There's our son! (one year later)

One year ago yesterday we saw Jaden's face for the first time.  True, it was only in a picture, but still ... :-)

We looked at this picture about a million times!  How do you fall in love with a picture?  When it's a picture of your son, it just happens.

Estimates are that there are 147 million orphans in the world. That's a really big number, and can be daunting. How do you find your child out there? Step one is to start looking! So we did. And somehow when we saw Jaden's picture, we knew. That smile, that look, I don't know, but somehow we knew.

A question that we have had many times is "How did you find him?"  There are many advocacy sites on the internet, but the two that we used to find Jaden were Advocate for WC on Yahoo and RainbowKids.com. 

It amazes me how many children are on these sites that have needs that would be considered minor and easily correctable here, and yet they just sit on the list parentless. Which means that these children continue to be in an orphanage without a mama or a baba.

Anyway, one approach is to find a child that you are interested in via an advocacy site and then to contact the adoption agency that has the child's file. This is the approach that we used. 

A second approach is to pick an adoption agency first and then give that agency a list of potential special needs that you are comfortable handling.  These special needs can be from the relatively simple and often purely cosmetic like multiple nevi (moles) to the very complex such as severe heart disease.   Some people who take this approach wait months and months to be matched to a child, while we were "matched" as soon as we saw Jaden and requested his file, which meant that we were able to move forward with bringing Jaden home as soon as possible.  

The picture of Jaden was already out of date when we saw it because it had been taken when his "file" was being created, which was several months before it was released and we found him.  And he had already grown up so much from the time that picture was taken until the day that we got to hold him.  But that picture is forever planted in our minds, kinda like our version of his baby picture.

And here he is one year later.  :-)

Having fun in Fort Jaden

 

Our little guy ... then and now

the 21st of April ... an important date

Tim here with some thoughts / musings from Jaden's baba.

April 21st was the three month anniversary of meeting Jaden (on Jan 21st, 2013) but as I was looking back over my old calendar from 2012 I realized that April 21st is an important date on its own merits.

On April 21, 2012 I handed over my selfishness to God and became truly open to His guidance about adoption.

But first, some of the back-story.

Tracy had mentioned adoption sometime in 2011 and I had pretty much shown no interest (scary, in retrospect!).  As always, Tracy showed great wisdom.  Her approach ... let it lie, and let God do the work.  :-)

I had not given adoption any more thought until 2012 when I started having some stirrings in my own heart.  My response was actually to try to argue with God and to explain why adoption was not the right thing for us to do.  Again, in retrospect, scary.  And a bit shaming in that most of my "logic" was based on the fact that we were so blessed with two wonderful kids, a loving marriage, stable and enjoyable jobs, etc.  Why would we want to take a chance on messing that up?  (If you want to know my opinion on those arguments right now, I can sum it up in one word ... "sick")

Anyway, in early 2012 the Holy Spirit starting working on me a bit, and after a while I realized that perhaps this wasn't just some crazy idea or some whim, but maybe it was something that was in God's will for our lives.  As I became more open to the idea of adoption there were lots of "coincidences" and "just so happens" that occurred.

One of them was that Tracy, Mitch, my mom and I went to see Steven Curtis Chapman (SCC) in Tulsa.  While waiting to go into the concert I looked over at the T-shirt stand outside the auditorium, and there was a shirt that believe it or not changed my life.  Josh Wilson was also on tour with SCC, and the title of one of Josh's songs was printed on one of the T-shirts.  I had never heard the song, but my life and my heart began to change when I saw the shirt.  It simply said "I REFUSE TO DO NOTHING"

Wow.

Even sitting here more than one year later, I can remember how I was standing, how I felt, and all kinds of details about the moment in time when I saw that shirt.  It was like an arrow of conviction, but it was also a spark of life to my soul.

Try "I REFUSE TO DO NOTHING" on when the Spirit has already been working on you.  Just the title of the song should be enough.  But then listen to it, and hear the lyrics.  Wow again.  (the lyrics are at the end of this blog entry, and the link below takes you to a Youtube video of the song)

I REFUSE VIDEO (WITH LYRICS) ON YOUTUBE (if an ad pops up you can click to skip it after a few seconds)

Then follow that up with the video that SCC showed in his concert.  For those of you who don't know, SCC has been a major advocate for international adoption for many years.   I had seen him several times in concert and knew that he showed a video about adoption during his shows.  I had seen it several times.  My response each time ... gee, someone needs to do something (but always someone else).  However, I had never seen one of those videos with the Holy Spirit working on me about adoption!  Needless to say, it was a very different experience, and it really affected me.  (Incidentally, later when we decided to adopt and we told my mom, her response was "I had a feeling that you would adopt when we were at the concert.")  :-)

So I had received the message loud and clear, and I had really started to be more open on the inside, but still I kept it to myself.  I knew I was being called to act, but I kept hoping that God would change His mind.


It was a few weeks later that April 21, 2012 rolled around, and after that resistance was futile ... but blessedly I didn't want to resist any more!!

I was attending a Walk to Emmaus weekend on that date.  Being there gave me an opportunity to spend 72 hours away from the noise and bustle of the world, away from my normal routine, etc.  It gave me an opportunity to spend some time really listening to God, and it took away some of my ability to dodge what He wanted to say to me.

The conviction was so strong that day, and His message so clear, that I made a pledge to God to give up my selfishness and self-centeredness and to be truly open to His leading us towards adopting.  This was not an out-of-the-blue decision, but rather the culmination of many many weeks of God's leading me.

That same night (April 21, 2012), Tracy attended a talk that was given by a lady who shared her experiences with ... you guessed it ... Chinese orphanages.

When I got home we talked about adoption and about what this might mean for us and our family.  Well, just to make sure we weren't so stupid that we missed it, God sent our friend Gael to invite us to her home for dinner that week.  Umm, yeah, she and her husband had adopted a child from China three years ago.

Gael has been a strong advocate for adoption since she brought their daughter home. I had heard her many times discussing adoption and the plight of orphans.  Little did I know that God was using her to prepare us to act.


(And to make things more interesting, we later found out that Gael arrived in China to pick up her daughter on the SAME DAY in 2009 that Jaden was abandoned.)  (cue the Twilight Zone music)

Well, by the time dinner was over that night it was a done deal in our hearts, and we were ready to move forward.  We talked it over with Laura and Mitch and each person in the family had veto power, but all four of us wanted to take this leap of faith.

On April 28, 2012 Tracy saw Jaden's picture online for the first time ... but more to come on that in a future post.


For now, he is snoozing away getting ready for another day with his forever family, and I am thanking God yet again for not giving up on me.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I REFUSE TO DO NOTHING by Josh Wilson

Sometimes I, I just wanna close my eyes
And act like everyone's alright
When I know they're not

This world needs God
But it's easier to stand and watch
I could say a prayer and just move on
Like nothing's wrong

But I refuse

'Cause I don't wanna live like I don't care
I don't wanna say another empty prayer
Oh I refuse to sit around and wait for someone else
To do what God has called me to do myself
Oh I could choose not to move but I refuse

I can hear the least of these
Crying out so desperately
And I know we are the hands and feet of You, oh God
So if You say move, it's time for me to follow through
And do what I was made to do
And show them who you are


'Cause I don't wanna live like I don't care
I don't wanna say another empty prayer
Oh I refuse to sit around and wait for someone else
To do what God has called me to do myself
Oh I could choose not to move

But I refuse to stand and watch the weary and lost cry out for help
I refuse to turn my back and try and act like all is well
I refuse to stay unchanged, to wait another day to die to myself
I refuse to make one more excuse

'Cause I don't wanna live like I don't care
I don't wanna say another empty prayer
Oh I refuse to sit around and wait for someone else
To do what God has called me to do myself
Oh I could choose not to move but I refuse


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Thank you, Lord










 

Post-surgery report and first day of school :)

I just realized that I hadn't posted a follow up from his surgery!  Oops, sorry.

Jaden did exceptionally well with the whole thing.  My big worry was that he would wake up and be sad or frightened about not being allowed food or water.  God showed up in a big way on this!  Jaden woke up relatively easily just before we needed to leave.  We left him in his jammies in hopes that he would fall back asleep as we made the 45 minute drive.  He did.  :)
When we got to the hospital, he was very serious and would only go with his Baba but he never asked for anything to eat or drink.  It was a good 2.5 hours from the time he woke until he got his sleepy syrup (Versed) and he never asked for anything, even when he saw others in the waiting room eating and/or drinking.  Entirely a "God thing" because normally he wants something to drink and eat nearly constantly.  After his sleepy syrup, the nursing staff came and wheeled him away on his bed and he just waved at us.  Not a single tear was shed.  They waited until they had used gas to make him sleep to start his IV and so he never had that fear to deal with either.  The dentist said that he didn't cry a single tear in the surgery suite either.  We got to go to him in recovery before he had awakened and he basically woke up in his Baba's arms.  He ended up getting one dose of pain meds and otherwise he did super.  He really didn't seem to have any pain after the first day.  His teeth look great.  She said that she found a few other areas while she had him under and she went ahead and repaired them so he got 6 root canals and 4 fillings total.

Now that that is behind us and we received all of his lab back (yeah!  normal) we can breathe a sigh of relief.

He went to his first day of "school" yesterday with me.  He and I went and visited a local private school called Stonebridge.  They are very accommodating and allowed him to come into the class that he would be in next year even though he is, of course, too young for that class right now.  It was incredible.  The class is small, maybe 12 kids, and the teacher was wonderful.  When we got there, Ms. Wann was already preparing them for Jaden.  They were all so excited to have him visit and were very sweet to him.  One of the little girls is also adopted from China and was stuck to him the whole morning.  It was very cute to watch although during the morning, she asked me why he didn't understand her.  She asked, "Is he French?" and the teacher replied that he was Chinese like her.  To which Nellie replied, "I'm not Chinese, I was born here!"  Ms. Wann responded easily with a simple, "Okay." and a smile.  I know the family and I am quite sure they were not keeping this from her so who knows what that was about?  Jaden did very well with most things.  He was bored during book time but otherwise he seemed engaged.  It is times like this though that I am reminded about how much he has missed.  They had a Play-Doh center and it was fun watching him discover Play-Doh.  He had obviously never seen it before and once I showed him how to use it, he was fascinated.   He loved stringing beads, even the small ones and was a pro after he saw the others do it first.  The teacher handed him a pair of safety scissors to do the work sheets they were working on and he just looked at them.  He had no idea how to use them.  It makes me sad to see some of these gaps in his experience.  Not because he doesn't know how to use scissors but simply because it reminds me of that sterile white orphanage without a single toy or crayon or book.

(and for my daughter the expert "reframer" I can say at least he had 3 weeks of his life in the children's hospital in Shanghai where he did get to play with some toys)

But right now he is at his play table at home, learning the joys of scissors!

The only trouble we had the first day was when we were leaving and they all wanted to hug him.  He was ok with the first couple and then he had had enough!  One of the little guys asked why he didn't want a hug.  When I tried to explain that he didn't really understand about hugs a whole lot, the little boy was so cute!  He grabbed another boy standing beside him and said "Look, Jaden!  This is how you hug!" and demonstrated a great bear hug.  Too cute.  

Tim took him back again this morning for another 3 hour visit and said he had a great time and seemed very comfortable. The director was very kind and invited Jaden to come in for the remaining few weeks of school on the Tiny Tot days and spend 2 afternoons a week visiting so that he will get to know the kids that will be moving up and will be in his class in the fall.  We aren't going to try to leave him there at all until the fall but we are going to try to make as many of those Tiny tot days as we can when one of us can stay with him for the class time.  The lady that teaches that class is also wonderful and even volunteered to come to our office and meet him there some first so that he would be comfortable!  Have I said in this blog how awesome our friends/church/community has been about loving our son?  I'll try to add some pictures a little later, but I wanted to get this done while Jaden is entertained.
Blessings, y'all.