Chapter 13

Chapter 13

“We HAVE to say no. My son is NOT five. I KNOW this Garen!”

It was a Thursday. November 5th of 2015 to be exact and we had gotten a new referral for a little boy who had just turned five. Unbelievable. Inconceivable that this was happening. Again, I was being asked to adopt a child that was not mine to adopt.

Garen was frustrated with me, but I had conceded a lot on this whole adoption journey. I had wanted to adopt a baby. Maybe a child that was one or two. Now I was being told my son was FIVE and I was really freaked out. This was not how I thought it was going to be. Nothing was how I thought it was going to be. But Garen put his foot down. He asked me how we could possibly say no to a child who so desperately needed us. I gave up. I was done. I told him to do what he wanted to do, and I would go along with it. I was so emotionally exhausted I don’t know how I kept going.

So Garen told the agency yes. And I wept.

The very next day we received an email with a picture of the Mini-est Miller, and I instantly recognized the little boy from my dream. And I saw the agency had gotten his birthday wrong. He was only three. This time I wept for a different reason. I had almost walked past my son. Thank GOD Garen followed his heart, for mine had been too weary to see.

Renewed, I devoured all the info the agency sent us. I immediately searched the internet for the children’s home that was listed on our referral. I reached out to them and introduced myself to the director and the social worker who was in charge of the little boy’s adoption. OUR little boy’s adoption. OUR adoption!

They were so happy to hear from us. They sent us pictures and showed pictures of US to this child who would soon be our son. Aggrey, the social worker, who is to this day a dear friend, thought English lessons would be a good idea. So we sent money for Timos’ tutoring. It was such a relief to be doing something that would benefit our child. Something direct. Even the smallest of consolations were something.

About a month after our acceptance of the referral we got one more call telling us we could not adopt this boy. Garen was immediately livid. He very quietly asked why we could not adopt Timothy Kiyimba. Our agent said it was because we had sent money for his language lessons. Still quiet, but with a tone that brooked NO dissension, Garen told her we would not stand to lose the referral. If they took it away from us, we would make so much noise that the world would pay attention. We had done NOTHING wrong, other parents had been allowed to send GIFTS. The next day we had a court date in Uganda.

Beautiful hindsight shows us that this agency, with so much to hide, just wanted to get us GONE. Even more beautiful hindsight shows how dearly the devil did not want to let this child go. Did not want the adoption to go through. Did not want the unfolding of our Catholic Journey to begin in earnest.