Guest post written by Christopher & Jonathan Arteza-Acosta

When my husband and I started dating in 2006, we shared several dreams in common. One of our most significant dreams was to start a family. This goal seemed so far off from where we were in our lives at the time. Both in our twenties, we were living in Florida and working jobs that did not seem to align with our ideas of our future together. A few years later, and feeling like we needed to move on to the next phase of our lives, we took our queue from a quote we had previously seen: “A year from now, you may wish you had started today.”

So in 2012, we were inspired to finally make some changes and take action towards our goals. The first step was relocating to another part of the country with more opportunity, then finding better careers, getting married, owning a beautiful home, and lastly starting a loving family. This was not going to be easy, but being by each other’s side and supporting our common dreams together, hopefully we would soon make them a reality.

We packed up everything (including our two puppies) and moved to Colorado. Before long, we both found ideal careers in the healthcare industry with schedules allowing time to continue to pursue our goals. The first two parts of our plan were complete and now it was on to legally make our relationship official. We got married in 2013 with all of our friends and family by our side in a lovely ceremony surrounded by the Rocky Mountains off in the distance. Everything was coming together and we were more than half way towards our biggest dream of having children.

With our next goal of owning our perfect home in mind, we needed to make some financial changes. We downsized to a very small one bedroom studio apartment, and cut back on our spending in order to save. It did not take us long and in two short years we were able to move into our picture-perfect home. We were so thankful to have everything falling into place towards making our dreams come true and there was only one goal left – to start a wonderful family and fill our home with little feet and lots of love and laughter.

We initially thought this process was going to be easy. We’ve come this far right? In 2015, we signed a two-year nonrefundable contract with an adoption facilitator and was promised the match rate was 99% successful, fast, and more affordable than going through a licensed adoption agency. We were told that some couples were even matched within months! “Wow!” we said to ourselves. The thought of us being parents in a few short months made us so excited and we went to work putting together our baby’s new room and collecting little things here and there to prepare. It is said that you’re never completely ready to be parents, but we were determined to be as ready as we could be.

Unfortunately, we found out that our biggest dream wasn’t as easy as we were told. We were matched a few times within the two years, with each time our matches falling through for different reasons followed by semi-encouraging responses from the facilitator that our time was coming and to just be patient. We did everything we could think of from hiring a videographer to visually tell our story so that prospective birth parents could connect with us, to asking friends and family to share our story wherever they could. We even had our story posted on online podcasts and publications including the Debt Free Guys, Forbes, and Huffington Post —all in hopes of making a connection somewhere to start our family. Two years had passed by so fast. Two years of staying positive, two years of making plans, and two years of thinking maybe today will be the day we will get the call!

Pretty soon however, our contract ended and we opted not to renew. Our hopefulness turned to disappointment. We were so upset and filled with grief. Did we make the right decision? Was this ever going to happen for us? Were we ever going to be dads? Was this dream just not in the cards? We hesitantly continued to move forward. We came this far and we were going to see our dreams through. After all, we were aware that some families had waited several years longer than us. We had worked separately with a local adoption agency called Adoption Choices of Colorado for our home studies and clearances and had formed a relationship with our social worker and thought we would try going through exclusively with them. We set up a call with the agency and completed all the necessary paperwork. Fortunately, they already had all of our home study information so moving forward with them was easier than anticipated. Everyone at the agency was very supportive and it was extremely refreshing considering the situation we had been in previously.

Within one month we finally received the call we had been waiting for over two years and really since we began our lives together. This was the moment all our previous efforts were for! A voice from the other end of the phone said “Congratulations, You are now Dads to a beautiful, healthy baby girl.” Filled with emotion, we quickly prepared to bring our beautiful baby home. The next day, we met our sweet baby at the hospital along with the birthmother and the birthfather who were so kind and remarkable for what they had been through and the decision they were making. We held our daughter in our arms and she was so gorgeous and perfect and ours. Everyone said, when it’s the right time and when it’s our baby then it will happen and you don’t really think too much about that statement until it actually does happen. Once we met our daughter, we couldn’t imagine it any other way. She was meant to be our baby girl. All of our waiting was over and the timing was impeccable.

Then, seventeen months later, on a Wednesday while we were working away at home, we received another one of those remarkable calls, this time from our birth mother’s social worker. “Are you boys ready for your daughter to be a big sister?” We could hardly believe what we were hearing. We took no time at all answering “YES!” and proceeded to get ready to bring our new little addition home to meet her older sister. It seemed our family was finally complete and all our dreams had come true. We were patient and determined and we made it happen.

Today, we are Daddy and Papa to two beautiful perfect little girls who make our lives whole. It definitely wasn’t an easy road, but we managed to get to the finish line and wouldn’t change our path for anything at all. Sometimes, when you feel like you have a setback, the unfortunate things in life put us on the route to the greatest things that will ever happen to us.

To help find your path to fatherhood through gay adoption, surrogacy or foster care check out the GWK Academy.