Funding an Adoption

I often wondered when I first began this adoption journey and would sometimes visit other blogs, how others were funding their adoption. A few people would post in their blogs that they were having yard sales/garage sales and other things like that and then I heard of people getting anonymous donations to their agency in large amounts towards their adoptions. We have things in our basement that I could sell that still have tags on it, but I prefer giving it to friends who may need it. Those purchases came from my days of just buying and putting it away for later. I have now stopped doing that unless I know that we will be using it soon.

When we initially started the adoption journey back in the spring, I did ask the agency person and she shared that people fund their adoptions different ways. She stated that some people take out loans, some people refinance their homes, some people put it on credit cards, some get adoption grants, and some do a variety of the aforementioned in addition to paying for it out of pocket. You can't put a price on a child and I believe that people will do what fits their household best. So, what fits my household best is not adding a large bill when we have the capability to work towards paying for it out of pocket.

Keeping it real:

Well, it was a bit overwhelming for us when we first started researching thinking, humm.....how can we do this without it breaking the bank and disrupting our household finances? Prior to us beginning the adoption process we knew that we wanted to go ahead and start family planning so we wanted to take care of some existing expenses.
We took the Crown Financial Ministries Class at our church summer of 2007 and after taking that class we made an even quicker plan to get rid of little bills and to pay off things so that we could be where we needed to be financially, especially preparing for a child. We wanted to be even better stewards with our money and taking that class even opened up our eyes even more. My parents are Crown Facilitators at their church and they also state that it keeps you focused on being a better steward, no matter how much income you make. We all have to be accountable for our spending whether we make $30,000 or $300,000 a year.


My mother and father constantly remind me that our generation makes way more than our ancestors could have ever dreamed of, yet we are not as financially responsible with the money that we make and our ancestors seemed to live off much less money. Many of us are making significant amounts of money and we can't live off of six figures, which is true, but sad, when our grand parents and great grand parents did not see that kind of money made in a year and yet they were still blessing people and taking care of their household.

How we are funding ours: 

We had only been married 3 years in 2007 and we had been in our home 3 years. We all know that it takes time to adjust and get your household situated after getting married and building a new home. Paying for all of the large household projects and furniture can break your bank really quick.
My husband and I loved to travel a lot as well as we enjoy having annual functions at our home like Christmas parties and things. We cut back on the large Christmas parties (last one was Christmas 2006) and BBQ's as of last year and said that we would not have another large event since we were planning for a child and wanted to cut back. These things add up when you look at the whole picture.
We love entertaining and having events, but this is worth the sacrifice. We are excited about cranking them back up after this is adoption is finalized because we love hosting events with our friends over.
Instead, we started knocking out some of the last remaining decorating projects and taking care of little unnecessary bills that we had acquired. We came into our home pretty much debt free, with the exception of one vehicle note and a graduate school student loan that was minimal.
We ended up getting an additional car at the end of year 1 of being marriage and selling my husbands 2 seater, because my husbands sports car was costing us more money to take care of than having a car note. Besides that, we knew that we needed another practical vehicle besides having 2 sports cars that were paid for and a new SUV, especially when visitors would come and preparing for a family in the future. Things were balanced then, 2 functional vehicles and my 2 seater/coupe. We didn't need four cars and his was causing more money than anything else, although it was paid for. We actually sold it to Carmax in the Spring of 2005 and did pretty good. 


We knew that we would have some bills with a new home and necessities, but we wanted to keep them at a minimum. So, we started knocking them out by taking an aggressive approach. I created an Excel spreadsheet that listed my bills and the dates that I would like to have them paid off and this kept me on track with meeting our goals.  I would get so excited seeing Paid off or Zero, no matter how small the bill was. Crown also has a lot of helpful budget and spending tools available on line.
My profession allows me to PRN/Contract my services at different places. So, on the weekends I began working a few hours on the weekends seeing patients at a facility or that I agreed to do PRN work for. My husband can work from his computer at home on the weekends on freelance projects, so both of us are not out of the house.


The great thing about doing PRN work is, I can fill out on the calendar when I want to work and for how many hours. I typically go in for 4-5 hours at most. I am usually finished on most Saturdays before people are up and moving around in my neighborhood. I still have the rest of the day to myself, which I usually end up working on homework from my doctoral classes if I fell behind during the week with my reading.


Within the first 6 months with using the PRN work and working towards our financial goals, I had most of my personal little bills paid off, helped save for large and rather expensive vacation that we took this past summer so that we could pay for everything with cash, took care of some larger projects in the house that we wanted to pay for in cash, and we began making small purchases for the baby.
While it is a sacrifice giving a few hours on the weekends, it really doesn't bother me and everything is for a season. I feel comfortable knowing that we can nest as we also make payments towards our adoption costs out of our pocket.
The funny thing is that our local agency that we are using now does not accept credit card payments anyway. Everything is accepted by checks. They are well known and have locations through out the U.S.
I thought this was interesting. I guess it doesn't even give us the option of attempting to use our credit card towards the adoption.


I remember talking with my mother when we first started the process and saying how expensive adoption was. She advised me that the money will come when you are following the right steps. It may not necessarily be in the form of cash given to you, but it will come. She was right. It did come in several different ways. That conversation is for another day and another post in the future.


I enjoy doing what I do and to me it is quick money and pain free because I enjoy working with patients! It is extra money that can really help fund the adoption and you don't have to go into debt doing an adoption, especially with our country's economic condition. Working extra on the weekend is a choice because my main contract job is more than sufficient, but we are doing several things and we would rather be debt free with beginning our family.


So, with saying all of this we have worked through this adoption by learning to layaway things for the baby, small amounts at a time. Boy, do they add up. I had not put anything on lay away since college and I didn't know that it still existed! We have cut back on purchasing gender specific clothing since we are not for sure of the gender of the baby since we moved from the Ethiopia program where we were requesting a girl. We would like a girl this time, but we are remaining open. I have a ton of girl stuff. It will get used.


We have tried to keep our eyes open for bargains on higher end pieces if possible. Most of all, we have tried to do a little bit at a time. I think the biggest thing for us was realizing that we could do it out of our pockets once we sat down and realized that we can break this down and it can actually work. The goal seems a lot closer when you can break it down to achievable steps.

For those who are trying to figure out a way to fund your adoption without going in the hole. Look at some expenses that you can cut back on i.e. (eating out too much, unnecessary travel, unnecessary purchases, cutting back on entertainment, and paying off monthly bills that add up to a significant amount.)


I know that this sounds crazy, but for those of you who have credit cards that are tempting to use, keep your limits at a reasonable amount, so that if you need to pay it off quickly, it will not be an impossible effort with extremely large limits. This has been what has saved me. It is too tempting to have wide open limits out there every where. I am glad that we were shown a over year ago to get what little bills we had --paid off.
The banks/credit card companies are really tripping now with the current situation that we are facing. So, it would benefit all of us to get our finances in order and try our best not to "owe anyone" except for the necessities that we must have. While I am not perfect, I am striving to be a better steward with the money that God has blessed me with. It is funny how money is mentioned so  much in the bible. This should be an eye opener for a lot of people. 


We have tried to come up with a time that we will start putting away money for the first few months of daycare when our child goes so that we are a few months ahead of the game with daycare expenses when that happens. We have a meeting with my financial planner this week so, I will have a clearer game plan for that after we get through this nursery furniture business.


When your money is not right it is an indication that something is not right in your life. It is also limits your ability to bless others and those in need, and that is something that I have always enjoyed doing not matter the size of the gift. Having too much debt in our lives should be a temporary situation and not a lifestyle or way of life. We all have the ability to have prosperity to a certain degree.  Many of us want to be blessed with more, but in actuality we are not ready for more. 

I know that we have all heard this--"Why should God bless you with more if you can not handle what he has already given you?"  We all need to think about that when we can not figure out why we keep hitting road blocks in our lives. We have to take a closer look at ourselves. 

"Therefore if you have not been faithful in the use of wordly wealth, who will entrust the true riches to you?"  Luke 16:11

Coincidence.....or what?

This is something that happened recently and I decided to post about it after waiting a week because I had only shared it with a few close friends.


Two Fridays ago (Friday November 14th) I was talking with a co-worker/friend from one of my PRN locations that I help out on the weekends. We were just standing, giggling and talking at my front door as she picked up her tickets for an event that she was attending that weekend. We ended up standing and talking for about an hour and I had homework to do since I knew that I had a full weekend with events.

We were laughing and just talking normal stuff and she was updating me on some of the patients that I was scheduled to see on that weekend since she is the Rehab manager at one of the locations that I assist on weekends. Some how we got on the conversation of adoption because we were discussing a patient and I told her that I had shared with 2 patients that I was working with the previous weekend that I was adopting after one of the patients shared that he had an adopted grandson from China.
I mentioned that I was adopting a child and the almost 85 year old female patient clearly asked me why was I adopting and did I have any children. I told her no and she followed up basically saying that adoption is wonderful and I would be blessed by it and had much more to say. It was an interesting conversation.


My friend knew that I was adopting but she was not for sure if I was adopting an infant or a toddler. After I told her that we were adopting an infant, she shared a situation with us. She told us that they had an acquaintance through the girl scout troop that she and her sister work with. They just recently found out from the person that she is expecting a baby.


One of the mothers who is her age (late twenties) is expecting her 4th child in a few months and has been trying to find a way for someone to adopt her child. She has even asked my friend if she could adopt the child or if she knew of anyone. The mother has 3 other children according to my friend and she states that she can not afford another child and would like for the child to be adopted. She does not have any support from her family, however, the family does not want her to give this child up for adoption.


The mother would like for it to be a semi-open adoption because she would like for the child to know that he or she has other siblings, which is understandable. Then I went into the whole thing about adoption is not co-parenting and semi-open to my husband and I means that we are raising this child as our own, however, we are willing to have some contact with the birth family with any adoption that we do, but it will be on terms that we are comfortable with.


I immediately asked if the mother was healthy and what was her mental state etc. She told me that she is educated, healthy and has beautiful, healthy children, but she can not afford to raise another child. She currently has 3 of them living in a one bedroom apartment with her. While she may not be in poverty, it just may be too much of a strain on the individual to keep things up.


I told my friend to tell the mother that she could call some agencies if she is really serious about adoption and they will work with her, but I guess she was trying to do it on her own, and really didn't know what to do. I gave my friend the name of some local adoption agencies to give to the young lady when she sees her again. At the time, I didn't feel one way or the other about the situation and I was not led to do anything but give agency information to be given to her to assist.


I kind of forgot about it and mentioned it to my husband the following morning and he immediately said that it is something that we needed to pray on and ask for guidance because he didn't know why we were presented with this situation right on our door steps.
He said, if this is the child that God wants us to have, then we will be shown one way or the other. He stated to keep working with the agency as we are since things have progressed quickly, and if something happens otherwise, we will know. If we are led to go this way as a private adoption, then we will use the adoption attorney that close friends of ours used to have every thing taken care of.


I mentioned the situation to a very close friend of mine and she said that she had chills when I told her because she had a situation to happen similar with one of her adoptions. I had never been presented with a situation like this or heard of anyone near me or in contact with me that would like to give their child up for adoption, so it was not just a random act in my eyes. I blew it off like it was a coincidence because I have to know that God is speaking to me before I move with anything like this. I just wasn't for sure the purpose of the contact with me. Maybe I was a source for the adoption agency. I don't know.


I spoke with another friend today, and I shared it with her since we are going through our adoption process together. She also stated that sometimes it is Divine intervention and we will just have to be patient and prayerful about the situation presented. In other words, for me not to blow it off like it was just a coincidence, because some things are ordered by God and we do not even see it.


I just thought that I would share the situation with a few others. I will update any news on this situation if needed.

This week last year... the Giants that I faced

Up close and Personal:

This week last year in 2007 I had a physical with my primary care physician. Everything went great with my physical except when she did my breast examination, she thought that she felt something on both breasts. As a precaution, I was recommended to go to the hospital's breast care center to have tests run to rule out cancer. I did not have a history in my family, however, that did not mean anything.

During this process, we had to place a hold on family planning because I was going to need to have a mammogram done in addition to the other tests. I remember walking out of my doctors office in shock. So many things passed through my mind at that moment. I remember getting in my truck and calling my husband and literally having a break down. I took a simple phrase of caution from my doctor and had diagnosed myself without being tested. I don't really remember how I got home because I was crying hysterically and I was talking to my husband. I remember him telling me to pull over and relax and get myself together so that I would not have an accident. He tried his best to comfort me, although he was in shock too and did not want to appear worried so that he could support me. At this point, I was not concerned about conceiving. I was worried that my life would change at the very moment if they found something or worried that I may not be here in a year. Thats how deep I was in dealing with my situation. I literally felt like I saw my life flashing before me during this time.

After I arrived home, I pulled myself together and my husband arrived shortly and reminded me that I am not God and he asked me why I was putting myself in the ground already. He stated that these tests are for early detection and that I needed to stop trying to predict the worse case scenario. His mothers side of the family has a history of breast cancer and he lost one of his aunts to Breast cancer as well. As well as his mother having a double mastectomy a year after we were married. So, this was real to us.

I remember calling my parents and letting them know about the appointment and there was a sense of peace. I also called a first cousin who is an OB/GYN RN in North Carolina. So, this is how I started my Thanksgiving Break last year. I had a sense of peace over the break and my family was already in prayer. When we returned from North Carolina last Thanksgiving, I no longer had those worries. I was ready to go to my appointment and go through what needed to be done.

I had my appointment on a Friday in December and I decided that I was comfortable with going on my own. I was at a different level of peace entering the building and was ready to face whatever I was going to face after the tests. I remember texting my mom before I walked into the building for the tests. Her text replied to me its okay, it is already taken care of.

Four hours later, I found that they could Not find anything after extensive tests on both breasts, and no cancerous tissue.

They advised me that I had healthy breast tissue and to return several years later at 40 years of age. I was 35 at this time last year. I advised them that I would return each year for my own peace of mind and my doctors recommendation as well. My doctor recommends me to go just to monitor the tissue and I am find with that since she thinks its tissue that she feels. However, our breasts can feel different at different times of the month. This was one test that I endured last November. It was a rough time. It all worked out and I learned then, that again, God is in control, through the good and bad.

Giant 2:

One and half month later (January 2008), I was at my yearly OB/GYN appointment and it went great too. I advised my OB doctor that I was concerned because we had been trying for about 4 months and nothing happened! She looked and me and said you are healthy and everything looks fine, but if I wanted to go ahead and proceed with further tests since I had a concern. She also reminded me that it takes some people a year or more because everyone's body is different. She had me scheduled for a HSG for early January 2008, blood work later that month, and tests to be run on my husband. We did everything in one month and I felt like a lab rat.

We left early one January morning to arrive at Radiology at the hospital and we talked to my parents that morning and my father talked to both of us on our way to the hospital and advised us that he had already prayed for us and the situation. He said some profound words, that were difficult to take at the time, but it made me strong. He advised me to accept whatever happens and let God handle the rest. Whatever happens is in his will. Everything is for a reason. I was still trying to figure out why I was going through so much and facing so many Giants, but it was a test.

I knew that 2008 was the year of new beginnings, I just did not know where I was going to fit in and it was not looking optimistic for me, to be honest.

After having the HSG performed, I found out that I had at least one tube that was not functioning properly and the other one was having a spasm. There was not any explanation of the possibility of the blocked tubes and I was not infertile. I watched the monitor after the test were run and tears streamed down my face and I had to walk out to the waiting room to tell my husband what they saw. My OB/GYN looked at me strangely and softly said, you are not infertile, it just may take you a little longer to get pregnant or you may or may not need a little assistance to clear the tubal issue or assistance with getting pregnant. She stated that at least you know what the hold up is because many of the patients have unexplained infertility and do not know after many tests are run. I was thankful for that, but I was still sad. I do not think that I had ever cried any harder that day that we left the hospital. We were both in shock and we returned home and we sat quietly for hours in disbelief. My husband could not even return to work and decided to stay home to take everything in mentally. I believe that I cried the rest of the day and then afterwards I immediately went into TYPE A mode and contacted the fertility specialist that my OB/GYN referred me to make an appointment to see what I would need to do possibly if they needed to further investigate my tubal situation. The other tests run later that month revealed that I was fine and my hormones were fine as well as my husbands tests were fine. My OB/GYN had performed all of the basic fertility work up that the specialist would have done first. So, we were glad to find out there were not any other issues after the other tests were completed after the HSG.

I held onto the paperwork from the specialist and felt that God was requiring me to be Patient and let him be in Charge as I am not in control of none of this. Even the doctors were saying that I was at the bottom end of the age latter, in terms of getting help. If I needed to go as far as IVF, I was/am at a good age where the success is much higher being in my thirties. In the end, God is still in control over procedures, assistance or whatever else. We felt led to wait with continuing to conceive and proceed with adoption and return to family planning later.

I always had my life on a time chart where I wanted to do certain things by a certain time, and this is how I had conducted my life until I was 35 and ran into a stumbling block. This was one event that we could not control. Adoption was always in my destiny because it was something that was placed in my heart as a child. We had formally stated that we would have our 2 first and then adopt our last child. It sounded like a good plan, but maybe God had a different plan for us. Although, I initially met opposition from some family that felt like we should have continued right then and there with conceiving and not adopting. Their concern was in love and wanting us to start our family. We were being obedient as to where God was leading us.

We decided that we would start our adoption process first because I felt that in my spirit that is where we needed to go and not for any particular reason. We were at a good place with so much peace and moved forward with researching adopting first in the spring of this year.

We decided not to family plan during that time that we were in the International program so that we could focus on the adoption. I had such peace going through the adoption search process. I wasn't worried about ovulation days and stressing myself out internally which was the primary source of the problem.

Anyone who has been through this knows the stress, even when you are not appearing to be stressed out. After going through the tests, I shared with a few people and little did I know that so many other people had gone through so much with infertility or a long wait with trying to get conceive and my little 4 months of trying was not anything compared to those that had endured so much for a much longer time. I humbled myself and I would not have normally shared with others. I am glad that I did because it helped others and it helped me.

It was amazing, I had people coming out the woodworks telling me about their issues that were deeper than mine and all that they did. I had people confide in me of their trials of IVF and other procedures. We all have our own journey and story to tell. You just never know what people are going through or have gone through. This is how we arrived to this point that we are now.

I share all of this to say that we all have tests, and many of us have more than others. In the end, it is preparing us for the bigger picture. God, will not fail. I am a living witness. We have to go through things some times so that we can appreciate things even more when we do receive it. Our struggle is also a testimony for others who are going through and may need that extra push to know that they are not in this fight alone.

We will have a very interesting year to come! And Remember, Giants do fall! The bigger they are, the harder they fall!

This is the significance of the song Giants by Donald Lawrence in my ipod mix.

When we follow the path that God wants us to follow through obedience, we will see how Sweet it is. Beginning a family in any form is truly a Gift from God.

This is my story. I hope that I have reached someone as I have been touched by others. Always remember that storms do not last forever.

Gifts from God....To be continued....

Peace and Blessings,

Sweet Patience, better known as Kristy