Doug and Mel

Hello! We are Douglas & Melissa, our friends and family call us Doug & Mel. We are excited at the opportunity to share our lives and ourselves with you through this letter. We cannot begin to imagine how difficult taking this path might be for you, and we can only hope that our letter might provide some encouragement and hope as you travel this way. Should you decide to stay a while and get to know more about us, we can only pray that it will result in a life-long answer to prayer for all of us.

We are committed to offering this child a life of unconditional love and constant nurturing. We believe that he or she should always know and feel your love and we will do everything we can to make sure of that.

The most important aspects of openness are having you know that your baby has a good home and that he or she grows up knowing that this decision was carefully made in their interest with love.

We would be happy to keep in touch over the years and would like to be as open as you like. We have deep respect for you and the difficult decision you are facing.

After several years of IVF, unsuccessful pregnancies, several losses, and the loss of our daughter Abigail in February 2012, we have decided that adoption is right for us.

Sincerely,
Doug & Mel

Call us toll free 888-508-1113

Email: adoptionForDnm@comcast.net

Or contact our social worker Tina Sanchez-Wright at Adoptions & Family Support Network phone 219-924-2600 AdoptionAndFamily@att.net

About Us

We met in April 2005, married in October 2005…we just knew we wanted to spend the rest of our lives together, we figured why wait. We met in downtown Chicago, where we both worked at the time. Mel working for a video game company (living in suburbs of Illinois) and Doug working as a Union Pipe Fitter for a company downtown. Doug was on a job at the train station, and Mel took the train to work from the suburbs. Mel had missed her normal train, and had to take a later train. Doug was sent to another building (not the train station) to do a job. As fate would have it, Mel missing her train meant she would get the opportunity to see/meet Doug as he returned to his job at the train station from the other building. We crossed paths as Mel exited the building and Doug entered…we smiled at each other and here we are 7 years later, married, and loving every moment of our lives.

In June 2005, after 2.5 months of dating, we found out we were expecting our first child. Doug then asked Mel to marry him. It was determined 3 weeks later that we were in fact not expecting a child. We unfortunately had a blighted ovum which is essentially an empty gestational sac, no baby inside. We were broken hearted and devastated. Mel told Doug they didn’t have to get married…Doug said “I don’t want to marry you because we thought we were having a baby, I want to marry you because I love you and want to wake up with you every day for the rest of my life”….so we continued on with our relationship, planning our wedding.

We married in October 2005 in Merrillville, Indiana. We had a fantastic wedding and reception, surrounded by all of our family & friends. It was a wonderful day.

We waited 2 years before we decided to try and have a baby again. We took many vacations and built our first home, which we moved in to in May 2006.

We traveled to Mexico 2 times, Dominican Republic for our honeymoon, Curacao (island off the coast of Venezuela) for Christmas one year, and many spots in the states. We wanted to enjoy as much as we could before we had a child, because we were sure we would be working on that child very soon….

During years 2007 & 2008 we tried many times to get pregnant with no success. At which time the doctor sent us to a fertility specialist.

Jan 2009 we did our first round of IVF…no luck, not pregnant.

May 2009 we tried a frozen embryo transfer (several left over from the IVF cycle that we froze for later use)….we ended up pregnant with triplets for 8 weeks, which ended in spontaneous miscarriage.

We had many more frozen embryo transfer tries until January 2011 when it actually worked again. We were pregnant…yippee! We had fraternal twins! However at our 12 week checkup the babies had no heartbeat and died…..

Then in September 2011, we tried again. It worked again, we were pregnant. At week 17, the membrane for the baby ruptured, causing all of the water to be lost. Our daughter Abigail was born 5 weeks later, February 13, 2012, at a mere 13oz, 11” long. She unfortunately did not survive because she was too early.

After several years of IVF, unsuccessful pregnancies, several losses, and the loss of our daughter Abigail in February 2012, we have decided that adoption is right for us. We did a total of 11 IVF cycles.

We built a 4 bedroom home with a finished basement that has a playroom just for our kids. We hope that one day we can fill that home with lots of little feet running around. We hope that you will find our story unique and find that we want to provide as much love and care for your child as you would want.

About Melissa

I am an Army brat, as we call ourselves. I have lived all over the country and even in Germany when I was very young. I don’t remember much of Germany other than how to count to 10. My mother passed away when I was 21 years old. She died suddenly and unexpected. My mother and I were the best of friends, and I miss her every day. I know she watches over me and Doug and protects us. I know she is in heaven with our daughter Abigail, loving every moment with her granddaughter. I went to middle & high school in Peachtree City, Georgia. Then went to college at LeTourneau University, a Christian college, in Longview, Texas. I moved to Illinois in 2000 after graduating college. I have a sister and brother in law (2 nieces) that lived here and I thought why not try a new city. I began working in the city of Chicago, in the downtown hustle bustle area in 2003. I loved taking the commuter train to work every day. It was such a cool experience. I met my husband Doug in April 2005, when he asked me to marry him in June 2005, he also asked me to move in with him in Indiana. He said “I don’t want you any further than my arms lengthy anymore”……I couldn’t resist he was just too cute. A lot of people say wow you guys moved in and got married quickly, but those folks don’t know us. If you ask our friends and family you will find they all say the same thing, we have one of the strongest relationships that anyone has seen. We respect each other and talk about everything. We have been through a lot of struggles in our quest to have a baby, and those struggles are what makes us bond tighter each time. I tell Doug all the time, my life wouldn’t be normal without him. He is my normal…anything else would be weird. I love waking up with him every morning. I love everything about him. He is such a compassionate, hard-working, loyal man. I couldn’t have asked for a better man for me. I know my mother was looking out for me when she sent him.

I currently work for a video game developer called Wideload Games, in the city of Chicago, which is owned by The Walt Disney Company, yes the one with Mickey Mouse. It is a fantastic company and I couldn’t be happier. My company is fantastic. When Doug & I do have a child, however that happens, I will be able to take 12 weeks off to be with our child. Then I will return to work part-time from home, if I return to work. Meaning I won’t ever have to leave our child. I won’t miss one moment of his/her life.

In my free time, I love cooking, shopping, and swimming in our pool. I have created my own recipe book from recipes that I have gotten from magazines, online, friends, and family. I am always up for trying something new when it comes to food. I also like working out, doing yoga & pilates. I try to stay active to keep myself feeling young. I want to be able to keep up with my active child when they start to walk, because we all know once they start walking, they don’t stop.

I hope that you can see that we have so much to offer a child, and hope that you can see all of the potential your child would have in our home and lives. Thank you for taking the time to get to know us, we look forward to getting to know you.

Mel

About Doug

My name is Douglas Arthur Graves and I was born in Blue Island Illinois in 1982. My parents had another child two years later. My sister April and I lived in Harvey Illinois until 1988 when we moved to Hobart Indiana.

My mom was a union carpenter and my dad was a union teamster. My sister and I both attended Merrillville school system. We lived in a big neighborhood and there were always kids to play with. We would ride our bikes, play football or baseball, and even bike tag.

When I was twelve years old I asked my parents if I could take their lawn mower and make money cutting the neighbors grass. It wasn’t long before I had a small business pulling in over one hundred dollars a week during summer break. About two years later the Hobart elks lodge had a banquet hall where I applied for a job and had my first legitimate job. I worked there for about two years or so and then went on to other employment in the restaurant business, grocery business, and automotive business. I always had a job throughout high school. I graduated from Merrillville High School in the year 2000. Shortly after graduation I was accepted into the Pipefitters apprenticeship where I began my career.

As a union Pipefitter I have been able to put forth my ethics of handwork, education I received in school, and my skill of being mechanically inclined. As a pipefitter I do numerous scopes of work including pipe layout, blueprint reading, welding, and supervising. We work in all kinds of atmospheres including steel mills, hospitals, oil refineries, and power houses to name a few. I love what I do because of the different people I work with in different atmospheres at any given time.

My wife and I met while I was working downtown Chicago and it was just like the movies. I smiled at her and she smile back. We stopped and talked to each other and at that time we exchanged numbers and the rest is history.

Since then we have moved into our home in Chesterton Indiana where we enjoy working around the house together. I love being busy around the house and constantly making improvements such as finishing our basement, building our deck, and installing hardwood floors. All of which we have done ourselves because that is what I enjoy.

I also enjoy swimming in our pool, golfing, fishing, and spending time with my wife and two dogs, Moxie and Mollie.

I would love to get to know you and your child. We have so much to offer him/her including much love, great schools, great neighborhood, and a lifetime of possibilities. Thank you for taking the time to get know me.

Doug