A Gift And A Loss

Well, I cannot believe that I'm writing this, but we went from being a family of three to a family of five, in less than a year! Just a few months after finishing post placement requirements for Harrison's adoption, we got another placement. You may be wondering how this all began... Weeks, maybe more like days or moments after getting placement of my sweet, soft 6-week-old angel, we knew that we wanted to do it again. We wanted to adopt another child. We thought it would most likely be an older child. We thought it would take a year or two. So we made sure and dropped the hint to "the adoption lady", as my daughter refers to our adoption social worker. Little did we know that just a few months later, we would be bringing home our 3rd child! I never would have thought, as a self-centered, pleasure-loving college student, that I would, in just a few years time, have three children, while hoping for more! I had bought into the cultural current that children were simply work and not blessings. But over the years, the Lord has changed our hearts, so that no longer do we want a small number of children, so we can have "fun" sooner. Instead, we want to always have open hearts and open doors, and accept whatever children the Lord sends our way, through adoption. So, from January to April, the days flew by. I cherished every minute with my sweet baby boy, loving his velevety-soft skin and sweet, babyish ways. I was saddened by how quickly time was flying, getting closer and closer to the toddler years, when mama and baby are not so close and cuddly. What I didn't know was that in Texas, on January 5th, my second son was born. In April, we started getting more serious about updating the home study and getting other paperwork lined up. I also applied for an adoption grant, as we had been watching a particular child on an adoption registry that we thought might be "the one." Then, in mid-May, we received an email about a little boy, a four-month-old, with health problems and a hefty placement fee. They hinted that the fee might be altered because of the situation. I'm not sure if they ever received any info from us, because a few days later we were informed that another family in Texas was interested. We weren't dissapointed; it had seemed like an impossible situation. Then, out of the blue, we received another email, a few weeks later. The placement had not happened in Texas, were we still interested? After a flurry of activity in getting our home study all updated and shiny again, we prepared to wait again, for word of what the decision was. We didn't know how many other families were being considered. Surprise! We had prepared ourselves for another wait when my phone rang and my social worker was telling me that the case worker for this little boy thought we were a perfect fit for him. There were just a couple more if's. They seemed like really BIG if's, but looking back, they were just speed bumps placed by the Lord, to help us trust Him. And I'm sure He enjoyed that fact that we talked to Him a lot more during that month. Throughout the entire month of June, we waited to hear what the outcome would be with this adoption. At first, we spent a bit of time getting used to the idea of all the mixed bag of medical/possible special needs this boy would come with. Reading his history of medical emergencies and challenges really brings me to tears now. But I also was comforted by John 9:2 "Neither this man nor his parents sinned," said Jesus, "but this happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life." Now, waiting and not knowing does two things to hopeful parents. It brings a lot of mental stress and anguish (especially knowing that this baby was going in for surgery and that we couldn't be there), and it makes you want the one you're waiting for more and more each day. This causes MORE stress, because you are afraid of getting your heart broken by that little picture, that you try not to look at multiple times per day. This was all made more painful and difficult due to the fact that we were dealing with the illness and imminent loss of my grandpa. He was diagnosed with cancer not long after we got the call about the baby boy. The range and acuteness of suffering that we all felt during this time, was magnified for me by seeing how the disease ravaged my once healthy, always there grandpa. And by seeing how it broke the hearts of his wife and daughters. Losing someone close to you is hard enough, but observing the wounds it evokes in the hearts of the ones you love makes it so much harder. Seeing people who almost never cry break down is terrible, and triggers the emotions felt the last time you saw them cry. We prayed and pleaded for my grandpa. We spent many hours by his side, talking, reminiscing, trying to distract him from the evil enemy that was catching up, and getting closer each day. The memories of that time are still raw and painful. I could go into so much more detail, but I won't. Everyone has to face a loved ones death at some point. And so much about the dying process is incredibly intimate. It's so strange and so real. It makes even death seem different, familiar?? It's hard to describe. I am thankful that I got to be with grandpa and my family the moment that he passed. It was so awful watching death powerfully wrench him from our grasp. But the displays of grief and love were beautiful. Exhaustion, sorrow and love brought the crazy, argumentative shards of our family together in that time, cementing us in that moment of stunning pain. And there is definitely a gaping hole where Grandpa Sonny used to be. His quiet pressence is dearly missed. And now I cannot write any more about this. We were still waiting. Waiting to hear if the agency would approve a placement without paying of fees. Let me tell you, despite the fact that most agencies are just trying to help unite children with families, in private adoptions, to my knowledge anyway, fees are rarely, if ever, waived. And they weren't for us either. We knew and quickly informed this agency from the beginning, that we had NO money for the placement. And it was not an insignificant sum. $19,000 is a big portion of our YEARLY income. We could possibly have saved up that much by the time our baby was ready to retire from his life career. But what they agreed to do was place now, and see what we could come up with for fees in the form of fundraising, before the 6 months of pre-finalization were up. We rejoiced, for this truly felt like a miracle. They had incurred a huge amount of bills for this little man and could have tried to find a richer family to take him. But they felt we were a good match for him, and we are SO thankful:) However, the biggest, scariest test of all was ICPC. Because of legal risk, I won't go into the details of why this was such a huge deal, but believe me when I say, his paperwork going through like it did was miraculous. Up till now, we were dealing with compassionate, Christians making decisions about our family's future composition. This felt totally different. This was a government entity, deciding, really, whether this baby would come home with us. And a refusal would most likely have ended the whole process. I kept falling into panic and fear at the thought of what this could mean for us, and then I would remember what the Lord had already done, the doors he had already opened, and I knew He must have done that for a reason. On July 6th, one month after findind out that this baby was still parentless, and also the day after my grandpa's funeral, we found out that we would be bringing home a son. We didn't think ICPC had been submitted yet, and it had only been the day before, but miraculously, it went though in less than 24 hours (they warn you that it can take up to 10 days!!!) The Lord was truly in and around this situation. He, most definitely, wanted Finn to be with us, forever! On July 27th, after a grueling 12-hour-with-two-kids drive, we received placement of our third child, second by adoption. In my next post I will write about the miracles that took place on our way home. We are truly, truly blessed!