Saturday, December 31, 2005

Choosing Adoption

While Kevin and I wait for news and updates on Isabella, we decided to start this blog so everyone who is interested in our adoption can learn up-to-date info on its status. We will try to add posts as often as possible and will have pictures of Isabella here as we get them. We are still praying for a March pick-up date but with more recent delays our hopes are dampering. Thank you to everyone who continues to pray for us as we wait for our little baby to come home forever.

We started thinking about adoption in March 2004 when we learned that I had Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (Symptoms include ovarian and uterine cyst growth, mulitple missed or heavy periods, history of depression, to name a few). Specialists gave us less than a one percent chance of conceiving, with intervention. We had been trying to conceive for about 10 months at that point, using ovulation charts, thermometers, folklores, ovulation tests...you name it, we tried it. In Februrary 2004, I missed a period and we thought this was it. But that was the beginning of a hard road for us, a road of tests, doctors, procedures and more doctors. There were weeks where I was at the fertility clinic every day - including Saturdays and Sundays. (Believe it or not the docs at fertility clinics work everyday of the year, because women's cycles are everyday of the year. That's dedication! Oh, and money!) We tried every drug to make me ovulate; I had weekly ultrasounds to monitor cyst growth; I gave myself daily shots of ferility drugs and steriods; I gained 40 pounds, swelled up and looked like a pregnant women; we tried many artificial inseminations. Nothing worked. In fact, the last cycle we tried, I had nine fertilizable eggs, but our doctors still only gave us a 12 percent success rate. It didn't work and I ended up in a lot of pain because the cyst growth was out of control.

Our hearts were breaking. So we went back to our original plan. "If we tried everything we could and we weren't pregnant, we'd research adoption agencies and begin that process." We wanted to be parents; that didn't mean I had to have the baby. We could give a home to another child that we would love just as much.

We researched and read everything we could find about international and domestic adoption. We even learned about surrogacy. But in the end international adoption was the safest route to take. So we picked a local agency and signed with them on Feb. 7, 2005.

I'll talk about our experiences in future posts.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I thank God for you Jennifer.
You are a strong and courageous woman! It won't be long til your "Izzy" is home and will be delighted to have a wonderful mother like you.
Thank you for sharing all of this with those of us who are awaiting her arrival. I can't wait to see and hold her in person as I'm sure you are too. Thank you again.
Love,
Diane Brezo