This post has been months in the making. Except every time I thought about writing it, I couldn't imagine the words I would use.
The short version is, we are adding a 5th child to our family. The long version follows.
Adoption has always been in the back of our mind. We have always had a heart for it. We have always had a heart for children and imagined ourselves having lots of them.
Let me preface that. Once, when we were dating, I took Adam along on a babysitting job for my church that involved watching dozens of children. One of the moms pulled me aside afterward and said, of Adam, "He is good with children. He will be a good dad. Remember that." Her words were prophetic. I have husband who is a fantastic father, and who is 100% behind me as a mother. His proactive parenting, easy-going personality and boundless energy have made child-rearing so far much easier, I believe, (and more fun!) than what I consider to be the norm.
When we were newly married we talked about adopting. And then life got busy and we discovered we were abundantly fertile and adoption kept getting pushed further back on the horizon.
Several months ago, Adam and I were talking Life and realized that we had different expectations, different timelines about some things. Adoption was one. So we decided to just pray about it. The more we prayed, the more we realized that human wisdom would always give us reason to wait, to put off those wonderful but scary longings that God put in our hearts.
We made lists of all the reasons we should and should not adopt a child. I'll start with the Should Nots. We already have four children. We live in a small house. Adoption is expensive. It's time-consuming work. Our kids are young. We would become a transracial family. On top of that, this child would (unless God leads us toward adoption again in the future) look very different than the rest of the family, which may prove to be difficult for that child. Will our kids all get enough attention? Will we look like crazy people?
Then there are the Shoulds. Poverty. Disease. Malnutrition. The chance to be a part of something life-changing. God's faithfulness. His provision of all resources, financial, emotional, physical, spiritual. Our three boys' mutual desires to open their hearts and family to an orphaned child. Extra seats in our car and food on our table and toys in our house. A network of loving grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and friends.
When we compared the Shoulds with the Should Nots, our best reasons for not adopting were pretty flimsy.
At some point, The Orphan stopped being hypothetical and started becoming real in our minds and in our hearts. We realized that our desire, like our Father's, was to move heaven and earth in order place the fatherless in a family. And we realized that oftentimes the timing doesn't seem ideal to our human brains, but when God puts a prompting in our hearts, the time is NOW, not later.
So we decided. Yes. The answer was yes. A few more months of prayer about countries, agencies, programs, and we ended up in Holt's Ethiopia program with friends and family covering us in prayer.
In Ethiopia, poverty is everywhere. Here are some statistics that jumped off the page at me when I first saw them on my friend Christy's blog:
* One out of every 20 children born alive die in their first month of life
* One out of ten die before reaching their first birthday
* One out of six die before reaching their fifth birthday
* There are 4.6 million orphans in Ethiopia
* The median age in Ethiopia is 18
* 1.5 million people in Ethiopia are infected with AIDS
* Per capita, Ethiopia receives less aid than any country in Africa
So here we are. Our application was accepted in November, and this weekend we have our first home visit for our homestudy. In the meantime, we've been chasing paper like crazy people for our homestudy and dossier, and we've seen more of our family doctor in the past few weeks than we have in the past few years combined.
When we began the process, we were told that 12-18 months was the typical timeline. Since then, things have been moving more quickly in our agency. The bottom line is, we really don't know how long it will take, and right now we are OK with that. I will post major updates here on the blog as they come about.
The next major step for us is completing our homestudy. That should be finished in the next couple of weeks. Then we complete parenting classes, get fingerprinted, and mail the thick stack of papers we've been accumulating for our dossier to Ethiopia. We anticipate all or most of that being done by the end of January. After a waiting period of anywhere from one to several months, a referral, or "match" is given. A court
date is set, and presumably passed, and then we
The short version is, we are adding a 5th child to our family. The long version follows.
Adoption has always been in the back of our mind. We have always had a heart for it. We have always had a heart for children and imagined ourselves having lots of them.
Let me preface that. Once, when we were dating, I took Adam along on a babysitting job for my church that involved watching dozens of children. One of the moms pulled me aside afterward and said, of Adam, "He is good with children. He will be a good dad. Remember that." Her words were prophetic. I have husband who is a fantastic father, and who is 100% behind me as a mother. His proactive parenting, easy-going personality and boundless energy have made child-rearing so far much easier, I believe, (and more fun!) than what I consider to be the norm.
When we were newly married we talked about adopting. And then life got busy and we discovered we were abundantly fertile and adoption kept getting pushed further back on the horizon.
Several months ago, Adam and I were talking Life and realized that we had different expectations, different timelines about some things. Adoption was one. So we decided to just pray about it. The more we prayed, the more we realized that human wisdom would always give us reason to wait, to put off those wonderful but scary longings that God put in our hearts.
We made lists of all the reasons we should and should not adopt a child. I'll start with the Should Nots. We already have four children. We live in a small house. Adoption is expensive. It's time-consuming work. Our kids are young. We would become a transracial family. On top of that, this child would (unless God leads us toward adoption again in the future) look very different than the rest of the family, which may prove to be difficult for that child. Will our kids all get enough attention? Will we look like crazy people?
Then there are the Shoulds. Poverty. Disease. Malnutrition. The chance to be a part of something life-changing. God's faithfulness. His provision of all resources, financial, emotional, physical, spiritual. Our three boys' mutual desires to open their hearts and family to an orphaned child. Extra seats in our car and food on our table and toys in our house. A network of loving grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and friends.
When we compared the Shoulds with the Should Nots, our best reasons for not adopting were pretty flimsy.
At some point, The Orphan stopped being hypothetical and started becoming real in our minds and in our hearts. We realized that our desire, like our Father's, was to move heaven and earth in order place the fatherless in a family. And we realized that oftentimes the timing doesn't seem ideal to our human brains, but when God puts a prompting in our hearts, the time is NOW, not later.
So we decided. Yes. The answer was yes. A few more months of prayer about countries, agencies, programs, and we ended up in Holt's Ethiopia program with friends and family covering us in prayer.
In Ethiopia, poverty is everywhere. Here are some statistics that jumped off the page at me when I first saw them on my friend Christy's blog:
* One out of every 20 children born alive die in their first month of life
* One out of ten die before reaching their first birthday
* One out of six die before reaching their fifth birthday
* There are 4.6 million orphans in Ethiopia
* The median age in Ethiopia is 18
* 1.5 million people in Ethiopia are infected with AIDS
* Per capita, Ethiopia receives less aid than any country in Africa
So here we are. Our application was accepted in November, and this weekend we have our first home visit for our homestudy. In the meantime, we've been chasing paper like crazy people for our homestudy and dossier, and we've seen more of our family doctor in the past few weeks than we have in the past few years combined.
When we began the process, we were told that 12-18 months was the typical timeline. Since then, things have been moving more quickly in our agency. The bottom line is, we really don't know how long it will take, and right now we are OK with that. I will post major updates here on the blog as they come about.
The next major step for us is completing our homestudy. That should be finished in the next couple of weeks. Then we complete parenting classes, get fingerprinted, and mail the thick stack of papers we've been accumulating for our dossier to Ethiopia. We anticipate all or most of that being done by the end of January. After a waiting period of anywhere from one to several months, a referral, or "match" is given. A court
date is set, and presumably passed, and then we travel to Ethiopia to pick up our child.
Until then, we prepare our hearts and our home for this new life, and we wait.
With joy and expectation.
Until then, we prepare our hearts and our home for this new life, and we wait.
With joy and expectation.
5 comments:
SO exciting, SO amazing, SO God!!
I am excited for your family to grow and change as you follow His calling in your lives.
I feel blessed to travel this journey with you and pray that He lightens the path each step of the way!!
That's so awesome Amber-Rose! We'll be praying for this special child and your special family!!
I could relate to so, so much in this post.
<3
B
We love you guys and CAN'T wait to help you welcome a new little Zimel child into your wonderful family. Happy New Year & talk with you soon my dear friend!
This is so amazing! I love to see the Lord work through adoption. I will anticipate hearing more. This is also something John and I are praying about for the future so thanks for being open,honest and sharing some great books!
Oh that's so cute that you got them all in those shirts!!
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