Chosen

How in the world do you go home to sit and wait after such an experience? God turned our lives upside-down in less than ten days. Wow. We prayed constantly, daily putting those children back in His hands. We knew our God had a definite plan for their adoption. For some reason He let our paths cross at this precise time in our adoption journey.

Thankfully, David and I already planned a trip up North less than a week later to visit several family members and friends, so packing and making final arrangements preoccupied me. We wouldn’t hear from anyone for several weeks, anyway, so I thanked God for the distraction.

Our trip included several stops, starting with my parents’ home. Then we planned to meet up with my brother and sister-in-law who lived a few hours away to stay with them for a few days. After that, the four of us would travel a few more hours to visit Mike’s parents. David and I made arrangements to stay there so we could attend a Quinceañera for a previous ESL student I’d worked with as a kindergartener. (A Quinceañera is a special fifteenth birthday celebration significant for females in the Mexican culture.) I taught many of the girl’s siblings and cousins, too, so her family held a special place in my heart. The invitation honored me.

Plenty of activity kept me occupied while we waited. Sadly, Mike’s work schedule did not allow him to join us. I wanted to take advantage of this trip to love on David like crazy in case God did plan to add these two children to our family.

We settled at my parents’ house and enjoyed a relaxing time playing games and making crafts. (My mom’s house resembles a craft-making haven. She’s incredibly gifted with her hands, and her unfinished basement allows her to store all kinds of supplies. It’s one of my favorite things to do whenever we visit.) While there, I worked on crafting a special gift to take to the Quinceañera.

 I did rather well with the “waiting,” so the e-mail from the summer events’ coordinator surprised me when it arrived after only a few short days rather than the weeks I expected.

“We talked extensively with the kids’ host family, and we agree your family seems the best match for these children. You are free to pursue their adoption if you still want to.”

If we still wanted to? Of course, we did! I felt like jumping up and down with excitement! Instead, I called Mike to share our wonderful news.

“Mike, they chose us as the best fit for the kids! We can start the process to adopt them! They really are our children!”

Even though we hadn’t even started the adoption process, this e-mail confirmed in our hearts God chose these children for us. Our child did not await us in El Salvador. Our children resided in Austin, Texas at that moment and would soon return to Colombia to wait for us.

The coordinator also asked us to come back again that weekend to spend more time with the kids and meet the social worker who came with them. She wanted to get to know us and observe our interactions with both children, something we later realized she should have done the previous two weekends.

Sadly, we couldn’t make it work since we already traveled to another state. She gave me the social worker’s phone number and asked me to tell her about our ambitions to adopt a child and what drew us to these kids. Since we’d never met, the conversation felt pretty awkward.

“Without meeting you and watching you interact with the kids, there’s really no need for us to talk. But don’t worry. Colombia’s decision to approve your adoption isn’t based on what I say about you, anyway. It just helps get you off on the right start.”

Soon a whirlwind of internet activity, e-mails, and phone calls with the coordinator dominated my time at my parents’ home as she tried to guide us through our next steps. First, we needed to find an agency. She gave me a list of about five different agencies in the U.S. that worked directly with the summer hosting organization so the adopting parents still ended up with the same child they started with. (Most adoption processes direct you through the entire process before they match you with a specific child).

Since none of the agencies were in Texas, we chose the agency the coordinator used previously for her own adoption. She successfully adopted her daughter through them, so we hoped for the same outcome in our case.  I contacted the agency right away, and they immediately mailed the application packet to our home.

We also needed to completely back out of the El Salvador program. Our contact person understood, seeing how God clearly led us to these two Colombian children.

“Your social worker will just need to change her interview questions to make your home study reflect a Colombian adoption rather than an El Salvador one. Since you’ve already paid the entire fee and met once already, it will save you a lot of time and money to stay with the same social worker.”

 That made perfect sense, so I called the social worker and left a message explaining our new situation. I said I would call her again when I returned from vacation so we could set up our next visit as soon as possible.

However, before jumping completely into the process, we needed to write a new letter of intent to the Colombian government (a petition to specifically adopt Juan David and Viviana). It required exact wording in several places, an explanation of our own desire and intent, and extensive information about ourselves and our family history, plus someone needed to write it in Spanish. We could not send it until after the kids returned to the orphanage in Colombia for a specified amount of time. Our process could officially begin once we received a reply.

This gave us a few weeks to get everything ready to prevent any delays once we gained permission to begin the process. We knew those were our children. We prepared ourselves for whatever it took to adopt them and bring them home.