We are currently in the fundraising process for our adoption. ( As mentioned in our last post.) Lately, we have been filling out grant forms, collecting documents that the grant managers wish to see etc. So far, we have applied to two grants that are from faith based organizations and they wanted to hear our "adoption testimony". So, we thought maybe you would too!

Adoption Testimony Part One

We feel called to be parents and give children a loving home. At one time, we thought that would happen through getting pregnant and over the course of a grueling and expensive infertility process, we discovered that that would be medically next to impossible for us.

We were somewhat open to adoption, but Jeanette had some conflicting emotions about that.  Jeanette was wrestling with the idea of never being pregnant and not having that experience. Jeanette wished to pursue Assisted Reproductive Techniques, and Bill was willing, but also more interested in adoption. Jeanette was also really wrestling emotionally with the whole process and felt like she could not adopt if it were only to ease her emotional pain or meet her own needs. She only wanted to adopt if it were for the sake of the children who needed a home.

So, for two years, most of our “infertility energy” was spent on trying to get medical help for our issues. One procedure in particular was only done in  New York City and cost about 35,000.00  Jeanette had been the one making all the calls and appointments up to this point and this particular appointment  was now just another item on her lenghty to do list.

However, we had invested some time and energy in adoption “work” as well. We had met with couples who had adopted and gone to seminars etc and had sort of begun putting feelers out in that realm, including looking on adoption websites for waiting children.

God was slowly beginning to heal Jeanette and one day in prayer she asked God if he would just show her if there were children “out there” in the world for them. That afternoon, Jeanette started getting matches for a lot of children and put maybe 100 in her profile. But, she didn’t really do anything about any of them. She wanted to finish the medical stuff first before pursing adoption full time.  Two little girls in particular stood out to her that day, and they were on her mind a lot, but she didn’t do anything other than put them in her profile. 

 In the meantime, Bill continued making connections with couples who had already adopted, looked into resources for adopted children and just in general kept waiting and praying for Jeanette to heal in hopes she would be willing to pursue adoption full time......