In the beginning

It's early January and I've decided to start a family blog. When I mention it to my mom, she might think it was something you weren't supposed to talk about in public, that is, until I explain it to her!

Late last year my husband and I decided to finally pursue adoption. THis is not a decision we came upon lightly or quickly. We've been attempting to have a family for the last 4 years and have decided to give up the conventional route and instead fulfill our dreams by way of Russia. How did we get here you might ask? Well, I could go on and on, but like the majority of people who choose adoption, we came by way of infertility, what a long and lonely road that can be. those of you who've experienced it know what I mean. And those of you who haven't had to personally face the physical and emotional trauma that infertility can be, consider yourself blessed and never underestimate how incredibly difficult it can be for those in your life who are facing it.

We spent 4 years in and out of surgeries for me, in and out of infertility appointments, procedures and of course pharmacies! There were times in first practice we visited where I felt like a sideshow... teaching hospitals can do that to you. Imagine, you, your husband in an OB visit with 4-5 other doctors all 'checking you out'...! Sometimes you could find humor in it all, but mainly it was the most sobering, clinical and monetarily exhaustive process imaginable. In the end we suffered two very serious losses, a miscarriage in April of 2004 at 15 weeks and a stillbirth of our daughter Sophia Madeleine at 31 weeks just before Thanksgiving 2005. After her loss, my husband and I went through some lonely and sad days together with the help of a few close friends and some family. We packed up her clothes, her toys, her nursery, picked up the crib we'd ordered and tucked it all neatly away in the nursery, aka 'the middle bedroom' now.

We'd discussed adoption that first year of marriage just as a 'what if'.... and at each turn during our battle with infertility we would talk about it again and again, the timing just didn't seem right. When we lost Sophia, the thought of going through all that again was more than we could bear, both at that moment and in the future. We began to seriously consider adoption and decided it would be a wonderful alternative to the way most people bring a child into their family.

As I write more updates I'll cover why we chose international adoption over domestic, why Russia over China and where we are in the process. We hope to use this blog down the road to share with our friends and family all that we experience on our way to creating a family of our own.