Clayton Adoption Story

 I often tell people that the adoption process is one of the most difficult things I have ever done, but adoption itself is one of the most beautiful. In our eyes, the journey was long and painful, but in God's eyes and in His timing it was perfect.

For those of you who have been through the adoption process you know that there's always a time when you feel like it's never going to happen for you. That's exactly where we were last year right about this time. We had been waiting for over two years, and we were longing to grow our family. We were frustrated and just tired of waiting. Thankfully though, God never stops working.

On Monday, December 8, 2014, I was in a meeting when someone asked me what was new with the adoption process. I responded that, unfortunately, we didn't have any news to share. Little did I know that during that meeting I received a voicemail from our adoption specialist.

When I returned her call, she told me about a birth mother who was out of state but had found our profile online and wanted to talk with us right away.  It was possible that she would be induced later that day, and she wanted to choose a family quickly. I was trying to keep my emotions under control and then I was told that the birth mother's name was Kaley, and tears welled up in my eyes.

You see, Rusty and I had picked the name Hailey for our little girl and had been praying over that name for five years. I instantly felt a connection with this birth mother simply because her name rhymed with Hailey. Sometimes it's the simple things that remind you that God is good and that He is sovereign.

At the time, we were still one of three couples the birth mother was considering, and I won’t go into the details of the emotional roller coaster we experienced over the next few days, but I do want to share with you the last conversation I had with the birth mother before she chose us. She talked with both Rusty and I the first time via speakerphone but the second conversation was just with me, Kaley, and Kaley's mom in the background. First Kaley wanted reassurance that Rusty and I were comfortable with open adoption and willing to send her pictures. The second question surprised me a little bit at first. She asked me if I would explain what Rusty and I believed about Heaven and Grace. I shared with her that God's grace is sufficient for all of us and that no matter how big or small our sins were if we repent and believe, we would worship in Heaven with Him one day. Nothing could keep us from the love of Christ.

As I shared that conversation with Rusty we decided if she picked us, Hailey's middle name would be Grace. (We had been praying over the name Hailey for years, but had never agreed on a middle name until now.)

What seemed like an eternity, but was actually only a few hours later – I received a call from our adoption specialist that not only had the birth mother picked us, but she was in labor. We needed to pack up and get on the road as soon as possible. After many tears and a prayer thanking God, we quickly called our family, and texted a few people because we didn't have time to talk on the phone. Rusty had to write his final exam for his students, so I packed up the car while he finalized things for work. A friend stopped by to give us diapers and formula. Another came over to put our car seat in for us. Another dear friend came by just to give me a hug. It was an absolute whirlwind!



December, 11 2014

What’s amazing about adoption is how instantly you become a family. The moment we held Hailey in our arms, we were in love.  She was ours. We were a family. Every tear, every prayer -- God answered. We saw God’s hand so clearly that day and knew this was the moment, this was the adoption He had planned for us.

We fell in love with the birthmother and her parents. Yes, we met them and her brother and aunt too – they all had time with Hailey in the hospital away from us. Did this make us nervous? A little, but we also understood that they needed their time to say goodbye. We were able to share with them how we had prayed over Hailey’s name for five years, and that we chose Grace for her middle name because of my conversation with the birthmother. We shared tears and joy and even grief with them. That’s the one emotion we weren’t prepared to experience. We grieved for them almost as we were losing a piece of ourselves.

When we said our goodbyes at the hospital, Hailey’s birthmother gave us a book of pictures of her growing up, so we have them to share with Hailey. She also had saved her ultra sound pictures for us, and had a blanket embroidered for Hailey. Her birth grandmother wrote me a letter about how they had prayed for us and were so thankful that God led them to us. I can’t even write this without tears and remembering that moment like it was yesterday. When Rusty and I looked through all of it, we sobbed and sobbed and sobbed. We were sitting in our vehicle in the hospital parking lot unable to go anywhere because we were so heartbroken for them. Our joy was now their grief. But thankfully our daughter will never question that her birthmother loves her. She will always know.



Every adoption story is unique. I have heard so many testimonies about adoption, and none of them are the same. When I say God answered every prayer, He really did. Hailey’s adoption story is more beautiful than we ever imagined it could be. While we were terrified of “open adoption” before we started the adoption process, we have come to realize that those words can mean so many different things. For us, it means that I send the birthmother pictures every now and then. I sent her flowers from Hailey for Mother’s Day, and she actually sent me flowers too. What a precious gift! I texted her a video last week when Hailey learned to crawl. It is never weird or uncomfortable or forced. We simply do what seems natural. We love that if something comes up with Hailey’s personality or health or whatever, I can simply ask the birthmother about it to know if it runs in the family. Do we worry this will make the birthmother want Hailey back? No. Hailey is our daughter in every way. We have been with her since she was 12 hours old (and she is legally ours too, so that isn’t even an option.) She will always know she’s adopted. And she will always know she is loved.

We are so thankful that we have a picture of Hailey’s birthmother holding her in the hospital and another picture of the 4 of us together. When we look at Hailey, we love that we know her pretty smile is almost identical to her birthmother’s (their noses even crinkle the same way), that Hailey has her birth grandmother’s cheeks, that her hair parts to the same side as her birthfather’s, and she has his eyes. We love that we will be able to share all of that with Hailey. And that’s one of the reasons why open adoption is so beautiful. 

Hypocrisy we harbor toward birth mothers

“I just don't understand how a woman could ever give up her child.”

I've had this thought before, and I've heard it verbalized by others. It's a pretty common consensus, especially among Christian mothers. And I understand the mentality. For women who have carried a child in their womb, felt the kicks, seen the nose on the sonogram, held their baby after laboring for hours.....to them it seems unfathomable that a fellow woman could then “give up her baby.”

For us who have gone through infertility issues, it seems even worse. Why would someone forsake the very thing we are so desperate to have for ourselves?

There is a definite stigma associated with birth mothers. Our culture sees adoptive parents as heroes and birth mothers as non-feeling miscreants who are taking the easy way out by giving up their baby.

This stigma causes many women to hide their pregnancies and adoptions- they know other women will look at them and cluck to themselves, “I just don't understand how a woman could ever give up her child.”

We feel this way toward birth mothers, but in the same breath we curse abortion and look down upon struggling single mothers. 

About five years ago, Mississippi got in a heated debate over Proposition 8 which if I remember correctly had to do with the law reading that life begins at conception, which would outlaw abortion completely in the state.

The wording in Proposition 8 was fairly flawed and did not end up passing, but that's not why I bring it up. There was tremendous support for it because people felt so strongly about abortion and wanted to stand up for the lives of the unborn.

I hate abortion. I too want to stand up for the lives of the unborn.

But I also want to stand in the gap for the BORN. Mississippi has one of the highest birth rates for single mothers in America. There are hundreds of Mississippi children stuffed in very few approved foster homes and even more on the state-sponsored adoption list. Most will “graduate out” without ever having a permanent family and home.

I just find it a little unsettling that the amount of people that feel so passionately over Prop 8 and the atrocity of Planned Parenthood doesn't match the amount of people with approved home studies, which you must have to foster or adopt.

We judge women negatively who have had abortions. We judge women negatively who “give up their babies.” We judge women negatively who choose to parent their children but need government assistance to do so. Obviously, it would be dandy if every pregnant woman was married with a loving spouse, had the financial resources to raise and educate a child in a stable home environment, and had a strong support system of family and friends. But that is not the world we live in.

Women who find themselves pregnant but aren't ready to be a mom (or who don't feel like they can handle another child) are in a lose-lose situation. If they choose life and not abortion, they then have two choices: parent the baby or go through with an adoption. Both options are incredibly hard! And our society judges them either way.

Judgment shows up everywhere, even on legal documents. In Tennessee, a birth mother choosing adoption for her baby must sign her name in a sentence that uses the word “abandonment.” She has to sign a form that basically says she is abandoning her newborn baby. That is really harsh verbiage to use, and it's just one more way we stigmatize birth mothers.

I know everyone reading this has deeply rooted feelings about abortion, adoption, orphans, etc, and I'm not trying to change anyone's mind or make someone feel wrong or try to herald my opinion in a self-righteous way. But I would like to see people's perspectives toward birth mothers shift a little.

“I just don't understand how a woman could ever give up her child.”

I will never forget the moment in the hospital when it came time for us to leave the hospital with AB. Her birth mother was in absolute agony even though she never wavered over her decision for us to raise her daughter. It was, without a doubt, the most anguishing 20 minutes of my life, watching that brave young girl go through the emotions of “giving up her child.” I'm boo-hooing just thinking about it right now. 

But she didn't see it as giving up her child, she saw it as giving me and Caleb to her child. She didn't see adoption as the easy way out; rather, she saw it as the most self-less gift she could give her baby. 

She did not give her baby to us. She gave us to her baby. 

We never saw it as her “giving up her child.” We're so thankful she chose life and us for AB. She is the hero in AB's story, not us.

***There are some incredible things happening behind the scenes with this blog! Several families from all over the country have agreed to share their adoption stories. People who were adopted as children are writing about what it was like for them growing up. Birth mothers will be sharing from their perspective as well! So hopefully this very opinionated post didn't turn anybody off :)

The feedback from the last post was overwhelming. I am still so surprised anyone is reading this blog, let alone 3,000 people and from several different countries. I think it just goes to show that people are truly interested in adoption and want to learn more about it and what they can do. I have many more less-opinionated posts planned that are more application-based, so stay with me, haha!