The God of Francesca

Save the Children

For over ten years, we had discussed adoption.

Back when the dream first started, I thought maybe we would adopt from Guatemala. I had this picture in my mind of a little Latino baby joining our beautifully diverse family someday. When I reached out to an orphanage supported by our church, international adoptions changed. Countries closed the programs because of trafficking concerns. So I figured there was likely no caramel-skinned babe in our future.

Still, we wanted more children in our home.

We struggled to have a second child, caught somewhere between fertility struggles, terrible timing, and the arduous work of rebuilding a marriage after collapse.

There was a season when I wasn't sure our marriage would survive. Trust had been broken. The future felt uncertain. Long before we were waiting for another child, we were learning how to stay.

I have carried a quiet heartbreak for years, tangled up with guilt from a hundred wrong turns. Some of it rooted in timing. Some in loss. Some in the lingering fear that maybe the choices of my youth had somehow closed the door on my ability to conceive again.

And beneath all of that was this ache I could never fully shake: the thought of my daughter growing up alone.

Even writing this now, I'm crying.

My own life is so deeply shaped by my siblings; the shared history, the built-in friendship, the laughter, the witnessing of an entire life by someone who remembers where you come from. I could not bear the thought of my wild, funny, tender-hearted, compassionate girl moving through the world without that kind of companionship beside her.

Not loud grief. Not dramatic grief. Just the quiet kind that settles into a mother’s heart when she starts believing a prayer may go unanswered.

And so we prayed and stepped forward, trusting that somewhere down that long road was a child meant for our family.

The Long and Winding Road

We officially started the adoption process more than six years ago with an agency in Mississippi. At the time, we were naïve enough to think starting the paperwork meant we were on our way.

Instead, we quickly learned we would need an entirely separate agency in Illinois to facilitate placement due to state-to-state regulations.

So we started over.

Many of the agencies we found were concentrated around Chicago and didn’t really serve Southern Illinois. We spent more time researching, calling, emailing, and trying to find someone willing to work with us.

Eventually, we found a very small agency that agreed to take us on.

I still remember our caseworker trying to set expectations gently. She told us, honestly: “Most adoptions average about a year before placement.”

A year sounded so long.

Over time, the waiting changed shape. At first, it felt active and hopeful — paperwork, profiles, anticipation. Yet as we continued to wait without word, updates, or any bites, it became quieter. Heavier somehow. Less like anticipation and more like learning to live alongside unanswered longing.

Tallulah asked regularly. Her faith still aflame. "When will my baby sister or brother be with us?" I always answered the same way, "Let's keep praying, baby. God's timing is perfect." But my prayers often outran my faith, and I wrestled to believe what I was asking for.

I think that’s part of why the phone call in February felt so impossible.

By then, this wasn’t a fresh dream.

It was an old prayer, and one I wasn't praying fervently.

Anyway, with a new state agency, we started the forty-plus-page application. Then came the physicals, fingerprints, background checks, financial disclosures, home visits, interviews, personal references, training requirements, and enough paperwork to make you feel like your entire life had been placed under a microscope.

Every drawer cleaned. Every document scanned. Every trauma, strength, weakness, parenting philosophy, and financial decision laid bare for strangers to evaluate.

Adoption is an exercise in exposure. Every part of your life is opened, examined, documented, and discussed.

Arrest records. Past mistakes. Failed marriages. Drug use. Family history. Medical history. The kinds of things most people spend years trying to move beyond suddenly pulled back into the light and discussed across tables and paperwork.

Something is humbling about sitting across from someone while they determine whether you are fit to become a parent to a child you already love in theory but have not yet met.

Tallulah learned about her parents' arrests and past lives.

The process didn’t end once the paperwork was submitted, either.

Every year there were more fingerprints. More background checks. More home visits. More training renewals. More invoices to pay to remain active in the system and keep our profile available for placement.

So when our caseworker called in February, I said, "She's probably calling because we haven't paid up this year yet!"

The Before Times...

In 2021, Jon lost his mom, Arlene, after a very fast-moving disease. It happened quickly and painfully, the way some losses do when life does not bother easing you into grief first.

When he received an inheritance from her estate, he decided on it almost immediately. We would save that money for the adoption. If we were given the chance someday, we wanted to use it to save a life.

We spent more than three years actively waiting in the adoption process. On the list. Long stretches where nothing happened at all. Eventually, the waiting itself became part of the furniture of our lives. Present, but no longer surprising. People would ask about it, and we'd shrug...

And then 2025 happened.

Hindsight has a way of revealing God's fingerprints all over seasons that once felt confusing and uncertain.

By the end of that year, I felt scraped raw. My body was struggling. My mind was exhausted. My heart was carrying more than it knew how to hold.

I spent most of the year sick, exhausted, stressed, or recovering from something. I had knee surgery at the end of 2024, then dealt with C-diff and a long string of health struggles afterward. At work, a new acquisition turned everyfrickinthing toxic. The environment became vicious in a way that still feels difficult to describe without sounding dramatic. It was corporate insanity at full volume.

I stopped sleeping well. I was anxious all the time. I was edgy, overmedicated, exhausted, and trying to function inside a life that no longer fit me. And Jon's job was no better: long hours, hostile coworkers, controlling leadership.

Beneath all the stress, ambition, and survival mode, God was exposing something in us that I think we had spent years dressing up as responsibility.

In October, I lost my job.

Underneath the heartbreak and collapse was something else too.

Relief.

Like the strange exhale that happens after you have been clenching your muscles for too long without realizing it.

Suddenly, the pace of our house changed.

Dinner together.
Games.
More quiet.
Less chaos.
More presence.

The greatest surprise was that as our careers unraveled, our marriage seemed to grow stronger.

I didn’t fully understand what God was doing. I just knew He was carrying us.

Then in January, Jon lost his executive position.

One executive losing a job is stressful enough. Both of us losing ours back-to-back felt almost absurd.

I remember thinking: What exactly are You doing, God?

It was almost... comical.

But underneath the uncertainty, there was also this strange feeling that He was forcing us to answer a question we had been talking about for years.

Were we serious about peace?

Were we serious about slowing down?

Were we serious about wanting a different kind of family life?

Because suddenly we had no choice.

And honestly, our marriage was healing too. We were becoming more present with each other and with our family. We were talking differently. Living differently. Slower. Softer. More intentionally.

Looking back, I think God was less interested in restoring my old life than He was in teaching me to trust Him with a new one.

We were healing.

The God of Francesca

By February, I think I had mostly given up on adoption ever happening.

Honestly, we probably both had.

Only Tallulah hadn’t.

She stayed in faith the whole time.

I started working again on February 2nd, fully remote, with my own little home office set-up. At the end of my days, I journal a bit in a devotional a friend gave me about being brave.

On February 9th, 2026, I wrote something in it:

“Can we have more children in our home?”

The next day, the phone rang.

I assumed it was just another annual adoption check-in.

Time to pay another invoice. Schedule another home visit. Renew fingerprints.

And I didn't particularly want to talk to them, given how dramatically our financial situation had changed after two job losses in less than six months.

It was Tuesday, February 10th. Around 5:16 PM. I was downstairs in our basement closing up my office for the day while Tallulah watched the Olympics.

Jon declined the call.

Then our case worker texted that it was urgent, so he called her back. He came to get me, saying she needed to speak to us.

She asked one question before anything else:

“Are you still hoping to adopt?”

I don't know if I answered her or if I disappeared into a vacuum for a few seconds, wondering if my hearing had finally failed me.

Then she told us a baby girl had been born earlier that day, and the birth mother had chosen us from the waiting families.

Wait, what? Say that again, please.

Then I started crying. Really crying.

Chosen.... us.

We had experienced massive rejection lately. Job losses. Financial uncertainty. Doors closing. Plans unraveling. And suddenly, in the middle of all that, someone had chosen us.

There was another detail we wouldn't fully appreciate until later. Because adoption fees are based partly on income, my new job happened to place us just below one of the agency's fee thresholds. Had I made one dollar more, our placement fee would have increased by nearly $2,000.

Frankie was born in Peoria, Illinois.

Which was already wild enough. But - amplified by the fact that we were already scheduled to travel to Peoria three days later for Tallulah’s cheer competition. We'd never been to Peoria in our lives.

Jon and I walked downstairs together to tell Tallulah. She knew something was up by my teary face. As we told her, that beautiful girl, full of faith, said, "I have a baby sister?!" My heart paused because I knew things could fall through, but Tallulah never wavered. In that moment, she had and was a sister.

We called my family, and they all came in clutch.

What do you guys need?

I'm coming. I'll be right there.

Let's go.

My mom was coming to Peoria with us and rearranged her life to come early.

My sister brought us everything: pack-n-play, carseat, diaper bag, boppy.

My parents got an Airbnb for the earlier days in Peoria, no questions asked.

Whatever you need, we got you.

The next morning, we ran a few errands, and then we headed to Peoria.

The whole drive felt surreal. I had butterflies, nausea, and sweaty palms the entire way there. It felt like stepping into a story that had somehow already been written before we arrived.

When we got to the hospital, they placed us in an overflow room. You could tell it wasn’t used often. Some things were missing. It felt temporary.

Around 3 PM, they brought her in.

This tiny little girl with a dinosaur cry.

Jon held her first. I think my heart needed a minute. I wondered.

Am I dreaming?

There are moments in life that feel stitched together by something far beyond logistics.

Francesca “Frankie” Arlene Maribel Denery.

Born February 10th, 2026 at 12:19 PM.
6 pounds, 3.75 ounces.
18 inches long.

Jon held her first.

Then Tallulah.

She had dark hair, dark eyes, and the tiniest little dinosaur cry I have ever heard in my life.

Jon melted immediately.

Frankie was born at 35 weeks and 6 days. Although she was initially classified as premature, our pediatrician later told us she didn't really consider her a premie because of how healthy, strong, and developed she appeared.

What struck me wasn't whether she technically met the definition of premature. It was the timing. Had she been born a few weeks later, we would have been in Chicago for State cheer instead of Peoria.

Even so, those first days were hard. We suspect she was dealing with nicotine withdrawal because the birth mom had vaped during pregnancy and hadn’t received prenatal care. At one point, she had considered abortion, but by the time she sought care, she was too far along. Like so many parts of this story, Frankie’s life seemed to hang on a series of moments that could have gone differently.

She just wanted to be held constantly. She also couldn't tolerate even a diaper change without that dinosaur cry shrieking at us.

We met the birth mother on Thursday before she was discharged from the hospital.

I remember feeling cautious in a way I still struggle to describe properly. I wanted to love her and respect her and honor the impossible position she was in. At the same time, every selfish part of my heart wanted to beg her not to change her mind.

She was tiny. Fair. Beautiful. Exhausted.

She told us how she hoped for an open adoption. I hoped for the same.

I will always be grateful for her courage.

I remember telling her about our family, our heritage, and how diverse we are. Frankie herself is white, Mexican, and Black. A full-on caramel swirl.
He is the God of details... my little Latina girl.

Friday was supposed to be the day the birth mother signed the surrender papers.

Instead, she asked for an extension until Saturday.

I remember thinking: Okay. Time to pray. I would not give way to fear or worry or doubt. After all... we were here.

So we started calling everyone we knew who prays with authority.

Then Saturday came, and she asked for another extension because she was trying to see whether she could receive aid that would allow her to parent.

My thoughts blurred. We understood that. We respected it. How could we do anything but understand?

But Tallulah. My God.

We were quietly breaking apart, waiting for the answer.

Tallulah had and was a sister... and she wouldn't accept anything else.
She was already living in the answer.

My mama heart couldn't let hers break.

We’re going to trust God to do the best thing for Frankie. And I say that with the conviction that you guys are the best thing for her. I don’t doubt a mother’s love and the intense emotion that comes with handing over your baby. But someone’s eternity hangs in the balance here. Life over death really. You guys are her real chance at life and eternal life.

It was one of the strangest emotional spaces I’ve ever occupied. Fear and peace somehow coexist. Like the Bible describes — peace that surpasses understanding. While the onslaught storm battered our minds.

The prayer stayed simple the entire time: Lord, let Your will be done.

And if it is Your will… let Francesca be ours.
After all, we were here.

Somewhere in the middle of all that waiting and struggle, on Valentine’s Day, it was just Francesca and me alone in the quiet hotel room. The pack-n-play sat beside the bed; the baby slept.

And I felt the Father whisper gently to my heart, Why are you still guarding yourself? Trust Me.

So I slid down onto my knees beside her, laid my hands on her tiny chest, and prayed over her with tears running down my face. I blessed her. I thanked God for her. And for the very first time, I called her my daughter. My little girl.

We were in it.

Jon & I continually reminded ourselves of all that God had done to get us there. No constructs of man held in this story of The God of Francesca.

He removed our jobs, for the love.

Jon and our pastors prayed until Heaven broke open and broke through. And we continually encouraged ourselves in the Lord. Our friends and family alongside us in those trenches, praying fervently. Jon believed, by the unction of the Holy Spirit, that the papers would be signed before 11 am Sunday.

Saturday night, our caseworker texted asking if she and the birth mother could come to the hotel Sunday morning to sign the papers. They would come and sign in one room while we waited in the other room. We agreed to let Frankie be with her, as sort of her way of saying good-bye, I think.

Sunday morning came slowly.

Our caseworker and the birth mother arrived at our hotel. They sat in one room while we sat in the other. Thirty minutes of paperwork.

I paced, bounced my knee, breathed heavily, and paced some more.

And then, there was a knock at the door... our caseworker.

Before 11 AM, the surrender papers were signed.

I didn’t cry immediately.

We had our own mountain of paperwork to sign.

And eventually it hit me.

And I cried.

What a miracle!!! We’re rejoicing so big.
Jon, thank you for your sentiments- I can’t begin to express how much I feel that “I GET TO PRAY. I GET to stand with my people for God’s kingdom purposes and plan!” So, thank you for the opportunity to be able to stand with you guys.

We can’t wait to meet Francesca! Which means free one!!

Not because everything was finished. There are still legal steps ahead of us even now.

But because suddenly the direction of our lives had changed.

The Parts We Can't Explain

Well, the parts where the only explanation is God

Earlier, on the way to Peoria, we started calculating the probability of everything lining up the way it did; it came out to something like 1 in 18 million.

We never go to Peoria.

Not for family. Not for work. Not for vacations. There was no thread tying our lives to that city at all.

But this year, for the very first time, Tallulah joined cheerleading. And out of all the places we could have been scheduled to travel, her competition landed in Peoria that weekend — before we ever knew a baby girl there would need us.

Three hours away. Close enough to reach her immediately when the call came. Far enough that we had no ordinary reason to ever be there.

And somehow, in the middle of all of it, Francesca was born during the same window we were already driving toward that city.

Statistically? A serious long shot.

As a life event? The kind of collision people never forget. A miracle.

There's a weight to miracles. Impossible to explain, but my whole being felt it.

And honestly, when I look back now, I no longer think 2025 was simply the year everything fell apart.

I think it was the year God made room.

Room in our schedules.
Room in our marriage.
Room in our priorities.
Room in our home.
Room in us.

Because before Frankie arrived, God was already rebuilding our family into the kind of place where she could be received well.

Her name means:
Francesca — free one.
Arlene — pledge or oath.
Maribel — wonderful or admirable.

Together:
A free woman, pledged and wonderful.

Freedom. Covenant. Beauty.

Strong and beloved.

Francesca's middle name, Arlene, comes from Jon's mother. The same lovely woman whose inheritance helped make her adoption possible.

I keep coming back to the story of Ebenezer in 1 Samuel 7:12.

A stone of remembrance.

A marker in the road where God's people stopped and said, "Thus far the Lord has helped us."

I think Frankie is one of our Ebenezers.

A reminder that God was present in every part of the story — even when we couldn't see what He was building.

And when I think about all the ways God carried us into this story — through illness, grief, job loss, waiting, exhaustion, prayer, and surrender — I keep coming back to the same conclusion over and over again:

God’s kindness is entirely too much. 🤍

Stones of Remembrance

A marker raised not merely to celebrate a miracle, but to remember the faithfulness of God.

These are some of ours, given just to my family by the God of Francesca:

• A dream of adoption planted more than a decade ago.
• An inheritance received in 2021 and set aside for a child we had not yet met.
• Six years of paperwork, fingerprints, home visits, and waiting.
• A marriage that survived what should have destroyed it.
• A daughter who never stopped believing she'd have a sibling.
• A year marked by illness, exhaustion, and uncertainty.
• A job loss in October.
• A second job loss in January.
• A home growing quieter, slower, and more peaceful.
• A new job beginning on February 2nd.
• A salary that landed one dollar beneath a fee threshold, saving nearly $2,000.
• A journal entry asking, "Can we have more children in our home?"
• A phone call at 5:16 p.m. on February 10th.
• A baby born in a city we had no reason to be in.
• A cheer competition already scheduled there.
• A little girl born at 35 weeks and 6 days, arriving just in time for our paths to cross.
• Family who showed up without hesitation.
• Friends and pastors who prayed relentlessly.
• A hotel room prayer on Valentine's Day.
• Papers signed before 11 a.m. on Sunday morning.
• A little girl named Francesca (Free One).

Any one of those facts can be explained on its own.

Together, they remind me of something else:

"Thus far the Lord has helped us."

And so I stack these stones, one beside another, grateful for the story they tell. 🤍

The Duchess, as she's affectionately known around here, has a smile that can disarm even the worst day. She came into our lives like a whirlwind and has made herself the center of all our stories.

As of today, June 16th at approximately 11:45 AM, Frankie is officially a Denery. 🤍