Ups and Downs

As with any adoption, Ethan (and Reese's) adoption has been full of ups and downs. Unfortunately, the downs are extreme. My prayer is that when we finally do meet him, the ups will be extreme, as well! The video has brought so much joy this week. We have watched it over and over and over and over and never get tired of watching him and hearing his voice. Just seeing a little bit of his personality has been such a blessing. We all love him so much. We did experience another moment of down on Thursday when we visited with our pediatrician. I have heard many horror stories about the things doctors say to adoptive parents and now we have had a small taste of what that is like. After looking at Ethan's paperwork, he looked me straight in the face and asked "And why would you want to bring this kid here?" SERIOUSLY?!?!?!?!? My response was "because he is my son." In my heart and mind this question was the equivalent to asking a pregnant mom is she wanted to abort a child with possible health issues. Is it really that hard for people to understand that we love Ethan and we will never give up on him. The doctor said that Ethan has congestive heart failure and even the pacemaker surgery will not fix this. He said he could die in 2 years. Although that news was shocking and upsetting, it doesn't change the fact that we love and want him so desperately. He has been abandoned once and we will not abandon him again. If we have 2 weeks, 2 years, or 2 decades with him, we will count it a gift from God. We will make every second count with him. I couldn't go back to work after the appointment, so I came home for awhile and had a good cry. I felt super alone and didn't really want to talk to anybody. It dawned on me that God was trying to tell me something, so I opened up my bible to Psalms and starting reading. In Psalm 37 I was reminded that I need to trust in the Lord and wait for Him to work this all out. He is not leaving us and forgetting about our family. He loves all of us and wouldn't have put this adoption in motion if He didn't already have all the details worked out. I want to have 100% trust and faith and I am blessed to be surrounded by people that remind me of that. Not saying it's not hard to be going through all of this, but I know God is giving us many blessings along the way that never would have been shown to us. The doctor did come up with a care plan for Ethan and said there is a 50/50 chance or less of being okay. Whatever that means. In his opinion, Ethan needs to have surgery now and there is no reason (other than financial or political for China) to wait until he is 2 and a half. Just like we thought, the Chinese doctors saying that is just ridiculous. We are praying and advocating for him to get moved to Beijing to the China Care Home so Half the Sky can evaluate him and do the surgery. We appreciate prayers for Ethan. He is sicker than what we thought and we need our prayer partners to pray him home safely. No news on Reese. Seems like we got our hopes up for nothing, which just adds to the sadness around here. Pray that the perfect match for us is revealed ASAP.