It seems like adoption is a lot of "hurry up ... wait ... hurry up ... wait". At least that has been our experience so far. I don't need to tell you how much this has tried my patience. We rushed to get our homestudy complete, so we could work on our dossier and send off our i800a - then came the wait on the i800a approval. We rushed to get our dossier apostilled and into the country for translation and to go in front of the ministry ... now we sit and wait again, this time on the orphan court. And, just when you think you've waited just about enough a key person in your adoption, in country, goes on vacation for the rest of the month. Ahhhhhh ... so frustrating.
Being the planner I am I want the adoption process all neat and organized and in a box with a bow on it. That is not adoption! Adoption is messy {as I've come to learn} ... not only the process but, the relationships. Nothing breaks my heart more than to call our sweet girl and have her beg me to come get her now or ask me for the one hundredth time the exact day we will arrive in her country. Not to mention the ever present feeling that something could go wrong - no one is promised an adoption will go through. In the last few weeks, in the group I am in on FB for other families adopting from L@tvi@, adoptions have failed, for one reason or another. You grieve for that family that just lost a child. A child they had already pictured in their home - at their dinner table, in their life. And, then you just get reminded that could be you. It is times like these that I wish God would just reveal himself to me and spell out the plan he has for us.
For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. - Jeremiah 29:11
And, in all of this I am still thankful for so many reasons ... God has provided so abundantly for our adoption. I need to remember what a wonderful adoption agency we are with. How blessed we have been to have our case worker for our adoption agency living just twenty minutes from our home, making our home study process fly in record time. How we have never needed to wait on funds - God has always provided the money when we needed it. How though we may be waiting months - some families wait years to complete an adoption. And, I am working to be more thankful for the lessons God is teaching me in all of this! I must remind myself that a year ago if you had told me I would be adopting, a teenage girl, from a country I had never heard of, I would definitely have thought you mental.
I equate where I am now to being 9 months pregnant with my three children. You know hard times are to come but, you just want to get that child here so you can go on with life. You want to hold them in your arms and feel like a family.
So, we will go on waiting. I will try to wait with a "happy heart", as I have so often in the past asked this of my children. I will wait right where God has me ... I will not try to squirm out from underneath the trial he has me under. And, in everything I will give thanks!
Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial because, having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him. - James 1:12
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