Our journey began with us having the desire to extend our family and share our life with a child. We both love kids and felt ready to dive into another phase in our life. Our families were very supportive but also cautious, not knowing how things would play out. It was a new experience for all of us, but nonetheless, we were excited. Our story is unique in that nearly all AdoptHelp adoptions involve newborn babies and we have adopted two children through AdoptHelp, who both came to us at one year of age.
When AdoptHelp explained that we could select exactly the types of situations to which we would be open, we jumped at the chance of pursing an infant or a toddler adoption.After doing a lot of research (and I mean a lot!) we felt comfortable with AdoptHelp from the beginning, we loved their free consultation and having all our questions answered with no pressure to sign up. We felt like we would not be waiting for years or get lost in the shuffle since AdoptHelp keeps their client list small. We were concerned that being a same-sex couple might be an issue, but they assured us that birthmothers were very open and in independent adoption it is the birth parents who personally select the family they wish to parent the child.
Waiting to be matched did not take long for us. We actually were rushing to get everything ready to bring our sons home rather than waiting months for anything to happen! We were definitely prepared to wait longer than we did. We were very clear about the level of communication we were comfortable having with birth mothers and AdoptHelp respected our wishes.
Meeting our first son was a life changing experience. Our doubts immediately vanished and all we wanted to do was take him home and make him feel safe and happy. Meeting our second son for the first time was also life changing. We never imagined we could be so lucky twice! Our first son transitioned unbelievably well, while our second son took a little longer to feel secure in his surroundings. Now they are so happy and love each other so much.
Our boys are now two and four. It is amazing to see how much they have bonded. Adoption is what made our family come to be. We read books on adoption with the boys and we are just beginning to explore and figure out the best ways to talk about it. We cannot imagine loving our kids any differently; if anything, we think our connection is even more intense and fateful. Overall, adoption has been a very positive experience and we cannot imagine our life without our boys. We are so thankful to their birthmothers for the sacrifices they made and for their trust in us. We also cannot thank the amazing AdoptHelp staff enough for all they have done for us.