Adoption has taken me to new places, has allowed me to meet new people and has caused me to feel emotions like I had never felt them before.  Adoption is intense.  It is not for the faint of heart.  That sounds like I’m bragging, “Look at us.  We are so awesome.  We did this really hard thing twice.”  My friends, I am not bragging.  I am sending out a warning call to those who have had even the smallest of thoughts about entering the adoption arena.  It is one of the best things I have ever done, but it is also by far the hardest thing I have ever done.

Yesterday I talked about the unexpected way God made us aware of our second son.  Today I am going to talk about the adventure of getting him home.  Just a month after learning about him, I boarded a plane by myself to fly to Kingston to meet with our lawyer.  I had flown to Kingston one other time.  It was to meet our daughter who’s adoption ended up failing.  I made it through immigration and customs then found a taxi to take me to my hotel.  It was the closest hotel I could find to the lawyer’s office.  It was beautiful, but I could hardly sleep.

The next morning I took another taxi to the lawyer’s office.  I was escorted into a brightly colored conference room.  The table was bright white and the shelves were stocked with volumes of brightly colored books.  I immediately thought of my furniture installing husband and started discretely taking pictures.  The lawyer came in and we had a wonderful conversation.  She shared about her own adoption experiences and her battle plan to get our son home.  Halfway through the meeting her associate came in and introduced himself.  He was going to be the one to actually go to court on our behalf.  He was very quiet, but also very intimidating.  He agreed that the plan laid out was the best course of action.  Toward the end of the meeting the lawyer armed me with the homework I needed to complete in order to move forward.  There was information to collect from family and friends.  I needed to get some papers signed by the birth mom and make sure she understood the process.  I needed to initiate a home study.  I needed to wait in country for the baby to be born and make sure he was safely transported to the children’s home.  When we were parting ways she asked me what I thought about the plan.  I told her that I felt very hopeful and was excited to start my homework.

I left her office and was taken by her driver to the bus station.  I boarded a commuter bus for a 3.5 hour journey to Montego Bay.  Once there a driver I have ridden with for years picked me up for an hours journey, to a part of the island I had never been, to meet with the birth mom.  I had a list of things to ask her from the lawyer.  I was so honored to be in her home.  I wanted her to sense and know that I cared for her as a person and not just a person that was giving us a baby.  She then walked me down the street so I could meet the woman that connected us.  After a short visit, I boarded the van for a 1.5 hour journey to the the children’s home to wait for the baby to be born.

I had planned the trip thinking I was going to have quite a few days to bond with the baby before having to go back home, but most of my time was spent waiting.  I worked diligently on the homework the lawyer had assigned, I helped upstairs with the kids, I read three books and I talked a lot on Voxer.  I had just discovered Voxer shortly before the trip and there was a group of us who were talking regularly with each other.  I am so thankful for Voxer.  It was a huge help in keeping me sane on that trip.  I was so thankful that I was able to stay at a place I was so familiar with, but got to see in a new way.  I got to meet and get to know the women that would take care of our son.

Our son was born two days before my flight back home.  I picked him up the next day.  He was so beautiful and tiny.  We gave mom a ride to pick up his birth record and I was able to see how much she loved him.  It was a gift God gave me with our first son and I was able to experience it again.  I am so thankful I can confidently tell my boys how loved they were and are.  On the way back to her house she gave us clear instructions of how we were to leave.  I was not sure of her reasons, but we followed her lead.  We dropped her off and followed her instructions.  Then it was just me, that tiny little peanut in my arms and our driver.

It began to rain as we got closer to the children’s home and when we pulled up to the front door the directors were there waiting with umbrellas.  It felt like a red carpet welcome.  They ushered us right into the directors’ apartment and I began to cry.  He was here!  I had done so many scary things, so many things that stretched me beyond my capacity, but he was here.  The directors had created a tiny room for us to be together that night.  It was a storage closet, but for that night it was our studio apartment.  He cried for most of the night, I changed diapers in the dark and tried to figure out how much formula to put in the bottles.  I am so thankful for that first night together.  I got to be the one there taking care of him, but was so sad that I had to leave him.

The next morning, I packed up my things and held him as much as I could.  Everyone promised they would take great care of him and keep me updated on how he was doing.  I had been sad leaving Jamaica in the past (who wouldn’t be), but I had never been this sad.  I knew I needed to get Kevin and our oldest son to Jamaica to meet him.  The day after getting home I took our one-year-old to get a passport and we made arrangements to go back the next month.

It was an 18-month journey to bring our son home.  All things considered it was a fairly quick process that felt like an eternity.  It was complete with emotional ups and downs.  I continued to be stretched out of my comfort zone, but my mama bear attitude kept me going.  He was our son and he needed to be in our home. We were witness to God’s amazing power and timing over and over again.  Lost documents, new Prime Ministers, bus detours and countless other hurdles were no match for the power of our God.  We met people that God had perfectly put into place as we needed them to be there.  These people connected with our story and wanted to help bring our son home.  I could not have orchestrated it on my own.

When it’s written out like this if feels like it really wasn’t a big deal, but it was.  It was really hard.  I had to put my big girl pants on every day and believe that God was going to move in mighty ways to bring our son home.  That is not easy.  Prayer is hard work, Some days prayer was all I had to do and it was really difficult.  It’s hard to believe that huge things that seem humanly impossible can happen, but they can, my friend, they can.

It took 4,081 days from the time God called me to adoption in Jamaica to the day we brought our Jamaican son home.  Just over 11 years.  His timing is not my timing.  His method is not the way I would do things.  It often times feels inefficient.  But the job was not only to get a baby from point A to point B, it was to do it in a way that showed only God could have made it happen.  He did it in a fashion to show his love, strength and sovereignty.  He was also reshaping Kevin and me to be the parents we needed to be for our kids and to make us look more like Jesus.  He did all of that in one adoption process!  I am so thankful he let me be a part of the process and I pray that my kids understand that, in both of their stories, God moved Heaven and Earth to bring them home.