Our Adoption Journey
Our adoption journey started in August 2003. We are an Air Force family currently stationed in the United Kingdom, and after hosting 2 boys from Belarus for a month, my husband and I decided to adopt. We wanted to give a child a loving home. When we first got married in 1992, we kept adoption as an option if God lead us in that direction. We have sponsored children through Compassion International since right after we got married 13 years ago. God used this to open our hearts to the idea of adopting as a way to further reach out to help a little one that needed a family. We have 2 biological children: a son now 10 yrs. old and a daughter now 7 yrs. old (who had both asked about getting a little brother or sister around the time of the visit with our Belarus guests).
After talking to another couple who adopted a little girl from China, we found out about a social worker who was to be in the area in October. We had our homestudy visit on October 6, 2003. Our homestudy was complete on December 17, 2003. We did start with one agency but changed in January 2004 due to a difference of opinion with some of their policies. We completed the adoption with Sense Resource Center from Norfolk, Virginia. We originally wanted to adopt from China but this country had an income requirement we could not meet. The country of the Ukraine was suggested to us, and we decided to pursue a Ukrainian adoption especially since Cindy has some Ukrainian heritage. March 2004, we got our immigration paperwork approved. After months of getting paperwork notarized, redone and notarized again, and updating the homestudy, our dossier was finally approved in November 2004.
We already invested a lot of money into this adoption through personal sources and a bank loan. At this point, we still needed the in-country fees and other agency fees. We knew God would make a way for us to finish this adoption.
We finally got the call from our agency on January 25, 2005 about our appointment date. We got an appointment on February 3rd. Only one week to finish up all the loose ends and get the last amount of money together. We called A Child Waits Foundation to find out the status of our application. It was still in the process of being reviewed. Thanks to the Nelsons, Raymona Griffin and A Child Waits Foundation, there was an urgent review done. We had the last of the money to finish the adoption by the time we left for Kiev, Ukraine on February 2, 2005.
On February 7, 2005, we met our new son, Alexander (4 yrs. old) - then "Slav"- in Lugansk, Ukraine. After spending a lot of time getting to know Slav/Alex, on Valentines Day 2005, we had our court hearing. On Thursday, February 17, 2005, Alex was our little boy. We left Ukraine with Alex on February 24 after spending only 3 weeks going through the adoption process. Our facilitator Max told us that our adoption had been one of the smoothest he had seen in awhile! We really feel this was a direct result of the prayer coverage we had over us thanks to our families and church!!!
He is now a healthy and bright 5 yr old. His English has tremendously improved and now he basically sounds like a "normal" English speaking little one. We have a tutor come once a week to teach him English and prepare him for Kindergarten in the fall. The adjustment period is still in progress but we expected this with his background. He enjoys having a big brother and sister to play with and they love having a little brother. Our son and daughter have been absolutely great about teaching him things. Alex is such a blessing to our family.
Thank you A Child Waits Foundation. We would not have Alex with us without the financial help of your loan program (especially the timeliness of help!). Praise God for your wonderful foundation.
Sincerely,
David and Cynthia Moore
