Sunday, December 12, 2010

A Mini Version of Our Adoption Story

November is National Adoption Month. During the month the local Families Supporting Adoption (FSA) Houston Chapter was to spotlight a family about adoption. I was supposed to submit our story, but never did (having a newborn around really throws kinks into things) so I thought I would post it here for friends and family to read. I did tweak the age of Alex only because this was supposed to be out last month (when he was only 3 weeks old). Enjoy!


Whirlwind of a life time!

Josh and I were married in Oct. 2006, about a year later we decided it was time to expand our family. Months turned into a year and that year turned into 2 years without any luck. We decided to start the adoption process and went to orientation. We were so overwhelmed by everything that we backed off and decided to go see my doctor and see what they could do for me. So off I went to the doctor. After taking medication for a while, we had no luck. After a few other tests were done, it was confirmed that I would not be able to have children, or if I did get pregnant, it would be very difficult to carry the baby to term. After hearing the news, we decided that adoption was our way to expand our family. In May of this year, we contacted LDS Family Services and started the process of adoption. After hemming and hawing over the online questions and fulfilling the other requirements, our application was finally finished and awaiting approval. Our profile went live early October and a week later we got the phone call that would change our lives for the rest of our life!

After the initial shock of getting chosen so quickly, it started to sink in that we only have 9 weeks to prepare for a baby. We already had plans to go to Utah for a vacation before we were even chosen, so we got our bags packed and started on our adventure driving to Utah to visit Josh’s family. We thought it would be a nice way to break up the weeks of waiting for our little guy. We arrived in Utah on a Sunday, and got a text message from our birth mom Monday night saying her water had broken. Panic started to take over because she wasn’t supposed to deliver for almost another month and even if we left Utah ASAP it would still take us 24 hours to drive home. As we thought of all our options, we booked the first flight we could Tuesday morning and our car would be towed home by my husbands’ wonderful parents. The flight home was the longest flight of our lives. The whole flight I kept thinking that our little guy was probably already born. As we landed in Houston, I immediately texted our birth mom asking how she was doing. Fortunately, for us, she had yet to go into full labor. We still had a chance at making it to the hospital before he was born. We finally arrive at the hospital (luckily for us the hospital was on our way home from the airport) at 4 pm and our little boy was born at 4:48 pm. We knew he was just waiting for us to arrive.

Alex was born about a month early so he spent the first 9 days of his life in the NICU. He didn’t have any medical problems besides being early and very little. He was only 4 pounds 12 ounces. The day we were able to bring him home was very nerve racking for me. I was so excited I didn’t remember some of the “you should know this stuff” stuff. Oh well, the wonderful nurse and wonderful Julie (our caseworker) helped me and we were finally on our way home.

Alex is 1 month old now and our lives couldn’t be any sweeter now. Our family is complete as for now and we couldn’t be happier. Adoption is a wonderful thing, without it, Josh and I wouldn’t be parents today. We feel very honored and privileged to be the parents of this little guy. We have the utmost respect and love for our birth mom, words cannot describe it. She will always hold a special place in our heart. Adoption has truly blessed our lives!


Just a couple pics:

Here is Alex while still in the NICU. I believe he was only 2 days old here



This was taken just a couple days ago. You can really see how much he has "chunked out". He weighed 4 pounds 12 ounces and was 18 inches long when he was born and earlier this week at a doctors appointment he weighed 6 pounds 14 ounces and is 19.5 inches long.



Our attempt at getting a First Christmas picture of Alex

3 comments:

Karen said...

He looks like Jared in that last one! It is so hilariously awesome that your little guy looks just like your family.

Peggy said...

That is such a fun and neat story. He's adorable and I can just imagine all of the love that he's getting. He couldn't have found a better family to come to!

Jeanette said...

So amazing. I'm so happy for you guys. How's it going being new parents? He is a little cutie.