I love self help books in times of hardship.  I have devotionals for couples in crisis, books on insecurity, books on rebuilding your marriage, adoption books, infertility books…I’ve experienced a need to read during all these trials.  All of the books I buy have a link to faithfulness; for me, my faith is what pulls me through.  I wanted to offer two suggestions that encouraged me during our two most recent trials:

Infertility: I believe I was led to Moments for Couples Who Long for Children by Ginger Garrett after browsing Amazon.com for another book Hannah’s Hope; in the suggested reads this book title popped up and I immediately bought it.  A blessing for women looking for comfort in the midst of infertility.  When I started the book, we were still hopeful that I would get pregnant, so I read it with the motivation to be pregnant and easing the pain until that day.  By the middle, we had moved on to adoption, so I read it with a bit of grieving and a new desire for our future as parents.  It addresses many of the things I struggled with such as anger, marriage strains, best friends having babies etc.  Each devotion starts with scripture and ends with a prayer.  An excellent daily read for those struggling with understanding our feelings during this difficult process.

Adoption: I have required readings that I have yet to read from my agency, but before we chose adoption I found Adopted for Life by Russell Moore.  Another divine accident as I was looking for literature from Beth Moore.  I thought she wrote this book and bought it before I realized my mistake.  I am having to read it twice since I read it the first time with skepticism as I had not committed to adopt yet.  This book does a better job of focusing on International Adoption since it speaks often of orpanages and abandoned children, but it also provides tips on affording adoption and how the church can help our families.  I definitely need to get my parents on board with reading these books since this will be the first adoption in both our families.

The good news is: whatever you choose to read know you are not alone in dealing with infertility and these tough issues of what to do next.  For us, God placed adoption on our hearts.  For me, it was an easy decision, for my husband it took a complete change of heart.  Literally.  He was against it since we got married, but God changed his heart of stone and now he is more excited and at peace than I am.  However, adoption is not for everyone and has just as many ups and downs as IVF and surrogacy etc.  For us, we chose after praying and then following where we had the most peace.  Since that day, doors have opened in ways we never imagined.