An Update in Eight

1) I can't believe I haven't updated in a week! It was that time of the month, so I was feeling pretty tired this past week. It is still hard. Every month. It starts and I think I guess there is not going to be a miracle this month. Sometimes I think it would be easier if I didn't believe in miracles.

2) Our visit with our house guests went well despite the unexpected news. They ended up staying until Thursday (last Thursday, not today). I found out they hadn't told anybody about their pregnancy so it wasn't just us. Not sure why. Hopefully, I didn't out their pregnancy on my blog. A friend who knows them didn't know who I was talking about so hopefully no one else knew either. However, it will be pretty difficult to hide it if that is their intention since the baby bump is getting pretty obvious.

3) I am doing better as far as the other unexpected news we received. Even though it is not much longer (about 6 months longer than we were expecting), it feels like it is so far off now. John actually told me he was sorry he said it was okay for us to be excited :( I think he is having as hard a time with it as I am. He said he almost threw away my Adoptive Families magazine away when it arrived. He copes by getting angry, I get sad. I am trying to adjust my attitude and embrace this waiting time. I have several things I am thinking about doing over this next year. I will post about them very soon. I am going to an information meeting about one of them tonight so I want to wait until I get more information before putting it "out there."

4) I do have to brag on my husband. John just finished his first year of school to become a family nurse practitioner. One more year to go! He finished this first year with a 4.0 GPA!!! The Friday before last, he was inducted into Sigma Theta Tau International - The Honor Society of Nursing. And just yesterday, he found out that he was selected as the most outstanding 1st year FNP student. I am so proud of him. He has worked so hard over this past year and it is wonderful to see his hard work recognized. Here are a couple pics from the induction ceremony.



5) My position at work is being converted from a contract position to a government position, which means more pay and much better benefits, especially in regards to vacation and sick days. Previously, I had no sick days at all and only 10 vacation days. This didn't sound too bad until I had to take a week of unpaid leave when the federal government shut down this past winter because of the blizzard. I am excited to be able to save more money towards our adoption and also be able to continue to pay my in-laws back for the money they loaned us for infertility treatment. I think I would be a little bitter about all the money we spent, but because we were part of the shared risk program, we got almost $16,000 back which was the start of our adoption fund.

6) On Saturday, I was able to attend a Prayer Rally for North Korea. It is exciting to see how God is uniting together many ministries and churches (especially Korean churches) together for His purposes for North Korea. At the beginning of the day we had a time of prayer for repentance and healing (how can we ask God to work out something in North Korea when we have a log in our own eye). An invitation to come up and be prayed for was given and initially I didn't think I would go. But then they mentioned how it is difficult to love others when you are doubting God's love for you. Infertility has taken its toll on me in many ways. Sometimes I really struggle to believe God is at work in my situation. I was sitting there feeling overwhelmed by so many emotions - doubting God's love, doubting His plan, hurting, and wanting so much to have more faith to believe. So I decided to go up to receive prayer. A pastor (though I didn't know he was a pastor at the time) and another gentleman laid hands on me and prayed. It was truly amazing. I didn't say anything to them and yet they prayed for everything I had been thinking. The first gentleman prayed for God to show His glory (actually he said this many times), for God to show His love to me in a tangible way, for more faith, and for healing from the pain. Then I was totally blown away when the pastor prayed for me. He said he saw me as a little girl who the heavenly Father was delighting in. Though I stumble and fall at times, He smiles at me, even laughs, He is so happy with me, and He knows I am trying. How I wish I could capture everything he said because he gave me the most beautiful picture of my heavenly Father, one that was much needed. I had a view of God as critical and judging of all my faults and I have not found it easy to shake this idea even though intellectually I know it is untrue. This picture of God as a loving Father who is cheering me on and delighting in me even when I fall down is radically different. It reminded me of a loving father who is watching his little one learn to walk. He doesn't get angry when the child falls down. He smiles, he encourages, he laughs, he delights. I never was able to wrap my mind around this picture of God before. I believe this pastor gave me a beautiful gift. When I have failed this past week, my mind has returned to this picture of God - still loving me, still delighting in me.

Then the first gentleman prayed again and said he had a clear vision of me riding a horse in a green pasture. I am not sure what to make of this one. What comes to mind is being carefree and at peace. Interesting considering that is what I have been seeking. I want to be free of this pain of infertility and pregnancy loss. I want and desperately need Christ's peace and healing. At the end they both said that they felt like that day was the beginning of a new day in my life. I am still pondering their words.

7) To be truthful, it was difficult to focus my prayers on North Korea. My mind kept returning to God's plan for us as far as children. This was partly not my fault because for some reason the subject of adoption came up repeatedly throughout this meeting, either in the context of our spiritual adoption or in regards to the orphans in North Korea and Northeast China (also North Korean children). In fact someone even specifically prayed for an opening up of adoption for the children in Northeast China. To be honest I was thinking it would never happen, but then I read that in fact a bill had already been introduced by Sen. Sam Brownback to allow for these adoptions. Definitely felt my heart stirring on this one.

8) I was feeling bad for having so much trouble focusing my prayers, but then Sunday at church my pastor said that when a particular thing keeps coming to our mind when we are praying, it is because that is what we need to be praying about!

I am behind on my blog commenting, but you girls are definitely in my prayers. Lisa and "A" I am praying specifically for your cycles. I am so hopeful for you both!

Many Thanks!

Thanks so much for all the recommendations, advice, encouragement, and prayers. Whether you sent me an email or left a comment, I truly appreciated it.

I think one of the main things I learned is there are even more options than I had originally thought. I have not had a chance to do much more than a initial read through of the recommended agencies' websites because of a very busy week at work last week so no decisions yet. I am hoping this week will be a little less crazy. John has finals this upcoming week, but then he has 2 weeks off until the fall semester starts. John is planning to use some of this time to do some research as well.

Some thoughts, , clarifications, and responses:

I not sure why I thought this, but I had not considered the possibility of adopting from another state until I made the request for info. Somehow it seemed like it would complicate an already complicated process. I am thankful for the suggestions of national agencies and those located in other states. With the law in Maryland giving 30 days before parental rights are revoked, I think it may make a lot of sense to adopt from another state.

I am less overwhelmed by the application/home study process. It is starting to seem more manageable to me.

I realize that $18,000 is on the low end for a domestic adoption. I really didn't have an objection to the price Bethany was charging, I was just mentioning the price had increased. I knew it was well within the price range for a domestic infant adoption. For those who may not know, the cost of domestic adoption ranges from $8,000 - $40,000. The low end is usually for stepparent adoptions. We have decided we can spend up to $25,000 if we save a portion of my salary. The main portion of my salary has to go to paying John's parents back for the $24,000 loan they gave us to pay for fertility treatments. We spent a total of $30,000 for 2 IVF/ICSI cycles including the cost of all our meds. Because we participated in the shared risk program, we got $16,000 of our money back which we will put towards adoption.

The reviews of Bethany are so mixed - some people love them, some people don't. Unless Bethany calls us and says they can fit us into the fall training session, I don't think we will go through them. I think there are large variations in Bethany's timing and quality of services from state to state. I have no problem with Bethany's 2 year wait for placement (of course I hope it would be much, much less). What I have a problem with is the 1 year to complete the homestudy and get approval. I think that may answer A's question (see comment section on previous post) about the time frame between the initial application and the approval and waiting as far as the requirement for it to take no longer than 6-7 months. It will take them 1 year to complete the homestudy so we won't have a home study that can expire. They will not come out for the home visit and interviews until you have completed the training, but since we can't get this training from them until March/April it will take a year before we have a completed homestudy and final approval. Other agencies seem to be able to complete a homestudy in a few months time. Sorry if I wasn't clear about the timeline. As far as the screening interview prior to the formal application packet, I think they do this so you don't waste your time and theirs if there is something in your background which will disqualify you from adopting.

Jess, thank you for the suggestion of an adoption consultant. I had not heard of such a thing, so I will definitely be looking into it. Your comment really hit me when you talked about setting up a nursery. I am just not there yet. After 4 1/2 years of infertility and a miscarriage, I am not yet at a point where I can believe I will actually have a child in my arms some day. I know many view adoption as a when and not an if, but I am not able to do so yet. I have always struggled with feeling not good enough and so I worry about getting approved. At a minimum I can not imagine setting up a nursery until we got approved, but even after that I know it would be a struggle for me. The fear of a failed adoption looms large for me. But I know I have to open my heart again. I have more to say about this, but it is a post for another day.

Niki, I think I have msn messenger through my hotmail, I will be in touch.

Alicia, as far as a specific prayer request, I would ask everyone to please pray for God to open our hearts to whatever way He wants to build our family. We are considering other options besides domestic infant adoption. Pray for God's leading and will for us, that our ears hear a voice behind us saying, "this is the way, walk in it." Isaiah 30:21

Again, I can't thank everyone enough for praying for us.

IVF/ICSI #2

Well here we go again. I wish I didn't have to write #2 after IVF/ICSI. I never wrote IVF #1 because I was really hoping that the first one would be it. Unfortunately, that is not the way things turned out. However, God has done an amazing work in my heart over the last month and a half or so. He has brought healing to the point that both John and I feel like we are ready to give things another try.

We are scheduled for this month. Initially, we thought we would wait until we got up to DC before trying again. This was partly because neither one of us thought our hearts would be ready to try again and partly because we were worried it would be too stressful being so close to our move. This was basically where we were at when John left for Peru in February. About a week after John got back (beginning of March) I figured I had better research fertility clinics in the DC area and check with the shared risk program to see if we could transfer into a program up there. For those who might not know, shared risk is a program where you pay a discounted fee and receive multiple IVF cycles. If treatment is unsuccessful, you receive 70% of your money back. You can also cancel out of the program and receive 70% of your money back if you can't or don't want to continue treatment. You can read more about it here. Anyway, I found a clinic no problem. But when I called IntegraMed to see if we could transfer to the clinic in DC I found out we could not. They wanted us to cancel out of the program here and enroll in the program in DC. We would basically have to start all over and pay the full fee. This was just not an option. So that left us finishing out the program here. I talked to my IVF nurse Sabrina to see if we would be able to get in for April. They require you to have two monthly cycles before beginning birth control pills (BCPs), which is the first step in an IVF cycle. Thankfully, my monthly cycles cooperated so that we could.

We are basically ready to go. Drugs have been ordered, appointments have been made. I have been taking BCPs since March 18th. I finish them Monday April 6th. So here is our schedule:

April 6 - baseline ultrasound (this is to make sure I have no cysts on my ovaries)
April 7 - 1st injection - Cetrotide (this is given to prevent premature LH surge or ovulation, if this happens then my cycle would be cancelled)
April 9 - baseline u/s and blood work (BW) to check my estrogen, progesterone, and LH levels
April 9/10 - Begin stims, Follistim and later Menopur (Follistim is used to stimulate the development of ovarian follicles and Menopur is used for better egg development and quality)

Projected egg retrieval dates: April 21, 22, 0r 23
Projected transfer dates: April 24, 25, or 26

Even If I am not ready (have enough mature follicles) until the 23rd, things should still work out just fine timing wise for our move. In this case transfer would be on the 26th, followed by bed rest until the 28th. Then the movers come to pack us up on the 29th and 30th and the cleaner comes on the 2nd of May. Since we don't have to do the packing and cleaning ourselves I think things will work out just fine. I can't believe things are actually about to get started. I am so much more relaxed this time. Last time the process of IVF itself with all the shots and drugs was completely overwhelming. You can read about a typical IVF cycle here. This time I know what to expect so I am much less nervous about the physical aspects of the process. Emotionally, I am both excited and nervous. I plan on taking it one day at a time, trusting in God's perfect plan for this cycle.