Adoption
is less about getting a child for your family and more about giving your family
for a child. Caring for children without families does not begin with what they
have to offer us but with what we must be willing to offer them, no matter
what, at all costs.-- Jason Johnson’s
Blog
We decided
17 months ago that we would go down the adoption road. After years of praying
about this it was finally time to get going.
A little
background about us; Jason was really
happy after son #3 and took a long while to decide that just one more would be
good idea. Jay is a result of me having
baby fever and Linda saying, “You know….things can be reversed.” I know…. TMI,
right?? After much prayer and prodding Jason had things reversed and we now
have our Jay Jay. Jason has endured a lot so that we could have just one more
baby so when I started talking about adoption he was REALLY sure that he was
done adding to our family.
I have
volunteered for LWB for 7 years now. LWB
is a Chinese charity that helps orphaned children with medical care, placement
into FC, nutrition and education programs, and helps position them to be
eligible for adoption. Once their physical and medical needs are met the
orphanage will agree to file their adoption paperwork. I have had the joy in
seeing many of “my” LWB kids join their forever families. I actually found LWB
while searching the web about Chinese adoptions. I don’t know if she will
remember this but my mom said, after our 3rd son, “Sis, to get a
girl you’re going to have to go to China”. So began my information searches
that lead to our adopting the girls. Over the years I have fallen in love with
little almond eyes and olive skin of both boys and girls. 143 million children
worldwide are orphans. This fact breaks my heart. I am a Mom and they need a
Mom. In my eyes the solution to this problem was easy. We needed to bring at
least one home and make her our daughter.
I asked Jason to pray about it as I didn’t
want him to agree simply so I would be quiet. I wanted him to feel the burden
that I did and be 100% on board before doing this. It took 5 or so years for
him to feel like God was saying yes.
After many months of discussing, we decided to set a deadline and meet
again and decide if this was God’s will for us or not. At that meeting, in our
kitchen, I was prepared for him to say no. Honestly, if that was his answer then
I needed to accept that God was leading him. I know after 23 years of marriage
that he takes seriously his role as leader of our home and doesn’t want to do
anything that isn’t in God’s plan for us. So, the meeting occurred and he said,
“I think the answer is yes.” Really?? I said, “You think Yes, or you’re saying
Yes?” Yes, my answer is yes!!! I waited a few days and kept asking him each day
if he was still saying yes.
We signed
with an agency and began the process. It has been a long, exhausting, happy, frustrating
rollercoaster of emotions. I have had meltdowns, tears, and more tears… but
finally after waiting 14 months we had a referral. The phone rang and Sarah
from CCAI said, “Melissa, you marked that you would consider adopting two
children. Are you still open to that?” YES I said. She then asked if I needed
to talk to my husband about his openness to two children before emailing a file
for TWIN girls. NO, NO, NO I don’t need to talk to him, send me the file!! Luckily he was ok with that too.
So our file
came in the middle of setting up for our 3rd yard sale. I ran to the
computer and hit refresh a thousand times before her email came up. I took a
moment to call Jason and let him in on our news. I was crying and he couldn’t
understand a word I was saying. Actually, he thought someone in our family had
died. I opened the email and there they were. We had started our adoption in
the SN line. We knew that “she” would have some SN. We had marked some pretty
scary conditions that we thought we could handle medically. Jamison’s heart
defect had given us confidence that with God’s help we could add a child with
medical needs to our family. So there they were, almost two, adorable, and completely
healthy. Their files were marked as premature and low birth weight. They
weighed 4.5 and 5 pounds at birth. That is actually good size for twins. Their
file says that they have caught up developmentally and don’t have any known
effects of being premature. Praise God!
I had
mentioned to Jason a few times during our wait that we might have to adopt one
more time so that our “Mei Mei” would have a sister. Someone to go through life
with that looked like her. Not that I wanted to go through this process again
but every little girl needs a sister. I adore my sister by birth and my sister
by marriage. God hears the desires of our heart. He gave us two healthy girls
who will be sisters by adoption and by birth.
We feel
extremely blessed and terrified too. I’m not the young 23 year old that I was
when I first became a mother. With God’s help and our family of helpers I know
that this will be an exciting journey with our 6 children.
I love you
all so deeply and I’m so grateful that God has placed each one of you in our
lives. Please pray for our girls:
1.
That God will prepare their hearts. They are
losing everything that is familiar to them.
2.
That their foster family will be loving and kind
with them. That they will help prepare them for our coming.
3.
That we will all stay healthy during the trip.
4.
That there won’t be any more delays in our
travel. Smooth sailing from here on out.
5.
That our home and business will run smoothly in
our absence.
6.
And that our girls are good sleepers and adjust
to the time difference quickly.
Melissa
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