A Continued Hope & Renewed Excitement!

We've had 2 very successful meetings with ANLC and I dare say we are finally at the point of commitment!  This is no small thing as it has taken us a VERY long time to get to this point.  So to be able to say with 99.9% confidence that we have found our liason towards bringing a baby home is freakin' amazing!  We've scheduled 1 more meeting with them to discuss the financing program and I believe that once that meeting is over, we'll have all we need to move forward.  The process is so easy it's ridiculous really.  The weeks to follow will be a whirlwind for sure.  Once we mail in the Application, pictures, and money (lol), then we're off to the races!  Their marketing team will spend approximately 2 weeks with us on creating 4 different web pages and our youtube videos.  During that time we'll also be able to jumpstart our homestudy (which will take about 6 weeks).  But the great news is, after the marketing portion is complete, we are officially on the web and are able to be matched with a birthmother immediately at that point.  So even though our homestudy is not yet complete, we are still marketable.  How great is that?!  So we could literally be matched with a birthmother as soon as mid-July (although the expected wait time is 4-6 months).  Either way, we are looking very seriously at bringing our baby home by Christmas.  Holy cow!!!

A Fresh Start

For those of you out there who have been faithful blog followers for the last 2 years (I'm floored when I think about all the time that has gone by since we officially started this process . . . and still no results), you may notice a small change.  As I was perusing the journal entries of yesteryear, I found myself a little discouraged by its content.  So I decided right then and there that it was time to clean up this blog . . . start preparing for a fresh start!  All the failed attempts and let-downs of the last 2 years have no place in this story anymore.  When I open this blog, I want to be ENCOURAGED by all the new and amazing things God is doing with us NOW and not be reminded of all the lost time and disappointments that came before.

Now, do NOT freak out!  Although I did delete approximately 50 posts from this blog . . . they are not lost forever.  I printed color copies of each entry/picture and created a little book entitled "Blessed Assurance: Our Adoption Story - Part 1 - The Foundation of our Journey."  Dated July 22, 2009 - April 1, 2010.

I just felt like it was time to let everything that came before go and start anew with fresh perspective and renewed hope.  So that's just what I've done.  I did keep a small handful of entries from what will now be affectionately referred to as "Part 1", so you'll see the dates skip around a bit.  But they seemed important in light of our story of how we started the process of adoption and have gotten to where we are now.  So, alas, they made the cut! :)

Our Adoption In Christ

A few weeks ago, our church brought in a guest pastor to speak on the topic of adoption - both wordly and spiritually.  We were in Raleigh at the time (for my sister's wedding) but a sweet friend forwarded the message to me in my absence.  I listened to it this morning and was on the verge of tears during the entire message.  He so clearly speaks to the motivation behind our adoption and why we feel we are so blessed to have been called to this ministry.  Please take the time to educate yourself on this amazing opportunity . . . perhaps your heart will be pierced as well and you'll be inspired to follow the biblical command of taking care of the orphans in this way just as we were.

Video Message: Our Adoption In Christ - Dr. Tony Merida

One Step Closer . . .

Okay, so after my last post about choosing the right agency to move forward with, we took a step back and re-evaluated some things.  We spent some time gathering information and reviewing all the details for each agency we have inquired about thus far and basically came to the decision that we didn't feel comfortable with any of them (a devastating blow at the time!).  So, once again, back to the Google search I went in hopes to find one glimmer of hope that I breezed over in my previous searches that would be relevant to us now.  Upon such efforts I stumbled upon a website for a company that offers legal adoption services nationwide called Adoption Network Law Center.  Immediately I read through the entire website and loved everything about it - but having never heard of it before, I was very cautious as to whether or not it was even legit.  But to our benefit, it turns out that it is a very reputable law center throughout the country and is highly successful at what they do.  Certainly a great start so far!  So I immediately contacted them via email for more information to which they quickly followed back up with a phone call.  We were pre-screened in that inital call and scheduled for a preliminary consultation with our designated adoption coordinator on June 8th (last night).  So we spent just over an hour going through the adoption process with them from beginning to end.  We reviewed all fees required and they were very thorough and comprehensive in their presentation to us.  In a nutshell, here are the details of pursuing adoption through ANLS:

• They spend over $1m annually on marketing to birthmothers nationwide thus resulting in over 300 newborn placements a year
• After working with our adoption coordinator to setup all marketing on our behalf (4 websites, YouTube video profiles, and brochures), the average wait time to be placed is within 4 months!
• The fees are fixed (minus certain things such as travel expenses) and regulated per state laws.  They also offer financing through their company so that money is not a reason why hopeful adoptive couples are unable to achieve their dream of starting a family.
• They offer a staff that is on call for both birthmothers and adoptive parents 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
• They require prospective birthmothers to undergo an extensive pre-screening process in order to rule out any "undesirable" candidates (such as those who are looking to take advantage of medical and or social leniancies during their pregnancy or others whose intentions are fraudulous - ie. never pregnant but looking to solicit money instead).
• Our part of the adoption process is completed in less than 3 months with very little paperwork involved.  Since they are a legal firm, not an adoption agency, they handle all the paperwork on our behalf.  We will submit two 7-8 page documents alone and that's it.  All our mktg is complete within the first 2 weeks, our homestudy is complete in 6-8 weeks, and then we wait for the phone call from our Adoption Coordinator saying we have a baby!
• ANLC represents the adoptive parents, NOT the birthmothers, which works well in our favor. 

From start to end, choosing ANLC will require more of us financially, but we have the assurance of knowing the process is legally binding and finalized according to state laws, we will be placed with a newborn in a matter of mere months rather than years, and we have a much larger pool of birthmothers to choose from (which would allow us to be more selective if we choose to) and still be placed within a reasonable amount of time.  Overall, we felt great about this "agency" and have scheduled a follow-up meeting in 2 weeks to move forward with the process.  Nothing is finalized yet, but we both feel equally comfortable about proceeding with ANLC, should we choose to continue down this path.

Note the caviat in that last statement . . . "should we choose to continue down this path."  I say this because it has recently come to my attention that my beloved husband would like to pursue embryo adoption as well.  This conversation came up very randomnly earlier this week and it was clear that Chris wanted to pursue this option just as much as ANLC.  In case you aren't familar with this type of adoption, allow me to explain.  When a couple goes through IVF, there are typically several embryos left over that requires the couple to either freeze them for future use or discard them (which, in essence, is a form of abortion as embryos are considered to be a human life form).  For those couples who are successful with IVF and choose not to use their remaining embryos, they have the option to donate them to an adoption agency instead.  For us, the adoptive parents, this will allow us to experience the best of both worlds - adoption AND pregnancy.  Per my research, there is only 1 agency in NC that offers embryo adoption, however, we were very pleasantly surprised to find out that our very own team of infertility doctors and nurses at CMC Womens Institute also offers this program as well!!!!  OBVIOUSLY there are some great results from that!  Having been with this team for 3 years now, they are fully aware of our medical history and are invested in us personally. Not to mention that it will potentially be covered by our medical insurance.  Additionally, the adoptive parents are in control over choosing the birthparent couple based on profiles presented to us that we can thumb through and choose appropriately per our standards.  Because this program is offered as a service through a medical facility, it cuts out the middle man of an adoption agency, therefore also cutting down significantly on expenses and time.  And last but not least, in the state of NC, all children born are legally bound to their birthmother (ie, the woman who delivered them in the hospital), which, in this case would be me; therefore, there is no wasted time or money after the baby is born on finalizing the adoption b/c the baby is legally recognized as our "biological child" upon delivery.  So it definitely sounds like a good opportunity to pursue as well.  We are scheduled to meet with Dr. Usadi on July 5th at 9am to discuss this opportunity and our candidacy.

We are DEFINITELY one step closer to finalizing our adoption plan, but as you can see, we still have at least one major decision to make.