The last few months have been very hard and we have had many questions about what God was doing...
After being matched with who we thought would be our daughter we were told that China could not be an option for our family for international adoption.
You can imagine our shock and disbelief after receiving our PA and being pre-approved by the Chinese government. At this point we had already sent this precious little girl photographs of all of us: her family that was waiting for her. We sent her birthday gifts and sent all of her information to specialists in Birmingham who were reviewing her files with us and were getting us set up for physical and speech therapy. Then the call came. The agency reviewed our home study and saw that from ages 17-22 (11 years ago), before he was a Christian, Jeff smoked marijuana...and China has a NO drug tolerance. My heart sank. Izzy was with me when I got the call, so I tried not to burst into tears in front of her, but my efforts were a failure. I couldn't understand why this was happening. I have not been able to write about it until today partially because a good friend encouraged me to do so.
How could this have been overlooked for so long? What was God doing? How could we have gotten as far as we did in this process without this being noticed? After all we shared all of this information in one of our first "full disclosure" phone meetings with our social workers. That's when our social worker that works, not locally with us, but that specializes in the China department, reminded me of how the phones were working poorly the day of that phone meeting and that she was cut off during that part of the interview. Somehow that information had "slipped through the cracks" for the entire process.
I had a range of emotions. I wish I could say that I rested and rejoiced in Gods sovereignty the whole time but that just isn't the case. Even as I type this I am brought to tears as I think about sweet little Zoey and the fact that she is still in an orphanage and still no inquiries have been made on her.
I have to say that the agency that we were working with has been amazing in helping us after all this and admitting that they were to blame for it all. I know everyone makes mistakes and things are overlooked and I just couldn't help but wonder how God was going to use this. Our agency told us that they would petition the CCCWA to get Zoeys file because before we inquired about her, she was on the shared list. They did indeed get her file and assured me that they would advocate for her and that we would be updated on all information related to her. I hope and pray a loving family who is open to her possible disabilities will inquire about her and adopt her soon!
So what now.... that is what everyone is asking. For several weeks I just didn't know. I was at a loss for words. Confused. Seeking God. We were afraid to lose money so we didn't want to change agencies but with our current agency our options were very limited. So we waited and prayed. We eventually decided to stay with our agency. They have treated us with so much love. Jeff's job was also so gracious as to agree to him leaving work for 6 weeks in order to complete the adoption process out of the country. So we agreed on Costa Rica. Latin American countries had not been an option for us before because of the long out of country stays although because of my background and fluent spanish it was definitely something we had considered. So with the support of Jeff's job at Strong Tower we decided to move forward. We are now in the process of switching everything over to Costa Rica with losing very money and little to no time.
And then another call came. A call from a friend in Kenya who has a little 5 year old girl with no living family other than her very young birth mother. This little girl was dropped off at an orphanage when she was almost 3. She had suffered what seemed to be severe abuse from her mothers boyfriend who is now her husband. The question of our willingness to adopt her came up and I emphatically said yes! I was told that in order to make this possible, her mother would have to sign her rights to Jeff and I directly and that she would be approached with this question in the next couple of weeks. Please pray for Gods will for this precious child!
So friends, it has been an eventful and emotional couple of months. We are at this point continuing to pursue both the adoption in Kenya and the adoption in Costa Rica. I am so thankful for everyone's prayers and support and I will make every effort to keep everyone posted more regularly!
