Good news and honesty

The last 24 hours have been great!! We received all but two pieces of our little one's medical reports yesterday, and I woke up this morning to find that the last two were sent last night! And then the director of our agency texted saying that CARA (Central Adoption Resource Authority) approved our match with her!! That's the first step of all the approvals we have to get on India's side. Now (from what I understand because I can't seem to keep up with everything) our agency will send our dossier to the orphanage where they will look through it all and approve it (or ask for MORE paperwork to be sent) and then mail us our little girl's files so that we can officially accept the referral...and then some more approvals start happening. Just a side note--I can't help thinking about all the sweet foster kids here in the US that would probably have appreciated their parents having to go through all these steps before they were born so they wouldn't have to wait for their parents to get their act together when they just want to be with them. I could go on and on about the difficulty of adopting vs the ease of a woman having baby after baby taken away because she refuses to get off drugs....but I won't...right now...on the blog...talk to me in person...and then regret bringing it up....
I've had a few super stressful days in the last 3 weeks really wanting to know more about our little girl and her special need. I haven't talked about it on the blog because it's a sensitive subject, and something that I could be judged for...even from people who haven't fully thought through it themselves. And I want to protect our little girl and don't feel sharing everything with everyone right now is beneficial. But I will tell a little of the process of our thoughts over the last few weeks just to keep people updated so they can know how to pray for her and us. And so I can have it all out there for future years when I can praise God for keeping me sane when I didn't think it was possible, and to remind me to just trust Him because he sees and takes care of this little Sparrow in the midst of all His sparrows.
Anyway, get comfortable and open your understanding ears and hearts. When we filled out the special needs form we felt like we had been very open to a lot of special needs. We considered where we were in life, where we wanted to go in the future...including a possible country move, so even with those desires, we considered ourselves open to saying yes to many things, even if those needs took a lot of time and patience when we brought her home. However, to be completely honest, we said no to maybe even more things. I understand that when I was pregnant with our babies we wouldn't make the decision to say yes or no to a child based on what the dr said. I understand that I know some very sweet, beautiful, wonderful special needs children who have some awesome parents who could never imagine life without their child. I understand that adoption is not about us...that we don't adopt to get a picture perfect child that will fit so nicely into our family...that will make our lives easier and more exciting. Orphans don't usually have a pretty story, and just like the rest of us, their goal isn't to come into a family and make everyone's lives easier. We don't know what tomorrow holds, I could be in a car accident (or break my leg in my daughter's messy room...) and cause all of our plans for the immediate or very distant future to be completely changed. I understand all of this, but when you're saying yes or no, it's easier to think of it as a choice than as a child. So this is where we are when we got the call for a referral. Our director said she spoke with the dr she usually consults with and our little one's special need was an easy fix, something that has to do with her skull, and is not a big deal. And then we started researching the tiny bit of info we received with the referral while we had weeks of waiting for reports...and realized that her special need could be a lot more intensive than we originally were told. Yes, it's google at it finest...telling us all kinds of things that we're probably dying of while we're searching for real answers---and it made us do what we all do--question our future if those answers are truth. What if our husband's headache ends up being a brain tumor?! What if our best friend's horrible rash is leprosy?! What if the child that has been referred to us, who we've been waiting 7 months for (and many more years of dreaming about), is actually mentally handicapped? What if? Really, what if? Would we say no because we have plans of a different future? Would we say yes because it's a child not a puppy? Would we say no because it might cause our family too much stress dealing with a child with such big special needs? Would we say yes because it's a child that if we say no, and other families say no, what kind of future will she have at a special needs group home in India for the rest of her life? Is this what other families do when they are given bad news during their pregnancy? Or when they're handed bad news at the same time that they're handed their brand new baby? You'd think I'd stop with this not trusting the Lord with our children after both our kids were almost diagnosed with very serious things at a couple weeks old. It wouldn't be a Vaughn child if we weren't given the opportunity to put all our faith and trust in Him soon after getting to see their beautiful faces. Yes, our children ended up getting amazing news that in the end wouldn't affect the rest of their lives, but will that be the case for every child God might give us? I don't know. I don't know the answer to that question, or to the question of what we'd do with bad news of a sweet little Indian girl. All I know is I'm praying while those reports are being looked over and discussed by the international adoption clinic. I'm praying for the Lord to calm our nerves, comfort us when things are unsure, and for understanding that He has had this sweet, perfect girl in His hands through every step of her body's formation.

Beautiful Face!

We received a referral for our sweet little girl July 4th!!! She is absolutely adorable, has a beautiful name, big eyes, lots of hair, and a little younger than we were expecting. This post looks so boring without a picture of her and I wish we could include one, but we're not allowed to post her picture or much info on social media. I'll definitely share tons more about her if you want to ask in real life though!! :) We actually just got one black and white picture of her from the agency on Friday but we're supposed to get another color picture of her and hopefully a bit more information about her Monday morning, which can't come fast enough!
Unfortunately, when I got the call from our adoption agency, Kyle and I happened to be away from each other for a couple days and had to open her picture together over the phone (not at all like anything I imagined in all my different daydream scenarios about the day we'd receive our referral), but it was still so special, and I still cried, and I got to share her with a few close friends that I was with on a girls' trip. It's definitely a 4th of July I will never forget! We are of course beyond excited, and were so happy to be able to share her picture and the little we know about her last night at church. I say it all the time, but I absolutely love our awesome church filled with compassionate, supportive, wonderful friends who love Jesus and love us--so grateful!

Now we have months more of waiting and more paperwork. Thankfully it's not nearly as much paperwork as the home study and dossier, but the other side of that is, it's less about what we can do, and more about just sitting and waiting for India to get everything done on their side. We have so many questions about who she is and where she is, and we're making a list of questions that will hopefully all be answered by our agency and/or her orphanage. They say the waiting on this side of it is 8-12 months--more on the 12 months side, and I've heard of plenty of cases where it's taken much longer, so I'm praying for patience on my side and efficiency on India's side. The last week or two was starting to get rough for me in the waiting for a referral, and I know it's only going to get harder from here since I know her sweet face and we all want her home, so lots of prayer for us would be amazing. I'll try to update more often than I have over the last few months--since it's been pretty much no updating that'll be pretty easy. ;) Not that there will be anything necessarily to say, but I'll be around just to remind everyone to keep praying. Next post I'll explain what things we're waiting for before we can bring her home.