*POP*

That was my huge bubble bursting.... I decided today would be a day to really discover if this whole thing is worth it. Am I getting myself worked up and praying for a miracle that will likely never happen. The answer......Yes. I called God's Littlest Angels today to see if I can even be considered for a Haitian adoption. What could it hurt to call right? After all, if you're going to present an issue to a man (my husband) you better have a solution and all the answers to back it up. I spoke to Holly and Jean who were both very nice, understood my desire but explained how the Haitian government [for once in its long history] has decided to try to follow laws they made 25 years ago. How noble. I shouldn't sound so sarcastic. Maybe any little step in the right direction for their government would help solve more of their problems. However, it doesn't solve mine. My problem of wanting to adopt a child. The problem of so many 100's of kids that are sitting in orphanages waiting to be adopted. Because, yes, they do know why they are there and seem happy to be there. They know they have a chance. And, of course, my heart still bleeds for the ones not sitting in orphanages. The ones in the smaller villages that are hungry or sick and have given up hope.

I have to stop.... stop obsessing. I have to find another way to find relief for the ache. I guess that means I need to keep pushing on with the mission and finding sponsors so more kids grow up independent and capable of overcoming what Haiti is. So there isn't a need for adoption someday. So that they can take care of their children someday.

I was told that exceptions are rarely made, but when they are it's a presidential dispensation. Which basically means the president of the Haitian government has to read a piece of paper that I would send from Trenton, Missouri among the other 1000's of files and papers sitting in an office somewhere to say, "sure, so she's got three kids.... let her have one of ours." When I know there are those 1000's of people in those other files and papers who do actually qualify without having been blessed with any children of their own--I feel selfish again.

Jean also said there are ways around it, but this agency doesn't promote it and it's probably not legal. If you have money you can do anything.... I bet Brad and Angelina didn't have these issues, or have to wait for months on end, even years to adopt their children. I know there is a reason and a purpose for all the rules and laws, but sometimes I want to be that little kid that stomps my feet and yells, "It's not fair!"

I was told that since my daughter will be leaving the home due to graduation and becoming an adult I should wait until I only have two children in my home to start the process and then see if I can get a dispensation. I'll still have to have an exception.... which means in another 12 months I can look forward to starting a process that may or may not put a child in my home, that I will have to wait 2 years for then. By the time the whole process could be complete, my next child will graduate and I'll be down to one child in the home. And he would be 9.... wow. I can't imagine my littlest son being 9. And then bringing a sibling that would be 3-4 home. It wouldn't be like a bonding sibling by then, it would be a 'spoiled baby syndrome' sibling that gets everything. lol I have to laugh. That's what the older kids think of their brother now. He gets everything he wants mom! lol At that age, would the kids even be around enough for an adopted child to recognize them as siblings?

A lot of confusion.... maybe I'm just still being selfish and riding the 'Haiti High' I'm on. I don't know today. And maybe that's just hormones! lol And maybe I should quit reading blogs! Some aggrevate me because I see people going to visit their newly assigned child for the first time and making lists of things to remember to take for their next visit..... the beach towel they forgot that the hotel didn't provide. A watch because the power goes out in the hotel and you'll never know what time it is, and reading the complaints of the dirty tile floors. And some like this one are the reasons I still think I should press on and try to fulfill my goal. I've seen the 'real' Haiti. The poverty, the dirt and trash, the malnutrition and starvation, the disease and sickness. Not having power in our house was the least of our worries. We lived with a rat. And I laugh about it. I was happy about it. We were treated like royalty and lived without amenities that others take for granted. I lived and wandered in a village that most of my friends and family wouldn't be caught dead in. Literally. And it saddens me. Those people don't even have access to an orphanage to give their children to in hopes they'll have a better life.

I keep telling myself, where there's a will there's a way. But I need to remember if it's God's will, there will be a way. Laws change, government changes. Maybe 6 months from now it will all be a drastic new change in law that allows families to adopt that have 3 children. My magic number. Or maybe, just maybe their government will just start caring about their own people and look for answers to make Haiti the place I know God intended it to be.

Religion that God accepts as pure and without fault is this: Caring for orphans or widows who need help,and keeping yourself free from the world's evil influence.

--James 1:27