Our Journey To Parenthood
Just a month ago, my husband and I were going away for a weekend retreat for young married couples. We were looking forward to getting away and spending time focused on each other and making our marriage stronger. Even driving to the retreat was so much fun. We love talking for hours in the car, with nothing else to do, just us and the road in front of us.
We were also nervous and anxious, since we were also speaking at two of the sessions. We spent weeks getting the material ready and we were looking forward to it with anticipation and trepidation. It was a relief when it was over, but we both love to speak and especially when we do it together, so it was very gratifying.
We had a phenomenal time and the retreat was so well organized, thanks to the great team that put in so much effort into making it a delightful and relaxing time for all the young couples. We also really enjoyed getting to know so many other young couples. It is always great to be with people that want to invest into their family’s future.
One of the most common questions that young couples ask one another is “Do you have any children?” This question is always somewhat awkward for us, as you can imagine. We’ve been in the process of adopting for SO many years now, so we’re technically “expecting” a child, and I always feel so disloyal and like I’m hurtful to my daughter’s memory by not mentioning her, but we’ve learned to simply smile and say, “No, we don’t have any children”. You don’t want to pour out your whole life story to everyone who innocently stops to chat, am I right?
And that’s just what we did that weekend, every time we were asked if we had any children or not.
How quickly life can drastically change. Just a few days later, we welcomed a precious, newborn little boy into our family.
As many of you already know, and have been following our journey for a long time, my husband and I were attempting to adopt 2 children from Russia. Sadly, President Putin banned all adoptions of Russian orphans by Americans in January of this year. We were heartbroken, of course, but this situation was completely out of our hands. Unfortunately, we live in an imperfect world, full of sorrow, heartache and pain. Evil has a place in our society and laws are passed that God isn’t happy with.
Since we live in a world where there is sin, sometimes humans make wrong and hurtful decisions. Humans are not robots and God allows the consequences of wrong decisions to come into effect and they hurt innocent people. There are so many examples of different situations in our world where God allowed bad things to happen. Think of Stalin and Hitler. Think of abortions, war, and murder. God is absolutely horrified and opposed to all of it. It’s so sad that hundreds of thousands of Russian orphans lost the chance to have a Dad and Mom and be part of a family.
In the spring of this year, Sergi and I had to make another decision of how we would proceed with our pursuit of parenthood and decided to become foster parents.
We spent every Saturday in foster care classes for a month and met some awesome people.
It has been quite an adventure. Many years of saving, planning, learning, signing paperwork, jumping through all sorts of hoops, proving to strangers that we are normal and caring people, who can be trusted with a child.
Seriously, it’s SO much easier to give birth. It must be a breeze – Get pregnant, go through the pregnancy ordeal for only 9 months (9 months ONLY, Wow.) and then give birth and take the baby home, no questions asked. Nobody has to inspect your house, get a referral from your job, check out your networth statement, get fingerprinted to make sure you’re not a criminal, completely invade your privacy, get referral letters from people who can vouch for your character, take parenting classes, etc. You birth parents have it easy! Ha ha!
In all honesty, of course it’s a wonderful thing that the social services in this country is trying their best to make sure that these precious children will go into the right homes, to caring and responsible people. I guess we passed, since we got our license as foster parents:).
Many times, it felt like we would never become parents, with so many obstacles that came up one after another. First I lost my patience, then all my excitement, and finally, even hope began to slowly drain out of me.
Yes, it was such a surreal moment when we finally got “the call”. I wasn’t expecting it at all at this point. Of course, it had to come on the day after I had worked a night shift and had to go back to work for another fun night at the hospital.
It was a wonderful, exhilarating day, full of so many emotions and tons of texting and calling our immediate family members, who were so excited too!
I will never forget that night, when we held him in our arms the first time. We fell in love with him the moment we saw him. This outstanding wave of love swept over me, and I knew I couldn’t have loved him more even if I had given birth to him myself. He has filled our hearts and our home with so much joy and thankfulness.
- Why did we decide to foster instead of adopt?
- Why didn’t we pursue adoption from Belarus, Ukraine, or another country?
- Huh? I’m confused. I saw a picture on FB/IG of two babies. What happened to the second one?
- What is foster care all about?
- Is it possible to love a child who was born to another woman as much as your own biological child?
This post is already way too long, so I had to break it up into more manageable, bite sized sections:). I can be really wordy, especially since I have A LOT to say about this subject!
All these questions and more will be answered tomorrow, so stay tuned.
In the meantime, if you have any other questions, feel free to ask. I WILL delete any questions of comments that I deem to be inappropriate. I don’t mind if you say something negative about my food, but I will not allow anything to be said about orphans or foster care that is even remotely hurtful. I am a mama bear when it comes to this subject, so you’ve been warned:). (I realize that most of you only have the best intentions and are very nice and caring people. Most often, comments can be really hurtful simply because of ignorance, so I don’t hold it against anyone.)
If you have any personal questions, feel free to write to me privately, as a private message on Facebook or to my email – [email protected]. I am very open to discussing any questions you may have about this subject.
Also, as I’ve mentioned before, we cannot legally label a child as a “foster child”, so any comments on social media which mention “foster care” or “foster child” will be deleted. While these children are with us, they are every bit a part of our family and we will treat them exactly how we would treat our own biological children.
Thank you so much to everyone of you who have been so supportive and have shared our joy. We’ve been blown away by such a warm response from many of you. We are absolutely thrilled to welcome this little guy into our family and thank God from the bottom of our hearts for allowing us to experience this incredible and awesome privilege of being parents.
22 Comments
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Marina Degler
Olga, I been following your story and long road to parenthood. A lot happend in your life and just want to show ,that God has plans for all of us. That there is a reason for everything.From the bottom of my heart I wish you all the happiness in the world. Your little boy is so adorable . Raising children it is very challenging . But you wouldn’t change it in the world.
All the best to your family!
Liliya A
So happy for you Olga!!! I just recently discovered you through a friend on facebook. I’ve read what happened to you in the past and am truly sorry. But, it looks like God has blessed you in the most amazing way. I would love to adopt one day as well, I love children. Wishing you all the happiness and may God bless you and family in every step you take and fulfill all your dreams.
Sashaa
Dear Olga, I have read your story before when I first started reading your blog and I have such respect for both of you guys and what you have went through . You deserve every minute of this, enjoy it , I wish nothing but the best to you ! This is such an amazing gift you have received ,God bless you ! Totally made me tear up this morning !
elena
Olga i have been following ur blog and following ur long process of becoming a mama. I am so happy that ur dream has finally come true. Kids r such a blessing. Many blessing to u, ur baby and also the proud daddy. Be blessed
Julia
Olga, I have been following your story for a little while and I was very happy to see pictures of your family expanding!! May God give you and your husband love and wisdom because we all need the help when raising kids 🙂
Olga
You two are incredible people! The world needs more like you! I’m so happy to see that you were able to turn a negative into such a positive. You are giving these children so much through your love and care! God’s biggest blessings for your family!
Darlene
Olga, I just wanted to congratulate you on the arrival of you new baby. God is surely smiling that 2 such wonderful people are taking care of this precious little one. I read a book {My Baby and Child} may years ago by Dr. Penelope Leach and in the forward she gave this piece of advice -Take her book and all the others and throw them under the bed and just do what is right for you and your baby. I found this advice to be invaluable as everyone will try to tell you what is the right thing to do. As you little one grows just remember that it is his job to drive you crazy. I have 2 children ages 18 and 20 and remind myself of this quite often. There is a great song performed by Reba McEntire called “What do you say” – that really puts life’s situations into perspective. Again – congratulation to both you and your husband. I know you will make wonderful parents.
Amy solo
Dear Olga,I really wish our world will have more people like you !!! By reading this blog I can feel so much love in your hearts … Looking at your pictures I can see so much light and joy !!! May God bless you deeply !
Galina O
Yes!!!!!!! That’s exactly the post I wanted to find this morning. You are both pretty amazing!
Zarina
Dear Olga and Sergey,
What only I can say, May God bless you !!!
You’re doing great job for giving to those precious babies love, attention. I think we would do the same thing, if we couldn’t had kids.
Tanya G
Dear Olga,
First of all I want to congratulate you and your husband with the new addition to your family. Kids are a God’s blessing. I myself is a parent to one child but I have a desire to adopt a child as well. I am sure God is working in my husband’s heart as we are currently not on the same page yet.
Where can I read the rest of your blog on “Our Journey to Parenthood” or is this the only article you’ve posted about becoming parents?
Julz
Im very happy that you have been able to become parents!!! And im really hoping that u wud be able to adopt this baby afterwards, everything is in Gods hands and may happen!!! God bless!!!
Oksana
Thank you for updating your blog. Isn’t it wonderful to be holding such precious, helpless, little baby? They bring such busyness into our lives, but more happiness than anything at the same time. I’m glad you and your husband are experiencing parenthood finally. And you still find time to work and keep up the blog, and feed the family besides. Yep, multitasking mommy already :-), there is nothing else more satisfying.
What was your topic on during your speaking seminar for the couples? I love listening to good lectures about family.
olgak7
Hi Oksana,
Our topics at the marriage retreat were One Marriage, Two Personalities and Marriage and Money.
Thanks for your kind words:).
Lena
Yea! Congratulations on your little guy! May he bring you lots of joy and smiles and laughter into your house!
Viktor I.
Congratulations! This a very heart warming story. Looks like it took lots of courage and perseverance to get as far as you have. I am really interested in finding why you chose to go the foster route instead of adoption. It seems like you are taking in this child as one of your own. If I am correctly informed, many foster children end up going back to their biological parents. Do you find yourself putting up psychological barriers/”limiting attachment” in order to protect yourself from such a scenario? The only thing that I can imagine(and I can’t) is loosing one of my children and you already have lost a child. Really just trying to understand the thought process of going from trying to adopt to being foster parent. Are you trying to adopt the child through the foster system? Be Blessed!
Yelena
Olga, you are such an amazing, and strong woman. I am so so happy for both of you! congratulations on you’re new baby boy! My thoughts and prayers go out to you. God bless your growing family and your new precious bundle of joy!
Olena@iFOODreal
WOW! I can just say “wow”. I can’t even imagine what you went through. Wow. You are right, we take it for granted so often… Good for you and congratulations on your little boy! Boys are awesome – loud, messy, crazy awesome creatures!:)
Nadia
Olichka,You guys are amazing! going through all of that and reached the finish line.All I want to say is God bless you and the child.May Gods hand be upon your family!
moms dish
I want another post 🙂 I love following your journey. Love your mama bear comment!
Amanda
You’re the best Olga and always inspire me with your amazing recipes and cheerful and optimistic attitude. Can’t wait for part two. One day I think you should write a book! At least a cookbook 🙂
olgak7
Thank you so much, Amanda. I do love to write, and would love to write books someday.