About Us
About Our Agency
Courageous Hearts Adoptions is a boutique-style non-profit adoption agency, which means our small but dedicated team compassionately gives you the personalized attention you deserve. Our collective experience and passion helps us guide birth mothers and adoptive parents alike.
Our Mission
To provide competent and transparent adoption services that meet the unmet needs of the birth parents we serve, while reducing the financial risks to potential adoptive parents.
Our Vision
Adoption services that are compassionate, holistic, and provide for expecting and birth mother needs while keeping fees low for adopting families.
Our Story
Courageous Hearts Adoptions was founded by a local family in Indiana — Greg and Julie Menefee (pictured above), their daughter-in-law, Jenna, and Jenna’s sister, Sara. Each was motivated to become involved through personal experiences with adoption.
Greg and Julie of Franklin, Indiana, have two granddaughters through adoption who have brought them great joy. They recognized the impact of adoption on a family. Adoption not only changes the lives of the adoptive parents and child, but it changes the lives of the entire extended family for the better. Jenna Menefee has two daughters through adoption and understands firsthand how the adoption process can be both emotionally and financially stressful yet completely worthwhile. She wanted to help other adoptive parents achieve their dreams of starting a family. Like so many other adoptive parents, Jenna would not be a mother today without the loving and selfless decisions made by her daughters’ birth mothers.
The Menefees also observed the financial stress involved in domestic adoptions and wanted to make the process more accessible for deserving families. They enlisted Jenna, an adoptive parent, and her sister, Sara Baker, who was already a practicing adoption professional in the community, to help develop a new program in Indiana.
Sara is well-versed in adoption. She stood alongside Jenna through both of her adoptions, and through her professional experience, she’s come to learn how inaccurate common adoption language can be in the notion that birth parents “give up” their child to be adopted. Sara is passionate about changing that perspective in society.
Adoption has been a huge blessing to all members of this family, and it is their desire to help other families have the same experience.
Stories of Love & Family
Every adoption story is different, but each of them is a beautiful representation of love and courage. Here, we share some of the stories we’ve collected from adoptive families, adoptees, and birth mothers that have made a lasting impact on all of us at Courageous Hearts.
Sara’s Story of True Love
Ever since Sara was a little girl, she knew she wanted to have a child by adoption. In March 2020, she would realize this dream and hold her baby girl for the very first time. But the journey to meeting their daughter was a “rollercoaster of feeling hopeful and heartbroken.”
Andrew & Jere: Daddy and Papa
In 2013, Andrew (now a member of our Board) and Jere officially became known as “Daddy” and “Papa”. Married in 2009, the two dreamed of becoming fathers together and growing their beautiful family.
Laura & Tommie’s Perfect Family
Laura and Tommie’s adoption process was rather quick but would be one that was difficult for them emotionally. But their future match would be “meant to be.”
Kristin’s Whirlwind Adoption
For Kristin, adoption was always an option, “I’m adopted. So I think in the back of my mind, I thought I would have a child through adoption.” But she felt unprepared for how quickly life changed.
Johnny Was Worth Every Waiting Moment
When Eve first laid her eyes on Johnny, it was like an “overwhelming sensation of peace.” With him in her arms, she felt at home, like life finally made sense. Not only did she find an instant bond with Johnny, she felt like he was meant to be part of their family.
How Taylor Embraces Her Adoptee Identity
Taylor was adopted as a baby from Korea by her Caucasian, American parents, who already had two biological sons. Today, Dr. Taylor Whittington is a health educator in higher education, and she is an adoption advocate.
One Birth Mom’s Courageous Decision
Every adoption starts with loss, but they do not have to end with it. For Brandi, working with Courageous Hearts Adoptions and creating an open adoption plan, has allowed her to heal and continue to love her baby that she placed for adoption.
A Single Mom’s Gift
Given her own life circumstances, Patricia decided to become a single mother. After failed fertility treatments and local domestic adoption in her Canadian hometown not being an option, she was excited to learn about her options for international newborn adoption from the U.S. What particularly drew her to adoption with Courageous Hearts was the openness, “that birth mothers get to…
A Second Adoption for Jason and Billy
Billy and Jason recently welcomed a beautiful baby boy into their home and growing family. Beau is their second child and though they had also adopted their 4-year-old daughter Louisa, the dads still had many of the same questions to consider that they did before their first adoption: Can we responsibly afford another adoption? Can we take the needed parental…
A forever thankful birth mother
The decision of expecting and birth moms to place a child for adoption is not easy. It can be scary and every single person has their own journey leading them to that decision. At Courageous Hearts Adoptions, we understand that not every expecting and birth parent has a network of support surrounding them during this process. While we work to…
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As you consider your options for adoption, we want to help you confidently make decisions and reduce your stress. We have tons of resources for you on this site, but we understand that sometimes you just need to reach out to someone and have an actual conversation.