Home for the Holidays: One Story of Adoption

By Courtney Solstad

Becoming a family took us a few more years than we expected. I always knew I wanted to be a mom and I was excited to think we might be parents before we approached our second anniversary. However, our parenthood journey did not go as planned. Weeks turned to months and months turned to years, and we were still not with child.

We decided to take the big step into fertility treatments and, after a few years, we were finally pregnant with our first child. A few weeks into the pregnancy we would finally get to see the tiny little heart beating on screen. Words can’t describe how that made us feel. But that joy soon turned into heartache as we learned at our first appointment that I would soon miscarry. We were broken, the news was just too painful to bear.

The beginning of something beautiful

Our hopes of parenthood felt so far out of reach, once again. We talked about adoption as an option we would like to explore and started the paperwork and classes. Throughout this process, we decided to give IVF one last try. Much to our surprise, it worked. We were very fearful and walked on egg shells until we saw that tiny heart beating strong! That pregnancy produced a healthy bouncing 8-pound baby girl. Over the next few years, we were lucky enough to have two more healthy baby girls.

Even with three healthy, wonderful girls, the idea of adoption never truly left us. After moving to Texas and my husband settling into a new career, we talked about adoption again. We made the decision to move forward with our plans of adding to our family this way.

We started the paperwork in September of 2015 and the girls could not have been more excited. Adoption, once you have kids, is a lot more paperwork, doctor's appointments, and interviews. The girls knew every step of the journey and were happy to do their part. Once we were approved, my husband and I decided we wouldn’t share information with the girls about being presented to birth moms, etc., as we wanted to protect them from the emotional journey of waiting. Every day they asked if we had received calls or emails from the agency, and we reported back that we didn’t have any news to share.

Christmas miracle

This all changed on a Thursday afternoon in December. I was working away when I received a phone call from a friend about an upcoming PTA event. While on the phone with her, I got another call - it was the adoption agency. I told her I needed to take the call and would call her back (I never called her back!). Our social worker was calling to tell me about a baby that had been born the day before and that we had been chosen for him. I could not soak in the information quick enough. I said, "YES YES YES!" and called my husband but he didn’t answer. I texted him. “911- call me!” Surely this would get him on the phone quickly. Another 5 minutes went by, I finally gave up and texted “We got a baby, it’s a boy! CALL ME!”

We didn’t tell the girls that night, nor the next morning that we were bringing home a baby. In fact, we put them to bed and I ran out to buy everything we needed. After dropping the girls off at school, we went to the hospital and finished up our paperwork. We were then led into the NICU where we fell in love with our tiny little 5-pound baby boy. He was so tiny and so perfect. Because he was born early (less than 37 weeks) and was small, he had to do a car seat study. This meant he would sit in his car seat for an hour and the nurse would watch him to make sure he did not have any issues. While we waited for the hour to pass, I scoured Pinterest, Google, and adoption stories on YouTube. I was searching for an awesome way to tell the girls about their new baby brother, but there was little inspiration. We were about to head home with a new baby brother and we had no idea how to tell our kids.

While a friend collected the girls from school and treated them to a snack, we got settled at home. I was sitting on the couch, holding our new baby boy when the doorbell rang….they were home and had no idea what was about to happen!

My husband jumped up, and suggested we lay him on a blanket near the Christmas tree and let them meet him that way. So that’s what we did!

I waited anxiously as they walked in to see their reactions. Our oldest was in shock! I don’t think she thought we could keep it a secret from her! Our youngest daughter jumped up and down and was so overjoyed and our very compassionate middle girl, cried tears of pure joy! They were all absolutely thrilled and overcome with emotion in their own ways.

It’s hard to believe he turns two this month. Adopting him has changed our worlds, for the better! He cannot wait for his sisters to get home from school each day and they all still run to him in excitement. He truly was the best gift we could have ever received for the holidays.

About Courtney Solstad

Courtney is a blogger from Dallas, TX who has four kiddos. She loves to post about deals, travel, fitness, recipes and more on her blog. Courtney has been blogging since 2008 and loves to talk about her family. When you read her blog, you will feel like you are talking to a friend. She is personal, relatable, and loves to live BIG!

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