Their biggest loss became our greatest gain and we will never forget that. We are forever grateful to have relationships that we would have never had without adoption. This has been the most unexpected blessing of adoption!
Johnny and Paola, Adoptive Parents
Made for This
We truly believe we were made for this. Paola remembers telling her mom from a young age that she would adopt a child some day. She has talked about it for years, even before meeting Johnny. When we met, we quickly realized that we both have a heart for adoption. It’s amazing how God orchestrates our lives and gives us a heart for things we never imagined. We believe adoption is at the heart of God. He has adopted us as his children and loves as His own.
Our Journey
When we started the adoption journey, we went on a journey that God had placed on our hearts since before we knew each other. We were already blessed with two biological children, our daughters Bella and Abby. We prayed that God would bring home the child he had for our family.
God gave our family a calling to adopt domestically, and we have had the great privilege of walking this road several times. We had difficult moments along our journeys. We had several failed adoptions and heartbreak along the way. Those were times where we questioned our calling and our ability to continue on this road.
There were moments when the financial burden seemed too great. We are thankful for those, like Katelyn’s Fund, that helped us along our journey through their thoughtful devotionals, prayer and financial assistance. We had family and friends that lovingly walked this journey with us and reminded us of our calling and our mission as a family. God continually healed our hurts and provided more abundantly than we could have ever imagined!
As hard as the journey can be, we consider ourselves crazy enough to have gone on the journey multiple times. We have had the enormous blessing of growing our family though adoption three times and seeing God work in the most extraordinary, beautiful ways. We adopted our son Josiah in 2015, our son Judah in 2017 and our son Micah in 2019.
Adoption has been the greatest growth experience for our family. We have grown together in love for each other and trust in the Lord. We have learned to trust in times that there are so many things that are out of your control. We have prayed together, cried together and grown to love in ways we had never envisioned. We’ve grown not only in love for the child God brings into our family, most surprisingly, for our birth families.
What Our Open Adoptions Look Like
I (Paola) remember starting the adoption process with a very closed off mindset on open adoption. “It’s not for me!” “That may be confusing.” “They give up their rights when they go with adoption.” Now, I can’t believe I ever thought those things! Despite my reservations, there was a grander picture that I could not yet see. God was working on me, and growing in me a type of love I didn’t even know I had. I have come admire and respect birth families so much for their courage and selflessness in placing their child in an adoptive family. I love our birth families deeply and I can’t imagine our lives without them!
We are thankful to have amazing relationships with our birth families. We have been able to minister to them throughout these past few years and share life with them. We have shared birthdays, Christmases, Spring Breaks, and countless family memories with them.
When it’s not a major holiday or celebration, our open adoptions look like text messages about their day at school, something funny they said, a new milestone or a new food he tried. We call each other, we video call, we try to keep the families connected as much as we can. They may call when they’re struggling and miss their babies, and we try to be available because we get to have these boys daily. Their biggest loss became our greatest gain and we will never forget that. We are forever grateful to have relationships that we would have never had without adoption.
This has been the most unexpected blessing of adoption! We have gained so many family members that love our boys immeasurably and we are so thankful for this. These relationships have not come without struggle. There are uncomfortable moments, awkward times and periods of questioning what we’re doing or if we’re doing it right.
Family relationships, no matter how they are formed, show us our greatest needs to depend on God for guidance. It’s a journey like no other. We’ve learned there is no right way, just the way that is best for our family and birth families. We’ve learned to depend on the Lord to guide us and show us how to best minister and love.
We have seen God’s redemption and the beauty that comes even out of brokenness. Mostly, we have seen God stretch and grow our family to be His light and to do His work in the world in the most unique way. Our hearts have been completely changed and our lives will never be the same!
