This little one’s photos and the brief amount of information provided (“likes musical toys”, “extroverted and active”) filled our thoughts for the two weeks we pored over and prayed over his file. China no longer has a healthy baby program available for foreign adoptions. That means that all children adopted from China to other countries come with some level of special need–from very small medical needs that have already been resolved, to needs that will require life-long care. From what has been said on paper about this little guy, his needs shouldn’t be overly complex. But there are just no guarantees in life. I imagined all kinds of worst case scenarios even as my heart ached to ask for this boy.
Jerry needed a little longer to process, especially in light of the failed match we had so recently gone through. It’s usually like that with us. He’s more cautious and calculated about decision making, where I’m more prone to just “know when I know.”
Finally we said the all important word. Yes! Yes, we would love the great honor of parenting this precious boy. On our 8th anniversary China gave us prior approval to proceed with our adoption. That means that as long as our official information matched the preliminary info provided, we should be accepted as his mom and dad! There are still so many unknowns, but as we’ve been reminded, love is risk. And what better risk is there really? We were over the moon with the news that we had been approved.
It’s hard to go on with your routine when you know such a big, important change is coming–but of course we did anyway. When you’re an expectant adoptive parent, no one can see any physical changes happening, so they don’t usually know to comment on your good news. Life just continues in spite of the daily dreams of your baby, somewhere far away. Work went on and the summer wound down. We went on a few cheap dates and people joked that we “better do that now” while we don’t need a babysitter.
All throughout 2017 I took walks and prayed, and took walks and prayed. Our homestudy was finished at the end of September, and we sent out our I800A form to the immigration people in Texas. I used an outdated version of the form at first and spent two weeks waiting only to have it returned to me with a request to use the newer version. I went for a very hard, long walk that night–trying to pray, but not succeeding very well. The correct version was done and resent. My birth certificate was lost for several weeks in it’s journey to be certified, only to finally appear out of nowhere after several calls to the office concerned. We waited all through November and December for a reply as we paper-chased and notarized, and arranged a little boy’s bedroom.
We got finger printed in Portland, filled out grant applications, celebrated Thanksgiving, and had a surprise birthday party for Jerry when he finally turned 30 and became old enough to adopt from China! It was just a tiny bit bittersweet because our goal had been to send all our paperwork (called a dossier) to China on his birthday–but immigration took a lot longer than expected, so this didn’t happen. Instead we spent several more weeks waiting for I800A approval to come.
We got our immigration approval on the day after Christmas. With it in the mail was a letter confirming that we would be receiving a $5000 grant! A few days later, my mom and I braved the below zero temperatures and took a trip to Augusta (the state capital) to get all our papers state certified. Then off they went to our agency. From there they took a trip to Washington for final approvals.
And then there’s today. Today our dossier (paperwork, remember?) goes to China! After weeks of prayers and preparation, it’s finally going! While this isn’t the day we had planned for, God has really picked a special date for this event. One year ago on this day, January 26, a doctor told Jerry and I that we would need a miracle to become parents. We felt crushed. But this day has been redeemed. Now this is the day that our dossier has gone to China. This is the day that we get to watch this unexpected miracle progress right before our very eyes.
