Hannah's Hope

I have heard of several people out there who read this blog and also have felt the pain of infertility become part of their life story.  I wanted to share a book with you all that I was given from someone in my church who also struggled with infertility.  The book is called Hannah's Hope.

"Hannah’s Hope offers insightful and heartfelt encouragement for couples dealing with infertility, miscarriage or failed adoption. Building on the story of Hannah (First Samuel, chapter 1), Jennifer Saake interweaves her personal experiences with advice gleaned from over ten years of providing aid to grieving families through the support network she co-founded with husband Rick, Hannah’s Prayer Ministries. While remaining true to the very real and anguishing emotions of longing for a child, Jenni continually directs her readers back to the comfort and strength of a compassionate God. Each chapter concludes with a special “Burden Bearers” section offering practical suggestions for pastors, family members and friends."

I was so encouraged by this book and also given an opportunity to examine my own self and how I am handling my infertility.  This book touches on so many aspects of infertility and all from a Biblical viewpoint. I found myself recognizing areas that I subconsciously worked through and finally I was able to make sense of the feelings I had and why I had them.  I also found areas that I had not worked through yet but I really needed to in order to be closer to God and truly give this infertility journey completely to Him.

I really really appreciated being given this book and so I want others to benefit from it as well.  Infertility is such a hard thing and something not often discussed for some reason.  In our church it seems that pregnancy and big families are so common, we often just expect to get pregnant and have a family.  It's not until month after month the test shows negative that we realize just how little we have to do with "blessing" ourselves with children and how each child truly is a blessing from God.  I know I was completely guilty of this as I never would have expected infertility to be a part of my story and always just expected that I would be able to get pregnant when I wanted to.

I think this book is not just for those who have dealt with infertility first hand.  Each chapter has a section at the end for those who are close to couples struggling with infertility. I think reading this book could really help those who are close to families struggling with infertility to really understand what they are going through and how they can be sensitive to their needs and understand how they can help during this difficult time for that couple.  I have so much appreciated the strong love and support I have been given by my friends and family as we struggled with the feelings that came after learning about our infertility and I hurt for those that don't receive that love and support as well.

Currently a friend has this book but if anyone else would like to borrow it once she is done just let me know and I will get it to you!

Fundraising Success!

I am so thankful for the awesome success we had with our t-shirt fundraiser!  I want to thank everyone who bought a shirt and supported the cause of adoption.  Through the fundraiser we were able to help three local families, including ourselves, raise money to put toward adoption expenses. We look forward to bringing HOPE to a child from the Philippines, China, and the United States and your support has helped make the financial burden a little lighter! I know everyone is very thankful for your support.  I wanted to give a little shout out to www.fundthenations.com as they were great to work with in all this! Despite a slight error and reprint of the t-shirts they were very quick to respond and fix the problem at hand.  So if anyone is looking for a company to use for a t-shirt fundraiser I would definitely recommend www.fundthenations.com!

                                                  Thank You, Thank You, Thank You!!

(Ignore how bad this picture is :) We haven't been able to get a good one because we have to set up the camera with a timer since we don't have anyone around to take our picture! But I wanted to get this post up before it goes too long!)