Our Adoption Story - Part 2 - Moving Forward

*This is part two of our adoption story, if you missed part one, you can read it here.

A few days after I decided to move forward, we decided we would put in an application at WACAP in hopes to get matched with a boy a few months after we complete our home study. There was a discount of $100 off an application, but we wouldn't have our application complete in time, so we prepaid the application fee to get the discount and then began working on our application.

Two days later, I was looking in the China Child Advocacy group and this little boy popped up in the group. His face was stunning. When I saw him I immediately felt drawn to him. My exact comment

One of the first pictures
we saw of him.

on his picture on Facebook was “Oh my goodness!!! Love!!!” He was so precious and at that moment I no longer felt deep sorrow from the loss of "Will," the boy we were supposed to host this past summer. A part of me felt guilty, like I was replacing "Will," but the other part of me felt grateful that God would bring me healing so quickly and would show me there were so many beautiful children out there that needed adopting. I couldn’t stop thinking of this boy's precious face, so I quickly contacted the agency, which was not WACAP, and requested his file. 

After a few back and forth emails, I received his file just hours before the July 4th holiday weekend began. This timing was perfect, as it gave my husband and me a chance to discuss his file all weekend. We were concerned about his special need (which I am keeping private), as it seemed scary and it was related to the brain. Every other child I’ve ever seen with this need, I quickly dismissed because I was scared, but the pull I felt toward this child made me want to research his special need a little more. I thought, “well, maybe it’s not too bad; maybe it’s manageable.” I connected with some moms on Facebook who have children with the same need and they reassured me that it was very manageable.

As we studied his file (which included a medical history) over the weekend, we were starting to see that his growth and development didn’t seem to match his diagnosis. He was developing on par, which is not typically the case with the diagnosis he was given. After we prayed and discussed, my husband I decided we would put his file on official “hold” with the agency in order to get a medical review of his file. Placing a child on “hold” gives potential adoptive parents exclusive access to the child’s file for one week, preventing someone else from being able to step up and adopt him.

On Monday, I sent an email and called to make sure we could put his file on hold. The new agency, Lifeline, called me back and discussed the process of putting him on hold. As soon as I got off the phone with the agency, I began to call neurosurgeons in hopes to find one that would look at his file and give us a review. I also prayed we could find one who would do it for free. Within 30 minutes, I found a neurosurgeon at a prominent research hospital where we live who willingly looked at the file and got back to me promptly. His findings were positive; he believed that there may be a misdiagnosis, or a translation issue, as he did not believe, based on the child’s developmental milestones, that the special need was as severe as indicated. He concluded what he thought the diagnosis might actually be with the understanding we really wouldn’t know for sure until he could see the child in person. In addition, they sent his file to the child development department and the doctors in development said his file looked great. This was all positive news. We asked the neurosurgeon what type of questions we should ask the orphanage regarding his file to get a follow up before making a decision and that evening we compiled our list of questions. We submitted our questions and our representative at Lifeline told us she hoped to hear something before our week deadline was up for our “hold,” but there was a chance we wouldn’t hear back in time, at which point we would have to make a decision regarding adoption without answers to the follow-up questions.

On Wednesday, I started thinking, “Maybe we should get a pediatrician to review the file, just to get a second set of medical eyes to look.” I knew it would be a stretch to see if a pediatrician could review it, as it was so late in the week already, but I contacted our pediatrician’s office first thing on Thursday morning. They said they would have the nurse call us back. On Friday morning, we received a call back from the nurse telling us that we could email the file over and that the doctor would look at it after work. What a blessing! Talk about last minute. Our pediatrician is pretty amazing anyway, but for her to take Friday night to look at the file for us is incredible.

Late Friday night, I got an email from our pediatrician also confirming that she thought overall the child looked healthy and developmentally on target. I kept thinking, “Wow, this is incredible!” We talked back and forth via email and one of the things she brought up was that we should talk to the local doctor who specializes in International Adoption. I knew it wouldn’t be possible to talk to the International Adoption doctor before Monday, given that it was 11pm on a Friday night, so I figured we’d just talk to her next week sometime just to touch base with her because at this point, we were really leaning toward saying yes to adopting him.  

On Saturday night around 1am—well really it was Sunday morning around 1am—I just decided, “You know, I’ll just send the International Adoption doctor an email and see what happens.” So at 1am, I typed up an email explaining that our pediatrician said we should touch base with her and that I knew it was a long shot at having her review the file but thought maybe she could review it later after we’ve already said yes to adopting him.

Would you guess that at 7:30am I received an email from her saying that she was on vacation and would love to review the file for us? She asked me to send it over to her and she would look it over and get back to us later in the day. Of course I’m thanking her over and over and apologizing for bothering her on vacation and also holding back tears at the blessing of having her respond. 

At 5:45pm on Sunday, night the doctor called and confirmed everything the other two doctors had previously said. That sealed it for us. We knew we needed to say yes, so late Sunday night, I emailed Lifeline and told them “YES!” I keep thinking, “Wow, God has totally blessed us in this process.” It is really unheard of that three doctors, one being a neurosurgeon, would all review our file within hours of our request and not even charge us a fee. God’s hand was clearly in that process. I feel so undeserving of his blessings and so privileged that he would allow such goodness for us.

At this time we were working on finishing up our home study paperwork. Our agent emailed us and asked us if we could have all of our paperwork completed by July 31st. “Umm…. sure, I guess.”

That’s insane, that was only two weeks away, we were running around like chickens with our heads cut off trying to get everything. In addition, we were still finishing our application with Lifeline and trying to get ourselves together to submit a Letter of Intent to China to ask for permission to adopt him. It was a lot!

If you're interested in supporting us on our journey, please feel free to participate in any of our fundraisers:

https://www.bonfirefunds.com/adopt-thomasson-adoption-fundraiser

www.gofundme.com/ThomassonAdoption 

Our Adoption Story - Part 1 - Orphan Hosting

In November 2014, I felt like the Lord laid it on my heart to pursue adoption. My husband wasn’t quite there yet, but I was, so I prayed and I pushed, but then I backed off and I let the Lord work. I wasn’t able to get pregnant a second time, although being able to get pregnant or not wasn’t really important in my decision to adopt.

I began researching children on the Waiting Child List in China and found a few kids that struck my interest. One of the files that I inquired and received information about was a Child named “Wallace.” Wallace had spina bifida and was

adorable. I contacted an agency called WACAP and spoke to a representative named Janie (name changed for privacy). (This is going to be important to know for later). I kept wondering if this was the child for us. His cute chubby cheeks made me smile every time I saw his picture. Time went on and I waited patiently knowing that if this child was supposed to be ours, then God would make it happen. In February, the child was adopted, therefore, not our child. Because I was still eagerly searching to find our son, I kept looking for another young boy. I found a boy named “Will.” At about the same time, my husband was also finally starting to take an interest in adoption. I sent an email to the agency inquiring about “Will.” They responded telling me that he was a part of their Hosting Program. They asked me if I was familiar with hosting, at which point I said no. They sent me a packet of information and I shared it with my husband. He wasn’t quite sure he wanted to do this, but was giving it some serious prayer and thoughts. This little boy was adorable, his special need was pretty minor and he was only 6 months younger than our daughter, which we thought could be a lot of fun. He also had those kissable cheeks that I just couldn’t resist.

From late February to end of April, we were still undecided about the program. There were a lot of financials costs associated with the program, but my husband really liked the idea of hosting a child before committing. The night before the deadline, we emailed the adoption agency to ask a question about the child and were surprised by the email we received in return. They told us they had another family interested in hosting him and that he was not longer available. I was surprised by this, as we had been speaking with them for months about this child, so I wrote them an email back letting them know I was surprised and somewhat disappointed, but understood. She wrote me back the next morning letting me know that the other family backed out and asked if we wanted to host. We originally thought God has closed this door, but when it was reopened the next day, we thought maybe this was God’s way of showing us we really did want to host this child. We had prayed about it and we both realized the only thing holding us back were the finances, so we decided to take the leap and trust God with the financials. We submitted our application fee and were so excited to share with everyone what we were planning to do for the summer. For the next few weeks, we prayed for the child, prayed for ourselves and prepared our home and summer plans for his arrival. We were so excited about this opportunity and as the days grew closer, we were starting to feel as if the Lord was going to lead us to adopt him. Our daughter was so thrilled to have a playmate for the summer. She would tell everyone about our plans and that she believed God would tell us to adopt him too. I listened to her sweet voice and believed we had no choice really but to adopt him. As his arrival approached, we found out his name.

At about 3 weeks out before his arrival, I received an email from the agency stating that there was an issue with his passport and not to panic they were working on it, but were worried if it wasn’t fixed in time he wouldn’t be able to make it for the summer hosting program. I didn’t panic, in fact, I thought it was a spiritual attack and prayed about it knowing that God’s victory would prevail. On Friday, we received a phone call letting us know they had bad news. His passport was not coming and they weren’t even sure where his file was. They believed he was pulled from their agency and placed in another agency, but they were “researching” it to find out what was going on. They’d let me know by Monday. On Monday, I received an email letting us know he had been matched with a family. We were heartbroken. I spent 3 full days crying. All my hopes were gone out the window. I honestly believed God was going to bless us with this child and had looked forward to adopting him after our summer hosting experience. On day 3, I was angry. I felt like our agency didn’t give us comfort, empathy, or direct answers. I needed reassurance that this actually happened. Call it denial, but I wasn’t going down without a fight. I started trying to figure out how I could get in touch with the CCCWA (Chinese Children’s Welfare) to find the answers I felt like I needed.

In the meantime, I had spoke to a woman who had done the hosting in the past and she suggested that I get plugged into some Facebook groups that advocated for waiting children. She thought that maybe if I saw all the kids that needed a home, it would help me to see that our child was still out there somewhere. I reluctantly took her advice and started to search high and low through the groups to see if any other child caught my eye the way this child had. In one of the groups I saw a picture of a boy and someone asked if anyone could help them find his file. Another woman commented that she could help, so I reached out to her to see if she could help me find information on the child’s file that we just lost. She said she was not able to, but suggested I contact her agency representative, Janie, at an agency called WACAP. Ironically, the woman she suggested I contact was the same woman I’ve been talking to since November about other various adoption questions, remember “Wallace?.” How ironic! I trusted Janie at WACAP as she has always been honest with me. I emailed her to ask if she could help and she so kindly did. She said that if they should find his file unmatched, we are agreeing 100% to adopt him through WACAP. I basically responded yes,yes,yes! She did however warn me not to get my hopes up as she felt he probably was already matched.

While we waited, I gathered an incredible prayer team to help support us during this time. I asked for very specific prayers, that God would move mountains, that God would bring us back our son, but that ultimately God’s will be done, as we know it is greater than any idea we could come up with. I spent many hours on my hands and knees in prayer, praying hard, fierce, consistently. I prayed back scripture. It was one of the most spiritually fulfilling moments in my life. I felt drawn to the Lord and have never felt that sense of need the way I did then. I believe God broke me there, he broke me from my need to control everything and to let go knowing that he was in control. As the days went on, we got an email from Janie. Unfortunately, he was matched. At first, I wasn’t surprised, but then I was very confused. I truly thought God was going to move that mountain and bring him home to us. I spent the next 3 days crying off and on again, looking at his picture on my phone, wishing all of this were a bad dream. I just couldn’t let go of him. In retrospect, I think it was more the hope of him, than it was him individually, but I don’t discover that until later. ;)

By day 3, I finally was able to talk to my best friend on the phone. She is my sounding board and unfortunately, due to circumstances, we had not talked at all during this entire ordeal. When I finally spoke to her, she spoke truth to me. I had prayed before our conversation that God would use to her to speak to me and he certainly did. She basically gave it to me straight, she told me I wasn’t being myself, that the person she heard through the phone was not the person she knew and that I needed to stop the self-doubt, the questioning of my faith, and the clear lack of self-control that I was displaying. She finally told me that I needed to delete his picture from my phone. I told her I wasn’t ready, but she told me I needed to anyway. It was time. I needed to know that it was over and I needed to move forward and let go. On a side note, everyone needs a best friend like this. They are essential for these moments in our lives! A few hours after I spoke to her, I looked at his picture one more time. I prayed over him that God will prepare his heart for his family, that his family loved the Lord and would raise him in a Christian home and with that I said goodbye to his sweet face and hit delete. It was rather cathartic actually. I have not cried a single tear over the situation since that moment. It was my healing moment, permission from myself to move forward, my time to pick up the pieces and continue to trust that God is in control and knows better than I do about everything in my life. I decided to move forward and put all my hope and trust in the Lord.

If you'd like to support us, you can find our GoFundMe page at: www.gofundme.com/ThomassonAdoption