[Wisdom]

My husband & I have been in the journey of adoption nearly two years, the first 1 1/2 researching (I'm a researching nut) and going through classes and paperwork w/the County b/c we thought that was the way we'd go. Our homestudy w/the County was approved earlier this year ('07) but we decided we weren't sure it's the way we want to go since it's fostering w/the possiblity of adopting and that entire process could take a long time (we're not getting any younger). (We even got a couple of calls for newborns but I didn't feel right about either situation so we declined them both.)
We decided to go w/a Christian nonprofit adoption agency and are nearly finished w/our homestudy. Now something else has come up: I'm not so sure I can handle "competing with" a birthmother as we raise our child. I realized I hadn't been honest w/myself about this (I'd convinced myself I could do it) and after reading a newspaper article about open adoption and another post recently I came clean w/myself and admitted it. (I'd been struggling /with it all along but tried to convince myself I could do it.) So now we're talking international adoption instead. We're a biracial couple (AA & CC) and I wanted to adopt an American biracial baby, giving the child a sense of his/her own American culture of both races. Being a biracial couple is unique, being a biracial child is unique so I thought it would be awesome to be one of the few biracial couples available to a biracial child for adoption. That's what's really in my heart and I thought God put it there. But then the whole open adoption thing...I don't know if I can handle it. (Actually the agency we're dealing with does semi-open.)
What we really need is confirmation from God about whether or not we're to adopt at all. I want to trust God in all of this but I need to sense His leading and I don't.
Prior to getting married I knew God was leading me towards marriage (even though I was scared to death) and I felt His hand all over the process. My husband received confirmation as well. With adoption, I'm not sensing any leading from God, no confirmation. We both love children and have a great marriage. I'm the one who keeps coming up with the change in adoption plans--my husband's pretty easy going and doesn't worry.
Prior to our adoption journey my husband was working in ministry full-time (nearly 80 hrs a week if not more) and there was no time for us to do anything but that. While he was on this job, he began to have a desire to adopt as well, which was answered prayer. So after his job w/the ministry ended we began to pursue adoption. God opened doors for me to quit my f.t. job and I started a home-based business so I could be home with our child. We thought it was the direction God was moving us in but now I don't know. It seems we're all over the place and not making a final decision about which route to take. Is it fear? Does God not want us to be parents? Am I sabotaging the process?
Can anyone else please share whether or not you had confirmation from God as you proceeded w/the process. Any input would be helpful. Thanks so much.

[bajj]

Wisdom, I think it is normal to go through several different thoughts, emotions, and fears.

I have to be honest and say I do not feel that I am competing with either of my boys' Birthmoms. They are who they are and I am who I am. I don't feel it's a competition at all. Just as I have room in my heart to love more than one person, my children have room in their heart to love more than one person.

I would say keep praying and see if you have peace or not.

I'll keep praying for you, too.

((((((Wisdom))))))))

[jaenelle]

If you really want to adopt domestically, don't give up because open adoption scares you. It's very possible to find situations where the birthmother wants a closed adoption, or what is called semi-open. While we would welcome contact from our daughter's birthparents/family, they do not, at this time, want contact with us, so we have what is basically a closed adoption. If that's really what you want, don't give up on finding it -- it's quite possible you can. However, open adoption is not as scary as it first sounds. You should talk to some people who have open adoptions (on all sides -- adoptive parents, birth parents, and adopted children) and get firsthand accounts of what it is like.

As for God calling me to adopt, I don't know. I certainly feel we wound up with the child we were meant to have, and looking back I realize I should have turned more of my grief and worries about infertility/the adoption process over to Him. But called? I don't know if that's the word I'd use. We are researching adopting daughter #2, and I do feel very strongly we are meant to have another girl, but I am trying to let God lead us and tell us when the time is right to begin again.

[mrsred]

Wisdom, it sounds like the enemy has been busy at work casting doubts on your plans. When you first felt you were called toa dopt, am I correct that you were led to foster-adopt? Why did you change your mind on that? If that was God's plan for you, and now you are second guessing God's plan, no wonder you have no peace.
Go back to praying, followed by obedience. Meditate on the Israelites when they were led out of Egypt. They questioned God, doubted his faithfulness and opted not to obey. they wandered the desert for 40 years. Get out of your desert. Pray, listen, obey.

[Yash]

mrsred - I loved your response

Wisdom - foster/adoption is not for the faint of heart. If you had asked me five years ago if I would adopt domestically, I would have said an emphatic NO. But God had other plans for me, doors kept closing and went through the door of fost/adopt completely on faith. When the adoption matcher told me that it would be a 9 - 18 month for an adoptable infant girl, I knew that God wanted me to have a son. When I got the call for my son, I didn't know what to do. I asked for some time and I took it and prayed. Was this the right situation? Was this my forever son? I felt God saying yes. When I called the adoption matcher back, she told me she had just spoken to my SW that had done my homestudy and the SW thought this was the perfect situation for me. I knew this was God's sign to me all systems go.

It's so hard to turn everything over to Him, but we must in order to know peace and not be plagued by doubts. I'm on the wating list for a baby girl from Vietnam. I always knew I would adopt internationally, but the cost had me apprehensive for a while until I "let go, let God." Every step I took, He provided for me. The money I needed to pay for things was there right on time. The time I needed off of work to paperchase was provided when I least expected. Am I worried about where the money is coming from for the rest of the adoption and my 2 weeks in Vietnam? Honestly no. I know God will provide.

You and your husband need to pray and have faith. Yes, doubts will come your way, as you're experiencing now, but you have to stand firm. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.

[msdizzydolores]

Originally Posted by mrsred

Wisdom, it sounds like the enemy has been busy at work casting doubts on your plans. When you first felt you were called toa dopt, am I correct that you were led to foster-adopt? Why did you change your mind on that? If that was God's plan for you, and now you are second guessing God's plan, no wonder you have no peace.
Go back to praying, followed by obedience. Meditate on the Israelites when they were led out of Egypt. They questioned God, doubted his faithfulness and opted not to obey. they wandered the desert for 40 years. Get out of your desert. Pray, listen, obey.

Amen. That was meant for me too.
Thank you for posting your response. I felt the conviction of the Holy Spirit for my doubt of God in my own situation, and I pray the original poster will too allow God to convict her precious heart and be lead back to trust in God alone.

[blessedbybug]

[quote=Wisdom] That's what's really in my heart and I thought God put it there. But then the whole open adoption thing...I don't know if I can handle it. (Actually the agency we're dealing with does semi-open.)
What we really need is confirmation from God about whether or not we're to adopt at all. I want to trust God in all of this but I need to sense His leading and I don't. [quote]

When DH and I make decisions, most often we look for the open doors and walk through them. When one slams shut, it definitely hurts but we know that wasn't the way we were to go. We have seen God lead us time and again this way and have trusted Him now because of how He has worked in our lives in the past. Sometimes confirmation comes when we can start to see a "pattern" of God's leading in our lives. And sometimes we cannot see the pattern until we wait or step away for a moment. Breathing God's will into our lives... making room for Him to reveal Himself in a way that we hadn't seen before.

With that said, you have prepared yourself for domestic adoption and have fears about how it might play out where openness is concerned. I can honestly say that we have been where you are and had to take a leap of faith and now that we are parenting we long for more openness than the first families are willing to give. But open relationships in adoption, no matter how much I believe in them, are not where everyone is. So if you truly know and believe that God has put in your heart this path, than I believe that with time and prayer, in essence, making space for God to breathe his will into your life, you will know. For us, we prayed that God would bring us the situation that was right with our family and that he would block anything that wasn't right. We are trusting and working through things believing now that he did just that.

I guess in a nutshell, without any specific confirmation to change direction from what you are doing, give it time and see what possibilities come up. You might surprise yourself as to what you are willing to consider...

Many prayers on your behalf...

[Linny]

I'm coming to this with a different thought, perhaps. I completely understand what you mean with your hesitation in open adoption. It isn't for everyone; and not every adoption is 'best' when conducted as an open or semi-open adoption.
I'll second the poster who mentioned that not every situation will be semi-open, or open. There are still many birthmothers who wish to have a closed adoption....and your agency should reflect your level of comfort with the kind of adoption you and a birthmother might want. If it doesn't I'd suggest working with another agency----or at least dealing with another agency (along with this one) who will allow you to approach adoption as individual as you are, KWIM? (I hate that agencies try to put their own stamp of what's acceptable on everyone's experience!)

But, in seeking God's Will for you..........maybe you need to search your own hearts to decide exactly what might be making you hesitant to adopt. If it's the 'agency making the decisions for you, rather than what you and birthparents want'....I can fully understand and encourage you NOT to take THIER decision as 'gospel', so to speak.

BUT..........are there perhaps other reasons that are making you hesitant?
If the foster to adopt possibilities are making you hesitant....this may be the Lord telling you this kind of stuff isn't for you either.
For us, our first adoptions were international. Two babies and many years later, we felt the leading to go Foster-Adopt, and did. After adopting three boys in two separate adoption experiences-----and none turned out well for us,--- sometimes, I wonder if we didn't mis-read what we felt God was leading us to? One day I hope to know.......
At a time when many would have thrown in the towel on adoption altogether, we felt the leading to go back to baby adoption (private agency, transracial). In the last six years, we've brought home three AA babies and I tell you, we feel immensely blessed. We also feel as though this is where the Lord led us, and now we feel we're complete in our adoptions.

Fostering to adopt is NOT easy......it's not for the faint of heart (as someone already pointed out)..........so if there's any 'guilt' at all for not going this route, realize it's NOT for everyone.

However, there are other ways to adopt and many, many entities to use in order to achieve it. FWIW, I have my own list of suggestions I'll be glad to pm to you if you'd like. But, realize that adoption is done so many different ways---just because your first thoughts on 'how to do it' might seem null and void, doesn't necessarily mean adoption is completely out for you.

My best to you....

Sincerely,

Linny

[CoryEllen]

In our situation, God told us just as plainly as if He had sent a written message that we should pursue adoption, and which agency we should use. All the paperwork fell into place, our homestudy was complete in record time, even our CW mentioned that she felt God was working in our lives to get things going....and now we have had radio-silence for almost a year. I think we are still on the right path, because I cannot deny the promptings that I have received so far, but I don't know what else I can do but wait. I don't feel that God is telling me NOT to continue, so my plan is to progress until I hear something from Him one way or another. My advice would be keep going until you hear otherwise; and be sure to keep that avenue of prayer open, in case He is trying to send a message, that your heart will be open to hear it.

[maricela]

I was listening to DR James Dobson 10 years ago & God spoke to me through him. He was interviewing a family who had 20 children;10 biological & 10 adopted. I can't remember the exact details of the interview but I remember that there was a member of the audience who was also adopted. He spoke to them about his love for his adoptive parents.

I felt at that moment that God spoke to me & that after 6 months of trying to decide whether to continue fertility treatments or to start the adoption process, I knew immediatly that His path for us was adoption. As soon as I got to work, I called my husband & gave him my decision & 10 months later our beautiful son was placed with us (he was 2 1/2). We went through DCFS Adoptions.

7 years later we adopted our DD through Fost/Adopt.

Good luck with your decision & listen to your heart. God is speaking to you. Sometimes we just have to slow down to hear what He has to say. It took me over 6 months to hear him.

[Barksum]

Oh, yes! We've been there, too. I was in anguish over adopting; yes, we were open to the idea of more children, but the adoption options we had open to us were very daunting, to say the least.

For me it boiled down to fear. Since God is not the author of fear I knew that being fearful was sinful. Once I realized that I was afraid of what might happen once we adopted, I knew how to deal with it. It took me awhile to figure out that it was actually fear, though.

There is a difference between fear and caution. Caution is when you do your research, know the possibilities, make an informed decision, put safety plans into place, and go forward or not. Once you move forward (or not) God will direct where He wants you to move. Fear is when you do nothing, dithering and crying, unable to do ANYTHING.

I'm not saying that you are being fearful; rather I'm sharing what I struggled with when we were working to adopt. This was MY experience, and I'm hoping something in it can help encourage you in whatever path God has for you.

On the OTHER hand, Dh and I were really struggling and wrestling with a decision of our own lately. This may sound odd to post about here, but we were struggling with the decision to NOT adopt more children. We are in the position of having adopted from foster care, and also having adopted a relative from foster care. One of our adopted children's bio mom had another baby who is now in foster care, and our relative who is the bio mom of one of our kids has also had another child who is now also in foster care. At this point neither is being placed adoptively, but there is that possibility in the future; as well as the possibility of more children being born to the bio parents of any of our adoptive children. Since we've adopted siblings of these children we are some of the first people approached when they want to place these little ones adoptively.

Dh and I are not getting any younger, either! We also have a small house. We homeschool and have 3 children with identified special needs. So I'm busy, Dh and I do have alot on our plate. But it is ok to say no? We really struggled with this!

We discussed this with an elder in our church and used him as a sounding board. Long story short, it is ok to say no, and we are at peace with that decision. I was so very relieved. (Again, I know this isn't what those who are waiting to adopt want to hear about, but it IS the flip side of the same coin.)

That's one way I know the decision is valid; I felt relief and peace when we came to the decision and stated it. Dh and I are in accord, and at peace.

So, keep seeking until YOU and your Dh are in accord and at peace. Do you have an elder or minister with whom you can consult? Sometimes just having a 3rd party with whom you can discuss the pros and cons can really help, but only if you have a sounding board who has your same philosophy of life. So if you are a Christian I would suggest getting a Christian perspective, not a secular one.

[tmphillips]

I don't think one needs to have confirmation, but it sure is helpful! In our case, I don't think we'd be adopting the specific child we were led to adopt, unless God had confirmed it in the miraculous way that he did...

[joelynn]

Just remember that God already has your child(ren) picked/planned for you. We have a semi-open with our first and closed (bmom's choice) with our second. I have to say I was disappointed when I found out our dd's bmom wanted a closed adoption. I didn't even get a name or a picture. In our semi-open we send pictures and updates to the agency for our bmom and she does the same. It works out fine. I don't know how your agency does it but I will admit I wasn't sure I could handle open either. I now know that I welcome it. Do what you feel comfortable with...you will find once you are in a situation your feelings will evolve. Again...God has a plan for you...you will figure it out. Sounds like you're stressing. Best wishes and I will be praying for you!

[Wisdom]

It's been a month since I posted the initial post and I want to thank you all for your input. Right after I posted I began to feel better. As I was writing I began to remember different things and events that were God's hand in leading us to adoption. Now I'm back on track and we're proceeding with adoption. Our homestudy is now complete and we're approved.

I became fearful after reading several negative open adoption situations. One was an article in the Los Angeles Times and the one that pushed me over the edge was a thread on this forum where the birthmother and adoptive mother were having a horrible relationship. The birthmother told the adoptive mother that she wasn't a good mother and the adoptive mother was then trying to decide on whether or not to maintain contact.

The agency we're going through does semi-open adoptions where we send pictures and updates through the agency and I feel fine with that. All the books say that open adoption is best so there's pressure to "do the right thing." I think the right thing is trusting God and for my husband and I to take it step-by-step. Should we and the birthmother decide to make it open after finalization we're able to do that as well. I'm back to trusting God! Thanks so much!

[joelynn]

I'm so glad you're doing better...