Adoption Story: Jesse + Brooke

The journey started somewhat oddly, I had been meeting with someone who was helping me balance my hormones naturally in an effort to get pregnant. We had been to a fertility specialist and decided that the medical route felt too invasive, too cold, and too uncomfortable for us. We had always dreamt of adoption, even before marriage, and now was the time to pursue it. In an effort to find a natural, safe skincare and makeup line, I connected with an acquaintance from college. I told her my journey and reasoning behind the switch to safer personal care products and she shared her own journey and how she was using Christian Adoption Consultants. I began researching CAC and decided to present this to my husband. We went out to dinner and talked about adoption. My husband expressed that he wished there was someone to help you navigate the adoption process because it felt overwhelming. In was in that moment that I explained CAC! You see we had been fostering 3 teenage boys for the past year and half and we felt like we were walking around in the dark and having to learn things for ourselves. Adoption seemed so vast and scary that we needed someone to hold our hands through this process!

We signed on with Susan in December 2015 and I quickly began searching for an agency to help with our home study. I began dreaming (and pinning on Pinterest!) just what I thought our life could look like. I pinned anything from nursery ideas to women holding a baby with her hair in a top knot. As silly as it sounded I desperately wanted to be that mom who was rocking her “I didn’t have time to do my hair”, hair. I prayed that by the summer we would have a sweet little baby to call our own. I dreamt of being matched with a birth mom who wanted us to be there for the ultrasound, the birth, and the whole process!

My dreams were slowly put on the back burner as we took time to press pause on the home study process and focus on our foster boys. We prepared to say goodbye to them as they went home to be with their mother at the end of March 2016. As I picked back up focusing on all the paperwork,my dreams were dashed again when we had to pause home study visits because my husband would be on tour with his band for most of May. While he was gone I began to prepare the nursery, laughing at myself because there was no way a baby was going to be in that room anytime soon! My heart began to change too – I had thought after a house full of boys, I wanted to have a baby girl but the Lord slowly prompted me to be open to whatever He was to give us.

The week my husband came back we started our home study visits. We finished our final visit on the last Tuesday of May. That?Saturday?my best friend had planned to have a baby shower with just close friends and family to get the bigger items we had on our registry, even though I was sure there would be no baby anytime soon. I focused on narrowing our list of agencies to work with as I prepped that week for family to be in town for the shower. That?Thursday, I received a phone call from a friend who works in adoption agency. With very little details she asked if we could give her our profile book and home study by the next day. Frantically I called Susan, who worked so hard to finish our book in such a short amount of time! Our home study agency agreed to rush our home study and would have a hard copy by the following?Monday. That?Friday?our profile book was shown – and not the pretty one we would later order. Our profile was shown on printer paper and in black and white!

The next few weeks would be filled with phone calls with the birth parents and a lot of waiting! I was so thankful though that I could enjoy my shower and not feel silly. The Lord answered my prayers and I was able to enjoy the party, just knowing that it could be so close. Our birth parents were very meticulous in their decision and it took them a full month to choose a couple. Our profile was shown on?June 2nd?and we got the call that we were chosen on?July 1st! Our three phone calls with the birth parents felt so natural, despite their tough questions. Though everything was a risk, we felt that we were meant to meet these people, even if it ended in heartache. We kept the sex of the baby a secret until we were matched and did not want to share the name of our son (SON- I was so excited to be a BOY mom again!) until consent papers were signed. I called my grandfather (who is more like a father to me) to tell him the news that we had been matched. My grandfather is 90 years old and is fading fast, but that man causally started using our son’s name in our conversation. I knew that the Lord was in this and no matter what happened in the next few weeks, that this was our son.

The next few weeks were filled with emotions as we finished the nursery and tried to make plans on how to travel to get our son. I am VERY type A and I was praying that God would just allow me enough time to make the correct plans so I wouldn’t miss the birth! Our birth mom wanted us near when she was in labor so we could see the baby quickly after. On?July 8thI received a phone call from our adoption agency that our birth mom has chosen to be induced at 39 weeks! I could plan! We wouldn’t miss the birth! I had 11 days to get everything in order and we planned to travel a few days before the birth so we could meet the birth parents.

The days leading up to our son’s birth were some of the best moments. We clicked immediately with our birth parents and what was planned as a quick, casual meeting ending up being an almost four hour conversation. The birth momma invited us to go with them to the hospital the next evening when they checked her in so we could get a feel for the hospital. I thank God so much for that evening! I never thought I would see the inside of a delivery room…but there I was sitting in the room that our son would be born in. That night the nurse did an ultrasound and we got to see our precious baby boy right there on the monitor.

The next morning our little man made an appearance before we anticipated and we frantically left the hotel room despite not finishing getting ready or packing anything. Because we left in such a hurry in our first picture with our son I am rocking the mom top knot – God can answer even the silliest prayers! The next three days in the hospital were filled with God’s pure grace and love. We were able to get a hospital room and provide primary care for our little one. We would wake up and wheel him over to the birth momma’s room and the five of us would hang out and talk while passing little man around.

So many fears I had going into adoption were shattered. Birth parents LOVE their babies, and they can love them while still handing them over to another momma’s arms. You CAN have wonderful, open communication with birth parents without a fear of blurring lines and creating tension.

I knew going into this I would love one person, but I never imagined loving three so intensely.

Beautiful photos thanks to Olivia G Photography.