Redeemed - My First Mother's Day

On the heels of Mother’s Day, my husband and I celebrated 11 years of marriage. It’s amazing to think that with each year of marriage it sounds like just another year. However, I wouldn’t describe our last year as “just another year.” In fact, when I look at each year of our marriage, I can look back and say to God “Oh, I see what you were doing there.” We have loved hard and we’ve lost hard. Some years we felt like we would barely make it through and felt like we were crawling across the finish line of our anniversary. However, each year we grew stronger in our partnership.

This year God turned our mourning into dancing as we adopted our adorable little Zoe! For the last four years we have miscarried within the first few months of the year. However, this year was different. We experienced that our God is a redeemer! On February 18, 2010 we had our first miscarriage at 10 weeks along. We took it hard. On February 18, 2014 we had our match meeting with Zoe’s birth mother. He didn’t just redeem our heartache, He redeemed it to the day.

On our way to the hospital to meet our daughter! 

People would ask why we waited so long to have children. Eventually, they stopped asking when we were going to have kids and started asking IF we were going to have kids. We would explain we wanted God’s best. We didn’t move forward with adoption until both my husband and I clearly heard from God.

Since becoming a mom, the main question I get is “How’s motherhood treating you?” Honestly, I have no idea how to answer this question. It’s so amazing and yet so humbling. No matter how I earned the title “mom,” God has entrusted me to raise this child. Those years of waiting allowed me time to humble myself and prepare my heart for this thing called motherhood.  

We are so thankful to have experienced the process of becoming parents with God on our side. We know beyond a shadow of a doubt that He made our match. He orchestrated the timing. He was working behind the scenes even when we couldn’t “feel” Him.

Before we had placement, I had a nagging thought in the back of my head. I always wondered what made me think I could be a mom. If I entertained it too long, it would roll into all the ways I could mess it up. After placement, I realized I couldn’t mess it up. God made our match and He wired me to specifically care for Zoe. Once I came to this realization, the nagging ceased and joy filled its place. I soak in each moment and I try not to forget to thank God each day.

Picture by Ginny Filer Photography

This was my first Mother’s Day and I got to stand for recognition in church. It was the most beautiful thing. As I stood, I felt like I was giving testimony to what God had done in our lives. I felt like by standing I was representing God’s faithfulness and redemption. I am honored that God could use someone like me and that He trusts me so much to be a mom. Not just any mom, but Zoe’s mom.