Lessons in Adoption Part 6
One thing I forgot to mention in my previous posts is the name that we were going to name the Russian child we were adopting. His name was going to be Cooper. We had shirts, decorations, and keepsakes bought and given to us with his name on them. We had his room ready. I guess Cooper was my idea for a name and Marcia agreed. I liked it because I had seen guys named Cooper playing baseball and when they would come up to bat, the crowd would holler “COOOOOOOOP!” I thought it was cool. So, there’s that. Nothing super spiritual. Just a love for baseball. Sorry.
Part of the grieving process included getting rid of all the stuff we had bought or were given with the name Cooper on it. In our minds that little boy, no matter where he is, will always be Cooper. We also didn’t think it would be fair to another little boy, if we adopted, to carry that name and be a reminder of what happened. We needed to start fresh. It was at that time that God placed it on my heart to talk with a friend of mine about a new name.
Lori was at that time a member of our same church. She had been married to one of my very best friends, Rick. Rick sang in our wedding then later became sick and died of ALS (Lou Gehrig’s Disease). This was before Victoria called us about the Poland adoption program. Marcia and I were not even sure if we were going to be able to adopt. I told Marcia that I felt that I needed to talk to Lori because we had decided we wanted to name our son Gehrig if we were able to adopt. We wanted to do this for two reasons. First it was in honor of my friend Rick. Second, Lou Gehrig is my favorite baseball player of all time. Remember, I love baseball. Marcia asked me why I felt like I needed to talk to Lori when we didn’t even know if we were going to be able to adopt. I told her I had no idea, but I just felt a strong feeling. So, one Wednesday night after church, I approached Lori with my idea for a name. She immediately teared up and said she thought it was a great idea. I was very relieved. It, in a way, gave us a little nudge of knowing it was ok to move forward with our lives and trying to adopt another child.
Back to the adoption process. Marcia and I prayed about the possibility of changing to the Poland program with New Beginnings. If we did this, it was going to be like we were starting all over in the process. We would have to leave our current agency and sign on fully with New Beginnings. It was a big step emotionally and financially. After several weeks in prayer, we realized we were never going to able to adopt Cooper from Russia. We also realized that the agency we were with did not particularly care if we adopted the little boy. We decided it was time to change and move on. We called Victoria and told her we were ready to start the process to adopt from Poland. I asked her how long the process would take. She replied that with it being a new program, she really wasn’t sure. We said that’s fine. It would happen when God wanted it to. And with that, we started the second leg of our adoption journey.