This is Part Two of a series on Adoption called Everything I Want You to Know About Adoption. To see the links to each individual post in this series, click the “adoption” tab on the nav bar at the top of the blog, or click here.
“I should be hearing the bells, not the crickets, right God? I mean, YOU are the one who gifted me to write, and YOU are the one who put a passion for it in my heart. All I want to do is fulfill the calling YOU have on my life…”
chirp….chirp…chirp….chirpNutty: How normal people might be describing me at this very moment.
Back to the crickets, which I totally assumed would be bells. In my car, I was mentally planning for Fallpalloza 2007—which included, as far as I could tell, working out at a gym and massive amounts of kid-free writing time. But I was missing it. I was missing God’s plan for Fall 2007.
Adoption—as in, additional child/children.
No more fantasizing about gym memberships, my prayers over the next few days intensified as I gently pursued various adoption avenues. Emphasis on gently.
First, I thought it might be a good idea to run this adoption thing past the man who would be the baby’s father and sole financial provider. I thought dinner at a great restaurant would be a perfect opportunity for this discussion.
Apparently, God had not yet spoken to Jon about said adoption, because I recall it going something like this:
Me: I’ve been thinking, maybe, about us adopting another baby, maybe.
Jon: *laughing*
Me: No, seriously.
Jon: No.
Me: Don’t you even want to a little bit?
Jon: Maybe about 1% of me wants that. Excuse me, Miss, could I have a refill on tea?
Next, I left a message with Glenda, the adoption coordinator we used with Elijah’s adoption. “Glenda? Hey, it’s Sandy. We are thinking about adopting another baby. Call me.”
No return call.
Um, God?
chirp…chirp…chirp…chirp
More praying. More seeking.
Then, a few days later while I was on the elliptical machine in our basement (as opposed to the one AT METRO FITNESS!) flipping through the TV channels, I decided to go past every show I would normally watch, and stop on TLC’s Adoption Stories.
FYI, I don’t know if that show is even on any longer. I’m not really a fan of the show, because the previews always include some scary, sensationalized teaser. Prior to that day, I had never, ever watched an actual episode of Adoption Stories. And I haven’t watched one since.
The featured family on the show that day was a couple from Tenessee adopting from Guatemala. About 5-minutes into the show, seeing all the little Guatemalan children without parents, the orphanages, the poverty, the NEED…oh my, all I heard were bells.
Little did I know, all of that was God’s way of preparing me for this very moment. On my elliptical. Watching Adoption Stories.
I stumbled onto the floor, grabbed a box of Puffs and sat cross-legged in front of the TV. I was a snotty, sobbing mess. And I was realizing right there on my basement floor that God was asking us to adopt a baby from Guatemala.
We have so much to give a child in need.
That night, I sat on my bed with my husband—hand-in-hand, eyeball to eyeball—and I described what I saw and felt when I watched television that day. Once again, I was a snotty, sobbing mess as I described to Jon the unmistakable tug on my heart to adopt a Guatemalan child. Jon was also touched by the need in Guatemala. But he was still not convinced we were supposed to adopt a baby.
This is the part of this story where I get very real with you. I understood his hesitation. It was valid. I wasn’t on board yet either. That amount of money would require significant sacrifice for our family and would totally derail our financial plans. I didn’t really want to sacrifice that big.
It wasn’t just about the money, though. I wasn’t feeling all warm and fuzzy about taking on the responsibilities of another baby. For me, it would mean going back to diapers and bottles and nap schedules and sleep deprivation. Gating off the staircases and locking the cabinets.
No gym membership. No 35-hours a week of kid-free writing time.
Spending the next 18 years raising another child. Spending the rest of my life as the mother of another child.
I was very conflicted. Obeying God was going to be very hard for me. If God wanted us to do this, I was not the person to convince my husband. I needed God to convince me, too.
About 10 days later, I found my husband at our desk. The file cabinet was open and piles of financial information was sprawled out all over the floor. I asked him, “What are you doing?”
He looked up, smiled at me and said, “I think we can do it.”
“Do what?”
“Adopt a baby.”
There’s more to this story, obviously. Come back Wednesday to hear it.
i love to hear this story. xo