Forever Families Friday

I’m still having trouble with the Forever Families Friday button, so click here to visit the Weaving Families blog.

Several people have asked about Weaving Families over the last couple of weeks. You can click here to visit their website and learn more about this awesome ministry.

Alright….this week’s question is:
How did you choose your adoption path (domestic, foster care, or international)?

For us, choosing to grow our family through domestic or international adoption was never even a question. When we decided to adopt, that raw, gaping wound of infertility was still wide open. We knew that we could not go through a domestic adoption for several reasons, but mostly because we were afraid of being chosen by a birthmother and then having her change her mind at the last minute or worse (for us), after the child was born. We decided almost immediately that we would adopt internationally.

Deciding to adopt was easy. I had always wanted to adopt and even though infertility threw a huge kink in our plans, we knew that us having biological children was not in His plans, so we moved on quickly even with the pain of infertility still lingering. Once we ruled out domestic adoption , we started researching every country that had an international adoption program. Choosing the country was the hardest part for us because we each felt strongly about different countries and could not agree at all.

I had always wanted to adopt from Cambodia or China. I’ve felt a connection to Cambodia for probably the last 15 years or so even though I have never visited that country, but adoptions from there had been closed to Americans for years and we didn’t meet the age requirement for China, so both of those were out. For a while I thought Ukraine was “it”, but Danny didn’t feel the same. We bounced around from country to country and only ruled Russia, Kaz and all countries in Africa. And we ruled out Guatemala pretty quickly, too. Danny is the one that was brought back to Guatemala and by the time he let me know that he really felt we should adopt from there, I was tired of researching and getting nowhere new and tired of thinking about it. I really wanted to move on and Guatemala did refer infants, which we wanted for our first, so I said okay. Honestly, there was no “this is it” or “we’ve been called to Guatemala” feelings for me for a while after we made the decision. I knew we had been called to adopt, but from where, I was still not convinced. I was very excited about adopting from Guatemala, but I felt no connection to the country whatsoever. A couple of months into our paper chase, when I was reading every thing about Guatemala that I could get my hands on, is when that changed. Every thing “clicked” in an instant and there was never another doubt that our first child would be born in Guatemala. Obviously since then lots of things have changed and now I can’t imagine the time that Guatemala wasn’t this huge part of my life. Thinking back to the time when I never even considered Guatemala seems like another person’s life.

We are starting our second (international) adoption soon. We have narrowed the long list of possible countries down to 2 and both are in the same part of the world. I began feeling convicted about this area while still fostering in Guatemala, but it was not until recently that both of us reached the same place of knowing that this is where we are being led.

Sadly, Cambodia is still closed to Americans, but we are hopeful that they will one day re-open at which time we will gladly start the paper chase….again. :)