Yesterday was also a big day for our adoption. Our agency's policy is that if we haven't matched with a birthmom/baby by the time we're 5 months pregnant, they put us on hold until our bio-baby is 6 months old. We got official word at 2:54 p.m. yesterday that no match has been made thus far. So, we know that we'll be on hold until at least June of next year.
There's so many emotions going on with all that. I know, you say, "You're pregnant! Of course there's emotions!" Ok, you're right. There are. But I do think there's layers of emotions that we wouldn't otherwise have if we weren't simultaneously pregnant AND pursuing adoption. A little relief that we won't have 2 newborns at the same time. A little disappointment that we won't meet our adopted child for at least another year. A tinge of doubt that maybe we messed something up in the process. A flicker of hope because we know God really is the One in control. "All the feelings," as they say.
When we found out on April 1st (Yes, April Fool's Day. See, God is funny!) that we were pregnant after several years of not getting pregnant, and deciding to go ahead and pursue adoption (something we'd always wanted to do, but had planned to do post-bio-babies), we were...surprised. A little confused. We were 2 weeks out from our final home visit and adoption approval..."Why Now God?" was a real question---not because we weren't happy. We were! Just...we don't get the inside scoop on what God's doing, and we were...confused.
For about a week, we wondered and prayed and asked advice about whether to even continue with our last home study appointment, and felt like God was leading us to go ahead and continue the process. We did, we got approved, and we only needed to make a profile book about our family to show prospective birthmoms. Boy, this last step seemed like it took forever!!! (Kinda 'cause it did...) But in June, we finally finished it with about a month to spare before we'd be put on hold by our agency.
All during that book-making process, we were, again, wondering and praying and asking advice about whether to even continue the process. Is it crazy to set yourself up to have 2 newborns at the same time??? We actually got to ask a couple who experienced that exact thing, and they said "Yes! It IS crazy, but it's worth it..." Honestly, during the process, I don't know that we were ever SURE one way or the other what God wanted for us, BUT we knew that we trusted Him to make the right decision. So, we took a step of faith, we made our book, we put ourselves out there, we set ourselves up for possible craziness. And, as you see, He said "Not right now."
All along I've told people that God knows the timing of when our adopted child will be born. That hasn't changed. All that's changed is that I THOUGHT I knew when it was going to happen, and I was wrong. I FEEL like I know now...I feel like maybe we're halfway through the adoption, too. Like maybe it'll be another year and a half before we met our next little one. But, honestly, I just don't know. I kind of hate when people turn things into cliches like "I don't know what the future holds, but I trust the One who holds the future." But, it really is true. Pretty much all of this has been a walk of faith. And it seems God isn't done teaching us about that yet. We're going out like Abraham to that place God is calling us to---we just don't know exactly where it is or when we're gonna get there. Til then, we trust Him.
In this whole process, the message of the song "Oceans" has been a recurring theme. It seems every time we were at a crossroads emotionally or financially, this song would come up. So, I thought I'd post it here:
C&C
