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Our story with adoption is kind of crazy. I went to Russia the summer after my junior year to make a documentary about the Salvation Army with about 20 other media students. While we were there, we spent time in the orphanages and seeing the orphans really impacted me but not as much as what happened to me on the flight home.
My seat on the plane was next to a young couple and a cute baby girl. This baby was so normal - giggling, crying, playing, sleeping, etc.... I asked them what her name was and they started to tell me about how they had just adopted her. They told me that the first few visits to Russia - she would just lay in her crib with no eye contact, no crying, no laughing, etc. They would hold her and they said it was like holding a doll because she didn't even react to their touch. But with every day with every visit, she got a little more responsive to them and sort of "woke up to life." Their last visit had been much longer in Russia since it was the final one and they said that was when she really blossomed - because they were able to love on her so much for a longer period of time. I just remember sitting there as a college student thinking.... "wow."
I wanted to adopt from that day on and when Jamie [husband] and I started dating, I told him that I really wanted to adopt some day. He is really laid back and was like "sure, sounds good. whatever." After having both boys, I started asking him if we could look into adoption and he still wasn't excited about it or completely sold out. He kept saying if you want to, then we'll do it. But I didn't want to embark on such a huge thing if he wasn't on board 110%. So, I just started praying and months later he came to me and said that he was studying scripture and realized he was being selfish and scared to not want to adopt. The Lord convicted him of that and changed his heart to desire adopting just like me. It was pretty amazing.
So, I started researching grants and calling agencies. We are a month to month family with our bills. We never have a lot left over but God is always faithful to provide just enough to keep us going. Every person I talked to said, "do not let finances keep you from pursuing adoption. If God wants you to adopt, He will provide a way and will provide the funds." So, I kept looking and researching and one night I got sooooooo overwhelmed with all the information out there. I remember just shutting off my mac and sitting in my bed and I started praying "God if you want us to adopt and it isn't' just my selfish desire, will you drop a baby in our lap?"
That night the awful earthquake happened in Haiti and a week later a ton of orphans were flown to Indy to find homes. One of the agencies called us and asked if we wanted to get on the list for a Haitian child. And I thought wow! That was a fast answer to my prayer for a child to be dropped in our laps. We said yes but then the next day they called back and said that all the children were "claimed" so we didn't "get to adopt one."
Well, I decided to keep praying that specific prayer for God to drop a baby in our lap if it was His will. After months of praying we got a call from a Dr. at a local hospital. She knew of our heart for adoption and after she delivered a baby girl, the mom and dad looked at her in the hospital room and told her that they couldn't keep the baby. They wanted her to find the baby a good home THAT DAY. They didn't want social services involved, no agencies, they wanted it quick and fast so they wouldn't worry about her. Basically, Evie's mom cheated on her husband with this guy. Her husband was fighting in Iraq and she was living with her parents. She hid the pregnancy by not eating and smoking so her parents never knew. She was determined to get home the next day before her parents started wondering where she was. (crazy!)
So..... The Dr. called us and said, "Hey I just delivered a baby girl and her parents want you to adopt her." I just stood there with the phone to my ear. We were on vacation in Michigan with Jamie's family. I told her that I needed to talk to Jamie and I would call her back. Jamie comes from a strong Christian family so we immediately formed a prayer circle with aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, etc. It was awesome - we just prayed for God's will to be done.
On our drive home from Michigan, we got a lawyer (God worked that out for us - it was a Saturday and he answered his cell phone on the golf course), the lawyer went Sunday morning and had both birth parents sign off on Evie and then on Monday we went in to court and became her guardians and were allowed to see her on Monday afternoon.
The Dr. got a slap on the hand from the hospital for not going through social services - which obviously they had to get involved for the adoption to be even allowed to take place. She didn't even care that she got in trouble. She kept saying it was a God thing. We got an adoption agency and did everything backwards - we had home studies, background checks, blood tests, everything but we already had Evie in our home. It was kind of crazy. haha!
It took us 1.5 years to finalize the adoption and we had a few scares but God took care of everything. Our lawyer isn't a believer and we kept telling him how God kept answering prayers during the 1.5 years and he didn't believe us but then some crazy stuff happened to answer our prayers and I will never forget him getting teary eyed and saying that he was beginning to think there was something to this "God thing."
Evie was pretty sick at the beginning (we are still paying her medical bills off from her first week of life). One of my friends from church had a baby the day before Evie at the same hospital and he was sick, too. So her baby boy and Evie were side by side in the NICU. I joked with her one day as she was nursing her son in the hospital if she would be my wet nurse. One of the nurses laughed with us but then said, "Oh breast milk would be so good for Evie since she is so sick." My friend pumped breast milk for Evie for the first 6 months of her life. It was amazing!!!!!!!! She only had to have 1 bottle of formula a day. Such a gift.
Our total cost of adoption ended up being around $1500 - way less than we were trying to save up for. And God provided.
So, that is basically our story. I had many times that weekend of overwhelming fear that we were taking on a child so suddenly. My dad kept saying, "You prayed for this. Calm down." I just like everything in order and I'm a very type A person. And the way it all happened was so chaotic. But Jamie was steadfast and strong. He kept saying, "God gave her to us. Stop doubting." She is definitely a daddy's girl which is so fun. And the boys just lover her.
One of the fears I had about adopting domestically was the tendency for birth mothers to be addicted to drugs, alcohol, or cigarettes. I wrote back asking Cathy to clarify why and how Evie was sick and how that impacted their family. This is her response:
Evie had horrible nicotine withdraw that made her scream constantly when she was awake for the first 4-5 days of her life. Then she would crash from wearing herself out and her heart rate would drop terribly low and she would stop breathing and she would set off all the monitors. It was so stressful to hold her those days. Usually babies are so calming to hold but not Evie. I would get so tense and my neck would hurt just from the anxiety of her screaming. And there was nothing that would help. I would think about how my boys would just nurse and sleep and cry only once in a while. I can't lie - my mind often wondered if I would be able to handle this. The nurses kept telling me she would be better once the nicotine was out of her system and they were so right. (sigh of relief)
She had a feeding tube for about 3 days because she was too weak to eat but she quickly got over that. She was extremely tiny - just 5 lbs. We were so not used to such a tiny thing. Our boys were big. One was 9 lb. 1 oz.
According to the nurses and the Dr. she came out sort of pale and green and something was terribly wrong with her blood. So, she had a blood transfusion the day she was born and they were never quite sure what caused her blood problem. I remember the Dr. saying something like "all her good blood might have gotten sucked back to her mother by the umbilical cord." I remember not understanding much the first week of her life. Tons of tests were run on her blood, heart, and even her brain and everything after her transfusion came back showing that she was fine. (Praise Jesus - but a heck of a lot of money to pay for all those tests)
We were sent home with a monitor in case she stopped breathing but it never happened. 4 months later we were able to get off of the monitor. She is as healthy as can be and actually gets sick less than our boys. ~ Cathy
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