Welcome to the King Family - Our Adoption Story

"This is the story of how my wife and I began our adventure in Foster Care and how we started our family." -Zach King

I am outside a courthouse in Orange County and it's gonna be one of the most emotional days of my life but I need to give you a little backstory to what we're doing here it all started in a dance class where this girl caught my eye and eventually I built up the courage to ask her out on a date and luckily she said yes the date was a terrible disaster first of all my car broke down so we decided to ride bikes to a flower restaurant but I had these really fancy rode bikes and I had forgot to show her how to unclip her feet from the special pedals so at a stoplight she fell over I mean completely sideways right into a bush so we're having dinner at the safar Esther on one of her knees totally bruised and bleeding and during our conversation I come to find out that she had adopted siblings in her family which was super neat because I had an adoptive sibling and both of us shared this future dream of having a family and made up of adopted kiddos and biological kiddos and so I was completely in love the night had finally taken a turn for the better and then we started to ride bikes back to my house and no joke she got her foot stuck in the pedals again and fell completely sideways busting open her other knee the bright side of the situation was while I cleaned up her knees with rubbing alcohol I got to hold her hand and help and a few years later I got to ask for her hand in marriage and we threw in an incredible backyard wedding and that was the very beginning of our well I felt like it was speeding up so quickly we bought home Rachel started pursuing a career in social work while my own film career was taking off I always felt like I had the easy fun dream job while her job was emotionally draining she was a case manager for foster and adoptive kiddos and helped them process their stories of abuse and abandonment I watched her every day carry the weight of these foster kiddos pain in the evenings we would talk about this huge need for more foster families in LA County Rachel and I share the same view that if there's a need and we have a resource that could help then why not we had an extra room in our home at the time and it was completely empty and we thought we could do this it was so frustrating and heartbreaking to know that these kids didn't have anywhere to go at night we were ready to take on the foster system but like big dreams tend to do it went to the backburner for a little longer hidden behind excuses like pass I'm gonna also do it her we don't know anything about raising kids yeah but maybe we should have a biological child first yeah we'll do foster care later hey I'm Zack and I'm Rachel and we are applying to be on The Amazing Race I mean we want to have a big family both biological and for adoption and this is kind of our last like big trip this was our audition video for The Amazing Race and to our surprise we were accepted to be a part of the TV show but before we left Rachel and I made a vow to each other that when we got back we would actually open up that empty room in our home for a foster placement soon after we were racing around the world competing for a million dollars on this reality TV show I won't give you any spoilers but I will tell you that when we got back we stuck to our word and we went through the foster training and the same day that we finished our certification process we got a call for our first placement unlike having a biological child where you have nine months to mentally prepare and get yourself ready to be a parent foster placements start with that phone call usually information like the child's name age and any known backstory I still remember the nervous feeling I had in my stomach walking down the dark alley with our empty car seat in hand ready to meet and pick up our first kid Oh I had never changed a poopy diaper swaddled or even fed a baby before what had we signed up for but the moment I saw his face all those thoughts went out the window he was brilliant and beautiful and we were now a family of three and we did all this stuff regular families do morning walks strolls at the beach dinner in the park extra cups of coffee and we put all of our love into this little guy for six months and then we got a call that he was going home we were on the one hand joyful that he could go back to a healed family but we were sure gonna miss him and what happened that same week some call destiny fate I call God another kiddo was born who he had yet to meet his name was Mason he stayed in the hospital for the first month of his life because he was born prematurely and we got to meet him when he was seven weeks old I took this video the very first time I met Mason my hand was almost bigger than his entire body but boy did he grow up quick look at her face how can I love that little Asian face Oh and before we knew it she was walking he was full of energy and life we had our hands full and that's when everything changed this little pumpkin is gonna be a big brother what I'm pregnant [Music] those nine months flew by [Music] this is my first time holding him this is my biological son Liam who quickly bonded with his older brother a brother who was about to stay in our family forever mission tomorrow you're gonna be adopted I am outside of court house it's gonna be one of the most emotional days of my life [Applause] [Music] Mayson is officially adopted family looks different for everybody in the world I like how mother Teresa once put it to change the world go home and love your family [Music] I don't know exactly what my family's gonna look like in the future but I do have a feeling this is just the beginning [Music] [Music]