Way Back When Wednesday - My Adoption Story Part II

This was taken from an interview I had with my Mom for a freshman English paper.  Having said that, I had to change the some of the grammar because my Mom obviously didn't adopt all of you readers, just me.  I'm debating whether or not to get rid of the [] marks showing the changes I made....  You'll get it when you read it.  It gets a little overwhelming by the end.


We first went through a lot of medical testing to find out what the trouble was and what could be done about it  Needless to say it wasn't successful and I don't want to go into that.  It wasn't fun.  All of my sisters-in-law and my sister were expecting.

After four years, we came to the realization that we were supposed to adopt.  I don't recall how we came to that except that both of us in our lives had been prepared to do this.  Both having brothers who were adopted made it very natural to have happen.  It wasn't an accident, adopting was the way things were supposed to happen.  We are ever so glad to have had it work out the way it has!!!

We began making efforts toward adopting while we were in Provo.  We went to one interview and both came home feeling "this is right to do, but not yet."  So we waited.  Soon Dad was offered two jobs, one in Michigan and one in San Diego California.  We prayed and decided we were to go to the great unknown (to us) the Midwest!

We headed to Michigan.  We arrived there and about one month later, I was called to be the Relief Society President.  I attended one of my first welfare meetings and the bishop read a letter he had received from the LDS Social Services there.  It said they needed "more adoptive parent applicants."  Can you imagine!!!!  They have more babies available than adoptive parents!  That just doesn't happen.

As RS President, I was supposed to make that announcement in RS.  I don't think I ever did, because I knew who that letter was for.  Heavenly Father was saying, "NOW!"  It was time to get busy, and so we did.  We called the next day and made an appointment.  We got all the paperwork that needed to be filled out.  This took some time--several months, maybe a year.  Finally we got it complete and began our waiting time.

During that time as the RS President, I went to a welfare meeting regarding LDS Social Services.  One of the speakers that day was Brother Bunch.  He told about several different situations--no names of course--of teenage pregnancy, birth parents, unwed mothers, etc.

But the story that I remember most was one about a young woman who was not a member of the church.  She wanted to place her baby for adoption.  Her mother didn't want her to go through LDS Social Services because she didn't want her grand baby to be raised Mormon.  She did say it was okay to place a baby somewhere else or get an abortion.

But the young woman didn't want to get an abortion.  To please her mother, she investigated a few other adoption agencies, but they didn't feel right.  So she returned to LDS Social Services and decided that it felt right.  She signed up to get the services there which included counseling and other benefits.

Later after we got Rachel, as I remembered this welfare meeting, I had a special feeling.  We had few details on Rachel's birth parents, but several of the other things about this young woman lined up.  And I felt like this story could have been about her birth mother.

In those days, the policy was a year minimum waiting time.  By this time it had been a year since we had moved to Michigan.  The first year we didn't expect anything to happen because we knew--and they kept reminding us--that there was a year minimum wait.  After the year was up, every phone call made us hold our breath.

Dad wouldn't believe that anything would ever happen, so he didn't want to buy anything to prepare.  But I did get a few things anyway.  A package of diapers, a bottle, I made a blanket, etc.  It was very exciting, but hard to wait.  And after one and a half years, [Rachel] came to us!

Waiting for PJ was totally different in that [Rachel] kept us having fun.  It wasn't so hard to wait because of [Rachel].  Also we were in Orem and had many friends and family around us.  In Michigan life was different without familiar people.  We did have our ward, but we didn't know them very well.  In Orem, we had adoption classes to help us prepare to be adoptive parents.  There weren't classes like that in Michigan because the LDS Social Services there was so much smaller than in Utah.

One thing that is worth remembering may go down under the happiest moment of my life... or one of them.  That is the two times that those babies were put into my arms.  [Rachel] had such a sweet cherubic face!  Little fat cheeks.  [She] was angelic and [her] foster mother said that is what they called [her], not knowing [her] name... Angel.

[Rachel] was so sweet until [she] got hungry.  Then [she] went from asleep and quiet to screaming in a matter of a second.  Screaming at the top of [her] lungs as if [her] life depended on it!  [She] screamed as if [her] life depended on it!  [Rachel] screamed until the bottle was in [her] mouth and then [she] would drain it in about 15 minutes and go back to sleep.

Now PJ was different, I guess he knew he was the second child.  He was much more patient to wait for food.  He would start fussing a little. They [Rachel] would entertain him and I could fix a bottle.  He was very easy to take care of.  Course by then I had a little experience and that helped a lot.