Success Stories
It was a Saturday in January. I was out in the garage. My husband Gary, came out; I could tell he had something on his mind. After a few minutes he said to me, “You know, we are truly blessed.” I acknowledged this fact and sat down on a stepladder to hear what he had to say. “I want to give something back.” he said. “What would you like to do?” I asked. He said, “I want to adopt a child.” It did me no good to be sitting down because I fell off that stepladder! After more discussion we went to the computer so my husband could show me all the homework he had done on this subject. International adoption, for many good reasons, came up predominantly in his research. We looked at many web sites. We had more discussion. Because of our age (we are in our 50's), my husband felt a teenager appropriate. He had to be nuts!? Eventually, I suggested he email these websites and see what more information they had to offer. Every agency, except one, responded to our email with a computer generated response list of the financial costs of adopting, and an additional message in fine print to contact them again if we wanted more information. GOOD GRIEF!!
On Monday I received a call from the one agency we had emailed that did not send us a computer-generated response. The caller said, “Hello. My name is Elena from Faithful Adoptions.” No cold email here, this was a personal response. Elena wanted to know why we were interested in adopting, why an older child, what does my husband think of this idea? She talked to me for close to an hour about OUR attitude toward adoption. Her concern for the child we might adopt impressed me beyond words. One thing I knew by the end of our conversation… Faithful Adoptions was going to be the agency we would go through if we decided to go forward with this idea.
And we did go forward… We have the most beautiful 14-year-old daughter we could hope for.
Through the entire process of adopting a child you need strong support. Elena has been there. Everything was coordinated for us, from finding an agency for our home study, walking us through putting our dossier together, to making sure all our accommodations in Russia were ready for us when we arrived. In Russia Natasha took care of us. Every detail was attended to. Elena even called us while we were in Russia just to hear how we were doing. Our coordinator in Moscow was equally wonderful.
The wait between our first and second visits was difficult for us. We had met our Kristina. We had held her in our arms. To help ease some of our anxiety, Elena arranged for us to talk on the phone with Kristina every couple of weeks. Those phone calls went a long way for all of us. It was the most wonderful thing to hear Kristina's voice and her continued enthusiasm over being adopted. Since Kristina has been home Elena has talked with her on a regular basis. Elena has helped to smooth some of the bumps of adjustment, for us and for our daughter. Kristina calls Elena her friend, Gary calls Elena family.
Something Gary and I decided from the beginning was, this child must also want us. The beautiful thing about adopting older children from Russia is, from ten years of age and up, the child must go to court and consent to their own adoption. They must stand in front of the judge, answer questions, and say they would like to be adopted by this family. At the end of our court session the judge said, “ Why are you crying!” (Speaking to me) I had no explanation other than joy! It was October 14 th , 2005.
Kristina's favorite picture she names very simply, "Family" (in perfect English). It is the picture taken at the end day we all stood in court and were pronounced a family. We cannot think of a time in all our lives when we have felt such joy, or such blessing.
Kristina was in school three days after coming to the United States (9 th grade). I went to school with her for her first day. She has four English classes, Algebra (which she had in the 6th grade), PE, and Art. Her teachers have sent notes home that she is "such an easy, willing student". Her teachers know something her Daddy and Mama do not. She gives us a ration regarding her homework. We have been blessed with a normal, typical, know-it-all teenager. The wonderful part is, she will not go to bed until she is certain her schoolwork is completed for the next day. (How hard is that to take?)
Kristina is appalled by the "freedom" American children have in school. Children talk in class, they get up from their seats, they talk to the teacher without raising their hands. This is not acceptable in Russia . Must be the reason her teachers say she is such an easy student.
Kristina has so far received all A's and B's in all of her classes. She is proud of herself and her teachers send home notes with words like, "amazed:", and, "astounding". (Let's hope to keep this up.) Her art teacher has one of her sketches of young girl displayed in the store of a local merchant. The teacher called to say he is allowed to select 6 of the best works from all his students. And all of these accomplishments within her first month of adjustment to a new culture, a new language, and a new world.
This is a dear and wondrous child. She has adapted to "family" so quickly. She received email from her orphanage and cried. Ten minutes later she was laughing with her Daddy and tormenting him. We have had misunderstandings, we have understandings, we have all shed tears, and we have laughed until we cried. We are a family. It is the most wonderful feeling there can be....
We set out to adopt because we felt we were blessed. Instead, we have been blessed ten-fold more.
Faithful Adoptions, Elena, and all those involved made a possibility a reality. For that we say “Spyceeba” (Russian for “Thank you”).
Gary, Linda, and Kristina
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