The Best Is Still Ahead

Shannon

Belleville, MI

Adoption is not new to us. We have walked this road many times, in many different forms. Three of our children came to us through adoption and are with us still. Two others came to us through adoption with medical needs we knew would not allow them to stay long, and we loved them through the time we had. We have also fostered twenty-two children, each of whom passed through our home for a season. Every child who has come to us has come through a decision someone else had to make. I think about those women often, and I am aware every day that our family exists because of choices they made in some of the hardest moments they will ever face. Their stories live inside the family we have built, and always will.

Our home has been a safe place for children with trauma, medical complexity, developmental delays, special needs, and backgrounds that started in very hard places. We know how to meet a child where they are, even when that means moving at a pace much different than the rest of the world. We have learned how to advocate inside hospital systems, IEP meetings, and therapy offices, and we know that healing is not linear. A child's progress is measured in the smallest things, sometimes for years before the bigger things come. None of this scares us. We know what we are walking into, and we are ready for whatever comes next.

There is a child somewhere whose path will lead to our family, and we are waiting. They will come home to people who have been ready for them. The best is still ahead.

 View Profile Book