Lost in Yalta

I'll begin at the end.  It was eventful.  I must forego the whole story and just say that we are back, all of us, safe and sound from a one day excursion to Yalta on the Black Sea.  We had Liza for 48 hours over my Mom's birthday weekend.  It felt good.  We saw the sun actually shining for the first time in 28 days.  The sky was blue.  Do you know how much that enhances your ability to cope?  It would not have been worth more to me had it been literally made of gold and handed to me.  It was tonic for the soul.  I don't know how long I stood, face uplifted, afraid to close my eyes and soaked in the sound of every wave, the beauty of every ray, my children laughing.  I breathed.  I was silent.  And I breathed.

Many sweet, kind people have tried to use logic to help us overcome spiritual oppression and emotional pain here.  I have been very convicted to pay attention to how we respond to someone who is hurting.  We are uncomfortable with sadness or anger, so we try to talk each other out of feeling those things.  I just want to point out that Satan does not release his grip on us because it ought to make sense.  Many things in this world should be and are not; or should not be and are.

If you were betrayed by a friend and someone said, "At least you had a friend" would you be comforted?  If you were sitting beside your mother's bedside while she dies and someone said, "At least you had her as long as you did" would you cease to mourn?  If your marriage ended and someone said, "At least you got out alive" would you not grieve the loss? If you spent every day for a month with social orphans whose parents live and yet do not come for them, in a spiritually oppressed nation and someone said, "At least you saved one" would you forget the rest?  I will never forget.  And if it ever stops hurting, then shame on me...because my eyes have been opened.  And it hurts.  Yet we are worn thin.  We are worn thin and that hurts, too.

 It's okay for Christians to hurt.  It is not a lack of faith or a failure. We should not approach others with a measuring stick and tell them when it's okay for them to hurt and when rationally they should stop hurting for our comfort.  My sister described a book written by her friend, Daniel Walser, in to Make a Life,  that describes it as sitting in a burning house.  This is a quote from her blog about this idea:

He articulates with precision the rarely heard perspective of a man grieving the loss of his unborn child.  “I begged God to raise her from the dead.  Crazy?  I didn’t think so.  I pleaded with the Almighty.  My heart nearly dislodged with the force of yearning behind each appeal.  I became a desperate, dime-store lawyer stating my case before what I hoped would be a fair and righteous judge.”  

But for me personally, the real treasure in his writing is less the narrative of what happened and much more the insider story of grief that follows. How we who stand outside often unintentionally fail those inside the “burning house,” how God does not, how we can help by being willing to enter into the flames rather than trying to simply extinguish them.

This story is for all of us: those who have hoped and been disappointed, those who mourn, and those who want to understand how to enter the mourning of others."

We will rejoice when we get our daughter home.  This place will become part of her past.  We cannot, however, erase that past.  It will still hurt her.  She will need us to enter the burning house, sit down in the midst of it, and burn with her then, as we are now.  It is a life skill for parents.  

I'll leave you with that image and show your some brighter ones.  They are the balm.

These are all elderly people dancing in the public square.  Joy you just don't see in Ukraine.

We had to return her by 1pm for a school field trip to the Circus.  Last night we heard there was a snow storm in the mountain passes we had traveled down.  That route was only 100km.  The alternate route was supposed to take 4 hours, so we had to wake up and leave straightaway.  She didn't talk or smile the whole drive drive back.  Then toward end she said, "Mommy?...One more week?"  Yes, baby, just one.  Then I had to give her back.  I pray that was the truth.

1000 Words

We’ve waited so long to post pictures of our girl, that we’re going to take advantage of it in this post, just because we can.

If you know us well, you probably know that the Christmas season is our absolute favorite time of year.  My wife starts decorating for Christmas sometime around Labor Day.  Christmas music begins by October 15^th.  Every week is filled with family traditions and activities.  So we knew leaving the country during this time would be particularly difficult.

We could have adopted anybody from anywhere at any time of the year.  In fact, we were going to adopt a baby domestically.  From the beginning of “our” plan to adopt, though, God clearly had some other purposes neatly built in.  Liza was placed in our lives as surely as a baby in your arms at the hospital.  We could just feel it, the hole being filled with just the right piece.   If you’ve been following our journey on Facebook you’ve may have an idea of how many people are praying for us, family, dear friends, acquaintances, people we barely know and many people we don’t know at all. Through our initial crisis, He’s united His body in prayer for a family adopting an orphan.  This in turn has drawn attention to the needs of all orphans – namely that of a family.  He’s changing the hearts of people with respect to how they think of orphans.  Perhaps, instead of “yes, but not me”, for some it has become “maybe me”? 

I wish I was spiritual enough to say that I wanted to adopt Liza just because I have a heart for orphans, but when I saw her last summer, I didn’t see an orphan.  I just saw my daughter. And I knew she was all alone halfway across the world. I wanted to go get her as quickly as possible and at whatever expense.  Any parent would do this for their child.  Reagan remembers watching an episode of Extreme Home Makeover some years ago in which they restored the home of a family who adopted several teenagers.  One of their young men talked about how grateful he was to his parents because everybody just wants babies.  She wished then that she was the kind of person who would do that.

Sweet 16 and never been claimed...til now

Just when it seems like things will go our way, though, God throws something in there to make us realize that it’s only going to happen by His will.  The most critical meeting of this entire journey is court.  The day before our hearing our facilitator told us of a family she’d worked with recently who were turned away by the judge.  They left here empty handed.  I just can’t imagine such a result.  We didn’t want Liza to worry at all about court, but she was nervous, like us.  She’s smart enough to know that there are still plenty of things that could go wrong.  

Liza's 16th B-Day Party

So when court was postponed from Friday, November 30^th to Tuesday, December 4^th, we started to feel like those 4 days were too much.  Like something must be wrong.  The SDA in Kiev had 10 business days before they would sign our papers.  They had our papers for 13 days, though.  The 13^th day was on Sunday, December 2^nd.  Of course, we had court scheduled for the 4^th and needed to have the signed papers in hand to attend our court date.  By 3PM on Monday the 3^rd, the papers were still not signed and it seemed like court would be delayed again.  Our facilitator told us:  “Americans know how to pray.  So please, guys, call your friends to pray for you.” So we put out the word on FB for friends to pray – and they prayed!  So many people prayed.

Her gift - a scarf from the market in town.

The phone rang. Good news!  Papers have been signed!  Bad news…  Blizzard in Kiev and flights to our region are either grounded or delayed.  Our facilitator in Kiev drove the 30 kilometers to the airport through the snow and ice for 2 hours. They found an ordinary person boarding the plane and explained what the documents were and what they were for.  That person was so moved by the desire for a 16 year old orphan to be adopted into a family, that they clutched the papers to their chest got on the plane and prayed the entire way!  When they got off the plane in region, they called our local facilitator who met them at the airport at 12:30 AM on the 4^th.  Court was on!

She LOVED it!

Our hearing was in the judge’s office with Liza represented by the orphanage social worker, two jurors, the judge and the prosecutor.  The session itself was filled with formalities; reading the same details of the case over and over again.  The judge asked us what the content of our case was: I answered formally, (paraphrased) to adopt Liza as our legal daughter, to change her name to the name she requested “Elizabeth Reagan Mountain” and to bring her home with us to the US.  The social worker told the court that she believed it was in Liza’s best interest for us to adopt her.  After a few questions from the judge and jury about how we would handle her education and social interactions, we were dismissed for a 30 minute reprieve while they deliberated.  FIVE minutes later we were called back in and sat down while the judge read the decision (in Russian of course).  One of our jurors, a stone-faced 50 year old woman in a miniskirt and thigh high boots, sat across the room smiling at us and Liza.  We knew it was good.  The judge declared our petition approved and that serious room burst into smiles all around.  

The next two hours were spent in celebration with our new daughter.  So much joy!  I toasted the table at lunch, "Today, a new daughter has been born into our family.  All children are born into families through difficult labor.  But afterward our great joy causes us to forget the pain.  None of our children earned a place in this family, but were placed here by God.  The same is true with this daughter."  Her social worker gave a toast  and we gathered for a quick photo in the cold before she had to return for the orphanage for 10 more days.  We were told ten days until the court decree becomes official.  It's turned out not to be exactly the case. 

As with everything in being here, there have been two sides to every coin.  Our joy in having a new daughter turned to sadness as she was taken away from us.  But when we went to visit her again today, things were somehow different.  We were visiting Elizabeth, not Елизавета.  We were visiting our daughter, not our soon-to-be-daughter.  And she was so happy and talkative.  We spent some time teaching each other more Russian and English - laughing at each other's attempts to pronounce difficult words or understand each language's word order.

Moments before rushing to the defense of her siblings (Read "Big Sister")

Liza may only be a child for two more years, but she needs a family for the rest of her life.  She is still so young.  I pray that some of your are reading this and being called to adopt a teenager.  Reagan calls her, "baby" and she loves it.  Even older children need to be somebody's baby.  We can't imagine life without her now.

New Sisters!

Welcoming Babushka and Dedushka to Crimea

Choosing her name - Elizabeth Reagan Mountain

Choke Hold

We’ve spent the last hour talking through emotions, Tom and I.  We’ve talked through the events of last night, where another apartment was rented for the sole purpose of another one night party.  This is a regular occurrence.  We’ve talked through all the feelings that nobody else can understand, not even friends who have spent three weeks in Ukraine adopting.  We’ve talked about what has helped and what has hurt us.  We’ve talked about how it might be when we get home and still cannot impart what’s happened, even face to face.  We’ve talked about our darkest moments.    

 We were tired enough to sleep through a normal party.  Music, voices I can ignore.  This was a something altogether different.  One guy was on some kind of drug that allowed him to sustain a maniacal, evil laughter for six solid hours.  It was paranormal.  Among those sounds, were others too inappropriate to describe.  We stuffed earphones connected to white noise devices at maximum volume, to no effect.  By 4:30 we hit a breaking point, both of us.  It was at that time that I turned on the computer to try to silence the violent thoughts we were struggling through.  But it opened the door for more ill thought out advice from well meaning people.

We cannot describe how we are being stretched and depleted.  You would have to go watch a movie that has you on the edge of your seat, gripped, crying, foregoing sleep and sustain that position for 21 days to have the slightest clue why we are unable to keep up appearances for the comfort of other people who are reading from the comforts of their own home, in their own country, with their own possessions.  Platitudes are not helping us.  Telling us what we’re doing wrong, how we could do it right, how you would do it differently is not helping us.

This scene from the movie Warrior might aid an insufficient imagination.  We feel like the brother who is losing the fight.  Please don’t respond with “You’re not losing the fight.”  We FEEL like the brother who is losing the fight.  We are fighting something that we love.  Not just fighting for something we love. We are FIGHTING something that we LOVE.  We have sustained dislocated joints, broken bones and torn muscles.  Our Father is watching but not preventing.  Our loved ones are NOT inside the ring with us, but helpless bystanders.  We can't break the choke hold.  We are exhausted and pinned.

Our brothers will hold us despite the sweat and the blood that is pouring off of us.  Our brothers will say nothing more than I’m sorry, I’m sorry, It’s okay, I love you.  You may be in the crowd cheering, but we can’t hear you right now through the pain.  We can only hear the ones that are holding us up and whispering in our ears.  We can only hear our brothers.  

Sixteen Years Ago

It was our 16^th wedding anniversary, Liza’s 16^th birthday yesterday.  Sixteen, the fateful day that has fueled our race to Ukraine.  Sixteen, the age when these kids are set off on their own.  For whatever reason, she has always celebrated her birthday on October 30^th but today is the date on her birth certificate.  We would never want to take that away from her so we will celebrate the way she has always has.  It would be, however, impossible to ignore the Hand of Providence in this date being part of our story.  Since we weren’t in Ukraine on October 30^th, this was our chance for a re-do.  A girl’s 16^th birthday should be magical.  In the orphanage though, all birthdays of a particular month are acknowledged on one day, all together.  So this was, in fact, her very first birthday party.

When the phone rang at 10am yesterday we were expecting confirmation that we could come get Liza for a special day.  As it happened that phone call was not confirmation.  It was the opposite.  We were told we were unable to take her off orphanage grounds for the special occasion.  The director was very apologetic but she said the inspector was already there as he had been for the last 5 business days.  All day, every day, doing headcounts.  The consensus is that he is trying to prevent adoptive families from having any privileges with their children before the process is complete.  If he were to discover Liza missing for a few hours, it would have a significant and detrimental impact on our court hearing this coming Tuesday.

So, Plan B: we ran to the enormous SuperMarket two blocks over and grabbed a cake.  Up the stairs on the second floor is a miniature mall.  We bought her a beautiful scarf (which she hasn’t taken off since).  Grandpa and October ran to the underground kiosks to the biggest hallways full of long stem roses ever (and by long stem, I mean 3 feet long and thick as a tree branch).  They chose a pink one, her favorite color next to Ukrainian black ;) .  It was without a doubt the most beautiful rose I have ever seen, and I used to work for a florist.  (Scheffler’s shout out for you Wheatonites).

The surprise was in the fact that she had not been told that we were trying to get special permissions in the first place.  So for Liza, there was no disappointment, only surprise.  A teacher sent her outside where all 8 of us were climbing out of our two taxis.  Keeper presented her rose by getting down on one knee.  When asked if she wanted to share her cake with her class she said, “Konyeshna!” (Of course!).  Her precious smile during the whole party was impossible to describe.  It was a little bit self conscious, a whole lot happy.  It was a smile that had been waiting her whole life to make its’ appearance. 

The class sang Happy Birthday in Russian and in English, then gave CocaCola toasts to her health and happiness in America with her big new family.  She in turn gave Tom and I a toast to our 16 years of marriage.  She grabbed my hand and we ran downstairs to take a piece of cake to her beloved Director saying, “Sank you, Mommy” all the way.  She lit up like a Christmas tree when she opened her very fashionable scarf privately afterward.  She still had it on today when we went to visit.  I would be remiss if I did not communicate how beloved she is here.  She has been well loved.  It may not be a home, but God provided for her.  Teachers stop us in the hall to say what a “good girl” she is.  Her geography teacher wanted a picture with her.   Birthdays for orphans are not easy days.  This birthday for Liza was as 16 ought to be.

**We promise to show you pictures of her sweet face after court next week.

Michael W. Smith's song from my junior high school days "Hand of Providence" has been playing in my head since early yesterday morning.  It reminds me that none of my life is accidental. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2HbrNcfmYs

Providence, Providence
See it laying down the cornerstone
The Hand of Providence - it's evident
For we could never make it on our own
Apportioning the power
Weighing all that it entails
Giving us the fulcrum
And a balance to the scales
Chorus:
Oh, the Hand of Providence
Is guiding us through choices that we make
Oh, the Hand of Providence
Is reaching out to help us on our way

Providence, ever since
Any thesis ever entered man
The Hand of Providence
Has been our best defense
Tho' his ways are sometimes hard to understand
From the dying of a heartbeat
To another soul reborn
From in between and circling
Our thoughts of love and war

Today was, by comparison, a much more difficult day.  It stormed heavily all night long.  It rained all day, dark gray and gloomy.  Hours stretched into eternity.  I can’t believe this is still the same day.  It has been black as pitch since 4 o’clock.  Our visit today was brief as all five of our kids slept and lazed most of the day away in their respective locations.  But one notable thing happened.  One thing struck me deeply as I watched a few of our kids play soccer on the pavement just outside the door of the dormitory.  It was still sprinkling and very, very dark because there are no lights outside.  I was standing on the large front steps next to a little boy named Oleg.  He was watching me intently, as Liza sometimes does to me and Tom both.  He said he was twelve, but he was tiny, possibly from malnutrition.  We’ve seen that a lot here.  I would glance quickly sideways every few minutes to see if he was still there.  Yep.  Still watching.  He didn’t look away embarrassed or even have anything to say.  His answers to my questions brief.  He was not waiting to interact with me.  I knew what he was doing, though.  He was watching me mother my children.  He wanted to study what that looks like.  He was wondering what it would be like to be the object of such affections. 

That’s what orphans do.  They dream.