Cultivating Family
This week’s testimonial shows how adoptions sometimes have a way of reflecting the adoptive family’s personality.
The more flexible and relaxed a family is throughout the adoption process, the more their adoption tends to go smoothly, and their chances of having a successful adoption rise dramatically.
Bruce and Shannon are a prime example of how a family’s positivity and patience from infertility to finalization will almost always conclude with a precious result.
…
In addition to working as a volunteer fire fighter and teacher, respectively, Bruce and Shannon work and live on a 2,800-acre farm.
“It is a more relaxed lifestyle than some of our friends – not being in the city and having a lot less hustle and bustle. It’s a little bit more freedom,” Shannon said. “We can take it a little slower than what we could if we were both working corporate jobs and living in a city.”
When the couple had trouble conceiving on their own, adoption was an easy decision. Both Bruce and Shannon had adopted family members and knew that it would be easy to discuss adoption with their own child some day.
For some couples, the wait time between for an adoption opportunity can feel excruciatingly long, but Bruce and Shannon found support from family and friends and stayed busy with their jobs and tending to such a large farm. Just five months after becoming an active adoptive family, Shannon was at school in early August when her phone rang – it was American Adoptions, with news of an adoption opportunity with a Florida birth mother who was due in January.
“I was glad I was at my desk because I needed to sit down,” Shannon said. “I quickly took notes and looking back on it my hand writing was atrocious; my hand must have been shaking when I was taking down the information. It was just an overwhelming sense of peace. It was a great excitement, but I felt very peaceful with the news. It was kind of like we were able to exhale just a little bit.”
Bruce was off work that day when his wife called him at home.
“There was a lot of excitement,” Bruce said. “I was at home, it wasn’t a real busy day, so I was able to sit and enjoy the news. Now we actually had some news that we could give to our friends and family who were asking about it. It was definitely a sense of peace and relaxation.”
…
Before Bruce and Shannon knew it, January arrived, and they got the call that their baby’s birth mother had gone into labor. The couple drove to her home state as soon as they could, finally meeting their daughter Meredith on Shannon’s birthday. Now, nearly a year old, Bruce and Shannon cannot wait to celebrate the holidays with their curious baby girl.
Check out our other adoption testimonials.
