A New Path

In his heart a man plans his course, but the LORD determines his steps.

Proverbs 16:9

When I think about it, I realize that adoption was always on my heart -- for other people at least. It wasn't until a rather traumatic third pregnancy and post delivery, and two miscarriages later that adoption was beginning to look very special to me personally.

In the end, I did get pregnant again and we had another beautiful, healthy baby girl. Yet, even in those early days the thought of adopting someday was in the back of my mind and tucked away into a neat corner of my heart. The fear of never having another child although a distant memory, never fully went away. We were blessed, we were busy, and yet something was missing.

I knew another pregnancy was out of the question, but my heart ached for another child. Despite the busyness of our lives, I found myself studying adoption blogs on the internet. Reading about children in need of a forever family. Falling in love with photos of sweet children who would love to have a family to call their own.

For awhile, I knew that the Engineer felt it was not an option, but shortly before Christmas he said to me one evening after I had finished pouring over an adoption blog, that it was time to consider adoption. I was shocked, surprised, excited, overwhelmed. God had a plan for us! A new course for us to be taking.

When it came down to the wire though, I balked. Here I had spent many hours thinking about what it would be like to welcome a Little One who was not our flesh and blood into our home, and knew that it could/would be a good thing, but when it came down to actually taking the first step, I was having cold feet. I prayed and waited and prayed and waited. After a few weeks, I began to research, and asking the Lord that if this direction was not from him, but simply from our hearts to close the doors quickly and hard.

For the first little bit, it was going to be my job to find out about countries, agencies, fees, etc. It was also going to be my job to make the phone calls to start us on this new path in our lives.

Today was the first big step. I called a specific agency because after much prayer and talking, we see God leading us to the Philippines. We already sponsor two Compassion children in the Philippines and our church sponsors missionaries who work there so it seems only natural to go with a country where we feel a connection.

The agency will be happy to have us, but first we need a social worker. I will sit on our decision for another week, and then find ourselves a social worker.

~Adoption Creed~

Not flesh of my flesh

nor bone of my bone,

but still miraculously my own.

Never forget for a single minute,

that you grew not under my heart,

but in it.

Author Unknown