Daniel and I always knew they wanted many children. Daniel came from a big family and loved the
dynamics of that. I only had one sister
and always wished for more siblings growing up.
When I was in graduate school for her degree in
speech-language pathology, I interned at a skilled nursing and therapy center
called Special Kids. After graduation, I
was hired there. One of my first clients
was a little girl adopted from China with significant delays. I fell in love! My boss also had adopted a little girl from
China after doing missionary work there for a year. I had never considered adoption as a means to
grow their family until meeting these people who had adopted and loving their
children.
Then, Daniel’s cousin adopted a little girl from
Taiwan. Seeing them go thru the process
successfully and the obvious joy the little girl brought to their family made us
start to talk about adoption. After our
second son was born, we decided to start the adoption process from Taiwan, thru
the same organization that Daniel’s cousin used. It was clear very fast that God was not
leading us to Taiwan. Doors slammed shut
everywhere we looked until Congo.
The Democratic Republic of Congo in Africa was where we felt
God’s leading. An amazing organization
that usually only takes on families known personally by past clients or thru
the founder’s church, decided to take on Daniel and I despite never meeting us. It was an amazing set of circumstances when
they found out they were only second on the list for a referral for an infant girl
(0-12 months old). In January of 2013, 7
months after initially signing on with Our Family in Africa, we accepted the
referral of a beautiful, but tiny 12 day old baby girl. We decided to name her
Selah Grace. (Her Congolese name is Ndjoka Therese).
Things with Selah moved smoothly. We were expecting to have her home by the
summer of 2013. However, things began to
slow down dramatically at the Embassy in Kinshasa, DRC and it was taking much
longer to get visas. We were thrilled,
however, when they received the adoption judgment in June 2013 and Selah was
officially our daughter!
However, in September 2013 the Congolese government suddenly
and unexpectedly imposed a suspension on the issuance of exit letters. The exit letter is the last thing needed to
leave the country with your child.
It has been 22 months since the suspension was put in place
and we still don’t have Selah home. Since that time, God had blessed us with a
baby girl thru birth we named Emma. She
is now 1 year old. Selah is still stuck in Congo and is over 2
years old now. She is healthy and doing
well and we give thanks for that every day.
Thru the process of waiting for Selah, we knew God was
stretching us. He was teaching us
lessons on waiting, perseverance, and that anything worth having is hard. We began to focus more on Selah and the
children waiting rather than their dream to adopt a young baby. We began to realize that no adoption is a non
special needs adoption. All children
come home with some sort of special needs.
The things that used to scare them, such as disabilities, didn’t seem so
scary anymore. After all, it’s not about
us as parents but about the children.
It’s about giving a child a home that needs one. And knowing it will be
messy and hard.
Daniel and I had always wanted to adopt but after the
hardships and feeling completely emotionally drained, we didn’t know if they
would ever adopt internationally again.
One night, I found a little girl on rainbow kids, an
adoption photolisting. She was nearly 3
years old and had down syndrome. I
remembered my time at Special Kids and how she always had a special place in my
heart for children with down syndrome.
This little girl was in China and Daniel and I didn’t meet the
requirements. However, I kept feeling
drawn to the little girl’s picture.
Then, in January of 2015, China changed some requirements
for the better! We suddenly qualified
where we didn’t before. Then, once
again, I saw a little girl on the photolisting that I felt drawn to. Since we now qualified, she decided to
inquire about her. The file was sent and
I was amazed! When looking at all the pictures, I discovered it was the same
little girl from months ago! This agency
was just using a different picture for the photolisting!
Daniel and I spent much time in prayer and research. We both felt drawn to this little girl. Finally, the agency sent a couple of videos
and when we saw the sweet girl in China smiling at the camera, we both broke
down in tears. We knew she was our daughter. We made it official with the agency on the
little girls 3rd birthday. We
have decided to name her Haven Joy.
Daniel and I always knew we wanted a big family and love
that God is in charge with how big that family will be! Now when we say we are called to adopt, we
know that the calling may not come when we think is best, but when God knows is
best. We are still fighting to bring
Selah home and now starting the process to bring Haven home as well.
God has used the wait and struggle for Selah to mold Daniel
and I so they would be ready to say ‘yes’ to another little girl in China. God uses hard, impossible things to bring
glory to Him. What started off as a
journey to bring home a healthy baby girl has resulted in striving to bring
home a toddler from Africa and a toddler with a lifelong special need from
China.
And that is the perfect story after all.
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