Anxiety is for the...Adopting Parents

I have never really been an anxious person. All my life I just took things as they came and dusted off after my inevitable falls. Often times not even noticing the parts of me that were really hurting. I was a goal keeper in my younger years. For the sake of this post, i'm gonna brag. I was a GOOD goal keeper. To get to be good I had to practice constantly to remove any bad habits that had formed. One particularly bad habit I had was diving into the goalposts. I knew the minute I launched for a ball I was gonna ring that bell like it was noon. One particular run in with the sticks I so lovingly referred to as my "boyfriend" I got back up quick after saving our team from going down a point (I mean obviously I was the savior to the team every game, I did mention I was good right?). I stood up like a soldier who'd just single handedly knocked down an entire army, chest puffed out and all. The whole world watching knew I'd rang that bell, and began to erupt into laughter when I was more concerned about the dirt in my sock than the growing knot on my forehead. So you see, even with physical wounds, I was often more concerned about the little things and ignored the headaches forming.

This adoption process has ROCKED MY WORLD. I worry about every step. Why? I have thought about this so hard. The only possible conclusion is this: my child needs me. I may not know where they are or who they are, but their birth parents have entrusted me with the ability to FIGHT for our babies. Right now, our son waits in his orphanage and I think about him 24/7. Sleep? Yeah right. My baby boy is sleeping in a crib on the other side of the world. In a region being rocked by terrorism and fear. I need to get to him. We need to protect him. I can't let it slip. I can't ignore the hurting in my head any longer. I gotta do this. If something were to go wrong and I was ignoring it, I could never forgive myself.

So that's where I'm at. I had to write it all out. It's been bouncing around in my head for a few months now. So yeah, I'm gonna continue to be a freakball of worry and emotions until I am walking down that hall at Dayton International Airport and I step outside the secure area. It's all gonna flow then. Be prepared for lots of red faced bawling photos and my kids looking at me like I have 6 heads. "Kids" that sounds so lovely.

Family is MORE than BLOOD!

How true is that though? Growing up I amassed a group of girls I call "sisters". They are at times more "family" than my own extended family (not knocking my family at all). Family is MORE than BLOOD!

We started a T-shirt fundraiser yesterday to help us pay for our homestudy. The homestudy update costs $700. The T-shirts will get us to $200 if we sell all 25.

They are super versatile. I made them that way so more people could buy them and wear them! You know you want one! Have a friend who is family? Buy them one too! Step parent? They need one too! Everyone needs one these walking advertisements that family is not just relegated to DNA. It is so much more. It is LOVE!

Get your shirts here: Hoos Family "Family is MORE than BLOOD" T-shirts!

It's Been A Long While...

Well. Here's an update. I guess I thought if I didn't blog about it I wouldn't have to bring all the emotions up to the surface.

In December I started pushing our agency for an update on Koraline. Because that's what we pay them for! Well, they kept saying "we emailed our in country representative and he hasn't responded, as soon as he does we'll forward it to you." After nearly a month of waiting I found the in country rep and emailed him myself. HE RESPONDED THE SAME DAY. Our daughters birth mother had heard rumors of American families adopting babies and harvesting their organs (NO children have been legally adopted internationally for this purpose, it was a scare tactic from the DRC media to get the country against international adoption during the suspension). So she did what any mother would do hearing that, she scooped her daughter up and brought her home.

Our hearts still ache at the loss of our baby girl. We pray everyday she is well taken care of, we know she is loved. This all went down before Christmas. I didn't have the heart to pack away any of her stuff until February. So obviously we couldn't handle starting another adoption right away.

On mothers day Kevin gave me a gift. It was a coupon gift with coupons like free night without baby duty (Jack's STILL not sleeping all night), or a back rub. The last coupon brought me to shock and then tears. "I'm ready, let's adopt again."

So we started the process.

That's where we're at, starting the process. Homestudy update is underway and we're exploring our options. There's an opportunity right now we are exploring and I'll be able to share more once we have a solid answer on some things!

Be praying for us. I'm so scared we'll get a match and then the country will suspend exit letters.

We are also accepting donations to help us with the fees of getting our homestudy updated, once that's done we can apply for grants.

Stay tuned for some fundraising opportunities coming up!

Jack's First Birthday Picture

Pictures are worth a thousand...

When you are adopting a child internationally all you have to go on during the court process are pictures. You get to watch your child grow through the lens of a camera. Unfortunately we have not had even that. Our agency has only gotten us one picture. There are all kinds of excuses and reasons but the reality is that it is killing this mama's heart to not be able to see my Koraline grow up. I want so bad to see more than the one picture. In almost 10 months so much can change with a toddler. I wish I could just see one more picture.

There is a man that can make this happen. However he needs a large chunk of $ to travel from Kinshasa to southern DR Congo where our girl is. It's heart breaking to know we may not ever see her picture. We have to raise the funds to send the man to take pictures and love on our girl. 1 in 7 kids die before reaching age 5 in the DRC. There's a chance that we may never see her face if this exit permit suspension continues. Part of me wants to hop in a plane and go there myself. But I'd have to rob a bank or something to get the $ to do that.

So here I sit asking for prayer, support, anything. Know a missionary in the DRC? Have an extra $2500 sitting around? Have something you can sell that might help us get to our goal? We're having an auction the first week of August. Buy something from that to help us out!

I lay awake at night watching our son sleep dreaming about the day when I can watch him and his sister run around in the backyard, take them to all the cool places, go swimming in a creek... This mama just needs a picture.

Jack's Finalization Hearing on 5/23/2014, which he slept through...

Letter to "L" on Mother's Day

When we were preparing to adopt I read all kinds of posts around each mothers day. Blogs about being so happy to have the gift of motherhood and blogs about how to celebrate the adopted child's first family. The one that had the most impact for me was a blog written by an adoptive mother to her children's birth mother. 

Our adoption with Jack is a closed adoption. So we have no contact with his first mommy. There is not a day go by that I don't think about her and the amazing love she showed our Jack. Everytime I tell him I love him I am telling him for her too. Every kiss is a kiss from her too. Every night when I cuddle up to my little snuggle bug I cuddle him for her too. So here's my letter to Jack's first mother, "L". 

Dear L,

You've never met me, or even seen my face. However we share in a miracle that is so amazing and perfect. When you chose to place your baby boy in an adoptive home you made the hardest decision you ever could! You are far braver than I ever could be. Everyday when I look at our son I see your courage and strength. His eyes reflect your love, his smiles reflect the happiness you gave him, he is above average on every milestone and I know he got that determination from you. 

This holiday was so very hard for me for so many years. The pain of empty arms is a deep one. I know now that your gift to me has resulted in you feeling this now. I want you to know that Jack will always know you how deep you love him. There are no words that can make this day hurt any less for you and I know that. 

The only thing I can do on this day is thank you. Not just a "hey, thanks" but a sincere thank you. You gave Jack life, you wanted and cherished him, you loved him. Now we can teach him how to live his life, we want and cherish him, and because of your love for him our family is fuller. You will be forever a part of our family even though we have never met you or even seen your face. 

From one mother to another, thank you from the depths of my heart for loving our son enough to give him life and thank you for making me a mother. Those words just don't seem enough. I don't think words can really say what I want to say. The gratitude is in the everyday, it's in the boo boos I kiss, in the way he explodes into grins and giggles when his daddy comes home from work, it's in the middle of the night when he wakes us up giggling. My thanks for you grows along with our boy. 

He is so handsome!

and cheesy

and a heartbreaker!

Detour: part 2

It's so hard to find the time and mental ware-with-all to type out blog posts now! So here goes nothin!

We took our time coming home from Texas. Baby Jack is the most perfect road trip baby! We usually had to stop before he needed to! I was never more happy to see the Cincinnati skyline! With being in a car for two days straight we really needed a quiet day of bonding with our boy.

It was tough transitioning from road trip to normal everyday life. Jack was sleeping 5 hour blocks in Texas and then he got his schedules flipped from sleeping in the car all day for 2 days. Since then he hasn't quite figured out his sleep schedule again. So that's been tough! Good thing Jack's grandma comes everyday to hold him so I can get some stuff done! We had some incredible people bring us meals and just love on us!

Then my parents came to visit for 2 weeks!

The past 9 weeks have been a whirlwind of crazy times. Little Jack has grown so fast! He's doubled his birth weight already!

Now every time I hold Jack I can't stop thinking about how we'll not have this time with Kora. Our bonding with her will be much different. Instead of having people over to meet her right away we'll have to go into our cocoon for a while and bond as a family.

While I'm writing about Kora I should also add that because of our "detour" we need to start over again with fundraising for our girl. We believe God knows who our children are and where they will be born. He called us to adopt Kora and we will fight to bring her home. He called us to adopt Jack and He made it happen. He will make a way for Kora to come home, I am confident in that. I'll have more details about how you can help us with Kora's adoption (and the loan we took out for Jack) soon.

Well that's about all I have to say right now....

DETOUR!

When we first switched countries and agencies from Ethiopia we were researching all our options and I had contacted an agency about domestic adoption. I had completely forgot about them until December 28th when the social worker with Adoption Covenant emailed me about a birth mom that they only had one profile to show! We prayed about it and decided that we would send a profile. If we got chosen that meant we had found one of the children God has set aside for our family! Well, on January 3rd, 2014 we got "the call" that we had BEEN CHOSEN! Baby boy was due on January 23rd. We had just 20 days to prepare our home for a newborn! So we ran around like crazy people for 2 weeks prepping and planning. Then we got word that birth mom's due date was moved up to the 14th! The 14th passed, no baby. So they naturally induced her by scraping her membranes on January 20th.

We did some research and chose to drive down to Lubbock, TX (where baby was born) on January 18th. We stopped for the night in Purdy, MO with friends and then the next day made the trek to Lubbock. We waited, and waited, and waited. Then on January 23rd (the original due date) at 2:30 am his first mommy's water broke! Then we waited, and waited, and waited some more until we got a call at 12:28 pm CST that she was pushing! We were on the other side of town so we drove as fast as we could! His first mommy wanted us to be the first to see and hold little J so we got our own delivery room! We rushed in the hospital (forgetting our good camera). We sat down in labor and delivery room #8 and as soon as we sat down we heard the most beautiful sound in labor and delivery room #10, our son's first cry! It sent my heart through the top of my head! So very beautiful and long awaited! Then, the moment our world changed forever, the nurse ran in the room with a blue tinted baby boy! We got to hold his hand as they did all the measurements and tests. I got to wash all the ooey gooey gunk off of him and hold him skin to skin. When they placed him on my chest for the first time it all became real, I became a mother! In that moment all the world stopped and the only thing that mattered was this tiny, squirming human in my arms. John "Jack" Malcolm Hoos had made his debut!

Jack's first weigh in! He was born at 1:21 pm CST, weighed 6 lbs and was 18.5" long!

Kevin rolling Jack to the nursery for a blood test

Our sweet little Jack!

We wanted to breastfeed Jack and his first feed was using a supplemental nursing system. It was the most beautiful experience I have ever had. I'll be writing a post on that once I get some time.

We had to wait 48 hours for his first mommy to sign the papers to make Jack ours. We had our own hospital room and barely let Jack out of our sight! We then had to stay in Texas for 7-14 days for paperwork to clear us to cross state lines with our new handsome little man. We stayed with friends in Houston and enjoyed it so much! We didn't have to cook or clean or anything, just cuddle with our sweet boy. Had some yummy food and good company! My parents were able to fly to Texas and visit with us and meet Jack too! It was a great time to get to know our boy before we got thrown back into life back home!

In the car to Houston! #receiveexperiement

To Be Continued...