Category: Adoption Page 6 of 8

Thank You For Loving My Son

On August 20, 2015

We missed out on three years and 10 months.

He’s ours now. But until then, you loved him.

You changed his diapers; you washed his diapers–by hand. You gave him baths twice a day; You fed him healthy meals. You cuddled him and gave him good night kisses. You potty trained him and changed his sheets every day. You chased him and made him laugh. You taught him his numbers and the names of all the animals. You gave him bubbles and glitter and paper mache. You gave him your lap and you let him get his snot all over you.

He was missing a family, but you gave him everything else possible while he waited. His life was full of enriching experiences. He is healthy and strong.

How can I possibly thank you? How could I ever repay you? You loved him like he was your own, and then you loved him enough to give him to me.

Thank you, Amy Hathaway, for running the best orphanage in Tanzania. Thank you for saving the lives of so many children. Thank you for giving them the best start possible, but also not being satisfied with what you could give them. Thank you for doing everything you can to get them back into their biological families or find them new ones.

Thank for to all the Mamas who dearly loved and cared for my son in thousands of ways. Thank you to all the foreign volunteers who keep coming to Forever Angels for long and short times and love and sacrifice for the children there. There were hundreds of people who loved my son before I did. I will always be grateful for you.

Lillian, a manager at Forever Angels, with Lily, her namesake!

If you’re looking for a worthy cause to donate to, consider Forever Angels (password to see the children is Tanzania). It is a truly excellent orphanage, which first and foremost seeks for family reunification. When that doesn’t happen, they look hard for good placements for their children. I trust them completely.

Forever Angels also has an excellent and organized volunteer program. I would recommend it for any young (or old!) person who desires to work at an orphanage.

One Less Orphan

By Amy Medina

On August 19, 2015

In Adoption

Monday, August 17th

Mwanza is 700 miles away in northern Tanzania, on the shores of Lake Victoria. Gil, Lily, and I flew up in the afternoon. Lily got to come because we were going to Forever Angels, My Orphanage, as Lily describes it. She was two when she left. She had no memory of it, so we aimed to fix that.

We arrived at Forever Angels at 6:00 pm. Hannah, one of the longer-term volunteers, was sitting outside with Johnny when we arrived. She told us later that he had been so excited all day, eagerly telling anyone who would listen that he was getting a mama and baba, and would be going on the airplane.

But when the longed-for moment came, he shrank inside himself. He knew how to relate to us when we were just ordinary visitors–because he had seen a lot of those. But a mama and baba? No clue. I crept up to him and sat with him on the couch, where he was clutching the picture of us that he had examined for the past two weeks.

Since it was dinner time, the plan was to go to a restaurant together with Hannah and Georgie, volunteers that Johnny knew and loved well. He let me hold him in the taxi, but during dinner, he stuck with Hannah. His big eyes kept a worry crease, but usually we could get him to laugh.

Tuesday, August 18th

We hung out in the Baby Home, which is not known for peace or quiet. The children barrage any friendly face–or even not-so-friendly–the moment you step in the door. If you’ve got an arm or a lap free–or part of a lap–they want in on it. As far as they were concerned, even Lily was big enough to be fair game.

When we went outside, we discovered Johnny was hiding behind a playhouse, which we were told he does often. He let me hold him, but mostly he kept his distance. I caught him solemnly watching us from across the garden.

At lunch time, we decided to take Johnny out with just us, to practice for that evening’s departure. We ate at a deserted hotel down the road, where it was just our family. We pushed on the swings and we played hide and seek, and Johnny was won over. For a while, the worry line disappeared and the smile emerged. I repeated to him what I had been saying all day. Will you come on the airplane with us? Will you come to our house? Finally, instead of stoic eyes, I got tiny nods.

Then we went to the social welfare office to make everything official.

In the evening, we took Johnny back into the Baby Home to say goodbye. The children mobbed him. Kwa Heri, Johnny! Good-bye, Johnny! Hugs, kisses.

I couldn’t hold back the tears.

Because so many had loved him.

Because the loss in his life is real.

Because there were so many others left behind.

He was so brave. He took my hand, a total stranger, and walked off from the place he loved. So much trust in one little three-year-old boy.

He fought sleep for hours, taking in dozens of new sights and experiences. He finally succumbed in the plane, and we got to our home in Dar es Salaam at midnight.

Wednesday, August 19–today

He met Grace and Josiah today, and as I write, he is sleeping after his first full day at home. More about that later. But for now, I just want to celebrate that there is one less orphan in the world, and that there are four children in my house, and that they are mine.

This Day

By Amy Medina

On June 24, 2015

In Adoption

It was one of those ordinary moments that suddenly becomes profound.

A week ago, I was in the Shopper’s Plaza parking lot, and my phone beeped. It was a text message from our social worker. Which orphanage do you choose? Forever Angels?

I quickly texted back: Yes!

I went into the store and starting my grocery shopping. The text kept swirling around in my head. Why would he need that information? He would only need it if he was writing our approval letter, right?

But I was afraid to ask him. I was afraid to hope. After all, it’s been three and a half years since we started on the journey to adopt a fourth child. We had to been told No more times than I can remember. In the past couple of months, we had been given reason to hope that maybe it would happen. But no one in social welfare had ever given us that assurance.

I finished shopping, forgetting half of what I came for, and went home with my thoughts spinning. What are you waiting for? Gil asked me. Just ask him!

So I did. I sent off the text: Does this mean you are writing our approval letter?

Yes.

YES!

And today, I was standing in the Tanzania Revenue Authority, getting our car registration renewed, when I got this text: I have good news for you. I have your letters for your fourth child.

After three and a half years of waiting and longing and despairing and praying, This Day finally came.

We have the letters in our hand.

In the next few days, Gil and I will fly up to Mwanza in northern Tanzania, where we will try to get to know about half dozen adorable, perfect little boys who each desperately need a family.

We will spend about 8 hours with these children, and then we will make our decision. It will be an impossible decision, an unthinkable decision. These boys are around 4-5 years old. We are possibly the last chance for each of them to get a family.

Rejoice with us…..and then pray with us!

After this trip, we’ll still have a wait of about 1-2 months before we came bring him home. But regardless, there was a whole lot of screaming and jumping and dancing in the Medina home today.

It finally happened. We were convinced it wouldn’t, and yet here we are.

Since ancient times, no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who acts on behalf of those who wait for him. (Isaiah 64:4)

Dear Birthmother

By Amy Medina

On May 9, 2015

In Adoption

My children are mine, no doubt about it. Legally, emotionally, forever and always, through late-night fears and throw-up on the floor, first toddling steps, fingerprints on the walls, bright scrawled drawings on my refrigerator.

They grin at me and yell “Mommy!” when the tooth comes out.

They look to me and whine, “Mommy…………” when life is unfair.

They cling to me and whisper, “Mommy” when the doctor comes at them with a needle.

I am Mommy. But you are too.

There is a part of them that is yours, and always will be. I look for you sometimes, in their faces, in their movements, in their reactions. I wonder if you have the same shoulder dimples, if you have the same almond-shaped eyes, if you have that slight frame.

One of you gave your life bearing my child. Tragedy. Sorrow. So unnecessary, because if you had given birth in another country, you would never have died.

I think about that day, when my child was taking her first breath, and hours later, you were taking your last. Did you get to hold her? Did her fingers curl around yours? Did you get to comprehend, at least for a few minutes, the beautiful miracle you brought into the world? Or did fear and pain overwhelm it all?

And the other two, you who held my child for nine months. You felt her kick against you. You watched your belly grow large with him. A miracle, a life, a breathing, feeling, child in the image of God, growing inside you, yet you felt only

despair.

What caused your hopelessness? Was it the lack of love in your life? Were you afraid of losing your only chance at an education? Was it rejection by your own mother, your empty purse, a broken heart?

I wish I had known you. I wish I could have come alongside of you and given you hope, and helped you realize that there could be another way, that this child who was knit inside of you for nine months could have always been yours.

If I met you today, I would collapse at your feet and thank you. The child you bore made me a Mommy. The child you bore has overflowed my cup. The child you bore is beautiful and intelligent and loving and full of hope.

I wish you could see her. I wish you could see him. I wish you could see me. I wish we could help you fill the holes in your heart. I wish for hope for you. And Redemption.

Your sorrow meant my joy. Your loss was my gain. I am sad that you will never know.

Dear Birthmother, you have given me an indescribable gift. I am forever indebted to you.

When You Became Mine

By Amy Medina

On March 18, 2015

In Adoption

On the day you were born, your cord was not cut, nor were you washed with water to make you clean, nor were you wrapped in cloths. No one looked on you with pity or had compassion enough to do any of these things for you. Rather, you were thrown out into the open field, for on the day you were born you were despised. (Ezekiel 16:4-5)

I find it interesting that so many people are shocked that some African women would dump their newborns into a pit latrine.

My last post quickly shot up into my #1 most-read post, with over 7000 hits. (I realize that’s small potatoes in the blog world, but it’s a lot for my tiny corner of the internet.)

It certainly was not my most inspired piece of writing. So all I can figure is that it was sensational enough to shock people into reading and sharing.

But why?

Why is it so shocking that women in Africa leave their newborns to die?

Is dumping a baby into a toilet more barbaric than jabbing a scalpel into a baby’s neck, suctioning out her brains, and crushing her skull? Or simply vacuuming her life away, piece by piece, as she struggles to get away?

After all, that’s what happened to over a million babies in America last year. Legally.

At least Tanzania has the sense to make child murder illegal.

In Tanzania, there’s not a lot of hope for unwanted babies, when adoption is so culturally unacceptable. But in America, there’s tens of thousands of couples who wait months….years….for the phone call that there’s a baby waiting for them. Yet still, we throw away a million babies a year.

Listen. My heart breaks for these mamas. I can’t imagine the despair, the hopelessness, the fear, that compels a mama to dump her newborn into a toilet pit. Or to pay money for someone to suck out her baby’s brains. I think of the 17-year-old who is terrified she’ll be kicked out of school. Or the prostitute who doesn’t see a way out. Or the desperate mama who just doesn’t know how she’ll feed one more child.

It goes against a woman’s deepest instinct to turn her back on her child. The heartache that leads her to that point must be unfathomable. Yes, Christians, let’s be known for advocating for the babies. But let’s be known for advocating for the mamas too.

But don’t just weep for the African babies who are thrown away. Weep for the American ones too–and those all over the world, for that matter. (Ironically, one of the few (only?) similarities between the United States and North Korea is that they both permit abortions past 20 weeks–two of only seven countries in the entire world that allow them.)

Yet

There is redemption for a baby lifted out of a toilet pit and given life and love.

There is redemption for the adoptive mother when that child fills empty spaces in her heart.

There is redemption for the birth mother who sacrificially gives her child a chance at life. And there’s even redemption available for the one who doesn’t.

Because in that picture, there is the reminder that we all are in the toilet pit, until the Day when we are lifted out and made Sons or Daughters.

Then I passed by and saw you kicking about in your blood, and as you lay there in your blood I said to you, “Live!” I made you grow like a plant of the field….I gave you my solemn oath and entered into a covenant with you, declares the Sovereign Lord, and you became mine. (Ezekiel 16:6, 8)