Danny Maffia and Justin DeMartin always knew they wanted children. Together for seven years and married for one, the time had come to make their family complete, but the process wouldn’t be easy.
“We always knew we wanted two kids at some point. We always thought twins would be amazing, but they are rare and to adopt twins is even rarer,” said Maffia. “We had three failed matches and two out of those three matches were expectant mothers who actually scammed us and the agency to get money unfortunately. As you can imagine, this was both financially and emotionally draining. So after all of the stressful failures, we were pretty much only really thinking we could go through this once.”
And once would be the only time they would have to. After more than 16 months, the couple got the call they were waiting for. An aunt of an expectant mother who saw a YouTube video of the couple got in touch and said she wanted the couple to adopt her nieces’ babies as the mother didn’t legally have an option to parent. The babies would either have to go into foster care or be adopted. The birthmom and aunt asked Maffia and DeMartin to come to the hospital before the babies were born via ceserean section so they could be the first to hold them.
And they did.
Twins, Parker and Emma, were born on Nov. 6.
While this was an exciting time, Maffia described holding the babies for the first time as bittersweet.
“They were born on a Monday and there were no guarantees she would sign. So we were holding and caring for the twins but technically they weren’t ours until she signed the surrender papers on Wednesday. The first time holding them was very difficult. I wanted to believe they were ours, but there was no guarantees. So I was afraid to fall too much in love. However after the papers were signed I still felt on edge since they were still with their birth mom. It wasn’t until discharge on Thursday and we had them in our car seats and we drove off from the hospital that I opened my heart to them. I cried and not a pretty cry like a hysterical cry of relief for about 20 minutes as my husband drove home. The first time I held them when we got home it was surreal. It felt amazing. I was instantly in love with them.”
The couple says each day is a learning experience, but they wouldn’t have it any other way. Their babies will always be loved with all of their hearts.
“I want them to be kind, giving, and well educated,” said Maffia. “And I definitely will always talk to them about adoption.”
Although the adoption process was exceptionally difficult for the couple, Maffia says everything they went through was well worth it.
“Throughout our challenges people kept saying ‘everything happens for a reason.’ We knew that to be true and that’s why we were experiencing those challenges to finally bring us to our twins, but it was hard to see that in the moment,” he said. “The biggest thing is to not just sit back. Be active in the process and be supportive of one another if you are adopting as a couple.”
