What a whirlwind of a few weeks it has been! INSANE.
Let's back up to Friday, 8/19/16. I felt anxious ALL day long. I couldn't shake it no matter what I did. Looking back, I think it had something to do with the next weeks events.
On Monday (8/22/16) we received a "spotlight" email from our adoption agency. We get these pretty often and they feature children who need families. They are usually older children(we are trying to keep our birth order) and I sometimes open them and sometimes do not. When I saw the one from Monday, at first I almost didn't open it. Then something told me I should. I read about a little girl who will be turning two very soon. I clicked to download two pictures of her. As soon as I saw her face my heart exploded. I called Josh to see if he had seen the email yet and he told me that if I wanted to see more info on her to request it. I emailed our agency and asked for more!
We received her file on Tuesday(8/23/16). We read over it after a very long and tiring day...the boys first football game was that night and we were all dog tired. But, we were excited to be looking at HER. We were confused and scared. Her needs are a little more complicated than we thought. BUT, what stuck with me was she was 9 months old when she was abandoned. That's pretty old. She had a note with her that had some very important information on it that I will cherish forever! I can't stop thinking about her birth mom. She desperately tried for 9 months to take care of her but just couldn't.
Anyway. Wednesday we were still thinking and praying and trying to figure it out. It was so hard! We were also told that there was another family looking at her file. At this point, I just started praying for clarity. I needed the Lord to show us what to do. We decided to send her file to the International Adoption Clinic to have it reviewed by one of the doctors. That night, I messaged another adoptive mom(that is local) on facebook to see if she knew of any other adoptive mom's that had adopted a child with the same needs as her. Of course she did! She put the two of us in touch. The next day, Thursday, I was able to talk with her and she was exactly what I needed! I felt so much better after talking with her. Not only does she have a child with this need, she is a nurse practitioner so she knows what she's talking about! I called Josh as soon as I got off the phone with her and he felt better too. That afternoon I received an email from the doctor at the IAC. It was supposed to be 72 hours before we heard from her and it had only been a few hours. She stated in the email that she wanted to talk with us the next morning and that she would LOVE if we had a video that we could send her of the little girl. Just so she could see in action how she was doing and such. Well, we didn't have that. I knew our agency had requested it but you never know if they will send one or not. I sent an email back to the doctor and told her this. Not even 5 minutes later I checked my email and in it was......an updated medical file AND A VIDEO of our girl! This is when I KNEW the Lord was working it out FOR SURE! :) Josh and I weren't even supposed to be at home when we received the email, normally at that time we are still at work. But the Lord even made sure we would be watching it together. And boy when we started watching...CLARITY! :) All the tears were cried because we knew this was what we have been praying and waiting for! This is when we decided to name her Mia, she just looks like a Mia! More on her middle name later! :)
The next morning we talked with the doctor. She was SO sweet! She explained everything she could. She went over everything that we already knew. We told her that another family was involved and she said she KNEW how hard that was because she's been there too. She told us she would be praying for us! As soon as we got off the phone with her we immediately emailed our agency and told them that we wanted to move forward with her. Later that day we learned that the other family had not made a decision yet. We each had two weeks to make a decision, so we knew they had until September 6th. We waited and waited. Our agency sent us a questionnaire to fill out in case the other family also wanted to move forward. An "advocate for your family" type of thing. If the other family said they wanted to move forward there would be a big meeting to decide who got her.
September 6th rolled around and we anxiously waited on a phone call. We had been in contact with our agency a lot up until this point just checking in. I went to Target at lunch for some retail therapy. I happened upon a cute little toboggan in the dollar section...it was a panda! I knew she needed it so I tossed it in the cart! When I went to check out the cashier grabbed it and said, "Ohhhh this is SO CUTE!" Of course I told her why I was buying it. She said, "Oh I want to adopt a little girl from China too!!! I even have a name picked out...Mia!" My jaw dropped as I said, "that's my daughter's name!!"(this was the first time I called her my daughter!) We both had chill bumps and I promised to bring her by to visit! :) About 30 minutes later I started feeling SO anxious again. It was not fun but I told my sister something was going on because I just couldn't shake it. About 30 minutes into feeling that way my cell phone rang, I saw it was our agency and I anxiously(literally) answered. It was the director. She was calling to tell us that the other family did not want to move forward and that she is most definitely OURS! She also told me that she almost called us before sending the spotlight email to see if we would be interested. Either way, the Lord was making sure she came our way!
Y'all this whole process has been such a blessing! It has been hard(STILL IS) but it's turning out so beautiful! I feel like I am sitting around with my jaw on the floor just in awe of the Lord's work in this, from the very beginning until now! I just look back at things and smile because only He could have done this!
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