Want to encourage you...

Today is Orphan Sunday and I wanted to encourage everyone to take a moment and not only pray for those children out there who are without a home but to pray for those families who long to bring little ones to their home. Take a few extra minutes today and hug your children a little bit tighter. I know children can be stressful at times and no child is perfect but be thankful that you have been able to get pregnant and have children or that you have been able to successfully adopt a child and bring him/her home. I don't say this to criticize in any way but lately I have been hearing more and more parents complain about their children or their pregnancies and it just breaks my heart. I am thrilled that God has chosen for Kelly and I to walk this journey of adoption and I look forward to seeing how God's hand works every detail of this process out. God has chosen a different path for Kelly and I but, as a lot of women do, I will always wonder what it would have been like to get pregnant and go through the miracle of childbirth. However, I am blessed to know that, hopefully, one day we will be able to bring home our child and we will love him/her with unconditional love and provide it with a life and family that it may not have otherwise had. So, today, remember those children who are without a home as well as those families that long to provide home to these children.

Below is a poem that has spoken to my heart in so many ways. I pray that God allows our infertility and adoption journey to be a way to speak to those around us. I pray that our journey will help give strength to those walking through the same struggles that we have been facing and are going through and for them to know they are not alone.

You and I By
Katherine R. Cottle

You talk with other women and complain about your children.

I have just come from the doctor’s office where I have been poked, prodded, and injected trying to find out why I can’t have what is causing your pain.

I know that children are a blessing from God.

You have been blessed with children and not I. Why?

You talk about how easy it is for you to get pregnant. In fact, all your husband has to do is “throw his pants over the bedpost.” You have the birth of your children all planned out.

I have just miscarried again.

You complain about never really wanting children and how inconvenient it has been to deny yourself for someone else.

I have just finished crying myself to sleep because God said “No” again.

You count the days before you go back to work and leave your child with someone else to raise him.

I wake up on an operating table, praying that this time the procedure will work.

You wake up one morning and you are pregnant

I wake up wondering, How far is too far to go with medical science?

You say, “Just adopt.”

I say, “Do you really think it is that easy?”

You say, “Just forget about it. Relax! It will happen when you least expect it.”

I say, “How can I forget about it? I have had to chart and plan lovemaking and take my temperature for the past six years because ‘timing is everything.’”