Hannah's Journey

I have really struggled with how much of Hannah's story I should share. Her journey to find a family hasn't been as easy for me to comprehend as Emma's was. Emma was found as a newborn, estimated to be a day old, in front of a hospital gate. Clearly, her parents had some compassion for her and wanted her to be found quickly. She had obvious disabilities probably to great for them to financially deal with... and she was born with flaws not widely accepted by the Chinese culture. We have always known that Emma's birthday is not exact, but close within days. Emma was abandoned, lived in an institution and had open heart surgery as an orphan. Thankfully, she came home at 15 months.

Hannah's story is quite different. Hannah was found in February 2010 and was estimated to be 5 months old at the time. Her assigned birthday could be off my months, weeks or days. We will never know. She was near death. Her medical file was very difficult to read. It stated that she was pale and in poor physical state and would vomit easily. I am not going to publicly share where she was found, but it is something I will never be able to wrap my brain around. Already at 5 months of age, she has lived through unimaginable pain and neglect.

Hannah has a long list of special medical needs. I have decided to share these needs because I believe God will use it to bring others to children like her who wait. Her medical file is overwhelming, but we have faith that she will thrive here in the States. First, she has been diagnosed with minor hydrocephalus. This means she has water on the brain. Normally kids with hydrocephalus have much larger heads than their bodies and they are developmentally behind. Her head is larger, but only slightly. Deep down, I just don't believe this will be an issue. We are prepared and willing to go down that road if it is an issue.

Second, Hannah has a heart condition. We were told that it is inoperable, and that she has a "weak" heart. It is extremely difficult to get a correct diagnosis on an orphan in China, so we have NO information or data on her heart. We are certainly stepping out in faith on this one. She has been through 5 major operations (for other issues) and her heart has survived each one with no problem, that is a wonderful sign. We have a wonderful cardiologist here and this will be one of the first things on our list to evaluate when she comes home.

Finally, Hannah's major issue is with her intestines. As my friend described her, "her plumbing is a little off!" She has been through a number of operations to repair this issue. She currently has a colostomy that is waiting to be reversed. This is a hard one for us. We originally asked them to hold on the reversal because we really want it done in the States. First, the care is better here. She almost died from a post op infection in one of her surgeries. We just don't want to take that risk in China again. It will be another 9 months until we get to her, however. That means she will be nearly 4 and still in diapers, living with a colostomy. This is not the healthiest option for her. Also, she is struggling with UTIs. They have partially removed one of her kidneys, and want to remove the rest of it. We believe her UTIs are because of a flaw with the past repairs, not because of a bad kidney. We want to keep her out of the hospital in China but we also don't want to risk infection. It is certainly a complicated matter so we have been praying for God's will. I don't know what to ask for, so I just want Him to take over. He has carried her away from death twice now, so if surgery must happen again in China, we trust that He will save her again!

We feel certain that Hannah is our daughter and brought to us for a reason. We have been amazed at how the finances so far have worked out. We have been planning this adoption since February when we put our house on the market. We knew that we wanted to adopt, but didn't think we would fit in our old house with 5 kids. Nothing happened!!! We were confused about what to do. We had saved for a bigger house, but could also use the funds for an adoption and just stay in our house and make it work.  Finally, a deal came through right before I left for China. When I was in China, I had a little scare. A friend emailed me and told me that Hannah's file had been pulled by a family. I was heartbroken. I felt so much guilt for not locking her file sooner (after spending several days with her, I knew she was mine!) I felt like I had chosen a bigger house over her. It was a horrible feeling. But, things worked out and her file was STILL there.

We moved, locked her file, and started our dossier all in the same week. First up was the home study.... $1,750. At the closing of our home, the lawyers made a mistake and refunded us $1,700. What?!?!?!? Then in the mail that week, I received a $25 check from a friend who meant to send it to me before I went to China. Our home study was covered.

After we moved into our house, our neighbors noticed Emma and said "the lady that lived here before you had 2 adopted daughters from China!" What are the chances? We really felt like God was showing off at this point.

Adoption friends from SFCV started sending me pictures once we announced our adoption. One picture was Hannah sitting in a butterfly jacket. The butterfly took over her entire chest. (I mentioned the significance of butterflies in my last post!) While I was searching through Kenlyn's FB page looking for the original video she posted, I came across a picture of Hannah that she was tagged in. I was also tagged in this picture. The picture was taken many, many months ago before I even knew Hannah was my daughter. I could not figure out why I was tagged in this picture so long ago. It was clearly a picture of Hannah!!! Well, in the far corner of the picture, was one of my sponsor children. The person had tagged me and Kenlyn for that purpose. I thought it was a cool reminder of how God has things planned for us way before we even know it! It certainly made me smile!

Just yesterday I was telling a friend at school all the cool things that have happened with this adoption. How we just know that we are doing the right thing. I kid you not.... a butterfly came and landed on her shirt!!!!! I pointed to the butterfly and said, "that is a whole other story!" As my friend Kyle said, "it is so cool that God can send something as small and simple as a butterfly to confirm what you are doing."

We are waiting on one more dossier document, then we will be DTC. My personal goal was to have papers to China by October 15, but it doesn't look like that will happen. Hopefully by the beginning of November we will be logged in, which puts us at a May/June travel. Keep praying for our girl!