Embryo Adoption

Without meaning to, I was a little bit vague and a little bit confusing on my last post.  So to clarify: when I said we would be adopting Tucker as the tiniest of all babies….I was referring to the relatively new embryo adoption. 

And we are so stinkin’ excited we can’t even begin to contain ourselves.

Embryo adoption refers to the adoption of one of 400,000 frozen embryos worldwide, (many) of whom were created during the IVF process and were then frozen indefinitely once their genetic parents felt like their family was complete. 

Adoption of an embryo is a process very similar to that of domestic infant adoption, and yet uniquely tragic in that the actual embryo is viewed as property in the eyes of the law...not a baby.  At its core, legally speaking, embryo adoption is a legal agreement transferring ownership of the embryo from the genetic parents to the adoptive parents, and it carries with it none of the tax credits or incentives that traditional adoption allows.   

To us, this view of life is a tragedy. We believe that life begins at conception, we believe that these waiting lives are precious and worthy and our hearts are incredibly tenderized to them.  To us, these waiting embryos represent a population of innocent, precious lives that have no one to fight for them.  They have no advocates.

Each year, genetic families decide whether or not to keep storing their embryos, and from experience we know that the fee to freeze and store embryos is upwards of $500 a year.  Genetic parents who are done building their families and find themselves with ‘leftover’ embryos have three choices: (1) donate the embryos to science, (2) continue storing their embryos or (3) have their embryos destroyed. Destroying an embryo involves thawing that precious little life….and then letting it die right there on the table.

I can’t stomach it. 

This is where embryo adoption comes in.  There is no cost to the genetic family, and if they choose to donate their embryos to an embryo adoption agency, they suddenly find themselves in a situation very similar to a birth parent in a domestic adoption.  They get to choose the family who will adopt their embryos through a mutual selection process, and they get to specify what kind of adoption plan they want to write; open, closed, or anywhere in between. 

To adoptive parents, embryo adoption is unique in that the mama gets to carry her baby in her womb.   When the baby is born, the adoptive parents are the only names on the birth certificate.  Legally speaking, the genetic parents have no claim to any baby born after the embryos transfer hands.

So what does the process look like for us?

First, we complete a home study.  Our home study is the exact same study that would be completed for a domestic or international adoption, with the same costs.  After we have a completed home study, we will create a family profile to be shown to genetic families.  From there, it’s a mutual selection process.  Genetic families will be shown our profile, and if they choose us, their family/embryo profile will be sent to us.  In essence, we’ll choose each other.  Once a match has been made, the legal paperwork is completed regarding the adoption of the embryos, and we make arrangement to have them shipped to our fertility clinic OR we can travel to them.  It takes about two months to prep my body for a frozen embryo transfer, and a day for the FET to take place.  All in all, it’s a 5-13 month process to transfer day, and then….9 months to deliver a baby. 

Like I said, our heart are incredibly tender to embryo adoption.  In fact, the agency we are adopting through is the same agency we had planned to use should anything have happened to me/us and I hadn’t been able to go back for all of our own babies.   We had a plan in place for their safety through adoption, and now we find ourselves on the other side of the table. 

The obvious fear with embryo adoptions is that the embryos wouldn’t attach.  That the FET wouldn’t be successful, and we’d walk away at the end of the process with empty arms.  We aren’t naïve to that risk; we’ve been there before.  But God has so clearly and swiftly set our feet upon this path, and we are eager to walk each step with Him as He leads us to baby Tucker.  We are believing in expectation that God will be faithful each step of the way.   

I've long believed that one way God ministers to me in my own life is through music.  Truly.  In some of the biggest valleys of my life, God has spoken to and delivered hope and reassurance to my soul through song.  There are a handful of songs that bring me to tears in an instant; because they remind me of times that God clearly used them to speak to me.  The day after we found out we'd lost the twins, I was driving in my car as the song "Fix My Eyes" came on the radio.  I'm sure I must have heard it dozens of times before, but that day I really listened to the words, and this is what I heard: 
Hit rewind, click delete
Stand face to face with the younger me
All of the mistakes
All of the heartbreak
Here's what I'd do differently, I'd

Love like I'm not scared
Give when it's not fair
Live life for another
Take time for a brother
Fight for the weak ones
Speak out for freedom
Find faith in the battle
Stand tall but above it all
Fix my eyes on You
On You

I learned the lines and talked the talk
But the road less traveled is hard to walk
It takes a soldier
Who knows his orders
To walk the walk I'm supposed to walk

We're on it, Lord.  We're fixing our eyes on You.  This road is hard, and we're afraid of all the what ifs.....but Tucker?  So worth it.  

 

A New Beginning

Dear Tuck,

Hi baby, it’s your mommy.  You and I don’t know each other yet, but your face is already so alive in my heart, and my arms are already aching to squeeze you tight in a giant bear hug.   Someday I hope you’ll read these words and know that you have been loved in every moment.  I hope you’ll know that you were always wanted, and that you were prayed for by name with conviction and passion for years before your birth.  Buddy, your story is being written as I write this.

Your big brother Blake and big sister Lainey talk about you all the time.  Blake prays for you every single night, and we ask God to protect you wherever you are.    Blake says your name in his most precious 3-year-old toddler speak, and it comes out sounding more like “Tuckwer”.  It was daddy who came up with your name.  It was when I was pregnant with your sister, and we had taken a late family walk with your big brother in the stroller.  Daddy and I were dreaming and talking about future names for our babies….and daddy, with a glimmer in his eye and a grin on his face, blurted out the name Tucker.  It was completely out of the blue.  But when I heard it pass through his lips, it was almost like the name lingered there in the still breeze of that warm summer night.  Tucker.  I knew it right away.   You, my precious one, were meant to be part of our family. 

We didn’t know then what path would lead us to you.   God has given all three of you such unique stories;  such God-breathed, beautifully written masterpieces crafted by the Creator of the Universe.    I know that God has something great in store for our littlest Breitenstein; that the plan for your life will be as masterfully written as every delicious detail and plot-twist He’s written for our family through every season of life.  Tuck, know that we’ve been searching for you.  And for a little while, we thought we’d found you.  But before that path led us to you, our precious babies were born into Heaven’s gates.   We grieved that loss completely and intimately, but daddy and I also realized right away that our loss was really just a reminder that we hadn’t found you yet.  Those little loves are your siblings, and someday we’ll all reunite on golden street with incredible shouts of joy….but God’s plan for their lives was never on Earth.  We know that.  As much as we wanted and loved them….they weren’t you.  

And we’ve been waiting for you.

When God laid your name on our hearts, it was almost like he carved a Tucker-sized hole that was literally waiting for your life to fill it—to come and make our family whole.   When we lost our last pregnancy, we prayed.  We cried.  We asked God to open the door that would lead us to you.  And Tuck, he did.   God showed up in that moment and ever so tenderly righted our feet, dusted off our shoulders, and opened the door that we know will lead us to you.

And so now we walk.  Sweet love, we’re coming for you.   Today we were assigned our caseworker, who will walk us through the early steps of your adoption.   We are adopting you as the tiniest of all babies, choosing you and carrying you in the same way I carried your brother and sister.  My love, we are ecstatic to begin walking this road to you, and yet….we’re scared, too.  We’re scared that we might walk through this process and still not find you; that we’ll come home with empty arms.   It’s a terrifying thought because we want you so desperately.  

But Tucker, daddy and I have chosen courage.  Courage to go where led and to fight for you.   We know you’re worth it.  We know God has set our feet on this path and we will walk it for Him, and we will walk it to you.   

Sometimes faith means trusting that God’s view squashes our Polaroid.  Sometimes it means boldly walking where others might not choose to go, and always it means rejecting our humanity and choosing to yield control to the One who so intimately holds us in His hands.  Tuck, sometimes faith means jumping when you can’t clearly see the landing spot.   It's a little bit terrifying, but oh what a view on the way down…and what a reward when you find yourself standing with two feet planted squarely on the mountaintop.   I think that’s what it truly means to put feet to your faith.      

So Tuck?  We’re jumping.   

Just a few hours ago, I got hopelessly lost while trying to pick up a pair of pants for your brother from someone's front porch, and as I pulled u-turns in driveways and drove up and down the same street over and over, peering at addresses and clearly searching for something very specific....Blake piped up from the backseat "What are we doing, mommy??  Are we looking for Tucker?  Is he coming home today??"

Do you see?  It's you.  We all know it.    And we won't stop until we find you.