The summer of 2015 is when the temperature was turned up. The pressure began to build. That precious pressure that would eventually begin to forge my feet of clay into something more enduring. The pressure that would blow my family into so many pieces it would take me almost five years of crawling around in the dark trying to find them all.
In a convoluted six-degrees of separation, a friend of ours, had a friend, who had a friend in Uganda. This man in Uganda was someone of some importance and he agreed to go and meet with our lawyer in Kampala and see about our case.
We heard back that he had spoken with our lawyer about us and that our name had indeed been attached to a little boy. This man even made the trip to visit the little boy who was to be our son, spoke to him, took pictures that he sent to us with congratulations.
A few months before this we had fixed up the Mini-est Miller’s bedroom. Painted and decorated the walls, bought a bed and shelves. Zade bought about twenty books to read to his little brother. We bought toys. But I could not picture this person, who I was told was my son, in THIS room. This was someone else’s room.
I felt so ungrateful because I didn’t recognize the child. My heart didn’t recognize him. I did not know this child, but I hid that from everyone. Because all the adoption literature and studies we had to read and complete said that sometimes there wouldn’t be a tangible connection. I didn’t know what to do, so I threw myself into buying stuff for this little person who would be coming to us soon. I filled his closet with clothes, his shelves with toys. Even though I took little joy in the process I got used to the idea of this particular boy becoming a Miller.
After a few weeks with no word from our agency Garen called and asked our agent when an official referral would be coming for B----. There was a shocked silence and then so many, many questions. They wanted to know how we knew of the boy. How we had pictures of the boy. How we knew the important man from Uganda. Garen knew to answer vaguely until we understood better what in the world was going on. And then they told us we would never be allowed to adopt B---.
I got a Facebook friend request from our adoption agent. She saw I had studied Journalism and then the crazy really started. Of course, now that this upstanding agency with a stellar record has been shut down, and several top-level employees indicted for adoption fraud, we see they were freaked out because they thought that we would learn about their illegal dealings and expose them. They saw us as threats with connections and a background in journalism. I studied journalism for a hot second in college, but they didn’t know that. We became a thorn in their side, and they never let us forget it.
Even though I didn’t recognize this tiny boy, once he was gone I felt such betrayal and I became frantic. I clung to the idea of him, and I hurt. But I wasn’t the only one. I would find Zade sitting in the room we had fixed up for the Mini-est Miller, just looking at the shelves of toys and the books he wanted to read out loud to this little person. As for me, I just wandered around the house taking down all the pictures I had put up of this little person I would now never meet.
Zade and I suffered. He and I feel things in a deeper way than Garen and Keegan. They have this amazing ability to just believe everything will work out the way it’s supposed to. So, they don’t sweat it. Zade and I tend to believe it will only work out if WE work it out and that causes so much stress. So much distress.
Our agency told us it would most likely be years now before we would get a referral and we were undone. Garen kept saying it wouldn’t take that long. I became angry at Garen for believing everything would be okay when it clearly wasn’t.
Keegan was settling into life at college and that was a distraction from the day to day adoption drama, but Zade, still at home, had never known so much pain in his life and it affected him in a big way. He told me he didn’t know how he was ever going to be able to love someone again. The price was too high. I didn’t know how to reach this teenager and convince him that God would see us through the pain.
In fact, I remember telling him that God was saving us from something we couldn’t see. It would be years before we found out the first little boy had likely been trafficked and was most likely kidnapped for adoption. Our agency, convinced we would uncover any inconsistencies, began to search for a little boy who was truly and obviously an orphan, cleared for a legal adoption. That way, if I researched his little life, I would find nothing illegal. God working miracles behind the scenes, while I cried and cursed Him for our present pain.
This was the first major miracle in our Adoption Journey.
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