Update on Embryo Adoption!

Well folks, it's been another tough year, and again, it's been awhile since we've posted. Yes, we are still moving forward with embryo adoption - we still have not moved into the matching phase yet. It's been a LONG road...it's been tough to not get discouraged and distracted, to stay motivated and keep moving forward, but we are still longing to build our family!!

Now is the time for us to be strong and remember the foundation God has been laying for us! Andrea recently watched a Steven Furtick sermon, and the Lord's message in that sermon breathed new life into our journey! It's so important to remember and celebrate what God has already done for us, all He's helped us accomplish, rather than be discouraged that we've not arrived at the destination yet. It's so hard to be patient!! 

So, let's celebrate how far we've come! Here are our achievements so far on our embryo adoption journey:

• Jan-Mar 2021: Completed our Home Study Update for private infant adoption, which we can also use for our embryo adoption (required by Snowflakes - will need to do again in Mar’22)
• Apr 28, 2021: Andrea’s 1st call with Dawn Canny from Snowflakes Embryo Adoption Program
• May 11, 2021: Our orientation phone call with Dawn
• May 18, 2021: Andrea received approval from her primary care doctor to proceed with pregnancy
• May 18, 2021: Decided on FCI (Fertility Centers of IL near Chicago) for the frozen embryo transfer based on extensive research of Snowflakes' preferred fertility clinics
• May 25, 2021: Our consultation call with Dr Jenny Hirschfeld-Cryton at FCI 
• May 26, 2021: Our call with Dawn to discuss questions and confirm our adoption preferences 
• Jun 13, 2021: Gathered all required documents, completed the application, and paid the $500 down payment
• Jun 14, 2021: Transferred the remainder of Andrea's severance pay to our adoption savings fund, which will fully fund our embryo adoption! It's going to be about $10-20K cheaper than private infant adoption - depending on how many frozen transfer cycles we will need.
• Jun 24, 2021: Updated our family Adoption Profile for embryo adoption, which the embryo donors will use to decide if they want us to adopt their embryos, similar to private infant adoption
• Jul 12, 2021: Decided on how to complete the required CPR and First Aid training and started reviewing materials
• Jul 21, 2021: Andrea completed the required webinars and summaries of lessons learned about embryo adoption
• Sep 7, 2021: Andrea had her mammogram and follow-up ultrasound - all is well!
• Sep 9, 2021: Andrea met with her OBGYN who will do the ultrasound monitoring prior to the frozen embryo transfer and got a baseline ultrasound and blood tests
• Oct 12, 2021: Andrea left her stressful job she started in January and started a job at a new company with a MUCH better work-life balance! The things she learned in all of her previous experiences will help her be successful in her new job, so it all worked out!
• Nov 1-15: We had our first round of Covid! We've been fortunate to not get infected until now, and Scott's symptoms were mild, and everyone else in our household avoided infection, so we got pretty lucky!! However, isolation/quarantine is HARD!!
• Nov 15, 2021: Updated Adoption Profile for Embryo Adoption - life changes a lot in 5 months! Had to add a picture of Andrea's stepdaughter's new baby boy that was born in October! We think the idea of raising our babies together is so fun and unique!

To-Do’s:

• Pre-Matching Phase:
• Scott to complete webinars and summaries
• Andrea to complete CPR and First Aid training and certification
• Scott to re-certify in CPR and First Aid
• Scott to complete blood tests required
• Andrea to complete more blood tests and procedures required
• Matching Phase (average time = 2-4 months): Snowflakes will match up our preferences with preferences of donating families and reach out to both families seeking agreement on a match
• Contract Phase (average time = 1-2 months): signing of contracts
• Shipping Phase (average time = 1-2 months): shipping of embryos to our fertility clinic
• Frozen Embryo Transfer Phase (1st cycle = 1-2 months; more cycles??)

FAQ's:

• Q: What are frozen embryos?
• A: Extra fertilized eggs that are frozen and stored at a medical facility for use in future IVF (in vitro fertilization) cycles
• Q: What is embryo adoption? 
• A: Embryo adoption is where we would adopt the frozen embryos from a couple who had extra frozen embryos from their IVF treatments and are done building their family (they may already have 1 or more children conceived through IVF). My local OBGYN will work with the fertility clinic Dr to prescribe me fertility medications and monitor my body's readiness for the transfer through ultrasounds. The fertility clinic Dr would then thaw and transfer 1-2 embryos to my body (just like a frozen IVF cycle) and I would hopefully grow at least one baby and give birth to our adopted child(ren). It's similar to surrogacy, only I would keep the baby I would give birth to. 
• Q: How many embryos will we adopt?
• A: We will transfer 1-2 embryos per cycle, depending on the quality of the embryos. We may need multiple cycles to have a successful cycle (a pregnancy). Not all embryos survive the thawing process, and not all embryos will implant. We hope to give birth to 1-2 children, depending on how everything goes. We would adopt all of the remaining embryos of a donating family, so we would be matched with a family that has 3-5 frozen embryos, giving us the best chance of conceiving 1-2 children. There are more options if things don't go according to plan, but let's hope for the best!
• Q: Why embryo adoption?
• A: The adoption would be final the minute we receive the embryos. The frozen embryos would be given a chance at life, since their biological parents are no longer able to, due to a variety of reasons: financial limitations, medical risks, etc. Andrea could experience the joys (and challenges!) of pregnancy: baby's kicks, breastfeeding, etc. We would both get to be present at every sonogram and ultrasound, in the delivery room, and the baby would be a part of our family immediately. Our names would be on the birth certificate as mother and father. We would also be able to control the prenatal environment - take all the vitamins, eat all the healthy food (and drinks), attend all the doctor's appointments, etc. Andrea would also receive 6 weeks of paid short term disability maternity leave - with private infant adoption, maternity leave is not a medical disability, so she would receive time off through FMLA, but it would not be paid - which we cannot afford. With the help of the Snowflakes organization, we would also be able to know the identity and medical history of both of the donating parents and have an opportunity for a semi-open adoption relationship. We would begin by sharing pictures and updates, with the possibility of in-person visits at some point if everyone feels comfortable. The spectrum of openness is just one of the adoption preferences mentioned above, as is race, medical history, etc.
• Q: What is Snowflakes?
• A: They are a division of a Christian adoption agency that facilitates embryo adoptions. Here is their website: https://nightlight.org/snowflakes-embryo-adoption-donation/embryo-adoption/

Please let us know what questions you have! Nearly everyone we talk to has never heard of embryo adoption, and we are learning a ton! Isn't it such a miracle that this is even possible!? We think so. :)

Love,

Scott & Andrea

Still Moving Forward... With Big Changes!!

Wow, what a crazy and hard year 2020 was for everyone!! The pandemic has thrown us some curve balls, like everyone else. But yet, God has sustained us. 

It has been awhile since we posted! Let me catch you up:

1. Our private infant adoption home study was approved in Jan20 and we immediately started planning our Trivia Night fundraiser, due to the extensive costs. When Covid-19 hit hard in the US in Mar'20, our Trivia Night planning came to a screeching halt - the pandemic just felt like a bad time to try to do fundraising, with so many hurting financially and physically, so we searched for other means of funding our adoption.

Thankfully, we were both able to work from home, and our church was able to have online services, and our family stayed healthy, so the impact of Covid on us was not as significant as others. We are so grateful for that. ❤️

2. We were able to refinance our house in Feb'20 for a lower payment and cash in hand, which enabled us to afford to hire our Christian Adoption Consultant, Dawn Wright in Apr'20! She has been awesome to work with! She emailed us several birth mom situations to consider. 

3. We were not approved for any of the grants we applied for, but we did find an adoption loan that we could afford to help us to fund our adoption without fundraising! 

4. Our oldest boy moved home from college in Mar'19 due to Covid-19 and struggled with severe anxiety, so we spent quite a bit of time supporting him through that. Thankfully, he's doing better, slowly but surely. 

5. The death of George Floyd and the resulting social unrest in our country really opened our eyes to the horrible treatment that our black friends are STILL experiencing after all these years. It's sad that it took all of that for us to have difficult conversations with our friends, read books and articles about white privilege, follow black authors and speakers on social media, listen to heart-breaking stories of racism still happening (whether we see it or not), and learn how to truly love our black friends and community. We also considered whether it's responsible for a white couple to be open to adopting children of other races with all the social unrest. After much consideration and prayer, we came back to our original belief that God knows which child is best for our family so we will continue to leave it in His very capable hands (as well as the birth family's). The good thing that came of this time of reflection is that we are now much more aware of the challenges that we could face, are more prepared, and more certain that our diverse church community, friends and family would be there to support us. We have some awesome people in our lives. ❤️

6. Scott got a new job as the supervisor in his department, which meant a lot more hours and stress, but also a bit more income, which will help with paying for our adoption! This also meant I needed to do more around the house to support him, including yard work, meals, and helping with our boys. 

7. We had a HUGE oak tree blown over by a storm in our back yard which took us, our neighbors, and neighbors' friends months to clean up! It destroyed our fire pit we worked so hard to create, and tore up part of our shed, but it didn't damage anything inside the shed or our house! And no one got hurt! Could've been much worse! We finally got the fire pit put back together in time for fall bonfires. We had lots of fire wood to burn 😊 

8. In Sep'20, Andrea decided to take a voluntary separation from a company she worked at for over 19 years due to massive reorganization company-wide. She spent months soul searching and debating this life changing decision, working with recruiters to fine tune her resume and search for a job in the difficult pandemic job market. 4 months later and after 5 interviews, she finally got a great job and started in Jan'21 She became extremely busy getting up to speed, but was grateful to be employed. 

10. Our oldest fur baby Finley passed away pretty quickly in September, which was heart-breaking! He was such a sweet boy. He soaked up lots of Andrea's tears about infertility over the years. He passed peacefully in his sleep with his mama laying by his side. She's so grateful she got to spend lots of time with him during his last couple of weeks. 

8. Our awesome next door neighbors moved to Texas! We were so sad to say goodbye but happy that they were able to move closer to family. They gave us a new free standing porch swing for our fire pit and we gained some awesome new neighbors and their dog Lulu who is our youngest fur baby Bonnie's new BFF! God works everything out for good. 

11. We used some of Andrea's severance pay to buy a new camper! We bought our truck 3 years ago to haul a camper and were so excited we could finally afford to buy a camper so we can camp comfortably with a little one someday. We also planned to use it to travel wherever we adopt our child, so we figured it would save us on travel expenses.

12. Andrea decided to start selling Pampered Chef products in Nov'20 so she could get discounts on all the things (budget-permitting) on her wish list and have fun socializing and meeting new people. Covid has been really hard on her since she loves to connect with people, so this is a fun outlet for her. 

13. We had to get our home study updated since it expired in Jan'21, and finally got it completed in Mar'21.

14. We finally submitted our applications to 2 of the agencies our consultant recommended for us in Mar'21! What a paper intensive and personally invasive process that is! They now know more about us than most of our family and friends do, haha! 

15. In May'21, after 2 years of trying to get our ducks in a row to adopt and receiving countless birth mom situations to review that didn't suit our preferences, and no movement from the agencies we applied to, we were starting to give up hope, when out of nowhere, the Lord popped an idea in Andrea's head: what about embryo adoption? We could control the prenatal environment and we wouldn't have to worry about tracking down the birth father for approval of adoption plans or birth mom changing her mind at the last minute. The more we looked into it, the more benefits we saw, and we realized that this may be the best way forward for us. We are so excited!! 

In a nutshell, embryo adoption is where we would adopt the frozen embryos, which are fertilized eggs, from a family who had leftover frozen embryos from their IVF (in vitro fertilization) treatments and are done building their family. We would then transfer the embryos to my body and I would hopefully grow the baby and give birth to our adopted child! There's so much more to this but this post is getting too long!! 

Stay tuned for our next post on embryo adoption!!