I wrote the post below and was going to get a some more details from Charity about her adoption before posting it. Before I could do that we took a trip to Huntsville. We went to visit a couple of our girls, son-in-laws, and grand kids for the 4th. While we were gone we found out our youngest son Matthew had past away. We spent the next week traveling to Daphne, AL where we had his funeral.

Our family joined us there and although it was a very difficult time it was comforting to be surrounded by our children, grandchildren, and extended family! We also got our travel date while there. We will be leaving to get our babies on the 28th of July. Our DAP apt is on the 30th. We are of course exhausted from the past couple of weeks, but have had many friends and family lifting us up in prayer. We are forever grateful! We are also so excited to go and get our girls. I had spent so much time on this that I decided to post it anyway! Hopefully the next time I write something it will be about us holding our children in our arms!


YES...we are still waiting for our travel date.  I can't believe that it takes this long to make a decision.  I am starting to think this is one of those life lessons that God teaches when you think you don't need to be taught. I thought as I have matured that I am so much more patient than when I was younger and this is true in most instances.  I am seeing however that I am still very impatient when it comes to things like this where I have to wait on someone else.  So while I am learning to take deep breathes and WAIT!! I thought I would write about 3 very special people in my life who have adopted children .

 My Mother!

My mother became a foster mom in 1997 to two babies.  Michael was 2 1/2 years old and Aurora was 6 months.  She had prayed that God would send her the children that he wanted her to adopt through being a foster mom.  The children had been removed because of neglect and abuse.  Aurora had been taken to the ER by the parents with a scull fracture that was missed and when taken home was then shaken because of her excessive crying.  Later it was discovered that she had an old leg fracture that had been untreated.  Aurora was left completely blind and eventually would have to have one of her eyes removed.  Michael although not physically injured but had been neglected and needed to be taught basic things that other children his age already knew. 

My mother spent the next 2 1/2 years supervising visits and documenting everything that occurred on those visits and after them.  This was a very difficult time for my mother having to spend time with the people she knew had done this to her baby. I respect her so much for being able to control her temper and tongue during these visits. She was an RN so when the Judge read her version of the interactions between the parents and the children it held a lot of weight.  There was one point when I believe they might have given the children back had it not been for these personal accounts.  After 2 1/2 years of waiting they offered the parents a deal of either signing their parental rights away or face prosecution.  They signed and finally my mother was able to adopt her children.  Today Michael is 17 and Aurora is 15.  

 

Michael is doing wonderful and will graduate this November from high school with plans of joining the Navy!  Aurora has continued to have many disabilities including seizures but through it all remains a joy and such a special gift from God.  It is heart breaking to know that such a beautiful and intelligent person had to suffer at the hands of someone who should have loved and protected her.  You may feel like they got away scott free but they didn't.  They lost two of the most precious gifts that God could give a person.   

 

 

My oldest daughter Charity!

Charity and Chris started talking about adopting a few years back.  They decided they would adopt from China and wanted a healthy toddler. Their son, Christopher had been born with Hypochondroplasia, which is a type of dwarfism.  He is a little person. They decided that to take on another special needs child would be to much.  At the time that they began their paper work Chris was working in Afghanistan. They began their paper work to adopt from China.  Several month's later while looking at the waiting children on Wide Horizons for Children Adoption web site Charity found a beautiful baby girl from Korea.  As most of you know that is where 3 of her sisters are from and also where she was born.  She called me to tell me she had found her daughter.  Now she just had to convince Chris who was 7000 miles away! At the time we, John and I, only lived about a mile away so I went over to see the baby that might be our new grand daughter.  

She began the process of finding out more about our little Emma and how she could switch countries as they were quite far into the paperwork.  Emma was born with Osteogenesis Imperfecta , OI, or better known as brittle bone disease.  They didn't know what type she had but were able to find out that her birth mom and sister had it as well.  She had had multiple broken bones from the birth process since the mother did not inform the doctors of her, (the mother's), condition.  Had they known the mother had OI they would have delivered her by Cesarean and avoided the possibility of breaks.  Since her birth she was with a foster family while waiting for her adoption. She had had excellent care and was loved.  She was one of the most beautiful babies I had ever laid my eyes on.  

Emma was 8 months old when they committed to her and 14 month when my daughter left to pick her up in Seoul! 

Emma has had multiple breaks, (including one when I was keeping her), since coming home and each time it breaks our hearts to know that she is in such pain and so afraid.  Charity and Chris do their best to allow her the freedom to explore her world but have come to realize that she must be protected sometimes even from herself.  She is 4 now and like all 4 year olds wants to climb, jump, and play.  Her most recent break of her leg has caused some bowing and she is now using a walker. We hope this will be temp and that as she grows she will become stronger and her bones will become thicker.  

 

   

Okay so maybe I went a little wild with the photos but she is just so stinking cute! You're all lucky I didn't post all of my pictures...LOL!

My Niece Desiree!

Desiree is my younger sister's only daughter and has lived with or near John and me for most of her life.  When Desiree was 22 she and her husband Jason agreed to care for a high school friends baby that had been born with every drug in her system except for alcohol. The birth mother could not get any family members to take her daughter.  She was headed to jail and didn't want her baby to go into foster care.  Desiree agreed but only if she could adopt her.  She knew she could never care for her then give her back. The mother agreed but because DCF was already involved it couldn't be a private adoption.  DCF brought little Corianna to Desiree straight from the hospital when she was 5 days old and weighed less than 5 pounds.  

God truly was working in this child's life to allow her to be with Desiree since she was to young at 22 to even be a foster mom.  Little Corianna suffered horrible drug withdrawals and would cry for hours.  She had numerous medical apts that Desiree would take her to along with her son Jason who was 3. I look back and think how young and brave she was to take a baby with so many problems, not knowing what the future would hold and if she would suffer effects of the drugs on into her childhood.

During the time that she was caring for Corianna her husband Jason left her but they agreed to keep it to themselves.  They would continue the adoption so that Corianna would not go into foster care and would take care of their personal issues after the adoption.  Just a few months before they were to have everything completed Jason's parents who didn't agree with adoption, (not just hers but any adoption), and had never wanted them to keep Corianna called DCF and told them of the pending divorce.  DCF threatened to remove the baby from her care.  Desiree called her case worker begging for her help. She spoke up in Desiree's defense because she was such a good mom and had cared so well for Corianna.  She went to battle for her and Desiree was allowed to continue to care for Corianna but the adoption was up in jeopardy.  Desiree now faced a divorcee and the reality that she might lose her daughter.  Remember, she was very young, divorced, and a stay at home mom with no income or profession.  She moved to southern Florida to be near family. This way she would have help and support.  We as a family tried to give that and covered her and Corianna with prayer.  Only God could take this situation and fix it and none of us could see how he was going to do it.  

Shortly after this DCF had a meeting and tried to tell her that she couldn't adopt her daughter. While in this meeting to determine the future of Corianna.  Desiree showed them detailed documentation that she had kept at the urging of her Grandmother, my mom, about Dr visit's, Corianna's care from DCF or lack there of, and how DCF had dropped the ball on many, many occasions in providing the proper benefits that the baby was due. When this happened Desiree had seen to it that Corianna got what was needed no matter what the cost to her personally.  God placed the right people at that meeting and a supervisor sitting in made the decision that she was a fit mom, had been doing a wonderful job, and would approve the adoption.  So after 18 months of not knowing how God would make this happen she became the sole adopted parent of her sweet baby girl at the age of 23!

Corianna is now 5 years old and will begin kindergarten at home, (Desiree home schools).  She is a beautiful, sweet, and very intelligent little girl who has brought so much joy not only to her mom but also to her extended family.  

We, (our family), sometimes look at these children like all of the children that we have been blessed with through the years and can't believe that God chose and continues to choose to allow us the privilege of having them in our lives!