I'm not sure how often people choose New Years Day to make a resolution to build their family.....but we did. While the pain of not being able to conceive naturally was still very raw, and fresh to us both, we knew the decision we had made to adopt was the decision that was meant to be.
Our decision on where to adopt from came very naturally as well. Jennifer and I are already in an ethnically diverse relationship, and have dealt with some of the baggage that comes with it. The looks, the whispers, and sometimes the disapproval, have been things we have dealt with for over 11 years. With me being caucasian, and Jennifer being Korean and Hawaiian, we knew we wanted to be able to continue to celebrate and honor the cultures that have made us who we are today. With this in mind, we quickly decided to adopt from South Korea. An important part of adoption is being able to ensure that your child never loses touch with their culture or identity, and of all the options on the table, we knew we could at least provide this to our child if we adopted from South Korea.
That choice was simple, but we quickly realized it may have been the easiest choice we would make as we moved along through the process.
Now keep in mind, I am going head first into this thing, and I have not a clue where to go from here. Thank God for google, because without it we may still be researching a "how to begin adoption" book at the Ada Public Library. As I began "Google-ing" Korean adoption, I was inundated with news articles, blogs, charities, and everything else under the sun pertaining to anything to do with adoption. To say we were overwhelmed would be a complete understatement, but as we read, and researched, and educated ourselves, it was confirmed in our hearts that "this" was the right choice for us.
Now I don't pretend to know how quickly behaviors change within adults who are going through the process of birthing a child, but I do know the minute we made the decision to adopt, our entire outlook on our life decisions changed as well. Simple decisions were becoming more complex, debates began to happen frequently over decisions we were making throughout the process. It's a funny feeling when you begin making decisions because of the effects they may have on a child you have never met; or may not even be born.
The Choice we were able to make together was to partner with Dillon International to begin the official process of adoption. Dillon is located in Tulsa, Oklahoma, which is within 2 hours of our home in Ada. We wanted to ensure that we were always a stones throw away should something happen during our process that needed some sorting out in person.
After hours of dissecting our information packet, which we were able to download online from Dillon, it was once again confirmed that we had made the right choice. I won't bore you with the stipulations and criteria involved in this process, but I assure you there are plenty. As intrusive as this process was about to become, we were able to find comfort in the fact that Dillon's top priority was to ensure that applicants were well qualified to care for the children that needed good parents so badly.
I remember shortly after we decided to go with Dillon, I was printing the official "Application #1" papers and thinking to myself, "how lucky are we to be beginning this process?" Many people would go on to tell us, "You're child is going to be the luckiest kid...you guys are going to be amazing parents!", but in reality, the moment we made that choice, we became the lucky ones.
Jennifer and I were days removed from the most challenging times we had experienced as a married couple. We both were faced with choices on how to move forward with our lives. It was the first time in my life I needed some direction. It's amazing that within days we were beginning this journey. I used to roll my eyes when people would say "Everything happens for a reason." I can say today, the reason those painful things needed to happen in my life was so I could find my ultimate purpose. The journey had begun......
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