Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Domestic v. International

This past year, Jacob and I have done a lot of research on where to adopt from and different agencies. We talked to everyone we knew who had adopted, from many different countries including the US. We prayed a lot too.

At first I was paralyzed. How could we choose a direction? Any criteria would mean there would be children we excluded. That was a very hard concept. My pediatrician is head of the international adoption clinic here and gave me just what I needed to hear to move on. She told me its about finding a child that is right for our family. Not in snobbish way, but practically, not just any child would benefit from our particular family structure, dynamic, or resources. That really helped us move forward. We finally decided to pursue adoption from Nepal. I could list the top ten reasons if you really wanted, but I'll spare you unless you just have to know. One of the reasons we chose Nepal is that my father-in-law goes every year to help this local man who runs an orphange there. But I'll return to this fact later.

Now that we've begun sharing this decision more, its suprising to me how many people have simply question or even taken issue with our decision to pursue adoption internationally. I am definately aware that there are concerns about child trafficing and such, but looking into it more brought up some interesting objections to international adoption. All-in-all I'm glad to be more aware of the issues so that we can be sure to be as ethical as possible and truly help a child that is in need.

So any of you interested in adoption, but unaware of some of the criticisms, I do think its a good idea to educate yourself on some of the corruption and downfalls of international adoption. We are still pursuing Nepal, mostly because our heart is there and I can't imagine finding our daughter anywhere else. If it is God's will that she come to us from elsewhere, I trust that he will change my heart for that as well. But with this new information I still feel confident because we have some one there who we feel we can trust. Hopefully we will find an agency who takes our concerns seriously and will help us adopt a child who is truly an orphan and will benefit from a life in America with our family.

So anyone concerned about our pursuits, I ask you to first pray for us. We are trusting that God will give us wisdom in all decisions and guide us to our daughter.

1 comment:

  1. Interesting.
    Very good points, with the main one being...it's a personal decision.

    Just got referred your blog from some friends. I miss adoption blogs.

    My wife and I adopted from Guatemala in 2008 and on Sept. 2 we will be celebrating our 2nd Adoption Day with Mateo and Kaia. I think international is a great plan, but then again I'd probably say that if you chose domestic. The bottom line is an orphan gets a home and you guys have a child that will receive the God given love you can't help but want to pour out to him or her.

    Anyway, just wanted to say hi. I need to read more and catch up on your story. Also, would love to help and especially dig the 147 million orphans t-shirts and feed one wrist bands, if you have any of those left or know where to get them. Let me know how we can help. Not much into the blogger world lately, but I do love Flickr (aka: jeffpope.com - see below). I believe my blog on WordPress is still up, just not posted on in a LONG time, but the adoption journey posts are still there (http://jeffpope.wordpress.com/).

    Here's my info:
    Jeff Pope
    Broomfield, CO.
    www.jeffpope.com (see adoption set for more on the kids)
    jeffpope11@yahoo.com

    I look forward to hearing from you and a thank-you to Paul Nicholson for hooking me up with your story. Peace!

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