Answer Your Phone- Our Foster Call Answered

The phone rang. I had been home sick from work and didn’t feel like answering. I checked to see who was calling. It was our Buckner case manager at the time. “Weird.” I thought to myself, as we were currently inactive. We were coming up on our deadline to decide if we would remain open. I wanted to open back up and begin taking placements, but my wife was enjoying our inactive time, really investing in our two adopted sons. We originally went active almost a year before that day, and knew we needed to decide soon. We would spend hours talking about the pros and cons, but ultimately, we just felt like we could not decide what to do. We were tired. It had been a long couple of years. 

We started our training to get licensed in January of 2013 after about 18 months of trying to conceive a child naturally. We both had a heart for the fatherless and even before our wedding and before we had any knowledge of future infertility struggles, we knew we wanted to adopt. I remember sitting at an adoption conference and the organization asked us to check off all areas of orphan care that we would want more information on. We checked off domestic infant adoption. We checked off international adoption. We were confident we could do both of those. We intentionally skipped over the box that read,  “Foster Care”. We could NEVER do foster care. 

So we sat through the adoption conference break outs and listened to speaker after speaker. We had one breakout session right before our lunch break and needed to pick a class. But nothing in that timeframe really spoke to us, so last minute we decided to attend the session on foster care just as a time filler. We listened to the speaker and wrapped up that session, grabbed our sack lunch to eat in the lunchroom. We had only been engaged for a little while, but we could already speak to each other without saying a word. So we sat quietly. Trying to not make eye contact, knowing it would be dangerous if we did. But when our eyes finally met, our mouths exclaimed loudly at the exact same time, “I feel like God wants us to do foster care.”

Fast forward through a wedding, 18 months of trying to get pregnant naturally, a move from Illinois to Texas, and my first job offer and acceptance as a youth pastor out of bible college, and there we were, starting the trainings to get licensed through Buckner in Midland. It would eventually take us 5 months to get our official approval to be a foster home. After the weekend trainings, home study, fire inspection/health inspection, background checks, fingerprints, etc. we felt ready. We knew what we wanted. While we really, truly only wanted 1 child under 1, we finally decided to be licensed for ages 0-5 and up to 2 kids. Praying that we would get a baby. 

I wish I had time to go into the details that followed, and believe me, so much followed. We went from 0 to 3 kids in less than 2 weeks after getting licensed a 4-year-old, 2-day-old, and 5-week-old, and then a few months later added a 4^th. We had 4 under the age of 4. And eventually we would lose our very first foster son in a heartbreaking way, but God kept reminding us of why we felt called to be open to his heart break and we would subsequently take another 3 more kids and even take one of our kids that returned home, back into our care again after a failed reunification. 

This. This is why we felt like we needed a break. This is why we were tired. We adopted the 2-day-old and 5-week-old boys that we were first placed with and finally became a forever mommy and daddy. We felt so blessed. And taking a break was so needed to spend time pouring into these sweet boys and just catching our breath.

But that phone call I mentioned earlier, changed everything. It was our case manager. “Hi Aaron. I was just calling because we have this baby boy.” Instantly I was confused. When Buckner calls and says that they have a child, it’s a placement call, but we weren’t currently open for calls. “The baby was born in an ambulance last week, transported to the hospital where he remained until discharge and was then released and placed with another Buckner family.” At this point, I am even more confused. Why are you telling me about another family accepting placement of a baby boy. “Anyways, the reason I am calling is because after further research, we discovered that this baby is actually the biological half-brother to your adopted son.” Before our case manager could even finish her sentence, I shouted “YES!” I accepted placement of this baby immediately. 

My wife wasn’t even in the room and we always told each other that we would talk through every placement call, even if we knew in our hearts it was a yes, but I broke that rule that day. I hung up the phone and ran out to the living room to tell her about the baby. It was a crazy whirlwind after that YES! Life was good. We had 3 amazing little boys and were on track to adopting that boy that stole our hearts unexpectedly. Sadly, after 7 months of loving that precious boy, CPS had to place him with a half sibling on the paternal dad’s side due to the ICWA laws. But that little boy would forever change the trajectory of our life and the life of so many others. 

After having lost a part of us that we were certain  would be a part of our family forever, God spoke to us. He told us, “You are loving each kid with your hands closed. I need you to love each child with your hands open. You’ve loved and you’ve lost. And you can keep doing this because I sustain you. It’s not meant to be easy, but I will be with you.”

And even in the heartbreaking moments of buckling that confused baby boy into his car seat one last time, God held our brokenness together and used him to keep our heart open to more. You see, in that moment, we wanted to stop. “Why God? Why would open this door for us to have our son’s sibling placed with us, when we thought we were done, just to rip him from our arms and leave us more broken then when we started.”

That questions was answered three days later, when a mom went into labor and delivered a sweet baby boy that she knew she could not parent, and she signed her rights over to us. And he became ours forever on Valentine’s Day of 2017. And the question is continually answered in subsequent phone calls at different hours of the day asking to take more. To take two little girls, dirty and scared. Or the phone call that said, “Aaron, my co-worker’s grandson is getting removed, will you take him for just a little while.” “Hey Aaron, it’s Paloma, we have a baby girl, 7 months old, her mom is a teen, she needs a family for a little while, will you take her.” From, “Aaron, the 7 month old baby you just took placement of has a brother at the shelter who is about to have a birthday, are you open to a visit.” to “Thank you for taking her brother as a placement now.” God has blessed us with 17 phone calls that we had the opportunity to say yes to. 3 phone calls we said no to. And a few phone calls that we said yes to, but the child was placed closer to home or with family. 

Phone call after phone call our life changes. Kids in, kids out. Some stay with us for a few days and others for forever. Our once age range of 1 under 1 is now written as up to 6 kids in our home, ages 0-18. Answered calls have led us to be on track for our 4^thofficial adoption this summer where we will adopt our 16 year old son, and have the joy of being forever parents to 4 handsome boys!  And even in the ugly, broken, and confusion we call foster care, we find clarity in God’s purpose for us in this ministry. To love every soul the Lord blends into our family. Whether an infant or a 16 year old, whether it be a sibling group of 3 struggling girls or a biological mom and dad, hurting and needing a cheerleader/mentor out of the family where their children were placed. With each phone call comes a new journey for us. If your phone is ringing now, answer it. You won’t regret it. 

Fostering Families

“Reunification- to cause to be unified again after dividing.” We hear this word many times while researching or being trained to become licensed foster parents. That’s the primary goal. No matter the allegations against a family, we learn that our “job” as foster parents is to care for these children as their biological family works towards their service plan in hopes that they will be successful in being unified again after dividing. This isn’t always pretty. It is definitely not always easy. But it’s our job. It’s what we sign up for when we become foster parents. And ultimately, it’s what God would want us to do. To love the least of these as if they were Him. 

5 years ago, this month, we took our very placement. A 4-year-old Caucasian boy, blonde hair, blue eyes and missing all of his front teeth. I remember him stepping out of the car at around 7 PM, rubbing his eyes from falling asleep in the car ride down from Abilene. We eagerly peeked out of the window as we watched for the CPS worker to bring him to our door. He yawned a great big yawn and instantly shoved his index finger into his nose. He walked slowly up to our front door step where the CPS worker rang our door bell and we greeted him immediately. We both tried not to overwhelm him, but we were excited to have him stay with us and wanted him to feel safe and loved the second he arrived. We told him he could call us any name he’s like and he chose Lightning McQueen and Mater. We agreed. We signed all the paperwork as he ate a late dinner of popcorn and other random treats from our pantry. They brought in a few of his belongings, snapped a picture of him, and off they went. 

You see, we didn’t have any other children. We wanted nothing more than to become parents and although yes it took from January of 2013 to May of 2013 to become licensed, in the matter of signing a few papers our dream came true.  What was our dream come true for us to be parents, we could tell immediately that this sweet boy was already struggling. You see our greatest gain was manifesting out of his greatest loss. 

The next few weeks went by without a visit with his biological mom. She was living in a different city and we had to work out the visitation details. She had just been released from jail and was trying to work out her living situation, but when we got everything figured out visitations began. The first visit was uncomfortable. As a new foster parent, you don’t know what to expect. Was this family going to hate us? Were they dangerous? Do we talk to them? How can we possibly make this as least awkward as possible? I remember the first time I met his parents. They saw him in the CPS office and he ran to them and they both scooped him up, hugged him, held him, and cried. We left him there for his 1 hour long visit and returned to pick him up. When it was time for him to say goodbye, they held him tight and cried as they kissed his face all over. Tears streaming down their face and now ours, we buckled him into his car seat and rolled down his window so he could say goodbye one more time. I remember my wife telling them that we would see them next week and that we promised to love him and keep him safe while he was with us. 

Weeks went by and visits continued. Each time we would spend just an extra few minutes together outside of the CPS office talking with his mom and dad about the week and all the fun things we had done or were going to do with him. They gleamed with joy hearing about pre-k, church activities, and day to day life we were living with their son. But sadness always seemed to be on the horizon, knowing that everything we were experiencing was one more thing they were missing out on. What bittersweet emotions they must have felt in those moments. Even harder were the moments that he would refer to us as “Mom” and “Dad” (we lost the names Lighting McQueen and Mater pretty quickly that first night)! And pretty soon they too began referring to us as “Mom” and “Dad”. Something I always wanted to be called, and now I would cringe when I would hear it come out of their mouths. 

More than half way into the case and his biological mom still had no steady living quarters and was still failing drug tests and in and out of jail for small warrants here and there for not paying fines, etc. She was trying so hard, but genuinely had zero family support and was caught in this cycle of doing good and still paying for the sins she had committed before making the good changes in her life. Finally, she checked herself in to an inpatient rehab. I think it was about a 60-day program. She was not able to see her son for 60 days. I remember reaching out to her right before she went in and she told us at the end of the 60 days there would be something called “The Cradle” where if she completed the program, her counselors, fellow rehab peers, and any family could come and cradle her out of the program. She told us that she considered us family and that she would really like for us to be there in 60 days since she knew none of her other family or friends would go. 

60 days later, my wife and I walked into this rehab facility filled with alcoholics and drug addicts. For a minute, I felt so out of place. Then I remembered that their sin and addiction was no worse than the sin and addictions I have overcome in my own life. In fact, some of them were even better because they were doing everything in their power to beat these sins and addictions. We walked into the ceremony room where they would announce that our foster son’s biological mother was graduating the program. Many of her peers would speak encouraging words to her as she was handed her certificate and then she picked a song that she wanted to be cradled to. They turned off all the lights, we circled around her, and they turned on the music as she laid in all of arms as we swayed back and forth until the song was over. 

It was an emotional experience for all that were in attendance. Not a dry eye in the room. We felt so honored and blessed that she chose us to be there and thankful that she trusted us enough to let us support her figuratively and literally in this defining moment in her life. God was knitting together our story and we were enjoying the opportunity to minister to this sweet mom’s heart. 

Because of all of the warrants and failed drug tests the permanency plan at this time was sadly still termination. Knowing what we know now after 5 years of fostering, this mom did not have the CPS staff support she needed to even remotely complete her service plan. Multiple case workers quit during her case and she ended up with a long time case worker towards the end of her case that was a snake. Rather than helping this mom navigate the system, she used every fault against her and ultimately chose to encourage relinquishment of parental rights to help speed up the end of the case. 

Our foster son’s biological mother was pregnant again and she wanted us to adopt both her son and the son she was carrying. But the caseworker used this pregnancy against the biological mom and to make an even longer story short, the caseworker succeeded in attaining relinquishment and moving our foster son to a distant relative that had never met him before about 10 months into the case. We were devastated to say the least. We had built such an amazing relationship with him mom and dad and had truly felt a peace about him staying forever with the intentions of having an open adoption and we were heart broken. We tried fighting the decision but in the state of Texas you are not allowed to be named a legal party to the case until a child has been with you for 12 months to the day. We raised our white flag and the case was over. 

We packed all of his bags and the case worker, program director, and our Buckner supervisor at the time met us at our house as we said goodbye. Saying goodbye was hard. He didn’t look at us. Didn’t speak to us. He was angry that we didn’t “fight harder” for him. He was scared, sad, and just as heartbroken as we were. He buckled himself in his own car seat. We sang his favorite song to him and kissed his cheeks and said goodbye. We closed the door and watched until the CPS car was out of sight. Walked back into our home where our other 3 foster children were playing, closed the front door and fell to our knees and cried. It was over. Our first foster son was gone and in that moment I never ever wanted to feel this way again. I mean come on, who wants to feel this way! 

We have lost all contact with him just a few short weeks after he left our home. His new family said they would let us see him and talk over the phone. They let us have one visit and never came back. I never thought I would be able to keep going. I always heard people say that they could never say goodbye. They couldn’t be foster parents because they would get too attached. We were “too attached”. But I would not trade a minute of it for the world. Every single moment we got with him is forever etched into my heart and my story. And because of the amazing opportunities we were blessed with to pour into his biological mom, even 5 years later we are still the couple she calls when she just needs to vent to. She still writes us on Facebook and tells us little tid-bits here and there she has heard from her son’s new parents. We still pray for her often. Knowing that God is not done with her and that even though she has no parental rights to this boy, she is HIS mom and she will always be HIS mom. And in the years to come when he begins to ask questions and put together the puzzle pieces of his story, he can look back at this time with us and remember that his foster parents loved his mom almost as much as he did. That’s what I want him to remember. I want him to remember Christ in us and through us, and because of Christ, how we were able to love his broken and hurting mother. 

From what we know she is doing great now. She is happy, healthy, and independent. This case didn’t end the way we would have hoped. As much as we wanted to adopt this sweet boy, we learned that by striving so much to grow our family and hoping so much to adopt we could easily lose sight of the hurting and broken people along the way. Missing an opportunity to heal and mend the hearts of those that love this boy even more than we do. 

A few years later, after the adoption of two of our sons, we were called to take in the biological sibling of one of them. He was just a few days old and in a foster family already but they had put two and two together and realized that he was our son’s half-brother. We accepted placement and he arrived to our home about a week later. We kept him for 8 months before he had to leave our home and be adopted by a Cherokee family, due to the ICWA laws. Oh, the heartbreak. He went to an amazing family who we still have contact with and get to do visits with and ultimately, we know God had a plan for us through all of it, but it was hard. So hard. But the ONE thing I am thankful for the most through that heart break was how it opened my eyes to what it must feel like to lose a child. We thought he was ours from the beginning, changed his name (which I don’t advise you ever to do in foster care), and planned our life as a forever family of five. We found out that his biological mother was wanting to relinquish rights but had listed a possible dad with Cherokee heritage. A blood test confirmed that this baby boy was Cherokee and would have to be placed with tribe members. I remember the phone call that he would for sure be leaving. The instant tears. The literal broken heart. I felt like I was having a heart-attack. I couldn’t breathe. We held each other as we faced the fact that our little boy would be leaving us soon. 

In those moments, I thought about what it must feel like as a bio parent in the system. Sure, we didn’t lose this baby because of poor choices we were making. But we were still losing him. I remember those first few nights after he left. Wondering if he missed us, if his new family would remember the way he liked to be swaddled or held. It was hard. But the moment we would get a text message from his new family with a picture of him smiling, our hearts would skip a beat with joy knowing he was well. He was happy. He was adjusting. Little things, like knowing when his teeth would pop through or when he started to take steps, all made us feel like even though he was gone he was still a part of our life. I am confident that these are the things that would help propel a biological parent to reach their full potential as they journeyed through the child welfare system. A simple picture, an encouraging text or email, something to let them know they were not alone in this mess. What do we have to lose? 

I think we as foster parents must stop looking at the end goal as adoption. If our end goal is adoption, although it is more expensive, we need to go the domestic/international/Waiting Child adoption route (which is actually NOT expensive at all)

, where the child is truly an orphan, needing a forever family. You see, when we sign up as a foster family we are not just fostering the child, but fostering the family and until a judge signs the termination order, it is our job, responsibility, and honor to walk side by side these families until they have proven incapable by the judge or CPS to care for these kids. It is not for us to decide. As hard as it really is to put into practice. And believe me, we have had cases and biological families where this was almost impossible to do. We must not give up to easily. And at the root of everything we do, we must think of the 18-year-old version of the child/children in our home and how we would answer them if they EVER asked this question, “What did you do to show love to my biological family?” Because believe it or not, many adoptees will want to know. And our future relationship with them could rely heavily on our response. The definition of reunification again is to cause to unify again after dividing. If you are unable to be a part of this cause, I would urge you to reconsider adoption through fostering.

Faith Through Infertility

When Aaron and I got married, we had the amazing blessing of working together. A lot of people thought this was crazy, but we loved it. We were able to sit in cubicles across from each other and chat through IM all day, take breaks together and eat lunch together. It was great! We started off typing letters that were dictated, which took a lot of focus, but after awhile, they changed our department. They started having us temps do more data entry. It was mindless work. We would find a couple letters and numbers on the screen and type them into the computer and then move on to the next one. It was incredibly boring. So we decided to listen to the Bible while working. I didn’t know at first if I would like it because I’m not and auditory learner. I’m much more visual. However, God used this time to teach us so much! 

During this time, we were also struggling with infertility. Many also thought we were crazy about this topic as well. Haha! We had been married less than a year and knew that there was a good chance that we would never be pregnant. They would tell us to just give it time, but we knew that wasn’t the case. We felt it in our hearts that it would be nearly impossible. 

As we listened to the Bible in those little cubicles, God taught us something that would stick with us and prepare us for our journey through infertility. He taught us that He is a God who opens and closes wombs. He opened Hannah's womb and she bore Samuel. He opened Sarah’s womb after 99 years and she bore Isaac. God opened Leah’s womb and allowed her to be blessed with a child. Genesis 29:31 says “ When the Lord saw that Leah was not loved, he enabled her to conceive, but Rachel remained childless. After this, God opened Rachel’s womb. In Genesis 30:22 it says, “Then God remembered Rachel; he listened to her and enabled her to conceive.” Over and over again, we heard how God opened a womb or kept a woman’s womb from conceiving to fulfill his purpose. 

There have been times where this has been very hard for us to trust as we see so many women get pregnant who aren’t thankful for their children or who seem to not deserve the child that God is blessing them with. What we’ve learned is that each of these children is purposed by God. And we can’t question why He did it. There were many children in the Bible that didn’t necessarily come in the most ordinary way, including Jesus. But God can uses them for amazing things! 

As we sat there hearing over and over again how God opens and closes wombs, God just kept telling us, I will open your womb when it’s time. Trust me. This was so hard to do. It was so hard to trust Him as our desire for a child increased and the hope diminished that we would ever have a child with every negative pregnancy test. 

During our first year of marriage, we also experienced 3 failed adoptions. It looked like God was perfectly preparing these opportunities and then last minute they would fall through and our hearts would break all over again. We felt so confused and hopeless and we felt like God wasn’t wanting to trust us with a child. 

When we moved to Odessa, He made it clear. He made us wait so that we would move here and open our home to each of the kids that have come to us through foster care. It felt like it took forever, but it was so worth the wait to experience life with each of these children. If we didn’t experience each of those negative pregnancy tests and if we didn’t go through each of those failed adoptions, we more than likely would have never moved. We also would have never loved our children that God blessed us with so fiercely. The wait made us appreciate them so much more. 

Now back to the infertility part. It has been 6 years. We have never used birth control and besides progesterone to help give me a cycle, we have never used anything else to prevent or cause a pregnancy. We decided before we got married that we would never use birth control because we felt like it was important to give that control to God. Even if that meant we got pregnant on our wedding night. That might sound crazy, but if God is a God that opens and closes wombs, we feel like we need to trust Him to do that, not a pill. I’m so thankful that we never used birth control because if I went off of it and never got pregnant, I would have regretted it. 

As time has gone on, God has brought me through a lot of ups and downs. I have spent many nights crying to Aaron about how I want nothing more than to experience pregnancy. Ever since I was little, I have had this desire deep down in my heart to one day experience having a baby grow inside of me. I have also had many moments where I feel like I’m ok with never getting pregnant. I love my kids. I don’t need to experience pregnancy because I’ve experienced the amazing redemptive story of adoption of our kids. We also got the amazing experience of adopting Kyan and being there for most of his doctor appointments and sonograms. On top of that, I got to be there when he was born and I got to nurse him for the first month of his life, which was absolutely amazing! 

Because of my experience with adoption, I feel like my desire for pregnancy has changed over the last 6 years. For many years, my desire to become pregnant was selfish. I wanted to be able to experience it for myself. I wanted to feel the baby move. I wanted to experience childbirth, as weird as that may be. I wanted to be able to surprise Aaron and tell him, guess what, I’m pregnant! However, I now feel completely different. God has brought me to a place that the only reason I want to get pregnant is to point to Him. I want to tell everyone about how He created a miracle and He opened my womb that had been barren for so many years. He did something that seemed absolutely impossible to us. Because of this, I truly believe that one day, He will open my womb. If He doesn’t, I'm ok. But if He does, get ready to hear me scream from the rooftops how awesome our God is for doing what seemed impossible! 

I write all of this to encourage those of you that are in the trenches of infertility. Trust God. No matter how long it has been. Use your infertility to glorify God. Use your pain and disappointment to rely on God and learn from Him. He is a God who opens and closes wombs and you can rest in that. He may have a bigger plan for you and your future children than you could ever dream or imagine! 

The Heart of a Foster Parent

Hey friends! This is Julie. This blog has been on my heart for several months and I felt like I needed to share it with all of you to encourage those of you who are fostering or are interested in possibly adopting or becoming a foster parent. 

So many people have asked us over the past 4 years how we could do foster care and love these kids and watch them leave. My answer has changed a lot over the past four years. When we first started, I would typically think my sarcastic answer of "well, I’m a cold-hearted shell of a person, that’s how I can do this”. Of course, that’s not true, but I didn’t really know how to answer that question well. All I knew was that God had called us to it and He would get us through any of those hard moments. 

Over the past four years, we have gone through some of the deepest hurt. We lost our first kiddo 11 months after we started. He was our first ever placement and as time went on, it looked like we were going to adopt him. Last minute the caseworker changed her mind and decided he needed to be moved to a relative placement. We were deceived into believing court was cancelled and next thing we knew, he was leaving and there was nothing we could do. We were all devastated. Having to watch the look on his face as we had to tell him he was moving to live with them, was heartbreaking. We also have had to say goodbye to some kids that were a challenge. And even though we felt a since of relief as we said goodbye, it was still so hard to watch them leave with an uncertain future. We have had a baby that was a biological brother to one of our adopted sons leave after 7 months of loving him unconditionally and deeply. When he came, we thought he was staying forever. We dreamed of a future with him in our family. When he left, it not only hurt us, but it hurt our boys. This was the first time they were old enough to feel the pain of losing their brother. Watching them hurt, killed me. When he left, I didn’t know if I could ever do it again. I didn’t think I could love another child and watch them leave. I was done. But God wasn’t. 

Quickly after our sweet baby left, God broke down all of my walls. He taught us that if we could survive loving him and letting him go, we could keep doing it because He would be faithful to be right by our side through every hurt. He reminded me why I’m doing this. He showed me the pain these children feel when they have to leave their parents. Even if they don’t make the best choices, these kids love their parents. When they are removed, every thing they have ever known is taken away. Their favorite toys, the smells they are used to, the food they are used to, all of their family members and friends, everything. And they don’t understand why. They are going through way more hurt as a tiny child than I will ever have to endure by loving them and one day having to possibly say goodbye. He reminded me that they are worth it and that they need us. They need me and my husband to pour love into their lives because they need it to help them heal. They need us to show them who Jesus is because they may never have another opportunity to learn the song Jesus Loves Me or what church is and why it’s important. They need my boys to be their brothers so they can have an example of what a normal childhood is like and what it looks like to be disciplined with love. And our boys are amazing at loving these kids that come into our home. It breaks their heart when they leave and I hate that. But I know that God called us to this life. He called us to love these kids because they desperately need it. And if He has called us, then He has called our boys to be a part of this ministry and He is going to equip them to handle the loss of each child that leaves our home. 

When we first started foster care, our hearts were adoption focused. We wanted to be foster care focused, but if we are being honest with ourselves, we were adoption focused. We wanted to build our family. When these kids would come into our house, we would try to remember that they might not stay. We would try for as long as we could to not dream about their future with us. We weren’t very good at this though. We would last a few weeks before we would start imagining our future with them. We would imagine what it would be like if they stayed with us forever. This was a very dangerous thing to do. This caused their departure to hurt so much more. Because when they left, not only did it hurt so bad because we loved them so much and lost them, but we also lost the dream of their future in our home. 

This was also a dangerous thing for our foster kids. We lost focus of what our goal should have been, which is family reunification. Family reunification are typically the two scariest words to a foster parent. It means you have to say goodbye, it also means that these kids that you love might be going to an unsafe environment. I have learned though that this should be my first goal. I should fight for their family. I should fight to help their family do what they need to do to get their kids back, if at all possible. As the case comes to an end, if it’s obvious that the family is not going to do what they need to do or if their return to their family is unsafe, than I need to fight for these kids because their safety is ultimately the most important thing. However, I can’t judge the situation from the first few weeks of a case. People can change and I need to do what I can to support that. With our first foster placement after we lost our sweet little boy, I went to the first parental visit with a completely different perspective. I had compassion for the mom because I know what it’s like to lose a child. I told the mom that I wasn’t trying to take her children and that I was going to love them the best I could while they were with me. I told her that I loved her and that I believed that she could do what she needed to do to get them back. She burst into tears and gave me the biggest hug. God reminded me in this moment that I’m not just doing foster care to minister to these kids. I’m doing foster care to minister to these families. Not every moment with biological families are as good as that one was. There are plenty of parents who don’t have this same kind of reaction. But I need to keep doing this for the ones that do. I still deeply love our very first foster placement’s mother. She loves her son with all of her heart. Honestly, she was dealt a bad hand by CPS and if things would have been different, I think she would have gotten him back. I’m so thankful that we went into that placement with a foster care focus. Because I will forever be so thankful for our relationship with her. God used her to help mold my heart to what it is today. A heart that wants to love with the understanding that it could get broken.  

I’ve learned that a broken heart isn’t the worst thing in the world. A broken heart causes me to lean on my Savior. A broken heart teaches me and helps me grow in my relationship with Christ. I’ve also learned that if I didn’t accept the risk of having a broken heart, I also wouldn’t have experienced some of the greatest love! I love each of the children that have come into our home with a deep love. Even the harder ones. I’ve learned that a broken heart is totally worth it because my broken heart has helped heal, nurture and love a child’s broken heart. And I will endure a broken heart over and over again if that means I can help a child over and over again. 

When You Don't Move the Mountains

One last shot. We had a glimmer of hope that they would see our hearts and help fight for us to keep him in our home.

We prayed. And prayed. And prayed some more. Our nightly routine with our other two boys is to watch worship videos on YouTube. So this night it was no different. But every song stood out to us. Particularly "Trust in You" by Lauren Daigle.

"When you don't move the mountains
I'm needing you to move
When you don't part the waters
I wish I could walk through
When you don't give the answers
As I cry out to you
I will trust, I will trust, I will trust in you".

This was it. Julie, with phone in her hand, made the phone call we were waiting on. It didn't go as planned. They were continuing to pursue placement of the boy we had known and grown to love as our own since July.

Devastated. Angry. Scared. Hurt. All of these feeling flooded our hearts as we knew that soon we would have to say goodbye to our son's half-brother. But as the lyrics said, no matter what, we would trust in the Lord.

"Truth is you know what tomorrow brings
There's not a day ahead you have not seen
So let all things be my life and breath
I want what you want Lord and nothing less"

Wanting what the Lord wants above what we want is not easy. Don't you hate lyrics like this? You'll be singing along and BOOM! The words hit you in the face. I do want what He wants. But to the extent of wanting it more than what I want for myself, it's tough. But, when you really do more than just sing it, and you BELIEVE it, amazing things happen.

My wife and I went to bed that night crying and praying for God to help us understand. Hoping for peace about the days, weeks, and months to come. We talked about our future and what that would look like without our sweet boy. We talked about whether or not we would ever be able to foster/adopt again. We talked about how we would help our older two sons understand this loss. We both agreed that the Lord wasn't done with our story yet. We had no clue what that would look like, but we knew that we didn't have to. God knew and that's all that truly mattered.

Earlier that day, our sweet boy had a physical therapy appointment. Julie was explaining to the therapist that we would be discontinuing therapy since he would be leaving soon. Our therapist was sympathetic and understanding and told Julie she would be praying for us in this transition.

We knew many people were praying. And we could feel the prayers. But this journey ahead still felt suffocating. Somehow we managed to fall asleep that night. The pure emotional exhaustion, coupled with having a baby that hardly slept, really took a toll on our bodies.

That next morning, I was out running errands when I got a message from my wife. It was a screenshot from a text Julie had received from the physical therapist. It stated that she had done an evaluation on a family that brought a friend with them who was expecting and needing to find an adoptive home. "It's a boy! Are y'all interested?!"

Julie sent me a screenshot from the therapist and a short message asking, "What do you think?" We've had our hearts broken so many times before with texts like this or situations we thought and dreamed about for years that never came to fruition. But for some reason, my immediate response was, "Wow. Let's do it."

And so we did. We called this expectant mom and met for lunch the next day. We found out her story. We heard the love she had for this baby and how she wanted to place him privately and in a home where he could be loved.

Was this real life? Were we really sitting at the table with this lady who could be carrying our future son? It all seemed too good to be true. But we remembered the lyrics to the song, "Truth is you know what tomorrow brings..." It was literally tomorrow and the Lord was bringing so much to us.

Weeks went by. We attended appointments and grew a friendship with this expectant Momma. She became more than to us. She became our family. One of our best friends. The days were long, but the weeks flew by.

We still had our sweet foster son in our home. Legal documents holding up his departure from our home. We treasured every extra second we got to spend with him.

The day came for him to leave us. In the early hours of that Saturday morning the moment came for him to be taken from our arms. It was the HARDEST day of our life and our marriage. For 7 months we loved him and in the matter of minutes we said our goodbyes and he was gone. The door closed and the car drove away and we fell to the floor in tears. All day Saturday we mourned the loss of a living child. It was the weirdest feeling in the world. We knew God was working, but in those moments, we felt empty and alone.

Sunday came and we went to church. We watched other babies in the church be held and loved and had to sneak in multiple snuggles from each of them. Our arms felt weird being empty. We made it through another day. Then Monday rolled around. If Monday's weren't bad enough on their own, it was a long day without our sweet boy! And with two more weeks before the due date of the expectant mom, we felt like it was more of an eternity.

Julie and I sat on the couch that night after a terribly long day and cried. We felt like our hearts were literally ripped out and stepped on and thrown into a blender and then flushed down the drain. Okay, okay, a little dramatic, but seriously we were hurting. I posted on Facebook how terribly low we were feeling and I got a text from a loved one that reminded me of a song. "There may be pain in the night, but joy comes in the morning."

We went to bed that night crying. And praying. And wanting to feel the Lord's presence. We counted the number of hours we would get to sleep without a baby to wake us up. It was bittersweet. We hated having an empty bassinet beside us, but were looking forward to a full nights sleep.

At 1:07 that morning we were awoken by a phone call that would change our life forever. She was in labor! We headed to the hospital as Julie's mom arrived to stay with our older two sons!

It was Valentine's Day! What a beautiful story of love being written that day. Love from our Savior shining upon each of us involved.

In that moment he arrived we knew he was so loved by so many. But the most important love we knew he was given was the love of the Lord. The provision He had on his life, his birth-mom's and ours.

"You are my strength and comfort
You are my steady hand
You are my firm foudation
The rock on which I stand
Your ways are always higher
You plans are always good
There's not a place where I'll go
You've not already stood"

It's not easy to see that His plans are greater than ours. How can that be, when sometimes all we can see on the earthly side is heartache and pain? How can good come from losing a child? How can good come from terrible situations that sometimes result in pregnancy? I don't have all the answers I would like to those two questions! Or to the questions you may be asking yourself in whatever storm you are facing. But what I can testify to is this. God is already there. He is already moving that mountain. He is already parting the waters. He is already on the other side of that storm, waiting for us to make it through.

I share this story of Kyan's journey to us to say this. Beauty really can come from ashes. Redemption can be found when we surrender ourselves wholly without knowledge of what road we may travel. Without knowledge of how we will get where we are going, but trusting that we will get there and we will never be alone in that journey.

I am so thankful for this 1 month old baby we hold in our arms and call our son. I'm thankful for the birth-mother who placed him in our care, and I'm thankful for the Lord that knew we would experience great joy and great loss to get here, but would fill our every need along the way.

Thank you to those that donated money towards our adoption expenses. Thank you to our family and friends that experienced heart-break along with us but continued to love each child the Lord has placed (no matter how long) in our home. And thank you to "Kallen", the sweet boy that the Lord used to bring us to our forever son. You will forever be a part of us and our love story written and directed by our AMAZING and POWERFUL God!