Welcome! Meet:

Marc + Karina

Emergency Room Nurse / Pediatric Nurse

Washington

Caucasian

None / Other

All About Marc & Karina
Why Adoption?
Gallery
Family and Home
Advice to Future Child
Perspectives on Open Adoption
Favorites

All About Marc & Karina

Hello, we are Karina and Marc. We hail from the far ends of the country – Karina was born in Hawaii and Marc in Boston – but we met in the middle in Washington state. We almost never met, because we both almost skipped the party that first brought us together in 2014. We’re glad we went and we got married five years later at the beach. We both work as nurses— Karina in pediatric primary care with an emphasis on children’s mental health and Marc in the emergency department.

Why Adoption?

Openness is a broad concept and we have given it careful thought as we chose adoption as our path to parenting. We believe that love is additive; the more people a child loves, and is loved by, the more everyone gains. We will center love as our motivation for continued connection, communication, and care with our child’s birth family. We deeply hold the desire to share as much of our child’s life with their whole birth family. We are willing and eager to do all that we can to keep our child connected to their birth family.

Family & Home

We love that our home is in a diverse neighborhood tucked into the big, exciting city. Thankfully, our home is close to both of our workplaces so we can spend more time as a family than commuting. We are across the street from a large park where we like to walk the dog and he likes to play at the playground. Karina enjoys knowing her coworkers are our neighbors and their kids are in our community schools.

We are blessed with messy, loving families as well as found families of close friends. Karina's friends have seen her through every life stage as they grew up together. Marc's friends have seen him through the worst days, hurricanes and COVID-19. Our friends and family are excited and supportive of our dream to grow our family through open adoption.

How others describe me

According to Marc, Karina is an incredibly empathetic person who invests her whole heart into everything she does. Her life’s mission is working with children and supporting young minds, helping them become confident and compassionate adults. She shares her love through food, writing messages on packed lunches and sharing lasagna with friends in need of support. Karina loves tending to growing things, from our dog Cerberus to her tomato plants on the balcony.

Karina thinks Marc is the kind of person you want as an emergency contact. He is dependable and caring. Marc is an incredibly energetic introvert. Most of his hobbies are quiet, reading fantasy novels and playing video games. He brings a sense of adventure to otherwise ordinary things. Running errands with Marc can turn into a side quest to find an off the beaten path event. One trip for ice cream ended with a brass band street concert. He zips around the city on his electric motorcycle and brings it home to his garage turned nerdy Bat Cave.

Advice to Future Child

In our family, compassion is the most important value - compassion for others and self. We hope to instill and support personal integrity, emotional intelligence, and an endless sense of curiosity. Children deserve every opportunity to explore themselves, their identity, and their environment. An open adoption will provide our child with the chance to know their whole story enriched with the traditions of their whole family. We look forward to sharing nature, exploring art, and engaging in community. We plan to seek out places of wonder in the natural world and moments of inter-connectedness in a bustling city. We both love the written word and want to share the magic of storytelling through libraries, theaters, movies, and campfire tales. The opportunity to learn comes in many places outside a traditional classroom - we plan to take advantage of that. Most importantly, we believe that the "work of childhood" is play.

Perspectives on Open Adoption

We hope to center our child's sense of self in their whole story. We dream about celebrating their joys with their birth family. We want to promote a sense of security through interconnected and open hearted relationships between us and our child’s birth family. Remaining flexible to meet the needs of all involved is something we are deeply committed to. Clear communication is essential to supporting this relationship and we are committed to do that. Further, it is something we prioritize together and with the people who share out lives. We hope to extend that to our child's birth family.

Favorites

Marc

Favorite Movie: The Star Wars Saga
Favorite Holiday/Tradition: getting dressed up for Halloween
Hobbies/Interests: reading, gaming, and motorcycling
Dream Vacation: Iceland to see the Northern lights and hotsprings
If I Could Choose a Superpower: fly

Karina

Favorite Movie: Hunger Games Series
Favorite Holiday/Tradition: dancing at New Years
Hobbies/Interests: dancing, cooking, reading
Dream Vacation: New Zealand
If I Could Choose a Superpower: Teleportation, no more traffic!