With the exception of a move from New Jersey to Tennessee in my first trimester and assuming the role of houseparents to 8 girls ages 6 to 16 in a Christian group home called Bethel Bible Village, my pregnancy was fairly uneventful. The 6 year old in our cottage was a little African-American girl named Christina Graham. About a month after we started at Bethel, Christina went back home to live with her mom. We stayed in touch because I had really connected with her when we traveled to Tennessee to interview for the position. In late October 2003, it became clear that Christina's mom was not taking care of Christina. Almost simultaneously, our miracle baby, Elizabeth, was born on November 3, 2003. She was perfect in every way and had a head full of red hair just like me. About a week after my delivery, Christina returned to Bethel Bible Village because the risk of her being put into state's custody was very high due to her mom's risky lifestyle and negligence. As Elizabeth grew, we continued to connect with Christina on a deeper level. Each month, if the girls in the cottage had a viable home option off campus, they went there for the weekend. Christina did not, so on "weekends off," Christina stayed in the cottage with our little family. These weekends afforded us the luxury of connecting with her on a whole different level without 7 other girls vying for our attention. We were able to do more intimate family-type activities and she stayed with us on major holidays as well. Within a few years, Christina came onto the state's radar as a child being "abandoned by neglect" since her mother was not doing much to restore custody. In order to prevent the state of Tennessee from taking her into their custody, her mom granted temporary custody to Bethel Bible Village. In the spring of 2005, Jim and I decided to leave our position at Bethel and focus on our little family. We were in the process of completing foster parent training so that we could get custody of Christina. That fall, Christina's mom signed her over to our custody and we took her with us out of Bethel Bible Village, which had been her home off and on since 2001. This eventually led to Christina's adoption in July of 2007. We went from being able to have no babies to doubling our family in a matter of 5 years.
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Elizabeth's Birth Day - November 3, 2003
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As busy as we were at this point in our lives, the pregnancy and subsequent breastfeeding had knocked back my abdominal pain substantially. With the exception of severe menstrual cycles, I didn't have too many days of being bed-ridden with pain. That all began to change in 2005...about 2 years after Elizabeth was born.
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