Inspire, Fall 2004

Inspire 25 As Paul Muckley ’88 describes his adoption story, he admits that it sounds like a baseball game, complete with slumps and strikeouts but ultimately with two good hits that made the game very worthwhile. When Paul and Laurie Potter Muckley ’89 married in 1990, their game plan was that they would wait five years before starting a family. But time passed, and their plan was not happening. “It was surprising to see that we were pushing 10 years with no babies in the picture. As time went by, more and more of our friends were starting their families, and though we were happy for them, each announcement just reminded us that nothing seemed to be happening on our side of things,” Paul said. After many unsuccessful attempts to conceive, Paul admits that as he sat on the bench, so to speak, he sometimes questioned God. He said, “We’d see teenage girls, clearly not married, pushing their babies around the mall, or we’d see other people who probably shouldn’t have been having babies having babies, and it really made us question what God was doing. We wondered why teenagers get pregnant after the prom, but we — a Christian couple with a good marriage, a good house, a good income, etc. — can’t. It just didn’t make sense to us, but we tried to believe that God somehow had a plan in our frustrations.” Paul and Laurie attempted fertility treatments but found them to be costly and emotionally draining, so they quit after three months and decided to pursue adoption. That’s when the game got more challenging. In 2000, believing that biracial children are often more quickly placed, they decided to sign up for a biracial program with a large agency. It wasn’t an easy process, and at times they wanted to give up — until one day when they got a call. Paul shared, “If we’ve learned anything from the adoption process, it’s that we have no real power to make anything happen on our own. If it’s going to happen at all, it has to be God’s will, and our pushing and pressing and fussing won’t make anything happen any quicker or any better.” On September 16, 2000, Hollyann was born, and Paul and Laurie soon welcomed their daughter home. “My first sight of Hollyann took my breath away,” Paul said, “seeing that beautiful brown-skinned, black-haired baby. I actually tingled all over.” The following summer, Paul and Laurie began considering the possibility of adopting a sibling for Hollyann, and so they contacted the agency again. “The facilitator immediately connected us with a birth mother in Louisiana who seemed interested in us over the phone. After several days, however, her mother told us she placed the baby with another family,” Paul said. Soon the facilitator connected them with another birth mother, but the woman had issues that caused them to feel uncomfortable pursuing a relationship. “We never really had a good connection with either of these women,” Paul explained, “so the fact that the adoptions didn’t happen wasn’t overly traumatic. But we were getting a hint of how the process might not go as smoothly as Hollyann’s had.” In the fall of 2001, the Muckleys were introduced to an expectant mother in California. There was a connection, and the mother agreed to let Paul and Laurie adopt her baby. As they started making plans, Paul and Laurie begin to feel that the birth mother was acting strangely. “We couldn’t seem to get through on the phone,” Paul recalled. “We called the hospital on the chance that we might find her there, and we did. We learned she had a baby girl. She seemed to indicate both that she wanted us to adopt the baby AND that she wanted to keep it.” The Muckleys agonized over the situation and then decided not to proceed. “This case was harder to take,” Paul noted, “perhaps because it was the third strike in a row.” They had three “strikes,” but the Muckleys still weren’t out of the game. The following February Paul and Laurie received a call about another birth mother not far from them. The meeting with the woman went so well that their social worker assured them the adoption would go through. The game plan changed, however, when the mother decided to keep her baby. “This one was really difficult,” Paul explained. “But we always said we’d only adopt a baby if the mother was clear she wanted to give it up.” Shortly thereafter 13-month-old Isaiah, who had been abandoned by his mother, was placed with the Muckleys. He had been in the care of a family friend who had no knowledge of where the birth mother was or what her plans were, and so the Muckleys kept Isaiah while they waited for a court hearing so they could officially adopt him. Before the hearing was held, however, the mother returned and wanted Isaiah back. There was nothing Paul and Laurie could do. It was traumatic, and Paul admits that again he questioned God. “Why would we have this child at all if we couldn’t keep him?” Paul asked. “Why would an irresponsible woman be allowed to disappear and then reappear in this boy’s life when a stable Christian family was eager to raise him?” But after they processed the disappointment, Paul said they got back in the game. He explained, “Though we were experiencing what baseball players would call a slump, we were still sold on adoption. Hollyann had been such a joy to us, and we knew we wanted a sibling for her. We decided to try one more time.” And this time they scored. Soon a young woman who was seeking a Christian family to adopt the baby she was carrying was introduced to the Muckleys. She asked them about their political and religious views and then agreed to let Paul and Laurie adopt her son. On November 13, 2002, Jayden was born, and a few days later he went home with the Muckleys. Paul stated, “Unlike Hollyann’s Winners Never Quit b y C e s s n a C a t h e r i n e Wi n s l ow P a u l ’ 8 8 a n d L a u r i e P o t t e r M u c k l e y ’ 8 9 (continued on page 27)