Losses and Benefits

It's been a long process to arrive where we are today as it is for all adoptive families.

Our journey has been typical for a soon-to-be adoptive family filled with benefits and losses. Looking back, we can see God's hand in our lives and we maintain thankful hearts filled with joy.

I'm writing this, not to focus on negatives by any means, but rather to give an honest glimpse into what it means to adopt and hopefully encourage others to adopt a child. Much of what I'll write comes from seminars, classes online tutorials and personal experience.

What are some of the "losses," you ask. It's a fair question. We're not experiencing your typical pregnancy.
To start, the announcement carries a different tone. Saying, "We're pregnant," versus "We're adopting," aren't treated the same. I don't know why, but we've had more than one person react with the attitude of "don't give up. You'll have your own child." One person went so far as to pray for us to be healed so we can have our "own" child. Thankfully, most friends and family have been extremely supportive and loving.

Then there are the vocabulary differences. There are birth mothers and birth fathers. There are forever families. There aren't "real" parents or "real children." There's time-in, not time-out. We need every moment possible to build attachment with our child.

Our adoption has changed my perceptions of God's story in the Bible. Until now, I didn't really appreciate adoption's role in the Bible. For example, Moses was adopted by the Egyptians. And Joseph raised a child he didn't conceive. His son's name was Jesus. And one of the most profound scriptures I've come across during this process is James 1:27 "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world."

While soon-to-be mothers are conspicuous for 9 months, we're not so much. While the mommy's tummy grows, the only thing growing for us has been the mounds of paperwork submitted. I guess that's why it's nicknamed the "paper pregnancy." We lose the opportunity for our baby to "have Daddy's nose, or Mommy's eyes."

On the other hand, we will be a conspicuous family as soon as Little Baby Forrester is in our arms. Many adoptive families stand out because their child doesn't physically appear like them. We'll probably experience something similar. It will be impossible to hide the fact he's 100 percent Hispanic with a 100 percent gringo father.

Many adoptive families don't know important details about their child's background or history. We'll miss the first 10 months of Little Baby Forrester's life. When he is older, it's possible he'll have questions that we won't have sufficient information.

But it's amazing to see God's plan unfold in our lives. Claudia is from Colombia. Her parents, sisters, niece, cousins, aunt and others live in the United States. Many live within an hour's drive of our home. This means our child will be able to continue to experience his Colombian culture in our home. How awesome is that?

One of my greatest joys has been to experience my wife's culture and become fast friends with her family. Our marriage has played an important part in my in laws being able to see their parents and siblings. What a blessing. And now God can bless Little Baby Forrester through our family. How awesome!

God is able to take seemingly negative events and turn them toward His purpose. I didn't know my father until last year. That left a hole in my life that was never quite filled until last Easter when I met him face-to-face for the first time. I feel as though God has prepared me my entire life to accept our son because I'll be able to relate to some of the feelings he will likely have. Unfortunately, he may never be able to meet his birth mother or birth father face-to-face.

The benefits Little Baby Forrester brings to our home are many. First and foremost, we'll be parents. I'd be lying if I didn't say we're a little nervous about this responsibility. He will make me a father, and my wife a mother. He'll make grandparents and uncles and aunts. He will change our family tree forever. And that is the single most, biggest benefit.

Son, we love you before we met you and now I understand how that's even possible. Thank you.

Our Official Announcement

March 22, 2011

Dear Family and Friends,

It only took God six days to create the world, so we know He can do big things in a small amount of time. We are so blessed to have His hand in our lives.

We are thrilled to officially announce the arrival of our baby boy from Colombia (S.A.) to our family. After doing a lot of paperwork during the past few weeks and finally getting the green light from our adoption agency today, we can officially announce that Little Baby Forrester will soon be coming home to stay.

It was extremely hard to keep all this information to ourselves for the past few weeks when all we could say was that we were approved. In actuality, we were overflowing with joy about news of our son. Now we can share this amazing moment with all of our friends and family. Simply put, he is a precious gift from God.

We don't have a date set for our travel to Colombia, but it will probably be late May or early June based on our agency's experience. We will keep everyone posted as best we can, but feel free to visit our blog for information as we will begin updating it more frequently.

Thank you so much for walking with us along our journey for over a year. We really appreciate every single word of support and every single time someone asked us for an update. Now a new journey is starting for our family and we want you to be part of it.

In Him,
Claudia and Brian

God Reveals His Plan for the Forresters

“For I know the plans I have for you, “declares the Lord,” plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future” – Jeremiah 29:11

At 9:01 a.m. on March 11, 2011, just two days after learning our application had been approved by Colombia and a child was possibly waiting for us, I received an email from our agency.

Our social worker asked if Brian was back in town and if he and I could call her. The first thing that came to my mind was, “This is it. This is the call that we've waited so long for. The call that will change our lives forever. The call that we will not ever forget”.

I was at my office talking with a friend when I got the email. I started shaking and I showed it to her. She also knew the significance of the email.

"What are you going to do," she asked.

“I am going outside. I am going to my car to call Brian and the agency." I called Brian while walking out of the building. “Do you have a minute? We need to call our agency," I asked.

“Sure. I'll host the conference call," Brian said; knowing what "the call" meant.

Just moments before then, Brian had been in his co-worker's office talking about receiving the approval earlier in the week. He told her they would receive a call at some point. "It could be this week, or next. Who knows," he explained.

After receiving the call from me, Brian darted back to his co-worker's office and said, "This is it. Claudia wants us to call the agency right now."

"You better come back into my office as soon as that call is over and tell me everything," she said while grinning.

Brian darted back to his office, took a deep breath and called me. "Are you ready," he asked.

"Not really, but go for it." So many things were going through our hearts and minds. So many emotions. So many feelings.

Within moments, our social worker was on the other line. After a brief hello we wanted to get to the point. She mentioned again how just a few days ago she had called with the good news about our approval and how she had mentioned the possibility of a referral.

“Well, this call is to talk to you guys about this little boy that is waiting for you both in Colombia," she said.

She lost me at that point. I could not help myself. I broke down in tears of joy. In the background I could hear Brian saying, “Wow. Wow. Wow."

I was not able to make any more comments at this point. I was overflowing with joy about what I was hearing. I could not wait for her to give us more information. She shared every single possible piece of information about our son, yes our son, that she had available.

From the first instance we heard his name, we knew he was ours. He is our baby boy and our first child!!

Right after we hung up, we received an email with his picture. The first picture of our baby boy. There he was staring back at us on our computer monitors. He was the most precious baby ever.

I immediately called Brian back.

"Did you see him," I asked. He said not yet, but a second later he said, "He is precious. He is our son."

God's plan was staring at us for the first time with a face and name. On this Friday morning, we became a family of 5 (including our two happy doggies).

Once more, we were witnesses of God’s beautiful creation. He was giving us one of His children.

“I prayed for this child, and the Lord has granted me what I asked of him” – 1 Samuel 1:27

Good News to Share

On March 8, 2011 at 2:16 p.m. my cell phone rang while I was at the office.

It was from Children's Hope International, our adoption agency in St. Louis, MO., and I got a little scared. I didn't want to answer the call. This was one of those moments in life that you have been anxiously waiting to arrive. When it is staring at you in the form of a call on your cell phone's i.d. waiting for you to answer, you question how prepared you are for the inevitable next moments.

When I answered, our social worker Nichole greeted. me. "I have some good news." Our dossier was approved by Colombia, she said. The dossier is essentially our entire lives on paper. Medical records. Tax returns. Photos of our family and house. Referral letters from friends. Fingerprints and background checks. Mini-biographies. Notarized psychological reports. And several other items that would take their own blog post to include.

After all these months of paperwork and notaries, Colombia accepted our dossier without any additional requests. Yeahhhhhhhhhhh! :  )

Of course, for us what seems like such a long and slow process is actually incredibly fast by comparison to the process for non-Colombian families. Since I am from Colombia, the government treats us as a Colombian family and the waiting period is shorter.

Different types of emotions ran through my mind. I was crying but at the same time I was happy to hear the good news. We were finally on Colombia's official waiting list to receive a child.

"How do you feel," Nichole asked.

"I'm really happy to hear this news," I replied. "This is really exciting."

"Well, I may have some other good news for you," she said. "It looks like Colombia may already have something waiting for you."

I said, "What do you mean?"

"It looks like they may already have a baby for you guys," Nichole said.

"What?" I exclaimed, and at that point I was in shock.

"If this is true, then you would be the first couple to get the approval and the referral at the same time," Nichole said.

I was crying and wanted to get a lot more details about the baby but she didn't have any additional news to share.

"You need to get your feet back down to earth because you have a lot of paper work that needs to be filled out," she said, before explaining some of the next steps. I could only think about the fact Brian was traveling in Atlanta and wasn't able to share this moment with me in person.

She asked me when Brian would return. "You better keep your phone nearby because I can call you at any time with some more information."

To be continued....

Overwhelmed

It took a few minutes for the conversation to be absorbed, but as it continued an overwhelming sensation began creeping into my mind.

It was a Wednesday evening at church during dinner. Claudia was working and I had the opportunity to stop by church for food, fellowship and class. Several friends were sitting with us. Two expecting mothers. One new mother. And three husbands.

The expecting mothers were talking about where and when they had registered for baby clothes, furniture, accessories and bottles. They debated about the pros and cons between different style bottles. They expressed surprise at how expensive baby monitors were and their different must-have features. They chatted about what they looked for in car seats. Do you get one that has the cradle you leave in the car?

I chimed in occasionally, but for the most part just listened. And then it hit me.

"We've not even begun to think about those things yet," I told the group. "We've been so focused on medical history, tax returns, notaries and apostilles (certifying the notary), photo albums, and biographies. We haven't even begun to talk about those other things."

"Don't worry," one of the mothers-to-be consoled. "You'll have plenty of time."

I explained how the car seat, for instance, really hit me. I mean, yeah, they are important. So important we'll need one while we're in Colombia. I explained that taxi cab drivers are efficient and cost effective on the streets of Colombia, but they are NOT safe to hold a baby in your arms while riding.

"Believe me, the taxi cab drivers won't care if we have a car seat or not," I explained. Mental pictures took me back to a couple of years ago when we drove in a cab that zoomed and zagged, braked, honked at crossing pedestrians, punched the accelerator, zagged again and suddenly stopped. The drive turned around, hand on the front passenger head rest, and apologized for taking so long to get to our destination.

The take away from that meal was that as adoptive parents, we have two processes to experience. There's the paper adoption process, as its some times called when you're compiling all the necessary components for your dossier; and then there is the baby registry, preparing the baby's room and other things.

As adoptive parents, we have to remember patience during the paper process and slow down a little bit to enjoy the fact that there are a lot of fun things about expecting a baby - and debating car seats and monitors and when is the best time to register and where are certainly a few of them.