because they want to know we're a match from the get-go 

and they don't want us changing our minds a month or two later!)

Out of the other half (the "known gender" situations), you can assume 50% of them are male.  Which leaves us with only a 25% possibility of having a girl baby.  Narrow that down further by expectant mother preferences (for couples without any children, for African American couples, or same-sex couples) and we could be waiting a long LONG time for a baby.

So, are you getting a girl?

The answer is: Maybe!

Under gender preference, we've selected "Girl" or "Unknown". I certainly would love a little princess to add to our brood. There's a good likelihood we'll know before the baby is born.  But if I'm standing in the hospital room and our expectant mom gives birth to a baby boy, then he will be our son.

And I'll know exactly what to do with him!