The Waiting Mother

When I began requesting adoption packets I was not entirely prepared for the beautiful sad faces that would stare back at me. I was not at all prepared for the numbers that I would encounter either, numbers like 25, 14000, 3, and 50-- 25 years old to adopt a child from each agency except 1 (Hope's Promise), 14000 the average price for an international adoption (for the sake of my heart I round up to $25000), 3 the number of years it is expected that a couple should be married before they are allowed to adopt a child, and finally 50 the oldest you can be to adopt a child.

I know that there are many children all over the world needing to be loved, I also know that when a social worker comes into our home, they will not see the love that we can give a child, rather they will see our debt, our one bedroom apartment, our class schedule, and my young age. All of these are just numbers though, and what do numbers have to do with love.

I will adopt because I know that each and every child regardless of their circumstance, their ability, their skin color, or their past deserves to be loved. I will adopt because I know that almost none of the children in orphanages have a chance of being anything more then pimps, prostitutes, drug dealers, or dead. I will adopt because I know that my heart will not rest until I hold in my arms that child that was meant for me, not the child of my womb but the child that God made to fit my heart.

Do not tell me that I am too young, too newly married, too poor, too naive; if anything I am too in love with a child that I do not know, who has not been born but who fits into the curve of my unconventional, passionate, and unworthy heart.