Adopting again has been one of the best decisions we ever made. All 4 of us really love having Gus in our family. Reed and Lena are very compassionate and loving with him, for the most part. It’s hard for me to imagine our family without him.

Recently, someone requested a blog post about making the decision to adopt a second time with input from my lovely panel of adoptive moms. I got a ton of great responses and I did my best to edit them down to something manageable to read. I hope this is helpful!

What did you do differently from your first adoption?

“In our second adoption, I worried less. I trusted God more. I packed less. I focused on the light at the end of the tunnel and not on the ups and downs of the process. I was a lot more relaxed.”

“A lot! We were able to move through the process a lot faster and generally be more prepared. We took more time to study the language our child spoke. In country, because we were more comfortable, we were able to enjoy more sightseeing. We also had a lot better understanding of what sort of behavior was typical and how to handle it– that made everything much easier!”

“We didn’t do much differently, except for to raise our age range from 0-6 to 6-9. We knew we wanted to use the same adoption team and adopt from the same country. We wanted our daughters to share a similar cultural background in spite of not being biological siblings.”

“What I did differently from the first adoption was look for an agency that had lower fees! LOL. Well, it’s the truth!! Once we had compiled a dossier and felt comfortable doing it, that was one big obstacle gone. Also, the first agency we used was a Christian agency and while we appreciated that, they were also VERY conservative, sometimes more conservative than China in their regulations and we looked the second time for one that was more flexible. “

“For our first adoption, we traveled with one child in mind. If we didn’t adopt her, we would have come home empty handed. With our second adoption, we traveled praying to adopt a particular child, but if we couldn’t we would have gone blind. We were open to HIV, where the first time we were “healthy kids only”. We adopted an older child, added an extra unknown child, both with HIV, and adopted out of birth order and “twinned” our kids.”

How did you know your family was ready to adopt again?

“Well, first of all, we never wanted [our son] to grow up the only Asian child in a family of Caucasians AND there was such an age gap between him (adopted at 21 months) and our biological children (ages 9 and 12 at his adoption) that we knew from the get-go that we wanted to go back for a sibling for him. I had thought maybe another boy, but [our son] began talking about his sister in China, and he talked about her, prayed about her, saved toys and food for her and just pestered us until we finally gave in and decided that perhaps it was time.”

“We knew we were ready because 3 weeks home from the first adoption, we got the phone call that the little boy we wanted was available again. We prayed, God gave us peace, and off we went! Our daughter had been asking for “two brubbers and a sistra baby” as well, so that made it easy for us to know she wanted siblings. We had the money, the FMLA time, the room in our house- and so we followed God’s leading.”

“I don’t know if we knew we were fully ready for #2, but we still felt a space in our hearts for another little girl. (We had hoped to adopt 2 on our first adoption, but only came home with one.) We wanted to adopt again before our daughter got a whole lot older. We also knew our daughter could really benefit from having an older sibling around. However, we definitely had concerns about adopting an older (6-9 year old) child, given that our daughter at home was just 3. I prayed more about this one issue than anything else in our adoption. God blessed us, and the child we adopted is a very good older sister.”

“Our first daughter fit in easily. It wasn’t perfect but things were ok. It had only been 6 months, so I thought, let’s get this all over with at once. Have all of our kids learn English together. Get over the Ukraine vs. America differences all at once. Move past orphanage behaviors at once. Our first daughter begged for a sister. My husband and I both come from families with 3 kids, so seeing her at holidays, all alone, just seemed so sad and lonely.”

“This was our biggest hesitation. We knew that we, the adults, could handle it. Practically, we knew we had the financial resources, the space, the time, and the energy. But, were the kid ready to be away from us while we travelled? Could they handle another change in their lives? I don’t have a great explanation except to say that we prayed about it and carefully considered our children’s personalities and needs.  In the end, we knew our family was ready.”

How did the needs of your adopted children factor in to your decision to adopt again?

“After our first adoption, we knew our daughter needed siblings. She needed other kids to help keep her grounded. She needed peer modeling. She was 1 of 3 kids in her first home, one of 65 kids in her orphanage and suddenly an only child. This was a shock for her.

With our third adoption, to adopt #4 and #5, our first daughter was going through some behavior issues and having issues in school. Honestly, her behavior was not going to stop me from adopting again. I had moments of “Am I taking on too much? More than I can handle?” but it ended up being a blessing having a younger child for her to model FOR.”

“Medical needs weren’t a factor. We knew we could adopt a child with the same medical needs we already had in our family. In fact, handling those medical needs and learning how to advocate for our children with special needs prepared us to parent a child with more complex medical needs. As for the general needs of our children, again, the needs we were already dealing with prepared us better to handle the needs of another adopted child. We were much more prepared the second time around, thanks to everything that we learned during our first adoption. When we did deal with some new behavior and challenges unique to our newest addition, we already had the resources and knew how to get the help we needed. “

“We are planning another adoption now, and we hope to adopt another child or children with orthopedic issues, so that our daughter with CP feels less different. Our other three are very mobile and active, and she is always a few steps behind- or more than a few! We know we’re comfortable with SN’s and so we’re open to what God has for us. We’re also open to FAS and other issues as well, again, because we’ve had such an easy time with it all.”

“When we began the process for our third adoption from China, our 5th child, that was a battle… [explaining the many trials with the medical needs of second adopted child during 3rd adoption process]. We questioned our sanity and ability to care for another child daily. Why did we do it anyway? We did it because we felt CLEARLY that God had spoken to us that THIS WAITING CHILD was to be our daughter. We had many miraculous signs and provisions to make us certain.”

“After [our daughter] had been home for about 4 months we called our foster agency and told them that we were ready to consider placements, as our daughter’s transition was moving along very well, and we thought that we would be able to have another child in the home, if they were going to be the right fit.”

How did you chose the country?

“We went back to the same country, because we had already fallen in love with a little boy there. We had a great experience with our facilitation team, and felt comfortable repeating the process. And we took our daughter back with us to visit her friends.”

“We chose the country easily because we already had a child from China and didn’t want him to be the only Chinese treasure in our house. China was an obvious choice for our second adoption and our 4th child.”

“The country that we had adopted from the first time was no longer an adoption. Because of law changes in that country, we would have to adopt out of birth order and that was not something that we were willing to do at that time. We researched countries all over the globe, talked to several agencies and learned the pros and cons of different countries. Ideally, we wanted to adopt from a country which was culturally similar to the country that we adopted from the first time. We found a country that had many children available who fit our age criteria and had many cultural similarities with the country we adopted from the first time. It was a great fit.”

“We knew we would stick with Ukraine since we wanted our kids to have the same backgrounds. Turns out we ended up at the same orphanage as our first.”

What else would you like to share with families considering adopting for a second time?

“Adoption #2 somehow felt less “ordained” and much more practical, though both were obviously God-orchestrated. It just seemed less monumental of a decision, maybe because we were not becoming first time parents that time.”

“The only thing else I’d like to share is this: I love adoption. Our family is growing and we are incredibly blessed, and I hope God continues to add to our family for as long as He desires. Every one of our children is unique and amazing, and the joy comes from being able to appreciate their individual strengths and personalities. My best advice to others is to not worry about milestones, psychiatric disorders, or having your kids look/act/function like typical kids raised from birth, for at least a year after you get home. It’s going to be an adjustment, much like the first year of being married- sharing a home with someone with different habits, expectations, needs, and likes. Be flexible, and enjoy your kids. Enjoy them. Delight yourself in the gifts God has given you- and take each moment for what it is. Don’t live in what happened yesterday, or five minutes ago, or what might happen in an hour. Keep focused on God, and always find a way to sing His praise- it’ll keep you energized and help heal the spirits of your former orphans. They’ll go through a lot of changes, and that’s hard on them, but there’s hope in God.”

“Our story hasn’t been ‘typical’. 3 adoptions, 5 kids, 2 years. Twinning, adopting out of birth order, adopting biological siblings and non-biological siblings, adopting tweenagers in my 20’s. But it is so perfectly clear that each and every one of our kids is where they should be given their circumstances. They all fit in so perfectly, flaws and all. I’m glad I didn’t listen to the experts and pass over a child because they were too close in age, had medical needs, or were born “too soon”. Take medical diagnosis’ with a grain of salt. Our “healthy” on paper child has been our hardest to figure out.”

“You know what’s best for your family. You may always have doubts that adopting again is the right decision at that exact moment– there is no exact perfect time. But, you know what you can handle. Don’t let anyone else pressure you into a decision about when, where or who you should be adopting.”