Lessons in Adoption Part 7

When we started our adoption process it was 2010. When we decided to change over to the Poland program, it was 2012. We spent 2 years in the process with nothing to show for it. We were tired and discouraged. While we felt we had a glimmer of hope with this new program, we also had grown a bit cautious in allowing ourselves to get too excited. We had no idea how much longer we were going to be doing this. How long would it take? How hard would it be? What would court be like? It didn’t take God long to answer all those questions.
Within weeks of signing up for the Poland program, I received an email from Victoria. I could tell from the email that she was very excited. She said, “I think we have a child for you!”. A little boy who had just turned 2 years old. She listed some of his health information, height, weight, etc. At the bottom of the email was included several pictures of one of the cutest little boys you could ever imagine. Hair was a little wild, but he had the most addictive smile. You could tell he was a happy little boy full of life. We fell in love with him immediately. Victoria needed us to respond as to if we accepted him or not. There was no question, he was ours!
Over the next few months we had to make three trips to Poland to complete the adoption process. The first trip was simply for us to meet the child and see the orphanage. The second trip was the biggest and most important. During the second trip, the child would stay with us in an apartment for 2+ weeks. He was with us day and night. At the end of the trip was our court session. The last trip would occur 2 weeks after the second trip. On the last trip, you came back and got your child, finished some final paperwork for passports, and one final doctor visit to verify the child is safe to travel.
During the first trip, we were taken to the orphanage where the child lived. It was very large grey stone building. It was very clean and well kept. It had a colorful playground out front. They took us into a large room where the children would play together. I would guess that there were 20-25 kids playing together in the room. As soon as Marcia and I went into the room, the workers encouraged us to get in the floor and play with the kids. We were immediately swarmed by all the kids except one. You guessed it, our child would not play with us. He would just stand off to the side and watch us play with the other kids. We would casually roll a ball his way from time to time. We would slide on the floor his way trying to get a little closer. Finally, his curiosity got the best of him. He couldn’t stand watching the other kids having fun with us. He came over and began to play ball with us. He then rocked on a rocking horse with us. He had the biggest smile. The orphanage workers told us that our child pretty much ruled the roost at the orphanage. He was the big kid on the playground (though not physically). He was often the leader or instigator of things. If you know him now, you would have to admit that nothing has changed!
Our second trip came in January of 2013. It was the biggest trip of the three and given our previous experience with foreign court, we were very nervous but also excited to get to spend 2+ weeks with our son. We stayed in an apartment with our son that had 2 bedrooms and 1 bath. It had a small kitchen and was within walking distance of a small grocery store. There was also a swing and seesaw in the backyard of the apartment. The only problem was that it was FREEZING while we were there. You couldn’t hardly stand being out there more than 15 minutes. It was a very interesting 2 weeks for us and Gehrig. He couldn’t speak English and we didn’t speak Polish. So, there was a lot of pictures and pointing. It was amazing to see how fast he connected with us. It was like he had known us his whole life. Like he was always ours. At the end of the trip was our court session. It was 180 degrees opposite of our first experience. We actually had friendly familiar faces with us during the whole session. They started once again with Marcia for questioning. When it came time for me, I felt sick. All the bad memories came rushing to my mind. I was terrified. I was asked one question. That question was, “Do you have anything to add to your wife’s testimony?”. My response was “No Ma’am.” The heavens parted, the sun shined down on me, and I’m pretty sure there was an angel chorus of Hallelujah loud enough for all of Poland to hear. I thought our agency contact, who was also our attorney in court, was going to fall out of her chair trying to fight back the laughter. She had come to our apartment the night before to help prep us for court. She was a little nervous about what I might say in court. She was constantly laughing at me and harassing me about my southern accent. She said I was unpredictable and wasn’t sure how the judge would take me. After I answered the judge’s question I sat down, and our attorney just grinned at me. I was so relieved. At the end of the day we had to say goodbye to our son. This time he really was our son. The court had ruled in favor of the adoption going through. I had a lot of emotions after court. I was excited, thankful, but also sad. I was happy about the court results, but I knew that we were going to have to leave our son for two weeks before we could come back to take him home. We left the next day for home feeling a lot differently from the last time we went through court.