There is so much involved. There is the I am single and work a lot will I be a good enough mom? There is the I'm almost 50 what am I doing with a toddler. There is the fact that he has a mom who is here with us. There is...and the list goes on with the doubts but there is also one thing I know for sure he is my boy and I love him beyond measure.
We have been trying to get things ready to submit to the Haitian government. The big stumbling block has been Abolina. Maybe I should go back and start the story at the beginning...
On January 17, 2010 I drove a load of people home from the hospital to the stadium where they were staying. In the truck were 2 new moms, one of them just wasn't "getting it" when I was explaining how to mix the formula. We dropped them off and everyone went to find their loved ones except Abolina. She sat down put Ronald on the ground and started going through the things the hospital gave her. I backed the truck up saying that baby is going to die. We went around the roundabout and I called Keith - the call went through on the first try (phone service was sketchy at best those days). I told him the story and he said bring them home. They stayed with Keith and Jan for a few days and we found a place that would take them both. They stayed there until May when they said they couldn't handle Abolina any more, she can be disruptive sometimes. So Abo came to live with me and Ronald stayed. In late August a friend mentioned they would like to adopt him. I wanted him to be in a home setting and bond with people. God provided enough formula and diapers to see him through that period of his growth. The people decided they couldn't adopt him and he has been at home with us since then. We got him a birth certificate and he has been a happy growing boy. As he is approaching 3 - when they start school here it is clearer and clearer that Abo just can't be a voice for him with her mental capacity.
A few months back we had a team of vets - one has an adopted grandson, the other an adopted daughter and the other 4 adopted daughters. After spending a week listening to their counsel I decided that it would be the wisest thing to proceed with adopting Ronald. Then comes in the finances. I can't pay all the fees - its several thousand dollars. One of the vets has been helping me raise the money as well as another friend who has adopted children.
Ok so finances are coming together now time to find an orphanage willing to register him, while he still lives with me. That took about 2 months. I have all the paper work done and now comes what to do about Abo, she isn't mentally capable to raise a child. So the orphanage considered making him abandoned and social services said it wasn't right but would be easiest. But none of us were comfortable with lying. That would have meant a new birth certificate and starting out our lives together in a lie. We spoke to several lawyers and it is possible to show mental incompetency but its not done often. The other option is to have a family council and have them be ok with the adoption and they speak for Abo.
Abo knows where she is from and that she has 2 brothers and her parents are dead. She can't tell us when she left, how old she is or where she lived here in Port. She knows she has a daughter but can't remember how old she is or where she is now, just that she is with the fathers family. She also talks about a baby boy who died.
So we decided to go searching for her family. There are folks in Merger who are from the same area. A 6 hour drive and an hour or so walk and questioning lots of people on market day and miracle of miracles we found her older brother, his wife and several people who knew her as a child.
Sometimes she says her name is Jolina but come to find out it is really Polina. Her birthday is July 2 and she is 26 years old. The last time her brother saw her was 2003 with her daughter who was 3. After that he had no idea what became of her. Her other brother has been in the Dominican Republic since 2004 and no one has heard from him. Her family was so happy to reconnect with her and happy that she and her son were in good hands. We left it at that and we would call them when it was time to do paperwork for the adoption.
Three days after that meeting we got a telephone call from the bus station saying they were here and to come pick them up. That really sent me into an emotional upheaval - did they want to take them back with them or were they going to try and get money from me. Too much too quick in the middle of a busy week. Plus Abo wasn't so calm about meeting them, she thought I wanted to send her away and she didn't know if she wanted to see them.
God has a way of working things out. Her brother and his wife spent 3 days thanking me for reuniting them and being willing to adopt Ronald. They are kind simple country folk who couldn't be more genuine. Ronald has 4 cousins, one who is his age. The adoption folks managed to get us all the appointments we needed for a family council and all the required signatures on all the multiple affidavits we needed. It is all beyond amazing.
Now this week I have to get 3 things notarized and an attestation from the bank that I have an account and all the paperwork will be ready to submit. That is another measure of grace because the rules were supposed to change in September but they have extended the deadline to November 1.
God is good!!! I am trusting him to work all this out (he has more than done so thus far). That the paperwork will be accepted, that I will find several more thousand dollars (they said $1000 for pre submission paperwork and we are at almost $2000) and that soon there will be a legal piece of paper saying what I already know - that Ronald is my son!
Sent from my BlackBerry® device from Digicel
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