Trust Me....

Over and over again the theme of "Trust Me" keeps repeating itself. Of course the Me in all of this is our Father. In church my scripture regarding Abraham and Isaac along with Trust Me was repeated in a sermon a visiting pastor gave. This time it was comforting and thought provoking, instead of like a knife in my heart.

Did all of this have to happen for us to get Hannah's referral? After all, she was referred out of batch and from an orphanage that gives very few referrals. Is there a similarity between Aidan and Isaac? I do not believe that God is cruel to use this precious child so that we would be referred Hannah. But, could He have used the wisdom and mercy that He has to make sure we got Hannah? Yes! It happened thousands of times before.

Does this new knowledge make me feel better? No, I still hurt badly over Aidan. Does it give me comfort and peace? Yes.

After hearing these words yet again, we were reminding of the story of Hannah. Hannah had to give Samuel back to the Lord.....she prayed for him and God granted her desire but she did have to give him up. Wow! That gave Mike and I chills. No matter what God is in control of this situation.

Another Bitter Sweet Day

Aidan my love. today we received the referral for Hannah. It was bitter sweet. She is beautiful, almost the female version of you! However, it was something that reconfirms that will not be able to adopt you.

We are still trying to make sense out of all of this. I pray for you daily and think of you many times a day. I cannot get your sweet face out of my mind. I want to know you so badly. You look so mischievous and fun. You would have fit perfectly into our family.

Our wish is that you will recover and that you can join our family. We pray that you are not alone and you are not afraid. You are our precious little boy and we will not forget you!

Yet, we celebrate the arrival of your sister. She is a cutie and we love her as well. She is from Hubei, a Hubei Honey. We are thrilled to have her, yet you are still in our heart and on our mind. There are so many promises with this referral. The promise of love, the promise of tomorrow, and the promise of the cement that holds a family together.

We love you sweet little boy! It breaks my heart into that you do not know that a couple 10,000 miles away loves you and thinks about you. All you know is that you are sick and possibly alone. I just cannot take it at times. I desperately want you to know about the love we have for you. Maybe someday, some how this will happen. We are trying to place this into God's hands. After all He united us in the first place.

We love you Aidan,
Your Mom and Dad

The Gifts, The Love

Well, the cyber gifts started coming in. We had stacks and stacks of gifts! There were three stacks on our front porch today! I was worried how we would react about when this happen. However, I did not feel sad! I was totally overwhelmed at the outpouring of love from everyone. We kept bringing the gifts in and decided to place them on our guest bed. It brought us comfort, great comfort.

Whenever the day would be difficult with questions or comments regarding Aidan, I would come home and look at the guest bed. I could feel the love coming from these people. I would also, pick up each package and think about the person that sent it. It gave me and Mike great strength.

Can I have his clothes?

I know that people meant well. But, with all good intentions people said things that were hurtful. The most shocking happened just minutes after we heard the news of Aidan. Someone actually asked me if she could have his clothes that I had purchased!!!! Can you believe that? That was hurtful. That comment actually made me sick.

People would actually say to me "Now you will get the girl you have always wanted". Those words would feel like a knife through my heart. It made it seem like Aidan did not make a difference in this world. He was our son, yes for only 10 days, but he was our son and he did make a difference in our lives. We loved him, we adored him and we were so thankful for him.

I finally got to where I would say, Aidan was our son, he is not a car that you trade in because it doesn't work or you do not like it, he is a baby. He is a human being and he is our son. Then I would fight the tears and fight from yelling at these people. They were trying to make me feel better but fell short.

It made me think about what I have said to people going through a difficult time - a miscarriage, a divorce, a job loss etc. Please forgive me. Just like these people, I meant well and I wanted to comfort. I noticed that the best response from people was "I am so sorry" or "I do not know what to say but please know that I am so sorry" or "I want to say something to make you feel better but I realize there is nothing I can say- just know I care". I promise from now on, I will be much more conscience of what I say.

The Call

On the way to work today Mike and I decided on our son's name. We loved the names Samuel and Aidan. So we decided to name him Michael Aidan Wen. Often people would tell us he looked like an angel - so we decided on Michael (plus the obvious, his father's name).

Then, while I was on the phone with a friend, I received an email from M. I just had a feeling that something was wrong with our paperwork. I got off the phone and called M to see what was wrong. Never, in my wildness dreams would I imagine what M would say. She said I have to tell you that your son is critically ill and you cannot adopt him.

All I remember is hearing this scream, wailing, crying, sobbing, and this guttural noise. It was coming from me! The next thing I knew, everyone was in my office. They were crying and hugging me....someone called Mike.

Mike came in and we had a moment and shut the door. I hated having to tell him what happen. I never want to hurt him, I love him so much. We hugged and cried together, I felt stronger standing beside him as we supported each other.

It was devastating. It was dark. We hurt so badly. But why? Why did this have to happen? Why now after waiting so long? Why us? All of these things kept running through my mind.

It was a horrible day! One that I hope nobody has to go through, ever. Our world came crashing down on us. The one thought that I kept thinking and it would make me sick, where was our Aidan and what had happen to him. Was he alone in a hospital? Was he OK? Was this all a mistake? Please dear Lord, be with our baby boy where ever he is. Protect him. Comfort him. Please let his foster mom be there with him. Place our baby boy in the cleft of your hand.

Why a Boy?

Sure, we have often wondered why we were referred a boy. I really did some soul searching on this one. Mike always believed that this was somehow God's will. I found comfort in his strength and decided this must be true.

How could you not fall in love with this little guy? There were lots of "red threads" in his referral. His referral was mailed on the anniversary of my father's death. I can't help but feel they somehow met in heaven.

He had several of the things we prayed for. He was very happy, healthy, slept well and ate well. Very selfishly, I prayed our child would be cute - he is adorable.

All throughout this adoption process God kept reminding me of several things:

1) I constantly ran into the phrase "I Am". This was always comforting to me. I felt God was in control and that I should not worry.

2) Several times in a row, my devotion was on Abraham and Isaac, particularly the part about sacrificing Isaac. I thought it was that I needed to sacrifice the "idea" of what my child would be - meaning the age of our daughter. I just thought we were going to be referred an older child. My friend Shelly helped me with that. She told me to pray with my hands palm up. This is representative of accepting a gift, whatever that gift from God may be.

3) The story of Hannah also repeatedly came up. We kept thinking that it was confirmation of the name. But, Hannah had a son!

The grieve for our daughter was very hard and very real. We empty the girl nursery and I just cried and cried. We packed up her clothes and preceded to make this nursery our son's. It broke my heart because everything we bought for our daughter was special. It was purchased on a trip or for a special purpose. Now, our darling son has everything thrown together.

We had a closet full of clothes and items for our daughter. Our son has very little clothes. I just never want him to think he was not wanted - EVER. We do want him very much, just that we EXPECTED a daughter. How do you ever get that point across?

Please know little one that you are so loved. You are perfect in every way and we would never trade you for anything or anyone.

Surprise Shower Times Two

Surprise!!!! One of our Yahoo boards is giving us a Surprise Cyber Shower. They are mailing us gifts but we cannot open until Oct 13th! Then we will all get on line and have the shower.

Another Yahoo group, our Feb DTC group, is also giving us a cyber shower. Both groups have the most amazing people. I attended a International Adoption Clinic Seminar and they talked about the average IA adoptive parent. The average adoptive parent is very giving and charitable. Well, I guess this just tells you how true this statement is huh?

It's All In a Name

Wow! We need a name! We had decided on Hannah Grace for our daughter after a long deliberation. First we were going to use the name Kaitlyn. Then we started watching Jon and Kate Plus 8. Mike fell in love with Hannah, she is his favorite. (My favorite is Leah). Then the sermon was on Hannah the next Sunday. Hannah was unable to have children. She prayed and prayed for a child and finally she gave birth to Samuel. Mike and I looked at each other and we knew that we wanted to name our daughter Hannah.

So we have a beautiful little boy and we need a name just as meaningful as Hannah was to our daughter.So now, we are looking at the following names:
Aidan
Samuel
Cody
Harrison
Ethan
Evan
Logan

Painting the Nursery....Again

Yes, we painted again! We painted a taupe and a sage to match the bedding. Mike picked out the bedding at Target and it is so cute! We also bought some cute clothes for our little Wen. They do make cute clothes for boys!

The room is just to cute. I went to the fabric store and bought matching fabric for the cushions for the rocking chair. I also went out and bought swimsuits, socks, swim diapers, pacifiers and toys for little boys. Now, we need to decide on a name.