Redeemed

REDEEMED

An Interview with Jeremy & Amanda Mehringer

Jeremy & Amanda Mehringer met in college at East Texas Baptist University. After dating they eventually married and planned, like most newlyweds, to have children. They also hoped that after their future biological children grew up a bit, to pursue adoption of additional children. God had a different plan in mind.

Jeremy, a fireman, and Amanda, a teacher, found that starting their family didn’t come as easy for them as it seemed to for others. “After that first year of trying we started the medications,” Amanda recalled. “And after that, came a new doctor and more interventions. We did countless IUI (Intrauterine Insemination transfers). I don’t even know exactly how many. But each transfer was unsuccessful and eventually our new doctor referred us to a fertility specialist.”

The fertility specialist helped the Mehringers through the IVF (In Vitro Fertilization) process. After the first transfer, they did achieve the pregnancy for which they had prayed for, but lost the baby in a little over nine and a half weeks.

“That was really hard because it was as far as we had ever gotten and we had already told friends and family,” Amanda said.

After the miscarriage they experienced an additonal chemical pregnancy and another unsuccessful transfer. When reflecting on that season Jeremy recalls “A big source of support came from our Connect Group, friends, our Sunday Group, and of course, our family. It was tough to go through. It’s such an intimate part of your life to share with others.”

With that support and their burning desire for children, Jeremy and Amanda then made the choice to pursue adoption. “We had seriously talked about how, one day, we were going to adopt so it was always on our hearts. We just didn’t know it would be in this order,” Amanda smiled and said.

Private adoption seemed financially out of reach for this couple, but Jeremy had a childhood friend who was going through the process of fostering children through an organization called Arrow Child & Family Ministries. Jeremy and Amanda contacted the organization and set in motion the fostering to adopt process. Among the numerous e-mails they were to receive, the one about 19-month-old Jordyn and her sister, 5-month-old Ruby Kate, stopped them in their tracks.

“As soon as we saw the girls it was game over. We didn’t even have to have a discussion, this was it! We submitted our profile and the process began”, Jeremy said.

“We traveled to Houston to keep them overnight. We packed any and everything we could think of and still ended up stopping at Target in Houston for more. We had never had infants or toddlers in our house, so we just wanted to make sure we were prepared! We walked into the office and walked out with two kids. They told us ‘Good luck, see you tomorrow.’ It was a whirlwind of a weekend,” Amanda laughed.

In May of 2016, the Mehringers officially became foster parents. In February of 2017, they officially became “Mommy and Daddy.”

Jeremy remembers a conversation with a buddy at the fire station in the Fall of 2016 while waiting for the adoption to become official. “Somehow we got

to talking about the whole thing and my buddy said, ‘How crazy would it be if another baby came along?’ Minutes later, I got a phone call updating us on the progress of the girls’ adoption. Then I heard, ‘By the way, there’s another baby, a sibling to the girls. Do y’all want the baby, too?’ I said, ‘absolutely!’ and didn’t even talk to Amanda until later,” Jeremy laughed. Bo would officially become their son in July of 2018, but the Mehringers know he had been part of God’s plan from the start.

In the span of two years, this couple went from no children, and little hope, to being parents of three!

Jeremy and Amanda testify how fostering and adoption have changed their lives for the better. When asked what advice they would give to anyone considering fostering or adopting children, they replied, “We, as a society, see foster care and adoption as a scary unknown and you don’t hear much positive. But to see it and experience it is to really get a grasp on what grace is all about.”

“We didn’t deserve this blessing at all, but God has shown mercy and love and grace toward us in a way I never understood before our kids came into our home,” says Jeremy. Amanda adds, “I don’t think there is any way to prepare fully, but the advice I could offer is that—it’s not a life that many will understand. It’s not like anything else anyone tries to compare it to. It’s hard, it’s sometimes ugly, it’s amazingly full, and absolutely beautiful!”