It's Time...

Hi all, As most of you know, for five of our seven years of marriage, Ragan and I have been in the process of trying to become parents.  After struggling through infertility and a miscarriage we sought other avenues to parenthood. This journey has been filled with highs and lows, peaks and valleys, happiness and sadness.  This is not the way I had planned for this to go.  No one ever thinks this will be their journey. No longer having the option to have a “traditional” child-bearing experience brings with it an entirely new set of questions, considerations, worries, and decisions.  Questions you don’t always know how to answer; considerations you never thought of otherwise; worries you feel selfish for even thinking about; and decisions you never thought you’d have to make.  These past five years have been incredibly challenging—for our marriage, for our faith, and for our finances.  We have prayed for this, we have put our trust in God, and we have leaned on each other.  There comes a time where you say to yourself, “OK” and move on.  That time is now. We are ready to move on, we’ve journeyed and struggled and we’ve grown weary.  We have accepted this and are at peace.  We have made the transition mentally to a future without children and honestly, we’re okay.  Our lives are not empty—in fact, quite the opposite.  We have four nieces and nephews that we love with every part of our hearts—we have our families and our friends and we know we have been richly blessed.  There has been a grieving process—grieving for the loss of the life we thought we would have, for the child we thought we would have—but we have come out the other side with joy and happiness.  We are not simply resolved to live this life, we are looking forward to this new life together. We know that this will shock (and perhaps even confuse or anger) some of you but this is a decision we have to make—and it is one we have not taken lightly.  We have been talking with each other and praying about this for over six months now—this decision to move on or to keep struggling for something we hoped for.  We ask that you please respect our decision and while your sentiments and good intentions are appreciated, we ask that you not try to offer words of encouragement such as “it’ll happen,” “be patient,” “I thought this is what you wanted,” etc.  While they are intended to encourage they only serve as individual blows, increasing our anguish when we are just trying to move on in peace and joy.  While we are fully accepting and at peace with our decision, we do continue to have our moments of sadness--which I am sure will continue throughout our lives popping up at times. We do thank you all for your sincere support and encouragement during these past five years—simple words cannot express our gratitude.  I know many of you have given us gifts to help us prepare for a child—if you would like your gift returned to you we will be happy to do so (but you may have to remind us what it is specifically you gave).  We plan to donate all gifts (monetary and otherwise) on June 1st to the Crisis Pregnancy Center and the Providence House (two Christ-centered charities supported by groups from our church) to help others who need it. We love you all so much! Ragan & Mandi

It's Officially Official...

...WE'RE FULLY CERTIFIED AND APPROVED AS FOSTER PARENTS!!!  So excited for this step to be done with!!  Now we wait for a placement.  Can't wait to introduce Baby Roo to all of you; whoever he or she may be.

Patience is a Virtue

It has now been 3 months since I made the first post saying it would be 1 week until we were certified.  We still have nothing to report.  I have to just believe and trust that God isn't ready yet and that's what's taking so long.  It gets really discouraging at times.  Don't get me wrong...I'm NOT saying I'm ready to have a foster child...because if we NEVER got the call because they had no children to place I would be overjoyed...I am not wishing foster care on anybody.  But what I am saying is that I'm ready for this approval process to be over.  We started this whole process November of 2010. 

...still waiting...

Twenty days later, still waiting.  Nothing new to share.  Hopefully soon.

(( this )) close

We're (( this )) close to being finished with the foster parent approval process.  We had to get some more references and that's done.  Now we're just waiting on medical forms.  We went in today to have TB skin tests done and will go Friday to have them read, at which point the medical forms will be complete.  Our social worker said she's going to give her report/our file to her supervisor tomorrow.  Her supervisor will look over our file and will either sign-off on it to approve us or will say she needs more info on this or that.  So keep your fingers crossed and keep the prayers coming that there will be no more hurdles.  Yay!

Wahoo!!! Light at the end of the tunnel!!

Hey guys.  So I finally have some great news to report.  I've been speaking with our home development worker a lot lately and hopefully we will be 100% fully approved and certified foster parents by next week!  Wahoo!  That's just such a huge relief to see our waiting is paying off.  They are struggling with budget cuts and (I assume) staff cuts which means they're all overworked and underpaid...just the same as most other state employees right now.  They have been pushing to complete case files for those foster homes with children already in them so naturally we got pushed to the back burner.  However, now things are going in full force.  Just a few more steps and we're there.  Doing the happy dance!

Longest One Week of My Life

Well, July 13th I posted and said that it would be 1 week before we were approved and finalized.  That one week has come and gone and still no word.  We called our social worker after the week was up and she said NO PROGRESS HAD BEEN MADE!  I'm trying to be understanding because I know they're dealing with the same budget and staff cuts as all the other state agencies but it's just so frustrating.  They tell you they have all these kids who need foster homes and here we are just waiting...FOR PAPERWORK.  It's been well past their "goal date" for us with no progress.  This is so frustrating.  If something doesn't happen soon our homestudy will expire and we'll have to start all over again.  I'll keep y'all posted.