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for Kat, having a baby at the end made it worth the pain. But at the end of this pregnancy, there was a surgery to remove what the doctors called “the products of conception.” It was the same surgery and clinical language that they use for mid- and late-term abortions, and when we tried to prepare for the surgery,  women through their abortions.


Whatever your thoughts on abortion, you can understand how that wasn’t


     pregnancy. That choice was made for us. We didn’t need encouragement that we were “doing the right thing” or “brave for choosing this option.” Our op- tions were taken away from us, and we would have done anything to make a different choice for our baby. But amidst the devastation, the Lord showed us His faithfulness in sending people who walked with us through our brokenness. He gave us reminders of  was the mother of a friend from college, and she reminded us of our hope in Christ. Our church family encouraged us with prayers, with meals during re- covery, and with stories of their own losses and the redemption that followed. Some of them even gave testimonies of having had miscarriages themselves and subsequently carrying babies to full term. While still reeling from this loss, with fear and trust we clung to the hope that we might yet have another child. Encouraged by our doctors that every sign seemed to indicate that this loss was a unique event, and that we could expect a healthy pregnancy in our future, we  When Kat got pregnant again, it seemed that the Lord had answered our prayers. We were nervous, but all the doctors told us that a second trimester               the chances of having a miscarriage between weeks 13 and 20 of pregnancy range from 5% to less than 1%. It is considered by most to be “the safe zone” of the pregnancy. We lost that baby in the second trimester, too. We didn’t know why the


Lord had placed on us a burden for more children when He seemed intent on keeping from us the gift for which He had given us a desire. This loss was even - tors and insurance companies to try to get someone to help us look for answers as to why this might be happening. We wanted a diagnosis of the problem that was killing our children. Despite all our efforts, we didn’t get very far. But in the absence of answers, after much prayer, we decided to try a third time for a healthy child. All the while, we were discussing whether this might be an indication that the Lord was calling us to adopt a child, but again the doctors assured us that having two rare second-trimester pregnancy losses, while extremely uncommon, was not indicative of an underlying problem. We were told that Kat should have no problem giving birth to a healthy baby if she got pregnant again. We lost a third child in the second trimester. Each successive loss took its


toll on us, not only emotionally, but physically. Kat required surgery af- ter every loss, and her recovery after each procedure grew longer and more complicated. She developed bleed- ing problems and ended up with in- fections that put her in the hospital more than once. On the positive side, after three second-trimester losses in        - vince the doctors and insurance com- pany to let us have some tests done to determine what was happening, but we never got any answers.


At this point it was clear to ev- eryone that something was wrong, but there is still so much that doctors don’t know about how God knits us together in our mothers’ womb. In the end we were told our best hope was to keep trying, with the reluc- tant acknowledgement that medical science could not tell us whether it would ever be possible for us to have another healthy child. Thankfully, we knew that we have a greater hope in Christ than the doctors could give us, and that we had other options for welcoming children into our family. Throughout the months of medi- cal tests, we talked in earnest about whether the Lord might be calling us to grow our family through adoption. We were still mourning our losses, but we also began to talk with friends we knew who had adopted children, as well as adults who had been ad- opted as children. We asked them for honest feedback about our desire to adopt, what we should consider or know before embarking on this jour- ney. We began researching what the different options were for adoption, and what the process might look like. We read a lot. We went to an informa- tional meeting at Bethany Christian Services hosted by Lisa Bills, the wife of ARP pastor Jim Bills.


Faith


Perhaps we were as stubborn as Balaam, not seeing what was right in front of us, but we wanted to be sure before pursuing such a serious and costly venture as adoption.


Christ


tells us to count the cost before start- ing a building project, and we knew       


November/December 2019 7


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