We are currently in the process of huge life changes. Not that any one event is really bigger than another, but the fact that we have several life changes happening all at once makes it BIG. We moved out of our house 5 days ago and said bye to our little rural town here in East Asia. We are spending a few more days with our team in the new town and in one week from today, we will be united with our son.
I haven't shared a whole lot of anything other than the adoption on this blog, but the adoption isn't the only thing happening in our family. We have also decided to move back to the States once the adoption is finalized. In 20 days we will arrive back in America for the first time in almost 3 years, to begin the next chapter of our life, which will include visiting lots of doctors and trying to figure out what our new normal is going to look like.
In October I wrote
this post about finding out about Silas's medical condition. We had already fallen in love with this little boy and then we received news from our doctors that didn't "fit" into our puzzle. And then I wrote
this one about the orphanage's response to what our doctors said. And finally, I wrote
this post about how the Lord led us to commit to bringing Silas into our family.
I know we have been pretty vague in all of our conversations about Silas's medical needs. Mainly because we feel like that is his story to share. We don't ever want his needs to define him. He is first and foremost a precious, loved and cherished child of God and he is our son. He is a 6 year old boy who is shy and quiet, but that has a smile that completely LIGHTS up the entire room, especially when he sings head, shoulders, knees and toes. He also happens to have a form of Spina Bifida. This is what the orphanage said that he did not have, but our doctors both agreed that he most likely did. It was only through a small side conversation that I was having with the orphanage director through text messaging in March that we found out he for sure does have Spina Bifida. The extent and severity of his case we do not know yet, but we do know that he is very mobile. He most likely has hydrocephalus as well, although the orphanage says he does not. There are some other medical needs that come along with having SB, but hopefully they can be managed by having the right medical care that he simply isn't getting where he is.
When we found out in March that our medical diagnosis was right, we went through a period of grieving. Even though we assumed it was, we were still hoping for the best, and now knowing it for certain was a different feeling. I was tempted to become angry. Angry at the orphanage, angry at our agency. There is no reason that the miscommunication should have happened. The file should have been translated correctly. Did the agency really ask the orphanage the questions that we sent? Why didn't they push for more information when we pushed, especially with two American doctors backing us. Were they lying, or are they just that misinformed? But at the end of the day, we were certain that God had chosen this child for our family and we know that all of it, every detail, was all part of his divine providence to bring us together. In all honesty, if his file had said Spina Bifida at the top, like many others did, we wouldn't have stepped out to request his file. It's not that we weren't open to more special needs, but at that time, we knew that there were certain special needs that we couldn't handle in our season of life and in our location. But God knew better.
Back in October and November when we were praying and pouring over the decision to pursue his adoption or not, we sought council and we begged our prayer warriors to help us through it. One thing that was said to us was that God called us to where are living. He is the one that led us here and has guided every one of our steps, and He is not going to stop now. They said, if this is truly something that God is asking you to do, He will show you how and He will lead you. We trusted His calling to move overseas and now we had to trust His calling to move us away if that was the case. And one of our very best friends told us that we needed to decide if it was more important to live a certain life and have a certain job, or to follow the Lord where He led us. We prayed with our teammates and cried over the implications of what this could mean for us. Our decision to adopt Silas was not made lightly. Although it should have been an easy one, it was hard. I wish I could tell him someday that we just knew as soon as we saw him and there were no questions and it was a fairytale. But there were lots of questions. And I hope and pray that he will value the fact that we sought the Lord until we knew that we knew that we knew. And because of that, there are no "what ifs" or "if onlys."
As soon as we knew for sure what we were dealing with, we reached out again to our doctors and others who could help us. This time to doctors who have worked with our company overseas for 20 years and doctors that live and work here in our country. We asked questions about what life would look like here and where we could find the specialists we needed and as one email came in after another, we read the same statements. "With what we know, we really think that you would be better off in the States." "The specialties you would need aren't really available here." "In all of my years, I have never met a family with this specific need living overseas." We knew that staying in our current location was not going to be an option, but we were thinking maybe we could transfer to a bigger city possibly. And there were a couple of options, but in the end, with a few other factors about our job considered, we felt the Lord leading us back to America. There are times when that decision is very hard. We love our life here, for the most part, and we really love our job, our team, and our colleagues, and change is never easy. But that doesn't mean it's not good. And it's worth it. Totally worth it.
We have been asked a lot of "whys" and "hows" and "what about..." and "whens" about our decision to adopt, our decision to adopt Silas, and our decision to move home. I wanted to write this post today, not because I feel like I have to defend myself or that I need to clarify anymore than I have. But I write it because I need to know. Because the truth is that I ask myself these questions quite often. And the more I am asked by others, the more I ask myself the same questions and I have to constantly go back to the Father and allow Him to remind me of the answers. And I also know that if one person is asking me a question, most likely there are others that have the same one. So I want to attempt to answer a few of them here.
1. So you are just going to walk away from your job?
How I wish things were that black and white. I have had some serious angst over this for the past 5 months. I have struggled with this. I have felt guilt and shame and failure over this. This is a great post about
unpacking the suitcase of shame for those in our field of work going home. Really, up until the last two weeks, I have struggled with this issue. But we just came back from a company wide conference that was 10 days long. We spent time with our colleagues, had fellowship and attended lots of classes and seminars. We walked away with so many exciting things to look forward to. We are not walking away from anything. We are only walking into the next chapter of our story. When we got on a plane to move to East Asia, we left our lives in the States, but that didn't make our family any less our family. In the same way, our heart for our work will not change. If anything, God has burdened us even more for our work and for as long as we can we will be very involved in what goes on here, from wherever we are.
2. Why would you choose to adopt a child with a special need?
My simple answer to this is we didn't. We chose to adopt a child, much in the same way that I chose to get pregnant with my biological children. God chose to match our family with a special needs child and we said yes. If the child in my womb had a special need, I would say yes to them too.
3. Aren't you worried about your biological kids?
I worry about my kids learning things they shouldn't learn at school and church and anywhere else they go. I worry about my kids safety. I worry about my kids as we drive down the road. I worry that my kids don't eat enough. But I don't worry about them having a brother. I don't worry about them thinking of someone else outside of themselves. I don't worry about them opening their hearts up to a child who needs them. I don't worry about the amazing ways God is growing and maturing them in this process. We are fully aware that there are challenges, big challenges, with adopting a child into our family, most of which we don't have a clue about yet. But living a life in pursuit of the Lord is something I desperately want to teach and model to my children. God doesn't call without equipping and I know that he loves my kids, even more than I do.
4. How can you just leave your teammates?
We don't take this one lightly. This has been one of the.single.most.heartwrenching parts of this decision. There have been many tears already and even more to come over this. In some ways that 99% of the people reading this will not understand, leaving our teammates is harder to think about than leaving America. This is the subject that fills me with the most grief. But with all of that being said, no matter where we are in the world, we will always be a team. Our hearts and our lives have been knitted together in a way that I cannot accurately describe to you in words. Our relationship isn't ending because our residence does. We have been in prayer about this together for almost a year now. We talk frequently about it and our teammates are the most supportive people in our lives about this topic. Father is taking care of them, just as He is taking care of us. He has provided in ways we didn't even know we needed provision for. He has big plans for their future, and we are so excited for them.
5. Why China when there are so many kids in the US foster system?
That is absolutely right. There are so many kids all over the world that need homes. We are all one Body with many parts. I believe that God is calling people right now to adopt in the States. Maybe he is calling you to do just that? For right now, He is calling our family to our child that happens to live in China right now.
I'm sure that this opens up the floor for many more questions. We welcome them. Please don't be afraid to ask us. We are happy to share about our journey.
We have a difficult road ahead of us. One that will be marked with uncertainty, fear, confusion, grief, sadness, and many other difficult emotions and processes. But we also know that there will be joy, restoration, memories, and most importantly love. Even if not immediately, it will come eventually. We trust the Father who has began a good work to finish it to completion and He who has promised is faithful.
