The Call

          From the time our oldest son turned five until he graduated from high school (count 13 years!) I spent most Saturdays and several nights a week most of the year sitting in bleachers watching him play baseball. Our daughter played softball also. There were other sports mixed in there, soccer, basketball and volleyball. But baseball was the constant. You can read some of the lessons I learned sitting in the stands by clicking here and here and here.

         Looking back it was no surprise I was in the bleachers watching a baseball game when I received the call from our third birth mother. Actually, it was not directly the birthmother, but her Aunt. Someone from our business had a distant relative whose teenage daughter was pregnant with twins. She knew we were trying to adopt and asked if we were interested in twins. She gave her relative my phone number.

         After I walked away from the cheering crowd sitting in the bleachers, so I could hear her, by heart began pounding faster. She explained the situation with her niece and wanted to know if we really would take twins. I told her about our family and how from the beginning of our adoption journey we were always planning on adopting two children. She said her niece was five months along and would like to meet us. She lived in a small town three hours away. I arranged a day and time for my husband and I to drive there and meet her.

         The first thought that crossed my mind when my husband told me about the potential of adopting twins was, “Wow! One baby is hard enough, two babies at a time will be really hard!” But then I remembered if God wanted this for us, certainly He would give us the strength to do it. My thoughts quickly turned to, “Great! It will be so cute to dress them in matching outfits!” What was my husband’s thought? As a baseball coach he was picturing his next second baseman/ shortstop combination.

         From that point on my emotions were mixed. I tried my best not to get my hopes up and to stay out of the emotional pool. I was not going to buy anything like I had the last time. No diapers, no sleepers, nothing.  I was not going to get attached. In fact, I was going to go with the idea of helping a birth mother and that was it. Maybe that was all we were supposed to do. But, I couldn’t help getting excited at the prospect of adopting twins. Twins!

         The next weekend my husband and I made the three-hour drive to her house. We said a nervous pray, not sure about what adventure God had us on this time. Since the birth mother found us, and did not go through the adoption agency, this would be an independent adoption. The agency would help us with the paperwork, but we were on our own with meeting the birth mother. I was grateful now that I had plenty of experience meeting with, talking to and driving birth mothers to doctor’s appointments. Isn’t God good to prepare us for what is ahead?

         We drove to the unfamiliar town, and pulled off onto a dirt road. There were large trees with branches hanging over the path. Looking for the rural landmarks, we pulled into a small grouping of houses with chickens clucking and walking in the dirt.  Not exactly sure we were at the right place, we climbed the steps to the first house. We knocked on the door, apprehensive about who we would meet on the other side.

Philippians 4:13 “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”

                          

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Don’t you love that God knows our future and prepares us for it in advance? 

( Click here  to continue reading on Day 14.)