Current Financial Goal: We are praying for $3, 563 by Sunday, August 19th to be able to pay our second Agency Fee. Praise God that because of several generous donors, we are currently only $745 away from that goal! In addition to the Agency Fee, we are expecting several out-of-pocket costs during our Home Study phase in the next few months that will cost around $2,000 +
(this amount is included in our overall goal of $35,000)
Check out our fundraiser here:
https://adopttogether.org/families/?fundraiser=linkfamilyadoption
(or you can give directly to us to avoid a 5% deduction taken from our fundraiser by our PureCharity account)
Current Prayer Request: We have our first Home Study home visit this Wednesday, July 18th! We are very excited to begin this 10-12 week process. Please pray along with us for this first visit and for all the subsequent paperwork we have ahead!
s Heart
I gripped tightly to the pen, and with my journal laid there as open as my vulnerable heart, I spewed words on the page as giant tears splashed beside each verse of my poetry. I pressed through all the suffocating emotions, and with grace for my tired heart, I allotted myself the space to sit and soak in all the ugly feelings. I had one task at hand- to ask my loving Father why. And to beg, with a trembling heart that He please remove the bitterness welling up within me.
“God, change my perspective. Breathe hope into me again.”
“I never meant you any harm. I wasn’t trying to mess with your heart, either.”
It was the week before Mother’s Day. I had a new excitement stirring within me as we had just taken recent steps toward the Adoption decision. We were still praying and waiting and discussing things, but it was only a matter of time when I just knew that we would submit our application for the Adoption Agency and move forward with great faith toward this new adventure of adopting our child!
Cue the screeching brakes.
The first week of May rolls in, and things are busy, busy with a 30th Birthday for Steven to plan and prep for. It’s getting later in the week when I realize that a little something that was supposed to start that week had not. Without going into further detail, let’s just say that in all the years of my blessed womanhood, my body has never missed a beat. She has functioned like clock work, and praise be, I have never had to wonder or worry if I’d be getting a visit each month- tried and true she has come, and entirely more punctual than I could ever hope to be! All of that to say, I had reason to believe for the first time in my life that week that I could actually be expecting. Day by day, hope was rising higher and higher in me, while simultaneously doubt and fear of disappointment hovered nearby. Steven was conveniently out of town the next week, and while my heart was building promise within, I began to dream of what this could mean. Soon enough, I was convinced that I was growing a life in my womb. In an effort to defer my hope and too, to be certain of the clearest possible answer, I waited to take a test.
Well. I waited long enough to have my answer biologically revealed to me before a plastic stick could ever rub it in first. My body had betrayed me that bleak and barren morning, and I fell to my face on the bed as salty streams of confusion, frustration, bitterness, and grief soaked my pillow.
And to top it all off, like a taunting voice, I remembered that Mother’s Day was just two days away. I couldn’t even bear it. The thought made me physically ill, and I fell numb for the remainder of the morning.
No need for the beautiful new dress I had let myself buy earlier that week as a celebratory token of what Sunday might mean for me. Nothing but crushed dreams resounded in my mind, and the idea of celebrating this holiday just hours after my heart was broken felt entirely cruel and impossible.
But the sweet whisper of my Lord met me in the pain and confusion that afternoon. He spoke something over me that I truly believe to be a promise for me and Steven’s future:
"I just wanted you to see that you can get pregnant. And in my perfect timing I will open your womb."
In that bittersweet moment, He simultaneously changed my perspective on the painful circumstances at hand and was also confirming the steps of obedience we were taking toward Adoption. With child-like faith, I just decided to believe what He said to me. And that’s when gentle peace swept over me, erasing the anger and bitterness that I had been enveloped in moments earlier.
One of my brothers and his wife shared these words with me several years ago as they had faced difficulty in becoming pregnant in the very beginning of their journey of starting a family. There was a wise gentleman in their church that spoke these words over them:
“God closes wombs for His glory, and He opens wombs for His glory.”
These words have become a personal mantra for my own journey through “Infertility.” I do not choose to use that word for our story because God has shown me time and time again that He is all powerful, in control, and nothing is impossible for His Healing hand! I choose to believe, through what has been revealed to me through that man’s words as well as the multiple accounts of barren women in the Bible, and stories of women in my own life, that God does indeed open and close wombs. And might I add- always for His glory.
I sat poised for battle with my pen and paper that afternoon, and let my words express their fullest extent of grief and longing, pain and suffering… and yet at the end of it all, with a prayerful spirit, I found a peace and hope that in time He would resurrect the joy in me for Adoption, and we would move forward when readied for the arduous journey ahead.
And it didn’t take long to heal. I found excitement once again in the calling he had placed in my heart, and Steven and I both felt ready to move ahead with fresh faith for the adventure He was setting before us. Regardless of the unknowns, and with no condition as to whether we ever get pregnant or not. This calling was meant to be met with trust and obedience, no matter the outcome.
And on that steady, non-demanding afternoon of Sunday, May 13th I rested and retreated, giving myself the needed space for emotions to come as needed. And as a symbol for myself, and as a gift to my bravery- I bought myself a cactus plant for Mother’s Day. Representative of the maternal love that can endure much suffering, I now cling to it and enjoy its daily reminder of strength and promise in my home.
(See last post for the full story on the “Cactus Blossom” meaning :) )
A Mother’s Day Poem
For the one with her arms full,
my heart rejoices for you
For the one who has experienced loss,
my heart goes out to you
For the one who is waiting, and hoping and praying,
my heart is right there with you, too
Whoever you are, and whatever your circumstances may be,
Happy Mother’s Day
to the ones who raised us
to the ones who are in the middle of the crazy,
and to the ones who are patiently waiting
I won’t pretend to know your journey
that brought you to where you are
Wherever you fall on this spectrum in life,
May we all praise God for His glorious Grace
The grace to face what we have been called to right now
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