The people that got us through

Adoption: a retrospective; part 1

Obviously adoption has always been a part of my life. Domestic and international. I am the domestic and I have quite a few second? cousins that are international adoptees from Vietnam, Korea and I think Cambodia. So the thought of adoption, even international adoption, was never out of the realm of possibility for us.

I do believe at some point I have posted our "infertility" story, but as usual I am too tired and mostly too lazy to go back and find it. So since it happens to be a part of the beginning of our adoption story you get to hear it again.

Somewhere around our 7th wedding anniversary we decided we wanted to start a family. This little tid-bit of information was kept to ourselves. We thought we wanted to be one of those couples that says, "surprise! We're pregnant!" Good in theory. The underlying part was that we didn't want the upcoming months to be filled with, "well... any news yet?" Oh how little did we know what would be in store for us in the next 3 years.

I made an appointment for my annual exam. This is a new doc to me since we now live in a new city. He was recommended by a friend who I trust. He delivered her 2 kids and she really likes him. We'll call him Dr. Uncaring. I proudly proclaim that we want to have a baby. His reply is that 80% of couples get pregnant in the first 12 months. OK. Off I go with a clean bill of health and the doc's "blessing" to get pregnant.

12 months later... nothing. Not even close. Although, I do think there were a few miscarriages in there. So back to Dr. Uncaring. Now he tells me that 90% of couples get pregnant in the first 18 months. I inform him that I am in alot of pain during my cycle. Pain not during my cycle and a whole host of other problems with me. He brushes them off and says, "well if you'd like to get your husband tested that would be great. Otherwise what you are describing for yourself sounds like endometriosis and we would do a laproscopic surgery to determine that. Here are some pamphlets. Let me know what you would like to do."

WTF? Surgery as a first option? Uh no. I come home to CS in tears. I place the sample cup he gave me in a drawer and we decide that we'll try 6 more months before starting any testing.

Sometime around October 2004 I was starting to get really discouraged. This whole TTC thing was really not working. We had discussed adoption in the past. I am so anti-doctor that I did not want to subject myself to being a lab experiment with tests, surgeries and medications. On a whim I did a google search for international adoption.

I came up with a fairly well known adoption agency. I started looking at their programs: China-too young, Vietnam-closed, Ukraine-too long of an in-country stay, Russia-...

At that moment it was like someone shoved me in the back and said, "I gave you your child. I put him in Russia." I knew at that moment where our path to parenthood would take us. Little did I know that it would take so long.

Up next... researching Russia. Is this for real?