How it started

As anyone who’s been through it knows, infertility sucks. My journey started in 1983, when I was 27 and Randy was 34. Married for three years, we were excited about starting a family. Then – nothing. Except disappointment, month after month. I was a runner then (still am) and logged nearly 40 miles a week. When I passed by my neighbors’ homes on trash day with all the empty Pampers boxes, tears would stream down my face as a I ran. I loved their babies, and I loved them. I just hated our situation.

Why couldn’t I do this thing everyone else did so effortlessly? I felt sad, inferior, alienated. I had nothing to contribute to conversations about stretch marks, breastfeeding, and long labors.

We tried everything under the sun – specialists, therapists, natural remedies, you name it. There were the obligatory thermometers and charts. There was lots of advice about what position was best and what position to be in afterward. And there was the regret about years of birth control.

I read if you lubricate with egg white, it helps the sperm get where it needs to go. It made me throw up. My mom’s best friend in Cyprus sent me dried leaves from a special tree growing near a monastery that had reportedly helped countless women conceive. She said to make a tea with it. It made me throw up.

There were years of tests, drugs, and surgeries for both of us. I had endometriosis – not a surprise with all the years of painful periods (“don’t complain about cramps! Just means you’re going to be a mom one day”) Randy had low sperm motility. After treatment, we were both pronounced “fixed,” but still nothing. So we tried artificial insemination (with his sperm). Hormones were part of the AI protocol, so that meant weight gain, mood swings, depression. But it would all be worth it, I kept telling myself. Still nothing.

Nine looooong years passed. Nine. Long. Years. The biological clock was ticking. The next step was IVF. We decided we’d had enough. Our relationship was strained and the agony of wanting a child so badly colored everything. At this point, when I prayed, it was “please let me stop wanting a child.” But that prayer was never answered (thankfully, I would realize later).

So we started exploring adoption. There was a lot of news coverage about birth moms relinquishing babies, then changing their minds.  After all we’d been through, I couldn’t bear to think that might happen after bringing a baby home. There was also the “sell yourself” aspect of the domestic adoption process; having birth moms “choose” you and having you “choose” them. We just wanted the next kid on the list. We didn’t want to select or be selected. Considering all this, international adoption seemed like our best option. We didn’t care which country. We just wanted a child who needed a home.

So our adoption journey began.