We came home from Ukraine on Dec. 5, 2005 with Joseph, Cate and Leah. I can't tell you how blessed we have been by these 3 and only the Lord knew what absolute and deep gems they have been to me. I can never even imagine my life without them... they are such a breath of life and joy ( most of the time :) I don't share many of my deep seated needs or desires but whenever I have needed an encouragement or a boost to my aches or anguishes guess who always knows without me sharing how to love me so that I know the Lord is there. Each one of them has their strengths and adds to our life in their own ways... all of them serve the Lord and bless many people's lives. Tonite before Paul and I went to bed... the 3 of them presented us with a card , flowers, glasses filled with sparking grape juice and an ice cream cake... All because they are so thankful that we adopted them 5 yrs ago..... We celebrated Cate's 13th b-day while there. The extra yg man is Roma, our beloved translator/facilitator we have used for all of our 10 adoptions from Ukraine... The family picture was our Christmas picture that year. Ben traveled with us as well and you see him in the pictures... He was a huge help on our trips where we adopted teens because they all had an immediate connection to him and he is fluent in Russian so we had a great translator.
I share this to encourage others to adopt older , teens. We have been so blessed by our older teenage adoptions and thank God for each one of them.
Congratulations and Happy Anniversary. Thanks for sharing and blessing so many with your lives.
ReplyDeleteCongratulations! You have a beautiful family and are in inspiration. I would like to ask, though, what is the secret to successful adoptions of teenagers? I have read so many blogs of families who adopted older children, though not necessarily teenagers, and so many of them struggle so very much with behavioural problems. What does it take to adopt older children and still like them a few years later?
ReplyDelete