Infertility sucks. There is no other way to put it. No amount of marriage prep or prayer could have ever adequately prepared me to be able to handle this situation. For a while now, we have been asking the same questions. Why? What? How? Why is this happening to us? What are we supposed to do next? How are we supposed to get through this? Ask anyone who has experienced a period of infertility, and they’ll tell you about these moments. About how trying to find the answers dominate your every thought. I have felt so stretched because I want to have these answers for Katie. I know that she has a desire for security. These answers could give her that security. But, when we ask them I just have to say, “I don’t know.” Let me tell you, not knowing sucks.
After numerous tests, pills, surgeries, etc., and asking these questions probably a million times over, adoption started presenting itself to us as an option. We started doing research and moving in that direction. One of my biggest concerns was that I didn’t want adoption to be my “Plan B.” I didn’t want my future son or daughter to ever question their place in my heart or my life or feel as if they were merely an adequate substitute to the life I wish I had. I think if we’re being honest, we all sometimes think that adoption is the “less than” option. We, as in not just Katie and me, but all of us. There are times where this mindset comes to the fore. Where one’s first thought when seeing an adoptive family is that “they probably can’t have their own child.” Or the idea of “watch, you’ll probably get pregnant now that you’ve started adopting.” This, in some ways, reinforces the idea that having biological children is the obvious Plan A. I want to be careful here. What I am not trying to say is that this mindset is bad or unnatural or that having a biological child is less than adoption. Katie and I still hope and pray to have biological children one day. Both paths are equally beautiful, fulfilling, and hard. What we have come to realize through this process is that growing our family through adoption has always been our Plan A.
I know that adoption is not the less than option. It is a beautiful thing. But like always, what seemed to get in the way is grasping onto the plan I had for MY LIFE. The one where I marry a smoking hot woman, have a few (preferably athletic) biological children, and after that, lifestyle and money permitting, would want to add to our family through adoption (check on the hot wife thing). In this world, I was in control of everything and could move my life forward as I sought fit. I knew adoption was a process AND EXPENSIVE which is why I put it at the end as the cherry on top to my dream life.
This is where the problem lies. I had grown so concerned for myself, my well-being and MY plan, that I failed to ask the question that would bring my heart some rest and peace. I was asking, “Why? What? How?” and it just caused unrest. An unrest that I didn’t want or need in my life. For months, nothing changed. Not until I changed the questions I was asking. I remember I was praying in our apartment living room at the end of 2018, and I felt led to ask another question of Jesus.
“Jesus, what are you doing here?”
And He spoke to me. Gently. Quietly. Truthfully. “Joseph, I have amazing things prepared for you (Jer29:11). I am working towards your good (Rom 8:28). Just be and let me do the heavy lifting (Exodus 14:14). He spoke directly to my heart saying “I love you. Just trust in me. I know it’s hard, but you can do this. You are my beloved.”
This last affirmation has been what I have clung to this year. I am not alone. I am not Fatherless and orphaned. I am the son of a God who loves me and created me in His image in a unique way that no one else will ever be. He did all this because He loves me so much and saved that particular part of Himself to be shown in me. I am beloved by my Father. He is taking care of everything and I only have one responsibility.
Each day.
That is my responsibility. That is all I have. Each day is a new opportunity to love God, my wife, the people placed in front of me, and baby M. I am called to just do what I can with each day that I am given. And living in each day, I find new questions to ask God. “Why am I here today? What do you want me to do today to serve you? How do you want me to do it?” And day by day, Jesus transforms me and moves me forward. He helps me see that all along He had a better plan. One that would be much better than I could have ever come up with. Just be. Just trust. I can still know peace without knowing what comes next.
Baby M. Wherever you are. I am asking God day-by-day to make me into the husband to your mother and father to you that I need to be. You are unquestionably our Plan A. I can’t wait to meet you and bring you home.
-Joe