Why international adoption of a child with special needs?

Elijah is a 3-year-old boy who has Down Syndrome.

Like any other little boy, he needs to be played with and loved. He needs to be held and hugged and kissed and given treats and little toy cars. He needs to kick balls around outside in the summer and he needs to play in the snow in the winter.

Instead he lives in a crib. If he leaves it, it's not often.

That's not what any child deserves. But unless someone decides to make a commitment to him, to spend a whole bunch of money, cross an ocean, to give their heart away to this little boy... he will never have the life he deserves. He will stay in that crib until one day he is moved to another bed he will never leave, in a worse place than he is in now. And he will live in that bed until he dies.

That is why people advocate for the international adoption of these little ones with special needs.

Genesis

This is not how I had hoped this post would go. I had hoped that when I finally posted Genesis, I would be saying she was going to be my daughter. But now I have to say that she isn't.

Genesis is a beautiful, sweet girl who needs a very special family. She is deafblind. We knew when we started working toward adopting her that she was blind. She has some hearing, she may even have some vision. She may be a candidate for a cochlear implant, which would restore some of her hearing. She is considered severely retarded. This could mean exactly what it says--or this could mean absolutely nothing, and she might have this diagnosis simply because she is deafblind, and it's hard for her to perceive the world around her, and the world must be brought to her fingers so that she can engage with that. She could have that diagnosis even if there's no cognitive involvement. At least one person who met her felt that she was very high-functioning. At this point she does not speak or walk. But how would a deafblind child living in an orphanage know that speaking and walking are things people do? How would she get the input to show her that one should move around on two legs when falls are much more likely? She can pull up to standing, and ride on a rocking horse, so if she does have a little bit of complicating cerebral palsy, it is not severe. She is almost certainly capable of walking--she just needs to be taught. It's even possible that she was not walking due to regression after being institutionalized, and she used to be able to walk.

Genesis is in a mental institution. She will turn 5 in December. She does not deserve to be where she is--there shouldn't be any little girls or boys there. She is blessed now to have a one-on-one caregiver, paid for by her prayer warrior in the US. (This program, through Life 2 Orphans, provides one-on-one caregivers to children at her orphanage. This can be a difference between life or death, or between surviving and thriving, and I would encourage anyone to support it.) It is through this program we received the update on her--but the update is from when the caregiver had just started working with her. So what we know about is really her low point, not her full capabilities.

She had lost weight. She had been taken away from everything she knew. If she had a strong bond with a caregiver, if she had a very special friend, she had just lost that. But even at her low point, I could see some hope. She smiled and laughed and showed affection. She had a short attention span--which means that, at least for short times, she could be engaged. Somehow, this caregiver had started getting through to her.

Genesis is not hopeless. She is God's daughter if not mine. She has so much potential. But she will also need a lot of one-on-one attention. She probably needs a mommy and daddy without 2 or 3 younger kids. She needs a family that can spend a lot of one-on-one time helping her learn about her world. And even as I write this, I am wishing so much it was us. I wish that I could help her explore the world, put pretty bows on her poor shaved head, cuddle her when she needed comfort. I wanted to be her mommy. Maybe I still do. If I thought I could make it work....



I don't know what her capabilities are. It may not be possible to know that until her mommy and daddy meet her. It may not really be known until she's been home for years. Even with no cognitive involvement, you couldn't just throw a deafblind child into a family and expect that she'd go with the flow. I don't know if she can even communicate at all. I don't know if she will learn. If I knew for sure that she had no cognitive involvement, or if we knew for sure she could hear and see a little, maybe we could go for it and there'd be reason enough to expect she would become somewhat independent. I'm not looking for a daughter who will become a Nobel prize winner, solve world hunger, or even necessarily live independently or go to college. But I have a 22-month old now, and I don't know if I can commit to a child who would function at a toddler level all of her life. And Genesis' parents need to be ready to be her mommy and daddy no matter what life brings. They need to be ready for a little girl who may never eat her own food, be potty trained, or walk. They need to be ready to provide a lifetime of care to a daughter who will never say thank you. They may end up with a daughter who is very bright, who can live independently, who can hear and speak and read Braille and sign. But they need to be able to commit to this little girl for her whole life, no matter where on that spectrum she is.

If I could know for sure that Genesis were my daughter, none of that would stop me. If God supernaturally told me I were her mom, or if she had been born to me, I would stop at nothing to give her everything she needed. I would find a way. But God has not told me I'm her mommy. It seems God has been very gently telling us that we are not her family. But I do believe she has a family!

How sad is it that if you travel backwards through Genesis's life, she becomes higher functioning?

She so needs to come home to a family.

Please, if you are reading this and think you might be her family--if you are thinking "I would adopt her, but..."--let me know and maybe I can help. I've done a lot of research now on educating and communicating with deafblind children. There is actually a school for the blind with a program for deafblind children only an hour from my house; I know of another in Alabama. This girl is so precious, and it is so important that she gets a family. Please pray for Genesis.

Dear Father in Heaven,
We pray for your sweet daughter Genesis. We don't know for sure what her needs or capabilities are. We don't know for sure what being her family will entail. We do know she is a precious little girl made in Your image. We know that Your Son Jesus loved her so much He died for her. We know that Genesis deserves every good thing, and we pray in faith that You would bring forward her family. Please, Lord, give her a mommy and daddy who can show her Your love and help her reach her full potential, be everything she can be, even while being willing to parent her if she is what the world would call the least of us. Please, Father, we pray in Jesus' name--show Genesis's mom and dad who they are. Teach them how to love her as you love us--not saying that our needs are too great, our potential too little, the cost to rescue us too much, but simply saying, my daughter, I love you.
Amen.

Praying for a sign

We got some more information on M. Saturday. It was kind of a shock.

I've posted a bit on what you can't see on a photolisting. What happens when you see a child and a list of her weaknesses with none of her strengths. This was a whole lot more of weaknesses than strengths.

She does not walk. She does not talk. She is not potty trained. She is of an age where one would expect a child to walk and talk and use the bathroom independently. (If she were two, all that wouldn't be a huge concern).

She is described as severely mentally retarded.

She has an additional physical disability which greatly impacts how she perceives and interacts with the world... in addition to the one we knew about. This would make communicating with her very, very hard, unless one of these disabilities can be corrected (possible with the new disability we just learned about). The combination of these difficulties could be part or all of why she does not have the affected physical, verbal, and self-care skills. Her difficulties in perceiving and interacting with the world around her could also have resulted in the diagnosis of mental retardation, even if her disabilities did not affect her cognitively. So there could definitely be an element of once we can get through to this little girl, she will blossom.

She does not have a special attachment to any caregiver--but due to other circumstances (recent moves before the information I received was written) this may not be indicative of a problem.

She is smaller than I expected--the height of my three-year-old and barely heavier than the weight of my 21-month-old. I do have reason to believe this was also due to a move, and she's put on some more weight since then. It is hard to tell whether she may have regressed in other areas since her move.

There is a little good news, if I read between the lines. She is comforted by physical contact. That means she is not afraid of touch! She shows affection with smiles and laughter. She shows affection! This also makes me a little less worried about RAD, despite the information that she doesn't have a special attachment right now. She has a short attention span and doesn't show much interest in her lessons--Praise God! A caregiver is getting through to this little girl somehow. A short attention span is miles from so disconnected from the world she can't be reached. Still....

Unless we get more information on her--which might itself be a miracle--we have no idea what her future looks like. We have no idea what she is capable of. We have no idea how intense the care she will require would be.

Our family could probably handle a child who would require the level of care a 7 to 10 year old would require throughout her life. I could handle it if she were never really independent but could be semi-independent most of the time. What I'm not sure we could handle is a child who will require the level of care a two-year-old needs all her life. Constant supervision and help. Constant redirection to keep her out of trouble. All of that compounded by the size of an adult, who could reach anywhere, open gates and locks, and has the physical strength to get into bigger trouble.

Unless she made big improvements since this report--which is a possibility due to changes which happened a short time before this report was written--we would have no clue what sort of prognosis M. would have until months, possibly more than a year, after she came home. If the new disability we learned about were corrected, would she blossom? Or is the diagnosis that she is severely cognitively affected correct, so that even if her other difficulties were taken away, she would still function at a toddler level all her life?

If she were born to me, I would never doubt M. were my daughter. I would do whatever I could to give her the best quality of life I could.

On the other hand, if all I know now had been available to me initially, I never would have thought she might be the little girl God had for us.

Is He giving us this information now, rather than before, so we had a chance to bond to this little girl and hope she might be part of our family? Or is He giving us this information now, rather than later, so that we will pursue the adoption of a different child? Is M. the little girl He wants in our family? Or... not?

We are still processing all the new information. We honestly don't know how to proceed.

I am asking God for a sign. Please pray that for us.

At this point, I was just starting to see this little girl as my daughter. I was thinking about bringing her home, teaching her, finding her the resources she needed. I had started to find clothes and toys I thought she would enjoy. I have named her in my heart.

But to bring home a child with such severe multiple impairments, whose prognosis is a complete unknown--is that really what's best for our family?

At this point I would need a sign to give her up. And I would need a sign to bring her home. So I ask that you would pray with me for a sign. Pray that God would grant it to my husband as well as myself. Pray that He would speak wisdom to our hearts--He gives wisdom to all who ask. Pray that He would prepare our hearts for whatever child He has for us, and heal our hearts--especially my daughter Hannah's heart, who so wants M. to be her sister--if we are not supposed to bring M. home. Please pray for M. too! Pray that she is learning and growing as much as possible. Pray that she is loved. Pray that her family is being prepared for her, whether or not it's us. Pray that if we are not her family, her family will step forward as soon as we step back (and pray that we know when to step back, if that's His will). Pray that M.'s family--us, or not--will love her forever, stand by her through every difficulty and all of her needs, and help her to become all that she has the potential to be. Whatever God's plan for M., may she be richly blessed, and be a blessing to all who know her. Father, protect her and guide us. Give us the courage to follow you, no matter what your answer.

In the name of Christ Jesus. Amen.

Smiley face

Look at that smiley face!

Vitaliy is 2 and will turn 3 next month.
He has Down Syndrome.
He is precious in the sight of God.
He needs a mommy and daddy.

Unbelievable suffering

This is another hard post.
But I am not going to ask you to adopt this little girl.
I am going to ask you to look at her.
She's called Liliana on RR, and she should have a family coming for her soon. She may not be on MFFM yet, but she will be.
Take a guess how old this little girl is.

Unless you've read about her elsewhere, you're wrong. This little girl is 11 years old and weighs only 10 pounds. The workers in her orphanage just do not care about the condition or fate of the children they "care" for. The horrible condition of Liliana and other children in her orphanage was discovered when a mother arrived to adopt her daughter Katerina. Katerina was not listed on Reece's Rainbow, when her mommy found her.

Katerina is nine.

There are 17 orphans with Down Syndrome (and many without it) in Katerina and Liliana's orphanage. Katerina, now Liliana, and four others already have families coming for them. Four families have stepped into the unknown to commit to adopting one of these severely malnourished children with Down Syndrome. Katerina's mommy is praying for 7 more families to step forward--families willing to accept the unknown and rescue children with a completely unknown prognosis, sight unseen. Families willing to show the orphanage director what kind of God we serve. Families willing to be Christ to some very needy boys and girls, who if they are anything like Liliana and Katerina it is beyond belief they are alive at all.

This is urgent. This is life and death. This shouldn't be what adoption is about--but today it is.

They all need families

Isn't he adorable? This is Jamison. He is 4--almost exactly a year older than my daughter. He needs a family.


They all need families.

Two children who can be adopted together

Adopting two children on the same trip is an option for some families. These two kids can be adopted at the same time with no additional fees or travel time at all--you would just need one more ticket back home. Presumably they're at the same orphanage.

Kole is 2 or 3 years old and has delays, but sounds like a lot of fun. He loves places to crawl through and watching cars... sounds a little like my boy :)



Ria has arthrogryposis, which is a connective tissue disorder resulting in tight joints. It can vary greatly in severity and which joints are affected, but surgery and physical therapy can improve the prognosis. Ria is receiving care for her condition in the orphanage she lives in. She is six.



Isn't Ria gorgeous? You can learn more about Ria and Kole from their Reece's Rainbow profiles, and interested families can see new photos and videos of these two taken this month.

So many are still waiting.

So many little boys and girls are still waiting for their families.

This is Dana. She is just the same age as my daughter, so she probably likes playing with dolls, friends, and books. She would probably love to have a pretend kitchen and a menagerie of stuffed animals and lots of bright, noisy electronic things. And I know she needs her own mommy and daddy.

I wish there weren't little girls and boys who didn't have mommies and daddies. I wish we lived in a world where every child was loved and valued as a child of God, regardless of his or her challenges. I am going to adopt a child so that there is one less orphan in this world of ours. So that one little girl doesn't go to bed without hugs and kisses. So that one little girl will always have enough to eat, her own bed to sleep in, and a family all her own. Maybe you can't do that--and that's okay. But please, do something! Even if it's just adding a couple dollars to a fund for one of these sweet little ones, like Valentin or Dana.

Two happy things

Sorry I missed yesterday! I have two pieces of very happy news.


Valentin, one of the first little boys I featured on this blog, has a family now! I don't know who they are yet, but he's on the "My family found me" page!

My other news is that we are now ready to start a home study! We are in the process of setting a date for our first visit, which could be next week. Please pray that everything will go smoothly and we can have our house a little more organized by then (we've been making progress, but I want the shelves a little neater, the bathroom a little cleaner, the pile off the stairs. That sort of thing).

Here's hoping that before too long, it will be my little girl on the MFFM page :)

(Not) In The Know

This is Victoria. There aren't as many little girls who look like my daughter as little boys who look like my son, but little Victoria is closest.

Victoria is another "additional child" at the bottom of the Reece's Rainbow list for Russia Region 6. So there's not much I can tell you about her. I can tell you that she's four and will be five soon. It looks like she likes dolls. She's clearly beautiful. Since RR doesn't say otherwise, presumably she is listed because she has Down Syndrome.

I don't know what medical issues she has, what she's been through in her life, what kind of orphanage she's in, or if she has been transferred. I don't know much about her personality; the site lists her "character" as "contact, calm." I am guessing "contact" means she interacts well with others, as opposed to avoiding or ignoring attempts at contact with her.

I know that Victoria needs a mommy and daddy and doesn't have them. I know that she has brown hair and brown eyes.

Not knowing anything about the child who will one day be your son or daughter is a big thing. But maybe you saw Victoria's picture and knew she was your daughter, and none of that really seems to matter. If that's true, you can commit to her on Reece's Rainbow.

I didn't know that much about my kids when I got them, after all. No one offered me the choice of a little boy who didn't have food allergies and slept through the night starting at 2 months when I found out I was 12 days pregnant with my son. I'm glad they didn't, because I am so thankful to have my little boy in my life. I didn't get to pick what color hair and eyes my little girl had, and decide whether she had unusually shaped feet and a condition that would leave her susceptible to urinary tract infections until she outgrew it. Where does one draw the line between the "perfect" child and the child with "special needs"? How many of us have no medical, emotional, or social "special needs"? Would you adopt a little girl who had vision problems, emotional health issues, needed a low-carb diet, and had poor impulse control? That was me as a teenager. I'm willing to bet all of us have problems that our parents never signed up for.

I remember that when I held my daughter in my arms the first time, I had expected to know her and did not. For 8 monts I had this little one inside me, knowing I was her mom and she was my daughter, but I didn't recognize her from the pictures I had seen or what I had read about what she might be like. What did I say when I had her? "My little girl!"

Kind of like adoption, isn't it? I never expected perfection. I didn't know whether she would be "normal" or what health concerns she might have. But I knew God had given me this daughter, and I did my best to take care of her, learn about her, and fall in love with her now that she was a baby in my arms that I could see and hear and feel in a new and different way.

Kids are dying.

This is Warner.



Warner died a little while ago while waiting for a family.

I don't know how he died. Maybe he was neglected. Maybe he just got sick. Maybe he had an untreated medical condition, like a heart defect. I don't know whether it was slow or sudden, whether anyone held him. I do know he never knew what it was like to have a mommy and daddy.

I know a lot of the things I talk about are hard things. These things aren't supposed to happen. Every child should be welcomed by his or her parents, raised by his or her parents, and die at a ripe old age. But not talking about kids dying alone won't change the fact that they do. And not thinking about the horrible conditions that they endure in orphanages and mental institutions won't make their conditions better. Some of us will be called to give money. Some of us will be called to bring one of these sweet kids home. Some of us will be called to go to the countries where this is happening and work there to make changes for the better. Some of us are so called to other things, helping people and supporting causes close to their heart, that it really is okay if they don't feel the call to help with the problem of abandoned children in Eastern Europe and Russia. If you are already throwing yourself into following God's will, and He isn't asking you to do anything about this, I'm not trying to guilt trip you. But this has become an issue close to my heart, so I want to make sure these kids have a chance to be loved.


This is Wyatt. He reminds me of Warner. Their names are kind of similar too.

Both kids deserved to be a son and not a statistic. Some of these kids are coming home starving, emaciated, at death's door. But they do come home, and they do make it. Some of them still die--from their medical conditions, from operations to correct them. But they don't starve to death from neglect. And they get to know a family's love.



If God is calling you to become a parent through international adoption, don't wait too long. If Wyatt is your son, don't delay.