A Journey of Faith: Part 4

I am sorry that this blog has been a long time coming.  It is difficult to write.  In telling you that the pain is still so real and still so fresh, you can come to the conclusion yourself that we haven't found our happy ending.  Not yet.

I have faith that it is still there.  Don't misread that to mean that I have faith that Eva Faith will be our forever daughter and in our home.  What I have faith in is that God has a plan and a purpose in all of this and that He can and will give our family a peace in all of this.  I have faith that there is redemption in this journey.  I will continue to pray each day for that.  I hope and pray that you can do the same for whatever pain may be in your life as well and that you can find the healing that you need through the faith in His promises.

Back to the story.......

I left off that we were anxiously waiting what was next with Eva Faith.  Waiting for any answers that might come our way in this spiderweb of sticky Ugandan guardianship.  We continued waiting for weeks without answers.  In the meantime we continued to pick Eva Faith up in the mornings and took her back in the evenings.  Careful to be aware of Joseph's feelings and make sure that he was not with us for either of those trips if it could be helped. 

We still didn't say anything to the kids.  What could we really say at this point?

Fast forward to the week before Thanksgiving..... the home had a few meetings with the mother (still didn't know what was going on as far as a legal case, but hoping she was not in trouble) and she had repeatedly said that she wasn't prepared to care for her daughter when she gave her up almost a year prior and she still wasn't prepared to care for her now.  She wanted her daughter to be adopted, but did request that she might know her.  Jason and I were open to this idea, especially since we were planning on raising our kids right here in Uganda.  We wouldn't be gaining guardianship and leaving the country so that was a big possibility and also important to us.  After all, we did change her name to Eva Faith to honor her birth mother who made the hard decision to give her birth when she so easily could have ended the pregnancy and made the decision to abandon her in a safe place when the side of some back road or a pit latrine is sadly the choice of many.  Especially those who fear prosecution later.  We were thankful for the role she had played in her daughter's life and were willing to do what we could to continue it on some level.

Back to Thanksgiving.... On the Wednesday, the week before Thanksgiving, we received the call from the home that we had been hoping for.  Papers were to be signed that Friday which would prevent any future problems with our case.  Because of that, the home felt comfortable fulfilling the care orders that had been signed in September and releasing Eva Faith to our full time care.  They said that she should be home with us that Saturday or Monday at the latest.  I was ecstatic!  Could this really be happening?  Could we be any more grateful for our Thanksgiving?

As you can tell, things didn't go as planned.  That Friday morning I received a call from the director of the orphanage, asking for Jason.  Jason was asked to come to his office right away, without me. (if any of you know me well, you know there wasn't a chance that was happening!).  So we both went right away.  We knew it was bad news.  Otherwise, why just Jason?

The director stalled for what seemed like an eternity before finally acknowledging why we were all there.  I can't really go into details, not yet at least, as to how that meeting was.  I am still so heartbroken and angry and I don't think what I would say would be too kind.  Bottom line to it all was that the mother had to consult a long lost family member, head of the clan, in order to get approval for the adoption and he refused.  We have heard that he is highly against US adoptions.  He said that the mother (who had run away over 2yrs prior) was to come home immediately, with her daughter, and he would make sure that they were taken care of.

Our journey with Eva Faith came to a slamming door in about a 10min conversation.  We were told to get the kids and say our goodbyes.  That day.  So that is what we did.  I captured some of those moments on film.  I think for me I needed to in order to remember it all.  To try to take it all in, what was happening.  To capture one more moment of the kids with their sister.  It all didn't make sense.  She was supposed to be coming home the next day.  We were supposed to be a complete family.

Why was God taking another daughter, another daughter named Faith, from us again?

There is still more to share, but I will leave you with these goodbyes for now.......

Everett has the biggest heart of anyone I know.  I worry that it means he hurts even more.

So much of my pain is in all the memories to come of these two sisters that won't happen.

They wouldn't let go of each other.

The director didn't want me to come because he said that I cared about the child and it would be too hard to hear.  Did he somehow think this Daddy cared any less?

 

 

 

The absolute best big brother in the world.

Pierce and Joseph were both with us that day too, but thankful that their little hearts are too young to understand most of what is going on.