When we first started the adoption process we told everyone we were adopting from China and we had every intention of doing that. We found an agency to work with, we worked and saved money in the hopes of beginning the process, and I prayed. One night in particular, I prayed that our "daughter in China" would be kept safe and have her needs met until we could get to her. After I said those words I felt in my heart (if you've never had an experience like this then you won't be able to relate) that our daughter, our child, was not in China. It was just a feeling, a thought. I didn't see a vision or hear an audible voice or anything weird like that. Well, I dismissed it but this continued on. Every night I prayed for our daughter in China and every night felt like China was not where our child was.
I began to research other countries and was drawn to Haiti. I was very interested in the adoption process there. I did my research and approached James with the idea. His response was less than excited. He worried about disease and malnourishment and what that would mean long term for a baby.
A few months later we got the phone call about a baby in San Antonio. We said we were interested and pursued that route. Of course, it didn't work out. Side note here: I had an uneasy feeling about that situation but I ignored it. After the devastation of that experience we didn't know what to do. So we did nothing for a while.
We then got a phone call about a baby boy that was due in a few months. We planned to adopt him but his birth mother changed her mind a few weeks before he was born. Again, we were left with our heads spinning and just at a loss as to what our next step should be.
We talked a lot about invitro-fertilization at this point. We went to a fertility clinic and visited with a doctor. She examined me, read about our background and the 7 failed artificial insemination's we had years earlier. She gave us a 70% chance of being successful with IVF. We thought about it, weighed out the pro's and con's, looked at the financial side of it, etc. I finally fessed up to James that I wasn't emotionally ready for this right now. He said that was fine and was an option we could re-visit later on.
I kept researching adoption and kept feeling led to Haiti. I belong to an online group of adoptive parents that have completed international adoptions. It's a great group, very informative. One day someone posted a message about a little girl in Haiti that was 6 years old and very malnourished. She had two brothers that were being adopted by a family but for some reason they couldn't adopt the little girl. I was shocked and saddened that these children were being split up. I thought to myself that James and I could adopt her, we could love her, we could contact the family adopting her brothers and hopefully she could keep in touch them as they all grew up. I contacted the orphanage in Haiti.
Long story short, the little girl was being adopted with her brothers. I was happy she was staying with her brothers, happy she would know the love of a family. A few days later the orphanage director emailed me. She said she had half-siblings that had just been brought to the orphanage a week earlier. They were 2 and 4 years old, a boy and a girl. Would we be interested in adopting them? She attached a picture. When I saw them my heart jumped. I knew these were our children. I have looked at several photo listings of waiting children and never felt the way I did when I looked at these two.
I emailed her back and told her I was interested but hadn't talked to my husband yet. I asked what we needed to do, what was the process? She emailed me back with details. I was on cloud 9. I couldn't wait to get home and tell James. He listened to me and told me he needed to think about everything. He was worried about the language barrier and the cost of adopting two children versus one-but he didn't say no. I was on pins and needles for a week waiting his answer. Finally, "yes"! Woo hoo!
December 21, 2006 we committed to the adoption of these two sweeties and began the process. We did not bring them home until June 23, 2009. It was a long, drawn out process that caused us much stress but Gracie and Samuel were worth every bit of it. We are so blessed to have them as our children. We pray for their birth families daily and hope to make annual visits to Haiti to see them beginning in 2011.
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