The long and windy road to Adoption - The first step is expectation management

It's been about 9 months since I last posted and I know at least one person out there has asked me if I was still doing the blog. The answer up until a few days ago as, "Not really." I had lost interest in writing things about Korea. I have been very busy with work and my free time on the weekends has been spent either playing with the kids, golfing, or hanging out with friends (written in decreasing order of regularity). Blogging has been very low on the to-do list. Plus, it turns out that I am not that funny, or original, and many of the topics I have thought about covering have been beaten to death by the internet at large. (Engrish anyone?). So I've let the masses speak for me and spent a lot of time chasing Sora and Deuce around the greater Korean Peninsula. Until now.

Look one post up and you'll see a VERY long write-up about me coming to grips with my/God's desire to adopt. This weekend my wonderful wife finally got me to put my money where my mouth is regarding that conversation/post from a few months back. You see, Jenn is a very astute observer and since we've been married for 11 years she knows that as much as I may WANT to do something it takes a little push or pull or kick in the ass to get me to do it. It's Newton's first law of relationships and she understands it quite well. "A husband at rest will remain at rest until the good wife makes him do what he should be doing on his own." I love her so much.

So what Jenn has been doing for the last couple months is figuring out how we, as foreigners, can adopt a Korean child. What she's discovered is that due to recent law changes it's become VERY difficult to adopt locally. With concerns of human trafficking at an all-time high Korean lawmakers have made foreign direct adoption from orphanages a very difficult proposition. We can go through a big agency like Holt but that means a bunch of trips back to the States in order to adopt a child from within the country we live... that's stupid. Another option which we have considered is contacting a mother-in-need prior to the birth of her baby and adopting her child almost immediately after she gives birth. While this is the most expeditious way, it also means we will have a newborn on our hands and if the child is put up for adoption newborns get snatched up very quickly. The 3rd option is finding a child from an orphanage that meets a couple of pre-conditions:

1. Birth parents are available for contact.

2. Birth parents are willing to give up child

The problem is that a lot of Korean parents are not willing to give up their children for adoption. Children are placed in orphanages as a measure of safe-keeping with the hope that someday the birth parents will be able to bring them back home. For a birth-parent to give up their child for adoption it is an admission of abject failure and, as in many cases, is a bitter pill to swallow. In other cases parents that are no longer able to be contacted by the orphanage are not able to give up custody of their children. Without legal granting of custody a child cannot be adopted.

Despite the challenges the third option works well for us for a few reasons. Older children are generally less likely to be adopted. I am looking to adopt an older child for that reason. When we adopt we want to have full contact information for the birth parents. I am not into taking away the option for my/our child to meet up with their birth family later in life. Finally Jenn and I are into full-disclosure adoption. That means that there will be no 16th birthday card that reads: Surprise! You're adopted! I want our adopted child to grow up knowing that we picked them, we encourage them to meet their birth parents, and they are indeed adopted.

And so this Saturday my wife said to me, "I've made an appointment with the orphanage and we're meeting there after lunch. No golfing today." We met two young girls and Jenn had a long discussion with the administrator of the orphanage. (A little side note. This is the only orphanage administrator that has actually been helpful to Jenn. All the others just told her "It's impossible but if you would like to volunteer we're happy to have you.") I took a liking to the younger girl but Jenn reminded me that I had told her that I was looking to adopt an older child... she remembers EVERYTHING I say.... So this morning Jenn called the orphanage and set up a "date" between our kids and the older girl. Her name is Sujin and apparently we've raised our children to be gracious, patient, and kind. Jenn and the kids took Sujin to the water park and then over to our house to watch movies and play. It turns out that Sujin had never been to a pool before (lots of crying) and is deathly afraid of cats (we have an enormous teddy bear of cat who apparently looks like he eats young Korean girls). Even after all that Sujin enjoyed her time with us and my kids are looking forward to spending more time with her.

In the meantime I (err... my wife) will be busy contacting the adoption lawyer, maintaining contact with the orphanage, researching the internet and Korean adoption documents, and generally helping me actually achieve my goal of adopting a child here. I sooooo married up.

Now I am busy working the expectation management piece of this ordeal. The administrator at the orphanage stressed the importance of keeping your word and not making promises without being able to keep them. (a page straight from the Counter-Insurgency and Transition Team Manuals... who says Military Theory has no application in domestic situations). I sat down with the kids on three separate occasions and stressed the importance of not talking about the future and treating Sujin just like one of their other local friends. And then I posted pictures of Sujin with my kids on the internet and spoke at length with some friends of mine about my hope that this all works out. Expectation Management does not just apply to the adoptee.

You may have seen this before...

As the title reads, you may have seen this before. A few months ago I wrote this as a note on Facebook. The reason I'm posting this here now is because it's a lead-in to the new direction I plan to take this blog. I'll have another post shortly after this one with an update on the whole adoption dealio. Bottom line is that I'm going to use this blog to talk about Jenn' and my attempt at adopting a Korean child.

Here's the note from a few months ago:

I've been a Christian since I was about 5 or 6 years old. I've been an active church member for most of the time since then. I went to a conservative Christian college. I've been to more summer camps than I care to recall. I've been a youth leader. I've been on evangelism teams. I was actually a pastoral studies major for a little bit in college and I occasionally toy with the idea of going back to school to get my M-Div. When I was younger I was always listening for "God's call on my life" and quite hoenstly never heard it ringing clearly.

Sure, I heard a lot of the basic teachings of Jesus resonating in my heart and head and I try to apply them. Love the people around you - even the jerks. Be kind to everyone - especially those that piss you off. Help the people around you - even the scary ones. Be kind to people - even when it hurts. All these things I regularly fail at but I keep trying because when I read about Jesus that's what he did. Sure, he started throwing tables when people cashed in on the idea of God and He cussed out some hypocritical teachers but I don't think that's for me. I'm not... what's that word... perfect. Yeah, I'm not perfect and he was so I guess he gets a few privileges that come with being God.

Me, I always felt called to just be like Jesus in the other ways but I never felt called to a specific application. Mission fieldwork doesn't ignite a fire in me and nor does it make me want to run away. (If there's anything I learned in Sunday School it was that a key indicator of God's Call is the desire to flee.) My brief desire to be a pastor was more of a desire not to be a Music Major or to continue college. Other potential calls from the Lord turned out to be much of the same - a desire to not do something else - or the desire to be more like Jesus on a personal level. I've always been more of a one-on-one evangelist with a desire to help certain people on a personal level. See my note about "The Woman at the Well" for a prime example. But today in church I was finally slapped in the face with a 100% bona fide CALL FROM GOD. After further review it turns out that it's been going on for quite awhile.

There was a guest preacher named, no-joke here, Jim-Bob Park and his preaching made me tear up a little bit through most of his sermon. This wasn't really all that weird since good sermons usually make me shed a couple of quiet tears. I'm a big softy for the love of God. It was at the end of the sermon when it took every fiber of my being to not break into a fit of sobbing when I finally accepted that God was REALLY TRYING TO GET ME TO DO SOMETHING. I literally had to stifle an audible wail when I felt a deep and gaping hole in my soul and realized I was being told how to fill it.

I'm not a big fan of life-changing emotional responses but this emotional response was not brought on solely by Jim-Bob's preaching. It was the subject of his preaching and the realization that God, in his perfect timing and wisdom, had been preparing me to hear this message since I was a kid. My previous reaction to emotionally-charged sermons had inevitably left me with an emotional hangover. I always ended up failing whatever charge I thought had been leveled on me personally. I always backslid and in a lot of cases figured out that I had engineered my own emotional response in order to get an emotional 'high.' Today I knew there was no possible way that I had made myself respond. I was not seeking the reigious equivalent of heroin. In fact I spent most of the sermon rationalizing the ever-growing ball of emotions away. (See previous comment about how running away is a key indicator of God's Call...) I was successful in my rationalizing until the end when I nearly lost my composure against my will. The subject of today's sermon? Adoption.

So I said that God had been preparing me for this message since I was a kid and that was not hyperbole. Some friends of mine when I was a kid, the Ylitalo family, had a few foster kids and I remember always being impressed with how they could continually shower love and care on some kids who, from what I could see, did everything to reject that love. The same with the Galvin family and their foster-child Kate. I always thought they were some of the most loving and caring people. Stupid with love, really. I was envious. On a personal level I was always a sucker for an abandoned animal (yes, I just equated stray animals to abandoned children. Don't think about it too much. It's just an easy way for me to show that I'm a big sap for those that don't have anyone to really love and care them) and no cat I've ever owned has been bought from a pet store.

As I grew older I never really thought about adoption much. In the back of my head I always thought it was a pretty noble thing. I said on occasion that I would consider adopting a child but never really thought it through or acted on it. During my 2nd year in Korea my unit sponsored an orphanage and a girl in whom I was interested was organizing a trip. In order to look like a nicer guy than I really was at the time I went along. Once. I never went back. I made a lot of excuses as to why but in retrospect I think the reason is that it straight up broke my heart to see those kids in that condition. It broke my heart and at the time there was nothing I could do to help those kids. I was too weak to make myself go and be a mentor and simply showing up and randomly giving care to children was too emotionally draining. The only excuse I can come up with is that the time wasn't right. Regardless I think back to the love that I could have given to those kids and how I held it back and... I understand why but I cannot rationalize it away.

When I was back in college this last time I took a class on adoption and read a lot of books and accounts. The instructor was an adoptee and I got the distinct impression that she was NOT an adoption advocate. I still don't know why but she gave a litany of reasons why NOT to adopt - particuarly why not to adopt internationally. Jenn and I had many discussions about adoption but it was too expensive. Putting two kids into private school while funding college tuitions, paying for 3 luxury cars, a lake home, college, and sevicing previous debts was challenging enough. Another child would impinge on that lifestyle a little too much. Bad timing.

Jenn and I did, however, talk about eventually having two more kids of our own. We toyed with the idea of adopting instead of having the kids ourselves but we were healthy and young and saw no real reason to adopt. It was a regular topic of discussion thereafter but it was expensive and we were busy. I deployed again and while I was gone my wonderful wife decided that it was time to cut back on expenses and start paying off debt. We sold the cars and got on a sustainable financial plan. During that time we decided that it would be good for the kids to get some international exposure so I asked to come to Korea.

This time in Korea I am not a single private. I have a good income and a good home. We have learned how to live on more limited means and found ways to cut down on private school tuition. We have also been talking a lot more about adoption. The orphanage I visited ten years ago is right down the road from where I live now and there is another within walking distance of our home. Jenn and I have had a couple of serious discussions about adopting one or more kids but the conversations have always ended with, "Later." Two weeks ago I bought "Despicable Me" for the kids not realizing that there was an adoption-related message in it. That stupid movie makes me tear up as often as I watch it. That stupid movie also got me to talking to Sora about adopting a brother or sister... or both. The idea has been met with the enthusiasm only possible from a 7 year-old girl given the prospect of a little sister.

And then the sermon. This is the first week Jenn and I have been back to church together since before her trip to the States. I expected it to be another sermon trying to gain support for the church's campaign to fight human trafficking but ol' Jim-Bob was a special guest speaker. It started with Ephesians 1:4-6 and ended with me struggling to keep from bawling like a baby and blowing snot all over the cuffs of my dress shirt. After the sermon I knew without a doubt that GOD'S CALL was ringing out. So much so that in the car on the way back I looked at my wife and told her the same. And she agreed.

Later is now. My preferred method of evangelism is one-on-one relationships and what better way to do that than to bring that person into your own home. And love them, be kind to them, do nice things for them, be wise and know how to answer their hard questions. We have the home, the stupid amount of love, the desire, the location, the maturity, and the clarion call of the Lord of Hosts himself ringing in our ears. Later is now