#1. Why Adoption? Many of you who know me, know that I have talked about wanting to adopt for a long time. I am not one of those girls who dreams of being pregnant with warm, fuzzy feelings. Even before meeting Mike, I knew that I wanted to be a mom. I just wasn't sure they would be my biological children. As Mike and I have talked about what our family will look like in the future, both of our hearts have been drawn to adoption. At Redeemer Fellowship (our church), there was a sermon about a year ago which painted a beautiful picture of Christ's love and sacrifice for us. Christ loved me, even in my sin and filth, so much that he died on the cross in order to adopt me into His family. At the end of the sermon, Kevin (our pastor) spoke about what we can do in response to God's love for us. For both Mike and myself, our answer was to adopt. God calls His children to glorify His name and one way that Mike and I can do this is to adopt one of His children. "Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me...' Then the righteous will answer him, saying, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink?...And the Kind will answer them, 'Truly, I way to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.'" - Matthew 25:34-40
#2. Can you have children biologically? Will you have children biologically? The answer to the first question is, we don't know and the second is, yes Lord willing. We thought that adoption would be a fun adventure for our first shot at parenthood. We have the time and resources to pursue this now, time and resources which may not be available if we had biological children first.
#3. Why international adoption? Mike and I carefully considered both domestic and international adoption. I can't say that we came to a conclusive decision as to why we chose international over domestic, other than to say that it is what seemed right for us. I feel that becoming parents is always an adventure, and international adoption as a means of becoming parents seemed like the right adventure for us.
#4. Why Africa? Why Ethiopia? We initially considered Africa because one of Mike's good friends from college has recently moved his family to Uganda. We have learned a lot about Africa, particularly eastern Africa, from Ben and his family. There is a great deal of poverty and illness in Africa which leads to a greater number of orphans. There is a tremendous need for orphan care in eastern Africa - this includes in country support as well as international adoption. We landed in Ethiopia by chance, but have since fallen in love with the country and its people. We initially looked into adopting from Uganda but quickly expanded our search to eastern Africa. The agency that we have chosen to work with has a strong relationship with Ethiopia and felt confident in our ability to successfully adopt from this country.
#5. Why Children's Hope International? We looked into several international adoption agencies before landing on CHI. We chose to use CHI initially because a friend of Mike's recently adopted from Ethiopia using this agency and highly recommended this agency to others. Then, after speaking with CHI, we felt confident that they were a trustworthy organization who had the best interests of the children at heart. Thus far, we have been very pleased with CHI and are excited to move forward with them!
These are just a few FAQs that I could think of right now. I'm sure more will come as our news becomes public!
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