#INEEDATC

My response to the Dave Thomas Foundation's tweet "@whitehouse asked what $2K means to you. Tell DC what the adoption tax credit means to your family. Use #INeedATC & #My2K in your tweet" is the letter I emailed to my senators and congressman back in October 2012:

After struggling with infertility my husband and I became pregnant with our son. I had a great pregnancy until 30 weeks when I had to go on bed rest and then delivered him at 34 ½ weeks. He is now a happy, healthy 6 year old kindergartener. Because we had trouble conceiving our son we started trying again only 11 months after he was born-hoping that the next pregnancy my body would “know how to make a baby”. Not the case. A longer struggle to try to conceive, more tests for hubby and myself. We then learned that BOTH of us had documented fertility issues. We’d chosen that I would be a stay at home mom after I had our son. My husband was laid off while trying to have a 2nd child. And fertility is expensive and not covered by our health insurance. We tried a few “mild” procedures. When going through fertility treatments I couldn’t simply “go back into the workforce” to make money to afford more fertility treatments…what employer would hire me and then let me off work 5-10 times a month per fertility cycle to go in for necessary ultrasounds, blood work, procedures, tests, etc. It’s a catch 22. We saved our money…my husband took a job 3 weeks after he was laid off (the company, Vermeer Southeast out of Marietta, GA shut down 2 stores and laid off over half their employees) that paid half his regular salary. We waited and prayed and decided to adopt…which had not been an option for us until we heard about the $13,360 refundable tax credit which would make a HUGE difference in the cost of a $30,000 domestic adoption. In August 2011, we adopted our beautiful daughter on her 1 month birthday. We were able to get a no interest credit card for 18 months and pay the adoption off before we began incurring any fees or interest! We sit now hoping and praying that this refundable adoption tax credit will be made permanent so that we can adopt again in 2013. Adoption is the best way to grow our family. There are many young healthy, loving, middle class families just like us-with college degrees, hard workers, with infertility issues…who can help those who can’t raise their babies. We need the adoption tax credit and need it refundable.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Corrie Jeffords