Christian was adopted when he was a young boy by his stepfather, who raised him along with Christian's biological mother. Anywhere in our profile where you see references to "Christian's family" or his dad, those are his adoptive family members who have been part of his life since he was about 3 years old and continue to be a big part of our lives now as well.

Christian feels that his dad adopting him had a significantly positive impact on his life as he was able to experience a loving father-son relationship. He also had a lot of beautiful experiences with his adoptive side of the family throughout his childhood.

Christian's adoptive family is large, currently there are 18 of us, and they are excited for us to welcome a baby through adoption. He was also the first grandchild to join that side of the family, so he had lots of love and attention from his grandparents, aunts, and uncles growing up. Christian very much looks forward to providing a child with the loving father-child relationship he experienced, and we both feel connected to expanding our family through adoption because of Christian's experience with his own adoption.

Adoption is our choice for how we want to grow our family. Adoption is not our backup plan or something we feel forced into due to life's circumstances - we have chosen not to have biological children because we feel that adoption is what's right for our family. Aneesa has always wanted to be a mother, but never felt connected to the idea of pregnancy or birth. When Aneesa told Christian she felt this way early in their relationship, Christian, having had his own personal experience with being adopted, was completely on board! Now that we have been together for almost 9 years and have taken the time to establish ourselves in our careers, settle into a home with space for kids, and create a truly solid, loving, healthy foundation between us as a couple, we feel as ready as we can be to take the big step of growing our family through adoption. We can't wait to welcome a child into our lives!

Our lifestyle is active but balanced, allowing us to experience so much that life has to offer while also giving us time to rest and re-charge. Almost every weekend, we have some sort of social plans with different members of our family/community - maybe it's a board game night, a dinner party, going to a Seattle Kraken or Torrent hockey game, a crafting night, a beachcombing day, a weekend getaway, or something totally new to us!

One weekend per month, we like to do a 'no plans weekend,' where we keep the whole weekend free of any firm plans to allow ourselves time to either simply rest and recharge at home, or to do something spontaneous and less structured. Our life is very full of music; whether it's a vinyl record from our carefully curated collection or Aneesa singing our favorite tunes with her best friend accompanying on guitar, music is a near-constant in our life and we can't wait to see what types of tunes our little one likes! We are lifelong learners and look forward to trying new things with our child as a family of 3!

We are fortunate to be surrounded by a large community of family and friends. We are extremely close with Aneesa's family and spend a lot of time with her parents, sister and brother-in-law. We like cooking meals together, board game nights, escape rooms, brunch, puzzles, and crafts. We also take a family trip once every year with Aneesa's family and her parents will be providing a lot of childcare support.

We are so lucky that Christian's family is also local to us, and will provide a large, loving group of cousins and aunts and uncles for a child. We spend Christmas with Christian's family every year, and Christian enjoys playing on a recreational hockey team with his dad and two of his uncles. Every year on January 1st, Aneesa's family comes together to exchange gifts and enjoy a beautiful feast of homemade Indian food, honoring her father's Indian heritage in a way that we all really look forward to.

We are absolutely thrilled at the idea of being able to share these cherished family traditions/activities with a child! We also have a strong community of 'chosen family,' made up of dear friends who have been in our lives for over a decade and can't wait to become aunties and uncles for our child. Our family is bursting at the seams with love and everyone is so excited to welcome a baby with open arms!

Washington - We live in a warm, cozy 3-bedroom, 2.5-bathroom home in Washington State with our sweet 17-year-old cat. We bought & moved into this home last summer to give ourselves enough space to grow our family, and we have really enjoyed settling into the space and creating a family home. So far, our favorite room of the house is the living room, where we often play games together and listen to our favorite vinyl records.

Our neighborhood is quiet and safe, while still being extremely close to everything our area has to offer, including awesome museums and parks, beaches, excellent schools, public libraries, and sporting events. Our home is just down the street from a local swim school, where we hope to take our baby to learn how to swim and be comfortable in the water, as we both love to spend time in the water during our beautiful PNW summers.

Our next-door neighbors have become new friends of ours, as they have three children under the age of 5 - we can't wait till our kiddo is old enough to run around outside with the neighbor kids! Perhaps most importantly, Aneesa's parents live just a 10 minute drive away, Aneesa's sister and brother-in-law are a 3 minute drive/15 minute walk away, and Aneesa and Christian's best friends are a 5 minute drive away as well. We feel very fortunate to have so many loved ones so close by to spend lots of time with our child and support us as we grow our family!

Thank you so much for taking the time to consider our family for your child! We recognize that you must be feeling an intense mix of emotions as you navigate making a very complex decision, and we are holding that space for you as you move through this time in your life. You are a part of this child’s story and that can never be erased!

We met in 2017 and spent our first date doing something we still love to do together almost a decade later - sitting by the water, enjoying the sunset, and having great conversation. After three years of dating, Christian proposed in September 2020, and we were married on a lovely summer day in 2022 just before our 5 year anniversary. Our wedding was a fusion-style cross-cultural wedding, where everyone wore traditional Indian wedding attire to honor Aneesa's heritage, and we used traditional Indian wedding flowers (marigolds) to decorate the whole space with garlands and bright colors. It was a wonderful day filled with so much zest for life and love from our family and friends! Almost 9 years after we first met, we truly are best friends and feel incredibly grateful to have each other as partners on this wild journey of life!

In the time since our wedding, we have been very intentionally focused on preparing ourselves for parenthood. What this has meant for us is taking some time to become established in our careers and gain financial stability, finding a home with enough space to grow our family, developing strong relationships within our community, and going on lots of adventures together. Perhaps most importantly, we have spent time in both individual and couples therapy to do deep work on ourselves as individuals and as a couple to ensure that we have healed our own wounds from the past and have developed the skills to communicate with each other effectively through all of life's ups and downs. At this point in our relationship, we feel very deeply aligned on our goals, values, and priorities and we know that our relationship has an incredibly solid, stable, and loving foundation. We are extremely committed to providing this same stability and love to our child throughout their life, and we look forward to sharing pictures and letters with you as the child grows up so that you have the opportunity to see the ways they are finding joy in life and thriving in our family. It's very important to us that they embrace adoption and you as part of their story and feel free to talk about it, wonder about it, and celebrate it.

One aspect of our life that we want to highlight is the knowledge that Aneesa brings to our family from her career. Her day-to-day is spent working with children who have severe behavioral struggles and varying levels of skill when it comes to coping, regulating, and communicating their emotions and needs. For the last 7 years she has poured herself into the children she works with, helping them to build their skills in identifying their feelings, feeling them, and coping with them appropriately. We have discussed at length the ways that we want to support our children to be as resilient, emotionally intelligent, kind, and respectful as possible, and we feel very confident that Aneesa's career background can help take us there as a family.

Becoming parents is already a very emotional topic for us - we have been excited, anxious, joyful, scared, and so much more as we've approached this journey, and we know you are experiencing a very different but similarly intense combination of emotions as you make your decision. We have shed a lot of happy tears together as we've thought about growing our family and talked with our loved ones about how excited we all are to welcome a baby into the family. Thank you again for your consideration! We wish you peace and strength as you approach your decision.

Sincerely,

Christian & Aneesa