Scared

       October 17^th, 2009. Nearly fourteen months had passed since Juan David and Viviana returned to Colombia after spending a summer in Austin, Texas. They still lived in an orphanage in Bogotá, while our home right outside of Dallas, Texas awaited them. I left the local Mail Mart to send them their first package from us, containing a karate outfit Juan David requested, Halloween costumes for both kids, and something small for Julian. I also tucked in a small envelope with a birthday card for Juan David and the little keychain inside. I wrote on the envelope, “Do not open until your birthday!”

“I promise. I promise I won’t open it early.” He assured me I could trust him to wait until his birthday. He acted giddy just knowing a package headed his way.

I wanted more than anything to deliver it in person, but I knew I couldn’t wait any longer to send it. It cost us a fortune, as I expected, but you can’t put a price on knowing how happy and loved it made them feel.

I sent him an e-mail that evening to tell him I sent the package. He replied the next morning.

“Thank you! I miss you, and I hope to be with you soon. From: Your adoptive son.”

He also sent pictures, giving me my first chance to “see” him since he returned to Colombia in August of the previous year. He’d definitely grown and matured some. What a beautiful boy!  Oh, how I hoped his closing words soon rang true, for him to officially become my adoptive son. I couldn’t even fathom how his heart would shatter if it didn’t come to pass.

I struggled to connect on the phone with both kids throughout the following week. Thankfully, Julian sent me an e-mail a few days later thanking me for the gifts, so I knew the package arrived safely.

My heart, however, grew more fragile every day. I drove to work in tears every single morning, my faith challenged almost beyond the limit through this inexplicable wait. I didn’t understand why it took so long to give us a date to go down there. Yet we received no response from Colombia whatsoever.

Just silence. Absolute silence.

Yet in that silence, God let me grow even closer to these two, no, three children every week. I never expected to build a relationship with their older brother, too! His e-mails reminded me of God’s constant presence and complete control. He still worked out His ultimate plan.

So why couldn’t we go down there already?

Scared

Some days I feel like crying,

other days my heart just aches,

I miss them terribly,

terrified I’ll have to let them go.

I don’t know what to think,

I don’t know how to feel,

I don’t know what to believe,

or if I should even hold on.

I hurt so deep inside

as I continue to wait

for that final proclamation

 of who my family is meant to be.

I thought I heard it clearly,

Confident we obeyed the call.

But now my heart is torn,

hoping we didn’t misread it all.

What is really going on?

Had they even seen our letters yet?

How long before we hear

What step we need to take?

Will there even be a next step?

Or should I not hold on to false hope?

I’m crumbling inside, falling apart.

The truth is,

I’m scared.

Falling Apart

If only I Could Tell You

Up early on this cold fall morn
just sitting here thinking of you,
knowing how much you long to come here,
and how much I long to go there, too.

http://www.zim.com/countrysites/americas/pages/americas.aspx

I can’t imagine what you go through
each and every day,
knowing a family has already chosen you,
yet not understanding the delay.

Your brother wrote me a heartfelt plea
to press on to bring you home.
He asked me to always love you

in a way you’ve never been shown.

Your sister touched a nerve
when she asked about her room,
not knowing it belonged to her,
nor that it’s awaited her since June.

You sounded so down and quiet
as you wrote my name down on your page.
Did you crave that love of a mother
that you lost at a very young age?

When I learn contentment in the waiting,
the three of you tug on my heart strings.
If only I could tell you
all we have been doing.

If only you knew the whole story
of this journey to bring you home.
I cling to my dreams of that day,
hoping it will soon come.

One courageous brother

In the meantime, I searched for Halloween costumes in several stores. I also kept an eye out for something small to add to the Halloween package that he could open on his birthday six days later. I never imagined we wouldn’t arrive in Colombia by then, November 6^th, his twelfth birthday. He came to Texas at the age of ten!

Halloween costumes, unfortunately, come with a pretty high price tag attached! I knew sending the box alone might cost a small fortune, so I searched for a cheaper route with the actual costumes. David and I browsed the local thrift store and enjoyed picking out costumes. David picked one for himself, too, while he searched for one for Juan David. I eyed the shelves and aisles for a simple princess dress for Viviana.

I couldn’t decide, so I bought two. David found matching costumes in different sizes for him and Juan David. I looked at him and smiled. “It’s almost like you’re brothers.”

“Mommy, we are already brothers.”

 Wow. I loved observing the faith of a child with no doubt in his mind. On Halloween night he and Juan David would wear matching outfits just like brothers, even in separate countries. I knew Juan David would like knowing that, too. He seemed to adore David, and they had so much in common.

During a recent conversation with Juan David, we talked about the distance between Dallas and Austin, where we lived in comparison to where he stayed for the hosting program. He didn’t have a map of Texas to look at, so I explained that Austin lay situated a few hours south of Dallas. I searched all over for a small sentimental gift to send for his birthday, and I recalled our conversation about the cities when my eyes caught sight of a little blue keychain shaped like Texas. Tiny diamonds imbedded themselves in the location of all the major cities, including Dallas and Austin, like a little map. I knew it made the perfect gift, a tangible reminder of the two families in Texas that loved him.

I never expected the surprise God neatly tucked around the next corner. Mid-October already, we still didn't have a date to appeal. While I checked my e-mail on a break at work, I noticed a message from Julian! I quickly opened it and read the most priceless note I’d ever received.

"Hello, Rachelle. How are you? I hope you are well. I only want to thank you for making the decision to adopt my brother and sister. I want to ask you to please do everything possible so you can adopt them, and when they are with you, I ask you to please show them a lot of love, all the love they did not receive from our mother. I give you a thousand thanks and hope you are filled with blessings."

Imagine the courage it took him to write that. Already sixteen years old, he couldn’t be included in the adoption (at least that’s what they told us). He must have gotten my e-mail address from his brother, who only had it for a few short weeks. I considered this letter his blessing for us to become their new family, an earnest plea and attempt to help them. What an act of selfless love toward his siblings!

I wrote him back immediately, telling him the same thing I told Juan David—both governments needed to agree on the placement before they made a final decision. It was not our decision to make at this point. I assured him we continued to do everything in our power to see them again. His siblings already had my love, and I loved him, too. I appreciated his e-mail more than he would ever know. I vowed to keep him a constant, steady presence in their lives once we got them home.

“Okay, God, what role does this boy play in our story? Will you use him to help us bring them home? Does any chance exist to adopt him, too, to get all three of them together? I assume he connects more to this story than we know. You’ve held things off long enough for him to finally make contact with us. We obviously didn’t see this coming . . .”

Wide open communication

Unfortunately, we didn’t get to go to Colombia a week later. The main psychologist who denied our case left for a vacation, so the committee recommended we not try to appeal without him there.

Sigh. Our agency’s director asked when we could go, and they said they hoped to give us a date within a few days.

So much for using Mike’s vacation time. Life remained in limbo, and I could hardly keep going with life so up in the air. Our faith stayed strong, but our flesh grew weaker with each passing moment.

Juan David seemed more settled after our last conversation. September just began, but Halloween already occupied his mind! We often compared our cultures and customs, so he wanted to tell me all about how they celebrate Halloween, his favorite holiday.

“I love to dress up in costumes. Can you send me one? Please?”

I never sent a package to Colombia because it could easily cost hundreds of dollars. If you attempt a more inexpensive option, your package could take months to arrive, if it arrived at all. However, I said I would look for costumes to send him before Halloween. I thought for sure I’d fly to Colombia before then at least to appeal, so I figured I’d take the costume with me.

That sweet boy also said his house parent agreed to let me keep calling the kids together on Saturday afternoons, so I did. I even put them on speaker phone so Mike and David could hear them. They seemed happiest whenever I called them together. I cherished Saturday afternoons, knowing I could talk to them and also hear their voices interacting with each other.

I didn’t realize Julian stood in the background each time, watching them interact with me over the phone. He saw their faces light up when they heard my voice, and he witnessed how much they adored me. Sadly, I never took into account what all he might suffer, knowing he’d lose them soon. They would gain a new family while he lost the only family he had left.

Neither Juan David nor Viviana mentioned Julian very much. Viviana shares a birthday month with Julian, her birthday only four days after his. On her birthday earlier in the year, she’d said her brother Juan David had a present for her. When I asked Juan David about the present, he said his brother had the money to buy it, not him. The first I’d really heard about Julian, now I knew he had a job and a way to make money.

Now, almost six months later, Juan David suddenly talked more about Julian. “If you adopt me, can I call my brother and send him letters?”

We, of course, planned to let them have as much contact with their brother as we could afford financially. We knew we likely wouldn’t be able to visit him often in Colombia because of the expense, but we wanted to encourage any other form of communication between them.

The silence regarding our appeal, though, wreaked havoc on me emotionally. I clung to Scripture and to Christian song lyrics like never before. I journaled about everything God taught me. His fingerprints smothered this story. Yet the days just passed by, keeping my children separated from a mother who wanted to love all over them.

They soon granted me permission to talk to Juan David three different nights a week, plus Saturdays. I thanked God for the kindness his house parents showed me. I cherished each phone call with those kids, and now e-mails from Juan David, too. I knew God kept our channel of communication wide open for a reason. 

Not my smartest move

Is this real? I trusted God moved things along quickly now. I didn’t want to guard my heart. I only wanted to board a plane for Colombia as soon as possible.

In the meantime, Juan David struggled with intense anxiety, although he didn’t know anything about the situation with our case. I tried to call him one evening, but he wasn’t there. The male house parent took advantage of my call to talk with me pretty seriously about him for the first time.

“He’s really anxious about you coming for him.  He longs to be with your family.” His voice spoke so kindly to me, but his words made me as anxious as Juan David, longing to get this process over with. 

“We are doing everything we can to make the adoption possible, but the process is difficult and complicated. Can I call him later this evening?” Since I couldn’t talk frankly with Juan David about the adoption, it felt good to explain our efforts to the man who lived with him.

“Of course.  Your phone calls always lift his spirits.” He knew how much we loved that boy. His final comment encouraged me.

I called later, but I only heard a busy signal. When I finally got through, Juan David had already fallen asleep.

I felt horrible. A female house parent answered this time, so I asked if I could possibly call during the weekend.

“Yes, that will be fine. You can call around eight o’clock tomorrow morning.” Her kind voice set me at ease.

I called Juan David the next morning right at eight o’clock. We shared a sweet conversation, but he sounded sad. “Your house parent told me you’re having a rough time. I’m sorry you feel so anxious. I promise you I will come.” I didn’t promise I’d adopt him, just that I’d come. In fact, I assumed at that moment we'd head to Colombia within the next two weeks.

Not my smartest move. Actually, one of the worst decisions I could have made in the whole process. Now I unintentionally played with his heart.

http://wii.mmgn.com/News/Super-Mario-Galaxy-2-Australia

I explained again that I couldn’t promise anything regarding an adoption. “You know we want to adopt you, but we don't make the final decision. Both of our governments need to agree on the best situation for you.”

However, the boy still wanted me to know how he would help around the house, with all the chores, etc. He already claimed the adoption as reality.

Little did I know at the time that children from his orphanage traveled to the States every year, and almost all of them found families. No wonder he seemed to know more than what I even told him. He knew how it worked, but in his young world, it took way too long. 

Only lacking one thing

Saturday came, and I nervously picked up the phone to call Viviana’s house at precisely two o’clock. One of her house parents reprimanded me once in the past for calling at the wrong time. I hated to do anything to jeopardize her trust in me. I wanted and needed her support more than anything. However, Juan David assured me I already had their permission.

 I asked for Viviana, and they passed the phone right to her.

“Tía!” She squealed when she heard my voice, especially on a Saturday. I asked about Juan David, and she eagerly passed the phone to him. He said hello and almost immediately passed the phone to Julian.

“When are you coming for my brother and sister?” Wow. What could I say?

“The process is complicated, but we’re trying to keep things moving as quickly as we can.” I don’t remember anything else we might have said to each other that day, but I’ll never forget hearing his voice for the first time.

His voice sounded similar to Juan David’s voice, but definitely older. We held a short conversation before he passed the phone back to Juan David. He and Viviana passed the phone back and forth a few times before they needed to go. I loved connecting with them together to witness more of their brother-sister relationship.

It couldn’t be much longer now. Our relationship felt more real every day. God allowed too many things to progress. I could not even fathom Him tearing it apart. He must have allowed me to grow even closer to them for a reason.

Now September, things got tense as our whole life hung in the air. Mike saved his vacation for the entire year in order to take as much time as possible to stay in Colombia with me to complete the adoption. His year started over again in late September, meaning he’d lose the vacation he never used from the previous year.

I relayed the situation to my agency’s director. “Is there any way you can request for us to appeal in person specifically within the next two weeks due to our job circumstances?”

“Yes, of course. I will make the request right away. Just be ready.”

Finally! We could possibly arrive in Colombia within another week or two! Sadly, all the adoption rules changed significantly since the last family’s successful appeal. They appealed, won, and stayed to complete the adoption. We would have to travel once to appeal, return home to await approval, complete more paperwork and finally travel again, months later, to complete the actual adoption.

I informed my substitute of every little change, which I’m sure drove her crazy. As much as I wanted to appear as a responsible teacher, I couldn’t keep it up. My teammates finally told me I couldn’t keep trying to over plan. We all teach the same things, anyway, so they offered to pass on their own lesson plans to my substitute in my absence.

So many details to think about! We contacted David’s teachers to explain the possibility of him traveling soon. We also made sure a room still remained available at the adoption hotel in Colombia. I even started pack! We just needed an actual date to purchase the airline tickets. 

http://www.123rf.com/photo_20233705_airline-boarding-pass-ticket-with-shadow-isolated-over-white-background.html

Another pivotal phone call

Appeal sent. Now we waited. And waited. And waited.

Nothing.

“Tía, when will you visit me? Will you bring me presents? Can you bring me sunglasses? Can you buy me an orange blanket? I love you, Tía. I miss you.”

My bond continued to grow and even deepen with the kids. Neither one let me off the phone without telling me first how much they loved me. We’d come a long way with both of them. Juan David tried his best to demonstrate patience, but I could tell his heart hurt as he wondered why it took so long. Viviana could hardly wait for me to visit. I already packed a suitcase full of clothes and toys she’d asked me to bring her.

However, God, being God, constantly gave me reminders of His sovereignty and His presence in my life. A new little girl joined my second grade bilingual class at school. While talking with her at recess one day, she told me she used to live in Colombia! In fact, her older sister still resided there.

My students come from all over, but the majority of them usually come from Mexico and a maybe a few from Central America (usually El Salvador and sometimes Honduras). Never do they come all the way from South America. Luck didn’t bring the first Colombian student directly to my class. God did that.

My heart latched on to that little Colombian girl immediately. God gave her to me to love, guide, and nurture until I could bring my own little Colombian girl home. I even imagined her and Viviana’s friendship when she arrived later in the year. Wouldn’t it be precious to have two little Colombian girls in the same grade?

My phone calls with Viviana grew longer each week. No matter how many times I told her I needed to go, she would quickly say, “Wait!” Then she thought of something else to tell me or ask me. I even missed out on calling Juan David several times because she kept me on the phone too long. The orphanage maintained a strict calling schedule.

Juan David’s newest request completely surprised me. “Will you call me this Saturday afternoon at 2:00 when I’m at Viviana’s house? I asked for permission for you to call while we are together. My older brother, Julian, will spend the afternoon there, too, and he really wants to meet you.”

“I will try.” The thought of calling at a different time made me nervous, so I couldn’t promise Viviana’s house parent would actually let me talk to them. 

Book launch commercial

***I am momentarily interrupting the story to give a brief book launch commercial! :)

Would you join my launch team to help spread the word about Unexpected Tears coming out in late August of this year? I am still a very new author, but I know so many of you have been touched by my story and my poetry written throughout each chapter. In order to help me launch this book (a new and revised version of my first book,  replacing From the Mountain . . . To the Valley . . . And Back!),

                                                 (Which will no longer be available)

I am asking you to share my posts from this blog, to retweet them, and to share them on Facebook and Pinterest. If you already read the first version, then you already know the story and know how it ends. If you could then write a short review on Amazon when it comes out, that would help me even more.

Basically, I just need your help to get the word out there. The more readers, the better. I hope my story can serve as an encouragement to someone else out there who is experiencing a season of unexpected tears.

I promise, the sequel you have been asking for, Painful Waiting, is in production, but revising the first book was an essential step in the process so they go well together as a series.

If any of my Texas locals have a group that you think could benefit from hearing my story, I would love to come speak for you, as well. Just leave me a comment on my blog so we can connect.

Make sure to join my mailing list for extra information and goodies! Thanks! You are a blessing to me.

Not much proper guidance

Almost ready to send our complete appeal now, our agency’s director gave me permission to contact another family who’d successfully appealed a denial in the past. The summer hosting program only knew of two past denials. Both families traveled to Colombia to appeal, only one went home with a child. We had a fifty-fifty chance.

After talking with the family, I felt a renewed sense of hope.  “Yes, your situation seems similar to our experience. They didn’t like several things they read in our psychological evaluation either. I would not accept their denial, though. I just couldn’t. Once the committee met us in person, they realized we were good people, very committed to the adoption. They let us keep our daughter in our custody for the full seven weeks we stayed in Colombia to then complete the adoption. Don’t worry. I think your situation will turn out fine, as well.”

However, they didn’t go through near as much trouble to build and present their appeal. They said their caseworker simply requested a date for them to meet with the committee and had them collect a few extra documents. They didn’t authenticate anything, nor did they even mail anything to Colombia. They took the documents with them in hand only a few short weeks later.

Ugh! If we used the same agency, why did the director tell me to collect and authenticate all this stuff to send first before even requesting a date for us to go down there? The next morning, I called the director to ask her myself.

“Well, I think it might give you a better chance if the committee can look over everything before they meet you. Once we send it all to Colombia, I will arrange a date for you to go.” I’ll always wonder if putting more energy into trying to get down there rather than in sending more papers would have led to a different outcome.

In fact, our agency really floundered once we had everything ready to put in the mail. “Send it all straight to Colombia to the Head of Adoptions.”

http://www.icbf.gov.co/portal/page/portal/PortalICBF/Bienestar/ProgramaAdopciones

A few hours later, “No, we think it’s better to send it to our agency representative in Colombia so she can look it over and then advocate better for you.”

Yet still within the same day, “Wait. Send it all to us first so we can add a cover letter and send it to Colombia for you. It will get more priority coming directly from an agency.”

 We sent everything straight to her the following day. 

Pivotal conversations

 In the meantime, I didn’t know how to proceed with my phone calls to the kids and the relationship I built with them over the last six months. I sent an e-mail to the person in Colombia who arranged for them to participate in the summer hosting program in the States. I explained the situation, saying we would send an appeal soon because we felt they made their decision based on a mistranslation. I asked her if I should still stay in contact with the kids.  

“I’m so sorry to hear about this. Since you plan to appeal the decision, I feel it very important, for the kids’ sake, for you to maintain contact with them. I hope everything turns out well for all of you.” She responded quickly with a positive tone in her message.

I didn’t call them at all over the last two weeks, but the kids still heard from me! The summer chaperone returned to Colombia and delivered my letters to them sometime during those two weeks of silence. My letters expressed how much we loved them, missed them, and prayed for them. I tucked a picture of our kitties in Viviana’s letter, and I sent Juan David a picture of David. I’d never sent them anything before due to the cost. By the time I finally called again, they both seemed ecstatic to hear my voice and thanked me repeatedly for sending them letters.

Wow. My heart melted. I didn’t explain why I hadn’t called for a while, obviously, and I realized through our conversations they didn’t know anything had happened. Viviana kept me on the phone for at least forty minutes, not accepting a single excuse for needing to let her go earlier. I heard live music in the background. I recognized it as a Christian song I learned either in Argentina or in one of the many Spanish churches I’d attended over the years, but I couldn’t place it. “It’s a song about God, like you told me!”

Wow, again. My letter expressed how much God loved her and how much I prayed for her, and now I saw the impression my words made on her heart. The person in the background began praying, and she joined in at certain points in the prayer. I considered this one of the most special phone calls I’d ever made to that little girl. God let me know He held her and took care of her for me.

I called Juan David that evening, too, and he suddenly wanted my e-mail address and gave me his. Apparently his house parent bought a computer, meaning we might have a chance to finally communicate via e-mail, as well.

It took forever for us to exchange e-mail addresses that night. We kept mistaking almost every other letter, but eventually we got them straight. Not only had I not lost contact with the kids yet, but now I might have even more chances to communicate with Juan David. Yes, God still worked. He hadn’t finished our story yet. I could not even imagine how God planned to use our e-mail address exchange that night.

Keep pushing forward

After a weekend of tears and prayer, we felt a sense of peace to appeal this decision. God walked with us. He brought us this far and brought Juan David and Viviana this close to having a family again. Satan worked here, once again attacking us, stealing our joy, trying to destroy our family and our faith.

By the time we talked with our agency’s director again, we had a plan ready to set in motion. I must admit she seemed helpless at this point and did not communicate well with us. I will always have suspicions that our own agency let us down in some way, but I also possessed a strong enough faith to know God was bigger than an agency.

This situation held a purpose. He allowed it to happen, even if we didn’t understand why. We claimed confidence over a happy ending, one bringing Him even more glory than completing the adoption in the timing we hoped.

With another new school year ready to begin, I found myself bombarded with adoption paper work all over again. To start, we wrote an appeal, a four­-page letter in Spanish explaining ourselves, also pointing out at least one mistranslation we knew about. We poured out our hearts, restating our firm commitment to these two children.

One of my bilingual teammates proofread and edited the letter for me, and then a Colombian coworker looked over it again after that. We also gathered more documentation, including a rebuttal letter from our psychologist and a new letter from our social worker restating her complete approval of us. We requested letters from family and close friends, as well, who could prove our sociability in contrast to the socially withdrawn people described in that denial letter. Our agency agreed to attach a letter, too.

I finally received the official letter from Colombia, so I immediately glanced at the Spanish letter, not the translation my agency sent with it. I wanted to read how the person stated all those comments in Spanish. Then I compared translations.

One particular sentence in the letter stated that I feared Juan David would likely wander the streets in search of food. What? I never said that! Why in the world would I ever say such a thing? Where did that come from? Of course they thought I had misconceived ideas about adoptive children if they thought I said something crazy like that! Something must have gone terribly wrong in the translation of our documents.

I scanned through our copy of the psychological evaluation looking for anything written even close to such an idea. In the paragraph addressing our fears of adoption, our psychologist quoted our agreement over the challenge of raising a teenager. Our realm of parenting experience only prepared us for a seven-year-old. We’d always been careful about what we exposed our seven-year-old to or gave him the freedom to do, still not even allowing him to cross a street without holding someone’s hand. Juan David, on the other hand, roamed the streets alone as a child before the orphanage took him in. Those streets exposed him to things our own son didn’t even know existed.

We took the risk of bringing Juan David’s history into our home with great faith. Even so, we verbally acknowledged the risk. So our psychologist quoted me saying, “He’s likely to be more ‘streetwise’ than our biological son.”

I don’t know if I chose the best word to use in that conversation, but I knew the context and our psychologist understood. However, the person who translated the documents obviously didn’t understand that context because that’s where he said I believed Juan David would likely search the streets for his food. Our appeal would certainly address the fact that we felt, or better yet, knew, errors existed in the translation.

bizior photography – www.bizior.com

When I talked with our psychologist, he couldn’t believe everything stated in that denial letter! He assured me none of it reflected what he personally said about us. As he read the letter, he shook his head, saying, “Wow. This is like a slap in the face. They took everything I said completely out of context.”

He willingly wrote a new letter, rebutting the statements made against us and restating his approval of us. He chose his words even more carefully this time due to the translation factor.

The only statement in the denial that came from our home study regarded our son’s nervousness to share his room. Our social worker wrote a new letter for us, once again giving her approval of us. She described all the steps we’d taken to prepare our son for the arrival of his new siblings as a way to address his concern over sharing a room.

My faith and hope built up again. I knew we could prove every single statement in that denial letter as inaccurate or misinterpreted information. While preparing our appeal, letters from family and friends poured in. Along with letters from our psychologist and social worker, our appeal now contained multiple personal letters stating beautiful things about our family. 

http://hermagazine.ca/renewing-the-lost-art-of-letter-writing/