When failure turns to success by Kendra

When failure turns to success by Kendra - February 2014 Scholarship Essay

Kevin Ngo once said, “It's during our failures...that we discover our true desire for success.” This quote reflects one of the most profound journeys in my life.

From the time I was little I wanted to be a mother. In fact I often thought as a child that I could do better parenting than the grown-ups around me. So I made a promise to myself, that I would one day have a family of my own.

I met my husband at Chico State. We started out as fast friends who after many adventures together, spurred a passionate love connection. When we both graduated, we began our careers in Sacramento and then married. He began a blossoming career in computers, and I aimed for my love of children in teaching. We enjoyed our myriad accomplishments together, our biggest being buying a home.

We were ready to have a family. So we started the baby quest like all young eager couples do. We waited, patiently, and tried not to focus on the pregnancy tests that refused to give us a plus sign. Waiting turned into years, but our infectious love for each other kept us distracted from the dripping thoughts of our fertility failures.

Instead of dwelling on our lack of pregnancy, we hypothesized that we needed to focus on other aspects of life. Surely we had stressed ourselves to the point of refusing provide the children we desired. We envisioned that by focusing our minds elsewhere, we would eventually fall pregnant.

I decided to further my education in psychology to keep me mentally busy. I found the subject to be absolutely fascinating. I loved my clinical rotations and the knowledge I gained during my experience at Sacramento State University. Unfortunately, it did not extinguish my agonizing pain of not becoming pregnant. When I saw other graduate students walk by with a pregnancy in progress, I felt furious, and tortured.

We came to the decision it was time to truly examine why we could not get pregnant. Frightened by what doctors may be deemed to report to us, we mustered up the courage to both be medically examined for fertility issues. As we had feared, here came the big dark gloomy cloud of discouraging news. The doctors told us that we would never become pregnant with out medical intervention. Even then, there were no guarantees.

Even though the news was devastating, it at least lifted the madness of our repeated desire for children being shot down like an innocent bird. We had to accept failure as a couple. We had failed to be normal, and our family making process was not only unsuccessful, but stamped by the medical community with a red infertility sign. Devastation swirled through our family home like a bad disease.

We were at a crossroad. We could give up on our marriage and ignore the passion that drove us together in the first place, or embrace that energy to create our family in another way. Was it possible to have a successful parenthood experience with out the help of the medical community? Somehow becoming the couple who bought test tubes, shots, medications, and doctor visits did not describe a journey we wanted to embark upon for parenthood. Adoption. It was that simple, and we wondered what had taken us so long to first discuss it.

Success for us as a couple became the journey of becoming adoptive parents. Surely this adventure would be one we could not fail at. Once we made our official decision, we began the arduous process of paper work, interviews, and social workers who examined our lives with a magnifying glass. Finally, we were granted the stamp of approval to find, adopt, and love a child.

We decided to adopt from China. Adopting from this country would be no small project. Getting approval was the easy part, waiting was the most difficult part. Just as we waited for all those pregnancy tests to turn pink, that never did, we waited for the phone to ring to tell us that we had been matched with a child.

But like most of our wait to parenthood, months turned into years. We knew how to pace ourselves during the lingering wait, as this was not our first time we were told to be patient.

Finally it was our turn. We had been matched with a little Chinese girl who was twelve months, and was waiting to be adopted. We were ecstatic, gleaming with pride, that only a new parent understands.

We relished every moment with our daughter, recording all her movements and anything we could capture. Unfortunately all of our doting unmasked an issue. No matter how happy we were to love her, it appeared that she was unable to give or receive the love we had all dreamed of.

At the age of three, our daughter was diagnosed with autism. I was so fortunate to have completed my psychology degree, so I could be an advocate for her and the services she deserved.

Today she is blossoming at eight, and considered a success by anyone who meets her. We could not have been luckier parents and thankful ones too.

Our biggest failure became our biggest gift!