Adoption fills nest of hearts: Clarksville families share pain of waiting and ups and downs of finding a child
By STACY SMITH SEGOVIA
The Leaf-Chronicle
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They bring you the depths of heartache and the heights of joy, so parents say of their children; of a love that cannot be equaled.
Adoptive parents face those highs and lows before they have children. Not knowing if you will be able to have a child when you desperately want a child is a different kind of dread.
Once a decision is made to pursue adoption, parent hopefuls begin a second series of highs and lows.
Elisabeth Klein knew she would have a harder time than most in conceiving a child because she has polycystic ovarian syndrome. Women who have PCOS suffer a variety of symptoms stemming from a malfunction of the ovaries. Some treatments are available to encourage normal ovulation, and Elisabeth tried them all with no success.
Fertility treatments can be uncomfortable, invasive and expensive, a cost not normally covered by insurance. In December 2001, Elisabeth had laparoscopic surgery in an attempt to repair her ovaries, but it didn't work. The doctor told Elisabeth and her husband, Marc Klein, if they wanted to be parents they should look into adoption.
"It is a very horrible thing to have to accept this," Elisabeth said. "It sounds melodramatic to say it, but you go through a period of mourning, almost as if someone has died."
Elisabeth also feels guilt, as if she has cheated Marc out of the opportunity to have biological children. She did a lot of research on adoption methods and was appalled by the numbers of adolescent girls in Tennessee who are having babies and keeping them.
For Lisa Martin, Mother's Day was the worst. Her church has a special ceremony for mothers each year.
"For eight years, I was brokenhearted I didn't get a rose, I wasn't recognized, and there's nothing I wanted more than to be a mother," she said.
By the time people accept that having biological children is unlikely, they have often hoped and tried for a child for many years. Options are confusing, and adoption information isn't compiled in one place, Elisabeth said.
When the adoption process proves lengthy and prone to disappointments, people feel distraught. Andy McClain and his wife, LaDonna, became victims of someone who took advantage of their emotions.
"Not everyone has good intentions," Andy said. "When the doctor tells you you will not have children, you get desperate."
The McClains were approached by a woman who said her 16-year-old daughter was pregnant and wanted to give the baby up for adoption. The couple was ecstatic. They put in a nursery and welcomed this woman and her daughter into their lives, even so far as welcoming them to family events.
"Then, we found out it was twins," Andy said. "We went out and bought more nursery stuff, bought a second bed."
As the due date approached and the McClains began legal work to adopt the children, the story fell apart. The phone number on the lawyer's letterhead rang at the woman's house. The McClains were stunned to learn that not only was the girl not expecting twins, she wasn't pregnant at all. Her mother had forged legal documents and fabricated the pregnancy.
"People need to know that there are individuals out there who will do this," Andy said. "We gave up hope. You tell yourself 'I'll never try this again.'"
Many parents who successfully adopt an infant have an "almost" baby story.
Last year, the Kleins had a visit from a woman and her 3-month-old nephew, a child they thought they were going to adopt. The next weekend, they were supposed to keep the baby as a trial run of sorts. The aunt said the baby was sick, postponed the visit, and then just stopped talking to the Kleins. She offered no explanation and did not return phone calls. They never saw the baby nor heard from the woman again.
"I don't think I've personally ever felt this weird or horrible in my life," Elisabeth said. "We don't know what to do with ourselves. You wait for so long, and then your dream is just within grasping distance and someone snatches it away from you."
The Rays are a success story, with daughters Cheyenne, 7, and Katie, 3, and a son, Cameron, 2. The children were adopted through the state. But the Rays' first experience with a potential adoption did not end the way they had hoped.
"Like a lot of people, we spent a lot of years on the biological aspects, so by the time we got to the adoption aspect, we really felt like time was marching on," Melissa Ray said.
Through a private attorney, the Rays found a woman who was expecting twins.
"Time just moves in slow motion when you're hoping something is going to turn out," Melissa said.
It didn't turn out, so the couple applied to be foster parents.
"We went into foster care with the hope and intent of adopting," Melissa said.
Soon, a 6-month-old baby girl was placed with the Rays.
"We thought this is the one, this is meant to be," Melissa said.
Two weeks later, they got a call. The state said the Rays had to return the baby immediately.
"We were devastated," Melissa said. "We had just gotten her in daycare. We were worried about where she was going. Being foster parents, that's kind of what you sign up for."
Lisa and Bradley Martin, proud parents of Annalise, who turns 3 on Friday, did not go through the adoption process unscathed, either.
"Bradley and I had tried to have a baby for probably about eight years," Lisa said. "We had done every possible fertility treatment with the exception of in vitro fertilization."
Lisa discussed adoption with Bradley, but he was against the idea. The day Lisa was supposed to begin the process for in vitro fertilization, a procedure she did not feel good about, she got a strange phone call.
When asked by her pastor, Lisa had reluctantly spoken to the congregation at her church, Sango United Methodist, about the struggles of infertility. A man in the crowd knew the Martins wanted to adopt. His stepdaughter was pregnant and looking for an adoptive family. At his recommendation, the woman called the Martins. She asked if they wanted to adopt her baby.
Although Bradley was initially reluctant, after getting more information from the adoption agency handling the case, Miriam's Promise, he agreed to pursue the adoption. The Martins had five months to wait before their daughter was due.
"There's such a fear that the mother will change her mind; that the birth father will object," Lisa said.
They kept in touch with the birth mother over the course of her pregnancy. When she found out her labor would be induced on May 23, 2000, she invited the Martins. When the baby was born, the woman said, "Look what I made for you!" Lisa remembers. It was an odd and beautiful thing for the woman to say, but it didn't mean there were no conflicting emotions involved.
"It was the most difficult thing I have ever done to take Annalise from her birth mother," Lisa said.
The Martins took Annalise home the day after she was born. Three months later, they invited the birth mother to Annalise's baptism. The visit was awkward, but fine, Lisa said.
The next day, the birth mother called. She said she had made a mistake. She said she wanted Annalise back, and would do anything to make that happen, Lisa remembers. Fortunately, it didn't take the birth mother long to realize she really did want the Martins to raise Annalise.
"She apologized," Lisa said. "She said 'I was very emotional with post partum depression.'"
Things were worse for the woman than for most new mothers, Lisa said, because she didn't have the demands of a new baby to distract her from the weight of her depression. Three years later, Lisa sends pictures of Annalise to her birth mother and father, maintaining cordial relationships with both.
"It is uncomfortable at times, but I keep that relationship not for Bradley and I, but for Annalise," Lisa said.
It barely took three seconds of holding his daughter for Bradley Martin's reservations about adoption to disappear.
"He's the best daddy I could have ever dreamed of for her," Lisa said. "He's so protective of her and wants everything to be so perfect for her."
Lisa's Mother's Day are very different now.
"I get Mother's Day cards from the woman every year," Lisa said. "This year, she wrote, 'I could not have chosen a better mother for your child,' and that meant a lot to me."
Andy and LaDonna have hope that an adoption will work out for them. Marc and Elisabeth have placed ads in newspapers and are working with an agency, Caring Choices, in hopes of adopting a baby.
"A little boy sure would be cool to run around with," said Marc, who coaches a softball team, the Diamondbacks, for Woodlawn Little League.
Lisa hopes her family's story will hearten people to hang in there through the ups and downs of the adoption process.
"There are risks no matter how a child comes into your life," she said. "This has been the most wonderful thing that has ever happened in our lives. If I can share some of that as an encouragement for someone going through this, I want to do that."
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Writer Stacy Smith Segovia can be reached by phone at 245-0237 or by e-mail at stacy
segovia@theleafchronicle.com
Source:
http://www.theleafchronicle.com/news...ws/337741.html
Originally published Wednesday, May 21, 2003
Article: Adoption fills nest of hearts [re: one family with PCOS] 
