Photo: Courtesy Gokhman Family
Roman Gokhman remembers the day clearly. He and wife Jennifer were painting a wall in their Concord, Calif. home in preparation for the birth of their first child when he received an email from a young woman in Michigan.
Roman began pacing back and forth. Were they prepared to welcome two infants within weeks of each other? Within a couple of hours, they had decided: yes.
Roman and Jennifer, who met in a journalism class at the University of Oregon in 2002, married four years later with the expectation of having children and showing them the world. But fertility struggles put them on a path to parenthood led them to not one, but two babies arriving within weeks of each other.
Now both 40, Roman, who works in health media and writes about music, and Jennifer, who works in editing and marketing, spoke to PEOPLE about becoming parents to their seven-year-old children: son August, conceived through in-vitro fertilization, and daughter Isabel, welcomed via adoption.
Courtesy Gokhman Family
Jennifer:Our story began with news that it was very unlikely we could conceive a child on our own. We looked into our options and initially decided that medical intervention was too expensive.
Listen below toMe Becoming Momto hear Jillian Michaels' adoption journey and her unique road to motherhood.
Roman: We started the adoption process, and we (specifically me) got impatient, so we started the IVF process at about the same time.
Jennifer: We met with a fertility doctor. Our only option was IVF, and we had a 30 percent chance that I could get pregnant. With those odds, we figured it wouldn’t happen — but I became pregnant in October 2013.
Roman: For us, adoption was never a backup plan. We wanted to adopt. There’s no lesser meaning to an adopted child than a biological one.
Roman: Our timing was extremely difficult. Isabel ended up coming first, and then we had August seven weeks after that.
Jennifer:We arrived in Michigan on April 29, 2014 and drove from Grand Rapids to Midland. When the nurses wheeled Isabel into our hospital room, my first thought was, “I can’t believe this is really happening!” And my second — and Roman’s first thought — was, “She’s beautiful. I love her.”
I was 33 weeks pregnant at the time. My husband and I had taken the newborn care class a couple weeks prior to our trip to Michigan for our adoption.
We stayed with friends in Michigan for three weeks and returned home just before my flight cutoff date [due to my pregnancy].
Roman: Isabel was a good sleeper. August was not. What we always tell each other privately is that if August had come first, it would have been a lot scarier for us because we would have expected that Isabel would have been as difficult.
Jennifer: As soon as he was born, the doctor recommended that we see a geneticist. We were able to see that he was meeting his milestones much later than his sister, and we eventually signed up with the Regional Center of California to get occupational and speech therapy.
He was diagnosed with autism when he was 2 and a half years old.
Jennifer: August and Isabel are a great sibling team. August has learned a lot from his slightly older sister. They care about each other and play together. They have the usual sibling squabbles, and they have the amazing ability to make giant messes together.
Jennifer: Taking care of “twins” has required strength and patience. We are thankful for our children, and we wouldn’t have it any other way.
We have kept in touch with Isabel’s birth mom since Isabel was born. We have kept Isabel informed about her adoption in age-appropriate ways and let her know that more people love her than she realizes.
Roman: August and Isabel are their own kids, their own people. Their likes are different and their interests are different.
Jennifer: Somebody made a remark to me. They said, You’re gonna love your biological child a little bit more than your adopted child. And I thought to myself, I don’t think so.
And the truth is it’s not that way at all. They’re each unique and they’re equally loved.
source: people.com
