Our first adoption started smoothly enough. After the tire-spinning of fertility treatments that lead no where, it was exhilarating (if not somewhat exhausting) to gather all the necessary documents needed for our homestudy and dossier. With each paper notarized, signature obtained and fee paid, we knew we were one step closer to parenthood than we'd ever been before.
Then on January 10, 2003 at 4pm, we received our referral phone call. A 3-week old healthy baby boy was in need of a family. It was a Friday afternoon and if we sped down I-95 fast enough, we might get to our adoption agency before they closed for the weekend to get the packet of medical information and that ever-so-precious first picture of our son. In the nick of time, we arrived, scooped up the packet and gazed our the picture of our son, who was 2,000 miles away. We named him right away, signed the referral acceptance letter that next business day and thus began the long wait for his arrival home.
Unfortunately, during that time, adoptions of Guatemalan children to foreign families was entering into an upheaval. I won't bore you, dear reader, with the details of the events that took place but if you do a Google search for "2003 Guatemalan adoption Hague" you will get a feel for the state of convoluted international mess we in which we found ourselves. After the angst and pain of our infertility journey thus far, it seemed unconscionable that this could be happening to us. We feared our son might never come home. But we forged ahead and even flew down to Guatemala to visit him twice that year. After nearly 10 months of sitting on our hands as the Guatemalan court languished over whether or not Guatemala was constitutionally a Hague-compliant nation, God smiled on us and the courts ruled in favor of continuing to permit inter-country adoption. Our son came home to us in December 2003, the day before his first birthday.
Those first few days and weeks of our son's arrival home were a blur. So many people from all around the world (literally) had held us up in prayer that year and we were overwhelmed with well-wishes and expressions of relief that the nightmare was finally over. The relief was indeed palpable. We were exhausted by the experience but thrilled beyond belief to have emerged victorious and with (seemingly) few battle scars.
I was so grateful for the gift of life we'd been given by his birthmother who we would never meet. How does one adequately thank a woman who had given us everything? Would she ever know our tremendous debt and gratitude? We'll likely never know in this life but if I could tell her, I'd like her to know that think of her often and pray for her, especially on his birthday.
To be continued...
No comments:
Post a Comment