Our Story

Where do we begin .... Nearly fourteen years ago Drew and I met while working at the same place in Tennessee. Go Vols!! We instantly became friends and became each others confidante during the months ahead. We grew as friends and had the best time together. Eventually we became more than friends and our relationship evolved into something special. Our relationship progressed fairly quickly and on September 4, 1998 we became husband and wife. One of the best days of my life.

Six years later after two moves that took us from Tennessee to Florida and finally to Raleigh, North Carolina. We began to look at growing our family. We talked about what that looked like for us and we really had a desire to adopt. We began the preliminary steps and looked at the country of Guatemala. It was not long before we realized God had other plans for our life and we found out we were pregnant with out first son. Needless to say our plans for adoption were put on the back burner.

Lucas joined our family five weeks early on June 7, 2004. Words cannot express the love we had for him. He was a great baby and grew so fast. It was not long before Drew began to express the idea of a second child. He wanted them close in age so they could grow up and have a strong bond. Having been the middle child between two boys who were roughly six years apart on both sides I agreed. We began the steps to getting pregnant again. We got pregnant right away and we were happy. God had other plans for this baby and took the baby home to heaven. We were so sad and I questioned everything I did that could have allowed this to happen. I realize now that nothing I did caused this. We grieved together and moved forward day by day. When the time came that we could try again we did only to have that baby taken too. Let's say we were devastated.I questioned everything.Why would God do this to us? It was one of the most difficult periods in my life. We took each day as it came and slowly moved forward. Having Lucas certainly allowed us to not wallow in our despair. How could we when God had given us one child to love and treasure. There were so many who had no children.

We decided to take a camping trip for Mother's day weekend. We told ourselves this will be fun, Lucas will enjoy it, we need the time away. I was miserable the whole time. On our last night Drew and I were sitting by the fire and he said do you think you could be pregnant? I said of course not. The next day at home I decided to take a test because I had one at home and what would it hurt. Let's just say that surprised was a under statement at what I saw on that stick. I was pregnant!!  How could this be we had not even gotten over what we had just been through and we were not trying due to the time lapse from our last miscarriage. The doctors think maybe I was initially pregnant with twins and lost one. Who knows really other than God. I was so nervous I didn't want to do anything that could hurt my baby. This pregnancy was considered high risk because of my history and I saw the doctor very frequently. I would go to have shots weekly to hopefully keep me from going into early labor and allowing me to carry the baby to full term. I ended up going in to labor 8 weeks early and had Owen on November 28, 2006. He was tiny at 5 1/2 pounds but so was Lucas at five weeks early. Owen did go straight to the NICU and had to stay for a little over a week. Not long for an 8 week preemie. God is good all the time, every time. We were told to try and have more children would be dangerous for the baby given my history and the doctors recommend we be done. Who was I to argue. I had two handsome and for the most part healthy boys. I was content. Drew took care of making sure their would be no more biological Douglass children and I was enjoying life as a family of four. We had so much to be thankful for.

Fast forward to a year later and I was in a groove with this mommy stuff. I had two boys who slept through the night.I could actually take a shower, go to work, take care of my family, have meaningful conversations with those around me. I began to feel God speaking to me .....


Mission Bound

God began to move in my life and stir my heart in a way he never had before. I was doing what I considered my calling in life by teaching little ones in my job.It has always been important to me to help lay a strong foundation for young children as I had the pleasure of a few important people doing the same for me. If not for those people in my life it might look considerably different today.

Looking back I can see the path the Lord was laying for me. I went on my first mission trip with a group from our church to Helena, Arkansas. We would be working with Together for Hope which worked to change poverty in the top 20 most impoverished counties in the United States. My role would be to set up and run a preschool camp. I knew I could do this and do it well. What I was not sure of was could I make a difference in the lives of the children I came in to contact with. I prayed the Lord would use me as he desired. I believe my life changed for the better that week and I left stronger in my faith having seen God's love on a more personal level. Did I make a difference that week, yes I think I did. I built friendships that continue today. I gave hugs to children who needed them. I fed hungry children, we laughed, we played, but most importantly I told them they were loved and special, that there was a plan for the life and Jesus would never leave them. That week turned into a six year commitment on my part and one that allowed me to see my oldest child become a part of. What a mighty God we serve!

I really enjoyed doing missions work and  showing God's love to his children. When the opportunity came to take a mission trip to Haiti in 2011 with Convoy of Hope I jumped at the chance. I had such a peace about the whole trip and knew God's desire was for me to be there. Everyone would say to me, "your going to Haiti, why? It's dangerous there, you could be killed." One of those people was my husband who objected rather loudly that he was not comfortable with this. I listened and respected his views but knew God was calling me there. I asked him to pray and open his heart to God's call for me and not his own. Needless to say in June, 2011 I went to Haiti.

I prepared myself for what I thought I would see. I had seen the news of the destruction and death that was a daily part of life in Haiti. Nothing could have prepared me for what I saw. It was devastating; it looked as if the earthquake had recently happened. The trash and debris was everywhere. I looked into the eyes of people who seemed lost to life. I held babies that were naked, no clothes to be had for them. Drinking and bathing with water that could kill them. What choice did they have. I wanted to bring them all home with me. It broke my heart and I still have a difficult time expressing fully what I saw. I went with the understanding that God would use me to change the lives of the children I met. Well, the children changed me. I left a part of myself there and will forever hold Haiti as a special part of my journey in this life.

I came back different! My world as I knew had been rocked to the core. I felt so ashamed of the way I was living. I loved the Lord with all my heart, I loved my family, I took good care of my kids. It would seem to the outside world that I had it all together. I was so self-absorbed and didn't even realize it. I had been putting my needs above others and God showed me the error of my ways real quick. He was preparing me and my family for the next chapter of our lives.

God Speaks

While in Haiti my role was to educate those the Lord put before us. We taught them how use water filtration systems that we brought with us and donated to the orphanages we visited. We had the privilege to bath and dress the children with clean water and clothes. We also played, sang and danced. Most importantly I got to love and pray over them. They would cling to us and want to be touched and held. I loved holding them and for a short period of time assuring them that they were important, created in his Image.

It was on this trip that God began to speak in my heart about his children, those that had no family. Those that slept on dirt floors with little or no clothes. Those that were hungry, sick, and alone. I began to see my role in his plan. My eyes had been opened to adoption prior to Lucas being born. Was this the plan the Lord had all along? I knew I could make a difference for a child. I began to pray about God's plan for our family . Was he calling us to help in this way? I came home from my trip and very quickly laid my heart out to my husband about what I felt God was speaking to me about. I told Drew that I felt the Lord saying take care of my little ones and I will take care of the rest. It was a shock to me to hear my husband say no. He wanted no part in hearing about this. We were settled he said. We have to think about our boys, our marriage, our finances and the difficulties that we could and probably would face during an adoption. This is not what I wanted to here. Now I would like to tell you that I was understanding and showed love to my husband, but that would just be another sin to add to my growing list of how I behaved after hearing his words. I was so upset. I felt he was being selfish considering he would not even really discuss it properly. I began to pray that God would change his heart if it was truly his plan for us to bring another child into our home through adoption. Those that know me know patience is not a virtue I have. I know better than to pray for it though.

Skip forward to November, 2011 and I am still praying the Lord's will for our life and the life of the child I feel is out there waiting to come home to us. I ask my husband to sit down with me to talk about what is now laying heavy on my heart. He agrees and we put our children to bed and sit down at our kitchen table. I am so nervous and I pray that the Lord will use my words to honor him and I begin to lay my heart out like I have never done before. I tell Drew what I feel the Lord calling us too and that I understand his reservations but that he is not allowing God to move in our lives. He is putting restrictions on God. He is saying no God I know what is best not you. We have a two hour conversation were I cry, laugh and lay it all on the table. I ask Drew to consider praying that God would show him what he has planned for our life, that he might make it abundantly clear his path for us and that if he really felt God closing that door then I would submit to his authority. That I would not be bitter and allow dissension in our marriage. I would move forward as hard as it would be.

 Drew's Side of the Story

Up to this point most of what you have read has been Cindy's incredibly accurate telling of our story.  Now we pick up with the exact same conversation from the other side of the kitchen table.  When Cindy asked that we sit down and talk I can honestly say I had no idea what we were going to be discussing.  I did know it was unusual for Cindy to ask to talk since we talk all of the time. When we sat down I made a conscious effort to not talk and I am so glad that I listened.  I was hanging on every word my wife spoke. I had never heard her speak with such passion and articulation and all while remaining incredibly calm.  This was a defining moment for Cindy on multiple levels and I was acutely aware of all of them.  My wife submitting without resentment, bitterness, or guilt? I believed her completely that for this decision she was going to trust me and God.

We had talked before about adoption over the years and I had successfully managed to ignore it, deflect it, side step it, and just flat out say no. I had a hundred reasons why we should not adopt a child and all of them were still valid and worried me, but Cindy was different this time. It was that difference I saw in her that made me decide to open my heart and my mind to the possibility of adoption. Was this what God really wanted for our family? Why did Cindy want another child so badly? Why did I not want another child? These questions and others were what I thought about as I read the book, Fields of the Fatherless by C. Thomas Davis.  Cindy had wanted me to read the book and I agreed because I saw it as a means to an end for me.  I would read this book if Cindy would read a book I had been asking her to read for two years.  

The book was an excellent read in general, but as I made my way through the book I still had not changed my mind about adoption at all. Until I got to the second to last chapter. Chapter 5: The Old Enemy: Fear. It was in reading this chapter that I was forced to question things like "am I compassionate" and "is fear keeping me from God". I can tell you that I had not been compassionate up to this point. Read the next four sentences and ask yourself the same question.

"Compassion asks us to go where it hurts, to enter into places of pain, to share in brokenness, fear, confusion, and anguish.  Compassion challenges us to cry out with those in misery, to mourn with those who are lonely, to weep with those in tears. Compassion requires us to be weak with the weak, vulnerable with the vulnerable, and powerless with the powerless.  Compassion means full immersion in he condition of being human."

I came to realize that I lacked true compassion and I was afraid of how having true compassion would change my life.

Then I did something just as my wife had done weeks earlier.  I decided to trust God. How did I know what God wanted? He seemed to scream what he wanted in so many ways. It just took me a while to realize how God can scream. Only God could give my wife peace. Only God could give my wife the comfort to allow someone else to have all of the control.  With all of that how could I doubt that God would walk with our family through the journey we were about to take.

So, I finally made my decision and being a little less dramatic that my normal self I chose the perfect time to tell Cindy.  It was December 16th and we were walking down the back isle at the Walmart grocery shopping.  Needless to say I caught her off guard as I simply said to her, "Cindy I have made my decision and I think we should move forward with our adoption. I'm going to step out in Faith and let God lead us".