Michael & Mike

Family is central to both of our lives and everyone is very supportive of our decision to become fathers through adoption. We are both so fortunate that both of our sets of parents are still married, still in love, and still driving each other nuts. We both have one sister who is three years older than we are. Mike’s family all lives in New York, and all just a few minutes away. This makes for some lively dinners with his parents, Neal and Dori, his sister and brother-in-law, Abbe and Abe (I guess we all like people with names like our own?), and our two rambunctious nephews, Jason and David (whom we adore). Sometimes Abe’s daughters from a previous marriage, Jackie and Rachel, join us, and more recently Jackie’s husband, Alvise (Al-veez-a…he’s Italian), and their son, the newest addition to our family, baby Andrea (they are now pregnant with twins!). We are blessed to have that incredible family so close to us. Whether we are having lunch on my parents terrace or watching football with my sister’s family or having homemade pasta that Alvise made, it’s wonderful being able to share so much time with family.

Michael’s parents, Ileana and Angel, still live in Miami. His sister, BB, lives in the Florida Keys, about an hour from his parents. They are also really close and see each other at least once a week.We visit them at least 4 times a year and always for two-to-three weeks over Christmas. We love spending time with his parents in the house, watching TV or movies, or going out to PF Changs or a neighborhood Indian restaurant. We love visiting BB and her husband, Steve, in the Keys. They are both lawyers, but live the perfect, relaxed Keys life, with two adorable dogs, Penny and Khaleesi, a boat, a pool with a nearby outdoor TV where we can watch games, a hot tub, and fishing off the dock. Our brother-in-law, Steve’s son Jason and Michael’s cousin Lisa live in the Keys too, so we always see them when we are there, and our brother-in-law, Steve’s other sons Tyler and Kenny are usually there over the holidays with Kenny’s wife Kyla and their young son. We love going on the boat with Captain Steve to the sandbar or to a restaurant or just fishing. The water is unbelievable, and the fish are usually biting. Oh, and every time we’re in the keys we have to get stone crabs at Key Largo Fisheries. Sometimes the claws are as big as your head if you get the colossal size!

Mike’s growing up story

I was born and raised in Manhattan in New York City. My parents, Neal and Dori, are both doctors, and incredibly loving. I’ll share a bit more about them later, but we’re still very close. I have one older sister, Abbe. She was pretty cool to me. She went to a music and art school and played the flute really well. When I was young, I was into comic books and baseball cards, cartoons and sports. My dad was a big Yankees, Giants, and Knicks fan, so that’s what I became too. I played sports a lot, especially basketball. I went to summer sleep-away camps that were mainly sports focused, including basketball and tennis camps, from when I was 9 to 14.

As opposed to much of my previous schooling, high school was a much bigger specialized science and math school. Since my parents were both doctors, they really helped me with science and math in school and that helped me when I took the test to get into the school. High school was the best school experience I ever had, and I am still friends with many of the kids I went to school with, Jason, Lauren, Sarah, Aanal, Durwin, Felix, and more. We were inseparable in school, and still talk frequently. We all were very into music, especially hip hop. Hip hop in New York in the early 90s was incredible, and I still have the best memories of going to see concerts of groups like A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, Public Enemy, Busta Rhymes and countless others. It felt like we went to a concert every week. I enjoyed my college and graduate school experiences as well, where I focused on literature. I met Michael soon as I was entering Grad School.

Michael’s growing up story

While Mike was growing up in the fast-paced city, it was all sunglasses and bathing suits in Miami, where I grew up. While I live in New York now, I’ll always be a Miami boy at heart. My parents, Angel and Ileana, both came from Cuba in the 1960s and made a home in Miami. My father worked for AT&T before he became an economics professor, and my mother was a school administrator. My older sister, Beatriz aka BB, and I both went to Catholic school and excelled in academics. My parents loved to take us to Disney World in Orlando. I loved it so much that as a kid I wanted to grow up to be a roller coaster designer. I still love Disney and can’t wait for our child to experience the Disney magic like I did. Like Mike, I was also very into music growing up. My first job at the age of 15 was at a record store called Specs. I became a buyer at the store and was obsessed with music, mainly British music like The Cure, The Smiths, Depeche Mode, New Order, George Michael, and lots of obscure groups no one has ever heard of except for real music nerds. I went to a lot of concerts, but I wanted backstage access, so I started a free music magazine, Bizzare, that had distribution throughout Florida. Being the editor of a music magazine provided me with contacts with record companies and ultimately got me backstage to meet a lot of great bands. I focused on Economics and Art History at Columbia University, but I knew I really wanted to be in the music business, so I interned at record companies during my semesters. When I graduated, my first job was in the Latin American division of Warner Music, giving me the opportunity to travel throughout Argentina, Chile, Mexico, Venezuela and Colombia as well as the United States. It was while I was working there that I met Mike.

What’s Important to Us

Family is key, and we always make time for each other. We get to see Mike’s parents and sister + nephews frequently, but always make sure to plan a couple of trips to see Michael’s family each year. Our friends also bring a lot of happiness into our lives. We get so much joy from our friendships, and rely on them for so much emotional support. Our family and friends are all so excited about our adopting a baby. I can’t wait for them to provide love and support to our child like they have to us over the years. Our passions and interests have allowed for us to grow with each other. We’re always interested in exploring all the amazing cultural offerings New York has to offer, and going to museums, art galleries, the theater, and concerts has given us the opportunity to see the world through other’s eyes and to constantly learn about new things. We can’t wait to see those things through a child’s eyes. Our mental and physical health is, of course, vital to our enjoying all of these things. We love going on walks and runs, and playing tennis or working out together for the physical side. For the mental health, having so much love and support from our families, being able to have time to read and enjoy activities apart from work is key. Time is another thing that we value. While work is important to us, and we are fortunate to have good, stable careers, we both feel it’s necessary to find time for our interests and leisure and all of the other things we’ve talked about that are important to us. We are so excited to make a shift in the way we spend our time once our baby comes into our lives.

Why We Want a Family

We’ve always talked about adopting a child, so it’s always been a question of when we would be blessed by adoption. We’ve always felt like we have so much unconditional love and support to give but we wanted to wait until we had successful careers so that we could completely devote our lives to a child. We were both raised in incredibly loving homes, and we want to create a home that is full of joy, where we can share that love and build something wonderful. We share many of the same values and look forward to bringing up a child together. We will always be good role models and be honest, loyal, dependable, socially conscious, ethical, and loving. We’ve always loved being around and caring for kids, and being able to be in Mike’s nephews’ lives is one of the highlights of our lives. Adoption has been a wonderful part of our lives for many years as our close friend, Andrew and his husband Tony became parents through adoption. We’ve been a part of their lives and watched as their kids have grown up. Andrew always told us how meaningful being a father is. We’ve been so fortunate to have him and Tony as models for fatherhood.

How We Plan to Raise a Family

We are so excited to be parents and have often talked about how we want to be as parents and as a family. Unconditional love is something we practice with each other and can’t wait to share that with our child. Of course that doesn’t mean we won’t correct and guide our child, but we want to do that in a nurturing and encouraging way, making it clear that our love is there regardless. Some of that guidance will be about building the child’s self-esteem and confidence, whether praising them when having done good or allowing them the space to accomplish things on their own. We aren’t naïve, though, and don’t think parenting is all high fives and celebrating accomplishments. Having house rules will be important, but within reason. Basic things like cleaning up after oneself, telling the truth, apologizing when wrong, brushing teeth, and no name calling are straightforward and will be helpful for the child to understand what’s expected. When discipline is necessary, we want it to be consistent with warnings and then an escalation like time out or loss of privileges, and most importantly, consistency between the two of us. That will take communication and patience. We want to make sure that we take the time to explain to our child as best as we can. We also want to try to be good role models for our child, knowing that children learn by watching. Mike’s dad likes to say “Model the behavior you want to see from others.” All of this sounds great on paper, but we also recognize parenting is difficult and takes a lot of flexibility, so we don’t expect things to proceed on our schedule or as we imagine it. We know we need to be flexible and change our parenting style as the child grows and changes.

We want to have our child have lots of experiences and expose them to many different things. Whether it’s playing sports together or taking them to museums, helping them build Lego models or enrolling them in robot school (I want to go too!), we want them to try a lot of different things so they can figure out what interests them. We don’t have a vision of what we want our child to be, but rather want them to be able to follow the paths that interest them most. Obviously that will take patience and dedication, but we’ll be there to encourage and help them. That goes for their education too. We both were fortunate to have really strong support from our parents and we want to provide that same support, whether that’s helping out with homework or learning something new together. The opportunity to grow together as a family is really one of the most exciting aspects of this journey. We can’t wait!

Our Strengths and values

We’re excited to create a loving, stable home for our child. As hard as it can be to talk about one’s own strengths without sounding egotistical, we believe we owe it to you as a way for you to start to imagine the type of home it will be. We both have been there for our friends and families when they want to talk about serious issues, whether around health, love, or struggles. That’s a testament to our abilities to listen well, our supportive natures, and compassionate hearts. We are both non-judgmental, but also able to provide good judgment and fair advice, helping provide clarity around decisions others may make and consequences of their actions. We believe this will only be a benefit when raising a child, instilling core values, and then giving them the tools to make foster good judgment skills.

We talked a bit earlier about unconditional love, and can’t wait to practice that with our child as we do with our families and core friends. Related to love, we believe that kindness and politeness are keys to creating a better society. Whether lending a hand to someone we don’t know, sending a kind note to a friend who hosted us for dinner, sharing a beautiful art work with people we know will enjoy it, cleaning up balloons and water bottles that were left or washed up on a beach, forgiving a friend for being cruel, kindness can take many different forms. Importantly, we believe that kindness shouldn’t just be practiced when people are watching, as a way to signal virtue, but when nobody’s looking.

Trustworthiness and honesty are two additional strengths. When we give our word to someone, we do everything within our powers to follow through and live up to that word. “Word is bond” is another way to explain it. Our reputations and honor are built on friends’, families’, and colleagues’ ability to trust what we tell them and our taking responsibility for our words and actions. We pride ourselves on our forthrightness and straightforwardness, and our follow through on the things we say.

Finally, our gratitude for our lives, friends and family is something we exercise every day. We are so fortunate and have so much good in our lives. We feel it’s really important to have gratitude for the positive, for our health and our family and friends’ health, for great experiences we have. Showing gratitude for the positive also allows us to put more difficult or uncertain times into perspective. We are expressing gratitude right now for your having taken the time to read through this and consider us as a home for your child. Thank you!

Thank you from the deepest part of our heart

We hope this has helped you to learn about our values and the kind of life we hope to offer you child. We would be thrilled to learn more about you and your dreams and aspirations for your child. Please feel free to contact us at our tollfree number: 1-800-935-0881. If you would like to email us, you may do so at hello@MichaelAndMike.com.

Whatever decision you make, we wish you peace and comfort.

With love,

Michael and Mike