Hello everyone,

I have amazing news to share with you.

We adopted again!

It was very unexpected and not anywhere near what I had imagined for the last 20+ years. But it has been an amazing experience and I am so grateful for the whole team of people who made it happen.

Mostly Zoey.

I’ve written about Zoey before and the role she has played in our lives. She has been a student, a pseudo-daughter, and a best friend. And I would not have the joy of being a mother again without her.

I’m not completely comfortable sharing all the details of how the adoption came about publicly yet. But it was an extremely unique and unlikely scenario. There were many days when I thought this wasn’t going to happen. If you have followed our journey, you know we have been trying to adopt from China again since 2019. When COVID caused China to “temporarily” pause adoptions in 2020, we waited. And waited. Eventually, the waiting got to be too much. We desperately wanted to be parents again and our daughter wanted a sister. So while we didn’t cancel our China match, we attempted to adopt elsewhere while we waited. We tried Vietnam, but I couldn’t do it. It didn’t feel right to me because we don’t have the ties to Vietnam that we do to China. It’s hard to explain, but I felt that we could not emotionally and culturally support a child from Vietnam the way we do our older child, and that didn’t seem right. We then tried for two years to adopt from American foster care. I sent hundreds of inquiries. We got almost no response back, and when we did, it was a rejection. Always because we had a special needs child. It felt like our daughter was being punished for being different.

Then Zoey called.

She works for a surrogacy agency in China and LA. Twin boys were coming, but their intended parents were no longer in the picture. Would we be willing to take them?

My dream of adoption had always been of a girl, an older girl, meeting in a sterile office with tentative steps and cautious glances. I never imagined I could be the mom to a newborn. Much less twins. Much less boys.

But I was meant to be a mom. Yes, I am a mother to Zofia, and I always will be. She has taught me a kind of love that is fierce, protective, and unrelenting. But I also knew there was more mothering in me—more nurturing, more guiding, more everyday caretaking—and I didn’t know what to do with that ache.

So while this was not the motherhood journey I had imagined, it was one I eagerly jumped at.

It was not easy—or cheap. But unlike when we tried to adopt from China, or Vietnam, or foster care, every time a barrier popped up, someone was there to clear it out of the way.

There were many days over the last seven years that I wondered if I had done everything wrong. I always said that everything I ever did—going to college, getting divorced, getting remarried, going to China—was all in preparation for adopting my daughters. After all that and spending thousands of dollars, I had one beloved daughter—but my heart still ached to welcome more.

But when it came to adopting the boys, it wasn’t my plan, but it seemed as if everything I had done–all the planning, all the waiting, all the rejections—had led to this. It was all thanks to Zoey, who we met at our first teaching job in China in 2010. She made it all worth it.

And now, we are learning how to be a family of five.

We are tired. We are grateful. We are adjusting. We are learning who these boys are and who we are becoming alongside them.

This isn’t the ending of our adoption story. It’s the beginning of a new chapter—one we’re taking one day at a time.

If you’d like to support our family as we settle into life with our boys, we’ve shared our story on our AdoptTogether page, where contributions go directly toward the costs of their adoption and care.

I also share updates, reflections, and moments from our everyday life on TikTok. Whether through a donation, a follow, or simply sharing our story, your support truly means more than we can express.

@amandarobertswriter March 2025 was my lowest point. I felt that I would never be a mother again. But by August 2025, I had two beautiful boys. Sometimes our journeys lead to unexpected happy endings. #adoption #surrogacy #familytime #storytime #momlife ♬ original sound – 𝒶𝓂𝒶𝒾

Thank you for walking alongside us.

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