Towards the end of 2017 Jeremy and Kari got connected and
officially started with us at Christian Adoption Consultants. In less than 12
months they would be holding their precious daughter in their arms! The journey
in between was filled with unexpected insights that God wanted for them to
experience. Listen to Kari as she shares their story:
“Our
family has had adoption on our hearts for years. It all began when God started
opening our eyes to beautiful adopted children living in our community. As we
sought to foster relationships with these wonderful families our eyes were
opened to the need. We became passionate about coming alongside families who
have adopted and form relationships with them. We then got involved hosting children
who were in crisis through an organization called Safe Families. Through their
mini-homestudy process we knew God was opening an incredible door. After helping families in crisis and hosting
children we decided to take the next step and become foster parents, and we
hoped to adopt if necessary. Once our license was complete we had many phone
calls for placements and we hurriedly got ready to care for these kids, but unfortunately
each placement fell through and we didn’t quite understand why. We were
beginning to feel the call from the Lord that a move across the country was a
door he was opening, we realized this may be why we hadn’t had a placement yet.
We knew this was God’s plan, but boy was it hard knowing we would have to start
our licensing all over again. Our licensor gave us a copy of our foster care
homestudy. We didn’t realize at the time what a huge gift that was. It ended up
making our adoption paperwork so much easier.
After we moved we felt God refining us and strengthening our faith even more. We were finally ready to take the financial leap towards domestic adoption. We were always so afraid of the cost before, but seeing God provide during our move we were ready and knew this was our next step in this new location he brought us to. We’d had domestic adoption on our hearts all along. We quickly began our homestudy, got connected with Dawn and signed on with Christian Adoption Consultants. We had been researching adoption for years and they were well recommended. We jumped in and we were SO excited. We began mountains of paper work and the emotional process of creating a profile book. When that was done we began lots of fundraising and I started a business that has not only helped us fundraise but is also helping people around the world out of poverty, funding others’ adoptions, empowering women and so much more. I never knew this process would lead me to a dream job!
During the fundraising there were months of waiting. The waiting was
HARD! We don’t feel like we waited very long, but from an emotional perspective
if felt like years. We questioned if this was the right path, we prayed, we
longed, but through it all we clung to HOPE. We knew the hope God had given us
would get us through this trying process. His hope kept us. His hope gave us
strength. His hope guided and got us through the most difficult parts. Hearing
“no” from a prospective birth mom was never easy, and it never got easier. Each
time we just prayed for these incredible birth mothers making such a hard
choice that they would have courage and know clearly which family would be best
for raising their child. We trusted God’s sovereignty and clung to it
daily.
Then one day we got the call that we had been chosen! We celebrated and
were beyond excited! I was helping a friend deliver a baby when she heard the
news, it sure was incredible. But then a week later we heard the hard news that
this courageous birth mom decided to parent. We were so sad, yet so proud of
her for choosing life and deciding to parent and we wished her all the best. A
situation came up pretty quickly after that, we wouldn’t have had the courage
to present to this birth mom if we had not had such a wonderful lesson through
this long waiting process of how good God truly is and how much we can place our
trust completely in his hands. We felt hopeful to present and a part of me felt
like this baby may be the one! On November 6th during a fundraising
event I got the call that our amazing birth mom had chosen us! We were floored
and excited and felt beyond honored! Our baby would be arriving in less than
six weeks and we were SO excited, hopeful, and ready!!! We knew this was a God
given “yes” and we knew we could fully be excited and hopeful, yes things could
change, but we were going to focus on the excitement of the “yes!” After all
there was no inclination that things would change and we were not going to live
in fear.
God writes each of our stories beautifully. He knows the path we will
be on. He guides us gently, lovingly and is always there during the hard times.
God wrote our baby’s birth story beautifully. We arrived in Utah the night
before her due date. We met the most incredible, courageous, beautiful woman,
our baby’s birth mom. She was going to be “our” birth mom. It was surreal. We
were so nervous to meet her. Yet so excited! The moment she met us we both knew
the gravity of this meeting and we both began to cry. We had a wonderful meal
together sharing life and future hopes for this child that would be arriving
the next day. Sweet Javeyah Hope arrived right before Christmas. We had the
beautiful gift of being at the birth supporting our birth mom through labor and
all through the hospital stay. We became a family over those few days. I will
never fully be able to express what our birth mom truly means to me. She was such a beautiful
person who loved her daughter so much and wanted the best possible future for
her. She made the hardest, most courageous decision and we will forever love
her for that. Javeyah means “desired” and boy was she desired and longed for.
We had her birth mom pick the spelling of her name since she fell in love with the
name we had thought of when we shared it with her. Her name has a Hispanic
heritage as does our daughter, and her birth mom loved that.
For a few days we were transported to another time it seemed, a time of hopeful anticipation, unselfishness, deep care, respect, deep bonding, and love. It was the most incredible experience of our lives and we are so grateful to have had the privilege to adopt. Thank you for reading our story.”
Maybe you have been waiting, longing, and been uncertain of your own adoption journey. I'd love to talk with you more and share some encouragement. Feel free to reach out to me anytime:
Dawn: (813) 360-7368
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