Thursday, September 15, 2011

Choosing My Trials

JD and I have friends that have been anxiously awaiting the arrival of their twin daughters. They went through fertility treatments and on their third IUI they had success and found out they were going to have twins. That is news that I always hoped to hear, in reality I still hope to hear even though it won't be me that carries those twins, most likely.
They went into the hospital on Wednesday to be induced since the girls didn't come on their own. I just found out this morning that C had to have an emergency c-section this morning after laboring all day yesterday and through the night and immediately after delivery had no measurable pulse and had to receive 5 units of blood and be transferred to the ICU at another hospital. Thankfully she is doing better now and is even awake but what a terrifying thing to have happen to you when it should be one of the happiest days of your life and then have it take such a dramatic turn in the other direction. From all indications both girls are doing well. I work at the hospital where they were delivered and I am so glad I will be working tonight and will hopefully get to see J and meet their daughters and before they go home.
As I have been keeping up on what has been going on with J and C this morning via Facebook and the events that have transpired in the last few hours for them I can't help but think again that I am glad I don't get get choose my trials. This is certainly not one that I would choose. I actually mentioned to some of my co-workers last week that I am learning to be grateful that we are adopting rather than continuing to pursue fertility treatments because of the things that I have seen some of these moms go through in the few months that I have worked on the mom/baby unit. This is the second time I have seen a new mom go to the ICU following an emergency c-section, obviously the odds are rare since I have seen many, many new moms without complications. I remember that the Lord works in mysterious ways and obviously I have to be taught in different ways to appreciate the blessings and trials that I have.

Until next time...

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Adoption- Step 1

JD and I went to Provo to the LDS Family Services adoption orientation meeting last Wednesday only to find out that we can't work with that office because we live in Pleasant Grove. We then went to the meeting at the American Fork office on Friday. I'm kind of glad we were able to attend both meetings because while the information was basically the same, the way it was presented and what they spent time focusing on was different at each office.
This morning I drove over the orientation paperwork to the office in American Fork- so that means our journey with adoption has "officially" started. They will now send a letter to our bishop for his recommendation, we will then be assigned a caseworker and after they receive the letter back from the bishop we will have what is called an intake interview with the caseworker and get the next batch of paperwork to complete. There are quite a few things that we need to get done or gathered prior to this next batch of paperwork being turned in. Birth certificates, marriage certificate, fingerprints for background checks, family pictures, a new blog set up to be shared with birth families (and really anyone else that would like to take a peek at it).
We also need to start writing our letter to birth families that will introduce us to them- no pressure to want that to be just right. The one thing I keep remembering is that birth mothers/families aren't looking for perfection we just need to be who we are and the Lord will take care of the rest.
Since this entry has taken me almost two weeks to write we have since met with Bishop Lawyer (we have been so blessed to have wonderful bishops since we have been married) to go over questions that he needed some extra information from us to complete. He was going to mail the letter back to LDS Family Services (LDSFS) yesterday, so I can only assume we should be hearing back from LDSFS this week sometime.
We still haven't started the birth family letter but I have some rough drafts running through mind- let's just say my focus isn't always on school but very often on the things we need to do to finish our paperwork in record time and then be prepared to welcome a child or children into our home. We have started cleaning out the third bedroom in our townhouse and cleaning out extra junk, errr I mean treasures, that are collecting dust around the house. It feels good to get rid of some of this stuff.
This morning I ordered the birth certificates and marriage certificate that we will need to turn in with our next set of paperwork. Next, doctor appointments for both us for a checkup and completing the next batch of paperwork we are given at our intake appointment. We are also hoping to be able to attend the Adoption Training in October that is a requirement of LDSFS but it all hinges on our intake interview. This is quite a journey and we are so excited to be adding to our family through adoption