1. You MUST be flexible especially in international adoption. Flexibility is key. Being flexible will save your sanity.
2. This is like a roller coaster. There will be amazing highs and many things to celebrate. But there will be days that are HARD. Days that just suck the life out of you. But to hang in there because all roller coaster rides eventually end. You may step on another one right after. But all roller coaster rides eventually come to an end.
Well, folks. We went into this eyes wide open. We read and researched like crazy. We attended webinars. We read everything we could get our hands on about the countries we 'qualified' for. We scoured blogs for any shred of helpful information or insight. We emailed agencies. We asked questions. We spoke with agencies. We asked questions. And we prayed. Oh we PRAYED!! And, you know what? God answered. He clearly made the path for us to walk down. He led us to the Democratic Republic of Congo. And the way our story played out after my August 20, 2012 phone call with Amy from our agency can only be described as God orchestrated. We were at the start of our ride heading up the roller coaster.
The months before we accepted the referrals of our kids were not so easy. We were on our way down to the bottom of the roller coaster. We questioned ourselves. We questioned God. I cried - a lot. And in the few weeks before we said yes to becoming Graham's family I was in the middle of one of the most confusing times in my life. We were coming to the bottom of what we thought was the lowest point on the roller coaster. We were hurting and grieving and we thought surely it cannot get any worse. We were wrong and just didn't know it.
We started our climb up another hill of the roller coaster at the end of March 2013 and the beginning of April. On the 8th of April I saw my baby girl's face for the first time. Oh what an amazing day that was! We waited anxiously and somewhat impatiently for the documents we needed to go to court to be made their parents. We tried to prepare ourselves for a LONG wait in court but were surprised to make it through relatively quickly. And then we were a family of EIGHT! Amazing. We were still on the uphill climb of our roller coaster.
We had worked to submit our documents to the United States Government to have our children classified as immediate relatives and get "in line" for a lengthy investigation period. We told ourselves it would be well into 2014 before we received confirmation of their cases being completed. The ride kept chugging on up.
Then news came that slowed down that climb. The DGM put a hold on issuing exit letters. We were so disappointed. But we said "it'll be ok - it will be a long time before our kids have visas appointments and surely they will be open by then!!" We were still climbing up that hill but much more slowly.
We were pleasantly surprised to be approved quickly by the United States Citizenship and Immigration Service but even more shocked to FLY at lightning speed through the embassy investigation period. Two month investigations seemed to be absolutely unheard of!!! Our kids had visa appointments BEFORE Christmas.
Our roller coaster ride had suddenly gotten very fast and was approaching the top of the hill at high speed.
On December 31, 2013 we met our kids for the first time. I hugged and said thank you to the woman who is filling in as 'Mom' in my absence. I held my kids for the first time, hugged them, kissed them, cried tears of happiness to be with them even for a short time. This was the exhilarating top of the roller coaster.
Coming home without them started the trip back down the other side of this crazy roller coaster. But we felt confident this was a short hill. That surely we wouldn't be gone for long. In fact we didn't even completely unpack our suitcases. We had hope that the DRC government, the DGM and the Embassy would make something happen and that the kids we love so much would be home soon. Time kept slipping by with no news and no indication of change but this still seemed to be a short hill - a bump on our way back up this ride.
Then this past Friday (3/21) we hit the lowest of lows so far on this adoption journey. There was a conference call between the Department of State, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) and the US Embassy in Kinshasa. Going into the call we did not get our hopes up - we know better by now. But the absolute lack of information and the lack of any sort of progress on anyone's behalf was disheartening. No one has answers. It appears, from the outside, that the DGM is not making the changes it says need to happen. We were told this will last until AT LEAST September and quite possibly much longer than that. And no one could say definitively that they WILL actually start issuing exit permits again. So we were left with more questions. How long will this last? Will this ever end? Will our kids ever come home? How old will they be when this does happen? What kind of chaos will there be in Kinshasa when or if this suspension does lift. There is estimated to be hundreds of us at this step.
It felt like hope was gone. It felt like we were left completely on our own in this fight. It feels like our government has failed us. It feels like there is no one left to fight for us and our kids. And that is an awful feeling and an awful place to be. We also received reports that the situation in Congo is not good, that it is very dangerous for our children and the families they are living with. These were hard truths to hear. It is hard to be stuck on the other side of the world away from important pieces of your family.
We had officially hit the lowest point on this roller coaster ride. Our stomachs had fallen out & we were feeling sick from all of the ups and downs and twists and turns.
Right now it feels like our ride is stuck here. It has lost the momentum to go back up another hill. We are desperately hoping and praying for positive movement forward. For answers and for a solution to be found. We are forever grateful to our children's foster family. They are doing an incredible thing and are loving on our kids in our absence teaching them what a family is like. But it is a temporary solution. Their permanent home is HERE - with us. For our kids we firmly believe that international adoption is the best answer. That is not the case for every child in the DRC but for our children it is. You will have to trust me on this as I refuse to reveal the parts of their story that make me believe this to be the case. Without us there is no one coming for them. They would be stuck in orphanages - most likely until they aged out if they even lived that long. Their futures after that would be very uncertain. We are not on this ride to 'rescue' anyone. If anything we are the ones being rescued. Rescued from our ignorance and inaction at what is happening around the world. No, we are on this ride because we believe we can provide a loving home for a child who otherwise wouldn't have one. We have met two of these children and call them son and daughter. We love them and have a God given FIGHT within us to do everything in our power to see to it that they have the very best.
Please, please pray for our family and for the families just like us that are STUCK. Please pray for our children and the many other children who have parents desperately wanting to bring them home. Pray for those children who don't have and never will have a family - they need positive influence in their lives and they need God's Holy protection in that place. Pray for movement within the government agency responsible for this suspension of exit permits - that they would let these children who have waiting loving parents take these kids HOME.
Pray for the roller coaster ride to start moving again. We've hit what we hope is the lowest point. We hope the only direction we can go is UP.
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