City, State

I don't think anyone is prepared to make this choice we had to, or have to make. Especially at 24, I was not the characteristic, stereotyped, teenage pregnancy dilemma. I didn't contact an adoption agency as soon as soon as I figured out I was pregnant. (I ignored the "growing" problem.)

What I did do was go to good ole' trusted google to start sourcing out adoption agencies I liked. After going through bland after bland site, with nothing I was connecting too, I clicked on Sunrise. I began looking through their pages and pages, of great information for adoptive parents, birth parents, and was captured by their way of introducing families. These beautiful one page profiles. On this one page, I was shown a fantastic glimpse of prospective families looking to adopt.

After looking through these profiles, I knew exactly who I wanted, from this open window into peoples hearts, in just a few paragraphs, I had picked who I felt would love and cherish this beautiful thing I was about to share with them.

To be honest, I didn't even contact Sunrise myself! They got the phone call while I was screaming in the hospital! (Not ideal, I can promise you that, but it worked out for me.) As I  was in the hospital one of the sunrise representatives came to talk to me, (in lighting speed she was  there!) Angie discussed with me, my options, the processes of adoption, and asked if there was a family I was interested in after I told her I had looked at profiles on the website. This calm, cool, collected woman, managed to soothe me in a matter of moments, on literally the most stressful and painful day of my life so far.

Sunrise has been with me from that day in the hospital to now at almost 2 years later! Continuing in their calm, cool, collected fashion, which sometimes you really need in times of hectic chaos! If I ever need someone to talk to, some advice on adoption, help with adoptive parents and conversations, how to begin to heal my heart, and who to reach out to, Sunrise has taken my hand. From a situation I wouldn't ever call the best or ideal, I've gotten the utmost love, care, and respect from people I hardly knew. I cherish all of the help they've been and never expected such kindness in my moment of turmoil...

City, State

Our daughter, Camden, was born on May 26th, 2009 at 4:10 (and 37 secs!) am. In true, selfless fashion, our birth mom wanted us to be at the hospital so we got to hold our daughter only minutes after she was born. It was instant: the connection we felt to her, and our birth mom, was indescribable. From the second we lay eyes on Camden, she was the love of our life, and what we had been waiting for, for a really long time. The 10 or so hours we spent at the hospital only made us love and respect our birth mom even more. Here is this woman, who is not only giving us her child, but guiding us, and mentoring us, and coaching us through those first hours of being parents. She was the one supporting us as we fumbled our way through first feedings, first baths, first diaper changes. And the whole time she knew she was going to have to walk away from this precious baby girl she had carried for the past 9 months. The strength that this must have taken still overwhelms me today. I’m convinced that the courage that birth mom’s possess would rival that of 1000 warriors.

When our birth mom said goodbye and left the hospital, I swear a piece of my heart and soul went with her and is still with her today.

The first weeks and months flew by. We were in awe of our precious daughter. But these emotions were also mixed with some heartbreak for our birth mom, who had sacrificed so much for the good of this sweet baby girl.

Their birth moms will always be in their heart, as we know we are in theirs, and our kids will always know our story of how we became a family.

On World Adoption Day 2014, our love and thoughts go out to all birth moms, everywhere. Know you are loved. Because of you and your indescribable courage, families are made and we can share the joy of being parent

City, State

I was 28 weeks pregnant when I found out about my pregnancy , needless to say I was not expecting to be pregnant at 21 and was no longer with the father.  It was not until I was 34 weeks that I decided that adoption was my plan. I called sunrise and was greeted with such warmth and compassion. They made me feel like it was my decision and that i had a lot of control over who would be my child's parent. The first steps were great I met with my social worker marg, she asked a few questions to make sure I was aware of what I was doing and then explained the process of what the adoption would look like. I had no idea that I was going to be able to choose the family that would become my child's parent. I looked through the book of home study's and quickly became drawn to a specific family and I could not go past that profile I chose one more family but quickly realized that my first choice was the right family for me and my child. It was Dec when I met that family and it felt like we had known each other for years and that all this family wanted was a child to complete there fairytale. I knew from that first meeting that my child would be the most important person in there life. I decided almost instantly that they were  the right family .

Just 6 short days later my son was born and he went home with his family 

He turned 13 this last dec and he is so happy in his family and I am so happy with my decision . Sunrise has been there for me through the ups and downs of the whole process. There will ups and down but the support that sunrise provided me has made it so that I could progress in my life and made me confident that I had made the right decision.

Your journey may have similarities but each journey is unique and special. Sunrise helped me make my journey as positive and smooth as possible.

Crystal 

City, State

We spoke with her on the phone soon after we had accepted our placement proposal.  Our adoption counselor told us that she really wanted to talk to us before we flew down to meet her. I can only imagine the emotions that were going through her head. She was scared of the future and worried if she was making the right choice in choosing us. And we were nervous as well. What if we said the wrong thing, what if she heard something that made her change her mind. All of that went away as our cell phone buzzed and we took the call while we were pulled over in a gas station parking lot. She said in her southern voice "Hi y'all".  And with those words we would begin a family, a family that includes our daughter's birth family.

When we first began our adoption journey we didn't know much about open adoption.  Before you hear stories from people who live it, you hear stories from people who fear it.  Our eyes were opened when went to an adoption panel held by our agency, Sunrise, that included a group of birth mothers telling their stories. This panel included birth mothers that were a regular part of their child's lives. It confirmed to us that you should never believe the stereotypes of what a birth mother is or might be. It reinforced that having the birth mother in our lives is what we wanted. These were women who loved their children before they were born, and still had relationships with them to this day. We wanted our yet to be placed child to know her birth family, to be able to ask questions, to be able to know where she gets her curly hair and love of looking at herself in the mirror. And also to be able to hear first hand that the decision to make an adoption plan by her birth mother was a decision made with love.

When we had our first phone call with our birth mom, we asked her if there was anything she wanted to know from us. The one thing she wanted to be sure of was that we were serious about open adoption, that we wouldn't just send a few pictures then forget about her. We told her without any hesitation that if that's what she was hoping for, she chose the right people. This is a promise that we have made to her, and she has made to us. Just as we have promised to always communicate and give updates, she too has promised to be there to answer questions. As adoptive parents, we loved to see how important this was to our birth mom, so don't be afraid to ask the tough questions.

Our daughter is still too young to understand what her "tummy mummy" means, but we make sure to tell her all about her first mom. We made a book with photos of all her favorite people, and we have included many pictures of her birth mother and her birth family. We point her out every chance we get. One of our favorite moments happened just recently. Every night before our daughter goes to bed, we say our nightly gratitude and we ask our daughter who she would like to bless. One night we asked her if she would like to bless her birth mother, and our daughter said "Tummy" and pointed up to her photo that we keep in her room. We knew then that it was starting to sink in.

For us, open adoption means open communication all the time. When we send a picture out to family, our birth mom is always part of the email. We are sometimes in contact daily, sometimes we go a week or so before we hear from her. But we always like to check in regularly to see how she's doing and to share a funny story, photos and videos, as well as Skype when we get the chance. In our experience you can never have too much communication.

We talked with our birth mom about how tough her decision was and how amazing it is that she is putting her daughter first. We were surprised to hear from her that she actually felt like she was being selfish. How could she think that, we thought? But she believed that because she was choosing to not raise her daughter, so she could finish school and do some of the things she had hoped and dreamed of doing, that our daughter might one day look on that decision as her birth mother giving up on her. But we will always let our little girl know that the choice to make an adoption plan was made with love. What better way to show our daughter that than by her birth mother succeeding and achieving her goals in life.

One of our favorite quotes about adoption is "She is mine in a way she will never be hers, and yet hers in a way she will never be mine, and so together we are a family." This may not be a traditional family,  but it is a beautiful family and we are so glad to be connected together with our birth family because of this beautiful little soul we both love and share. Because for us, we feel we didn't just adopt our little daughter into our family, but our birth mother is now part of our family as well, and always will be. There is no way on earth that we can ever be thankful enough to her for making us a family, and we feel that at the very least we want to always have her in our lives. We are so excited to be raising our daughter with so many people that love her, including her birth mother. In our opinion, a child can never have too much love.

Mike, Rebecca, and their daughter Noelle