Welcome Home

Seven years ago - December 7, 2004 - Sierra came home. We had learned about her only two weeks earlier after expressing some interest in adopting a little girl.
Stan and I and our three boys were happy together and enjoying taking care of the children placed in our home - most of which were also boys. I mentioned to Stan that it would nice to add a little sister to the mix, and he agreed that we should mention it to someone at the agency so that if a foster/adopt situation came up we might be called.

About a week after speaking with a supervisor, she called back to tell me about an eight month old baby girl who had been born two months premature and addicted to three different drugs. Another foster parent had been caring for her since she was two months old, birth mother had not been in contact and the birth father was unknown, and this older foster mother did not feel able to adopt the baby.

I told the supervisor to please not contact any other families - how presumptuous of me! - until I could call Stan and we could meet the baby. The next day I visited with Sierra in her foster home, made arrangements for another visit and then scheduled for the whole family to go and pick her up and bring her home on December 7, 2004.

It was only about a half-hour car ride, but it seemed to take SO long to get to her. We had packed the rest of the kids - Angel, Fred, Eli, Evan and River - into the car and talked about the new baby all the way. There was jockeying for position as to who was going to get to sit next to the baby in car and who would get to hold her first when we got home. I don't remember who won those arguments, but I do remember a seamless transition.

That's only part of the story of seven years ago - the happy part. Now the not-so-happy part:

I mentioned River, a blond haired, blue eyed, very friendly and highly precocious little boy of 2 1/2. River had been placed with us in September 2004; the following month we were asked if we would consider being an adoptive resource for him, and we said yes. Just a month after we committed to adoption, we were told that his grandparents had arrived from out of state to request visitation. Following that visit and another one, we were told that River would be moving with his grandparents to South Carolina... in two days.

That news came on the morning of December 7, the very same day we brought Sierra home. And so just two months after we had thought River would be our fourth 'permanent' son, he left our home and family for good.

Some might see God's timing in all of this: that even though we had lost the chance to adopt River, God had brought Sierra to our family. And there is nothing wrong with that perspective, but it's just not where I was or may ever be with it all. Having River leave, albeit to be with his relatives who clearly loved him, was one of the most difficult fostering experiences for me. There is still a piece of my heart reserved for him, I still think of him every year in December not only because that was when he left, but because his birthday is December 23 - this year he'll be turning 10 years old.

While I am immensely thankful for the miracle of adoption through foster care, as well as for birth families who are reunited through it, my heart is also broken for all the children who may never experience the love and security of a permanent, forever family either through reunification with family or through adoption.

Some of these kids will never hear, "Welcome home."