Our journey to the adoption of Helena was at the same time very laborious and very fast.
We first began considering adoption when we found out that Jill, Staci's cousin, announced she was pregnant. When we first heard about it, we both had thoughts that we may adopt her baby. Staci had had 3 miscarriages in a row and we wanted to have another little girl in our family. On January 7th, Jill talked with Staci for the first time about the possibility of us adopting her baby. On January 12th, Jill told Staci that she would most likely be placing her baby, and she would be placing her baby with us. We were excited but scared of all the unknowns. We started our home study process with LDS Social Services. After we had already started the process, Jill called and as gently as she could, let us know that she had changed her mind and she would be parenting her own child. We understood, but were pretty heartbroken. From there we decided we had already started the adoption process and if Jill's baby wasn't right for our family, maybe we could find a baby that was.
Our Home Study was a lot of work and much more paper work than we thought it would be. We worked very hard on getting everything completed: background checks from 5 different states, personal references, home inspections, several meetings individually and as a family with the social worker, FBI fingerprinting, a huge long biography written for both Staci and Sterling, and all the other things. Staci really felt it was important to have the home study report in hand in time for our trip to Utah. We completed all that we could do for the home study on May 11th. The long report still had to be written, but we had completed what was required of us.
Steve, Staci's brother, had been telling us a lot about A Act of Love, the agency he got his Lily through. Our plan was to meet with two different agency's upon our arrival in Utah and get the process started. From the beginning we knew that we would do our home study with LDS Social Services, but that the actual adoption would be through another agency.
We arrived on Thursday, May 27 in Salt Lake City. Steve had told Staci to call Kathy at AAOL. Staci called and left a message during the day, but hadn't heard back from them yet. That night Staci got a call on her phone from Steve, but it was really Kathy. Steve was at Kathy's painting her basement. Steve had asked Kathy if he had talked to Staci yet and when she admitted that she hadn't had time to call Staci yet, Steve dialed it on his phone and handed it to her. Staci and Kathy talked for the first time about the possibilities of adopting Helena. At first we were skeptical because it was so fast, the legal issues, and the cost. We had come to Utah for a vacation and to START the adoption process. We had no idea that it could actually happen while we were on vacation within the window of our plane tickets.
On Friday, we met Kathy for the first time at the Agency. She described 2 birth mothers to us. The first was a birth mother in Utah and the second was a birth mother in Michigan. It did not make much sense for us to travel to Michigan even thought there were a lot of potential problems surrounding Helena. As Kathy described Helena's birth parents, we both felt that this was the baby that Heavenly Father sent for us. Within minutes we committed to Kathy that we would like to adopt Helena, as long as her birth parents approved of us. The Agency contacted them and they told us Friday afternoon that her birth parents were pleased to have us adopt Helena. We did a conference call and we were both able to talk to the birth parents. The father was very excited that Sterling was in the Army. He had tried to enlist in the Marines but was medically disqualified. We agreed to meet with them on June 1st at 12:00 at the Agency.
We spent the weekend mentally preparing for the upcoming adoption, it was a very long weekend. We both wanted more information and to know what was going to happen next, but we just had to wait!
On Monday, May 31st, we were preparing to go to Lagoon with the DeVroom family. We were just getting ready to leave when Kathy called to tell us Helena was born at 4:30 that morning and we needed to meet at the agency to go over some things before we could go to the hospital to see her. We dropped the kids off with Papa and Mimi so they could still enjoy the family day at Lagoon while we went to the agency to meet with Kathy. Finally we left the agency and were on our way to meet Helena and her birth parents for the first time. Her birth parents were so ready to leave the hospital, but were very happy to see us. They wanted to leave, but wanted to be sure we were there with her before they left. We talked with them for about an hour and took pictures with Helena.
On Tuesday we had our originally planned meeting with the birth parents at the agency. They were really nice people who had fallen victim to a horrible drug, and lost everything because of it. They were very kind and brought pictures of their other children and of their siblings and parents. We talked for over an hour about their hobbies and interests and dreams. It was amazing!
On Wednesday Helena was released from the hospital. We were able to drive her to the agency, for yet more paperwork! After the paperwork had been finished we took Helena back to Shelli's to meet her brothers and sister for the first time.
Throughout this entire process miracle after miracle has taken place. Heavenly Father has blessed our lives with "more blessings than our hands can hold".
