This is My Story! This is My Song!

🎵This is my story! This is my song!🎵 Henry’s beginnings belong to him, but I will forever tell my side of God’s story:

After Eloise, we were sure our family was complete: we gave away all of our baby things as she outgrew them and settled into life as a family of four. Not long after her first birthday, though, I felt a tug at my heart again. I couldn’t shake it, so I prayed about it and brought it up to Cody. He took some time and thought and prayed, and in January of this year, we sat in the Sam’s parking lot and officially decided to pursue adoption again. From the start, it felt different than our first experience. There was a peace and less urgency, and we just knew it would happen the way it all should. Sure, I hoped for a quick process, but realistically, families wait years, and we knew that. Thankfully, God patiently listened to me list the points I was nervous about over and over. Just the next Sunday, I was minding my own business taking notes of the sermon when our pastor read Genesis 26:12. I was paying attention but when he read that verse out loud, it felt like he screamed it at me. IN THAT SAME YEAR?! “God, is that you? Are you saying our family will grow this year?!” I continued with my notes but I could not stop thinking about Isaac and God’s blessing. The next morning, I journaled about it, and from there, I wrote it everywhere: in my notebook, on our family board, especially on my heart. I constantly prayed that verse, asking God to show me what I needed to sow and asked that he bless us with a baby this same year. A lot of days, I felt silly. So many families, especially ones with children, especially ones with biological children wait years! But I would open my Bible and read about Isaac and ask God to strengthen my faith and assure me that he spoke to me. I was almost certain it would happen! I could feel it!

The occasion came up once for us to present our profile, and we did. It was an urgent, need to send this over now situation, so we did and within two hours we found out another family was chosen. All along, we felt completely certain that we did not want any baby for us-we wanted the one that God had for us, and a no just meant “not yet.” It still stung; I think that’s human nature. Again, (thank you, God, for your patience), I questioned if “in that same year” was really meant for me.

Just two weeks later, we got another call, another opportunity to present our family. We were out with friends, so Cody and I stepped outside to hear the details and said, “yes, please submit our family.” We high fived, hugged, and went along with our week. It was an emotional week, as our friends were moving far away. The sadness was a weird distraction. The further the week went on, the more our hope faded. Surely, we’d not been chosen and someone forgot to tell us. With that resolve and after sadly sending our friends off, we woke up on a Thursday with a “let’s start fresh” attitude. Cody was home from work that morning, so he started cleaning at one end of the house, and I started cleaning the other while Sully and Eloise did their own version of helping in between. Around 9am, my phone rang with the person who would be delivering the news. I sprinted to Cody and put the phone on speaker. As she spoke, I kept making an “it’s a no” face at Cody as I tried to judge her tone, but then she said the words, “they’ve chosen y’all.” Tears and hugs and complete shock. I had zero control of my brain at that point because all I could register was “in that same year!” I could not form a single to do list other than things that literally did not matter at all. (Think, I need to clean the laundry room instead of pack my family to meet our son.) Thankfully, Cody is the better half of us and thrives in chaos much better than I do, so he kicked us into gear. The rest of the day was a complete blur of celebrating, planning, trying to pick a name, and prepping Sully and Eloise the best we knew how.

Ending a season well is so important to me, but our season ended abruptly. I got progressively more teary as the night came to a close as I realized it would be the last night as a family of four. With all that needed to be done, Cody got us all to the couch after dinner, and we snuggled and watched Bubble Guppies together. He knew exactly what my heart needed, just another reason I love him so. We did a joint bed time with the big kids and have so many extra snuggles and kisses. My mom was there right after their bed time, and we went to bed excited and ready. At 2AM, we were out of the house on the way to the airport to fly to meet our guy.

It was surreal. We knew nothing about him-no birth weight, no length, no pictures but we loved him so much already. The day was spent flying and waiting and flying some more and to finally arrive. We sat down our things in our hotel and ran across the street to the hospital to meet him. Lots of little details in between, and we were back at our hotel, waiting again. But that night around 7pm, we finally got the opportunity to see our son for the first time. As we washed our hands, the nurse said, “he’s a little guy that likes to be held,” and all I could awkwardly reply was, “I have two hands that work really well.” The rest is history. Henry was wearing the cutest pumpkin hat and wrapped in a classic hospital blanket, and I’m pretty sure we held him from that point until really, well, now. We still snuggle him all day.

Many more details in between that aren’t mine to share, but the short version is this: There is a period of time in adoption where a mom can still choose to parent. This is very much her right, and we respected it fully. But it’s still a scary thought. In this wait, we weren’t sure if Henry would get to be a Parker. It felt frozen in my prayers-I couldn’t bring myself to pray that he would be ours because he’s not ours first. I told God that I was thinking about Isaac again but this time with Abraham. If this story ended in us having to “sacrifice” Henry to God for His glory, we would do it. It would break our hearts, but we respected the process and wanted best for his first family too. If God was calling us to love Henry for a very short season, that we would do. Before “in that same year” was on our letter board, a friend wrote out a lyric from “Pieces,” a song about how God doesn’t give his heart in pieces. I sang that in my heart and promised Henry I wouldn’t give him just part of my heart, even if I only got to know him for a little bit. To feel that level of love and know that it was fragile was one of the scariest feelings. I didn’t have many words for God but just sat with him.  Henry wasn’t a puppy I was hoping would be under the tree at Christmas-he was a couple’s son, and I would not pray against that.

After the most God-filled, holy, emotional two weeks of my entire life, we got the word that Henry was an official member of our family, and my heart just breathed a thank you. When we brought Henry home from the hospital to the Airbnb, I got to tell Sully, “do you remember all of those times you prayed for a baby? All of those times you talked to God, he heard you. So in your life, if you ever wonder if God can hear you, look at your sweet brother and know that He does.”

So here I am, sitting in the quiet rocking our baby smirking at God. I’m sure He’s shaken his head at me a few times in this process knowing it would work the way He needed it to. He said he would work all things together for His good and glory, and I believe him. He said our family would grow, so I believe him. In the future, when things get hard or scary or sad, I believe him. Henry is already set apart, and it’s all just beginning.