Child Collectors Extraordinaire

[Morton Fan]

Meanwhile, Jean at There's No Place Like Home is making me like her more and more in spite of myself. She recently posted that she is struggling to homeschool all their children, so they are putting some of their kids in public school.

I agree - she seems to be doing quite a good job, in my opinion. She's much different than I expected from reading the posts while she was still in China.

[chaotic life]

Adeye is taking Harper but leaving Haysa. Makes perfect sense, leave the child so fragile merely touching her breaks her bones and she's had to be rushed hours away for decent medical care repeatedly since coming home a mere few months ago. Afterall, everyone must follow those footsteps. But precious Harper, you know the one she BRAGGED that her birthparents changed their minds and wanted her back but instead adopted *another* DS child from the orphanage, so it was all dandy afterall, that child is precious enough to her that she keeps her by her side instead of entrusting "caregivers" to provide for her.

[Joan of Snarc]

I wonder who Adeye gets to babysit all those fragile kids (and non-fragile kids)? I only have two kids and I've never had anybody who would babysit more than an evening. She is really lucky she has someone or some people who are willing to take that on.

[chaotic life]

I have quite a few friends who can and will watch my normal kids. I have a handful that will watch my medical needs child, so long as I to his prophy treatments *before* they watch him. In his entire life, I had exactly three friends who could watch Micah, two who came even close to managing his medical needs and only ONE I trusted with his life. I can count on one hand the number of times i left my medically fragile child outside of the care of BOTH of his parents, and none of those were mere months after he came home! Personally, I think it's detached and irresponsible. Summit should have waited until NEXT year, Haysa and Kael needed their MOTHER right now. They should have been more important to her.

[gardenvarietycitizen]

...Harper, you know the one she BRAGGED that her birthparents changed their minds and wanted her back but instead adopted *another* DS child from the orphanage, so it was all dandy afterall...

Woah. When was this? I hadn't realized that she adopted a kid with still willing parents? :shock: I gotta go read more archives.

I can kinda see maybe thinking that Hasya is too fragile for travelling but if so, do they HAVE to go to this conference, this year? I mean, the family is famous enough and evangelizing enough through their blog that people who want to hear them surely do already?

[chaotic life]

Harper's parents tried to parent her and then continued to visit the orphanage, which btw technically invalidates the orphan visa for the US. She posted several months after she brought the girls home that as soon as she came home with Harper, her birthparents regretted it and asked for her back, but since she wasn't sending Harper back, they adopted another DS child from the orphanage...and wasn't it all amazing and wonderful

How God works.

[Patsy]

That's disgusting.

[ILoveJellybeans]

Wow, they wanted their child back, but they got to adopt another one so thats all okay? Its not like kids are interchangeable....

[Emme]

Anyone have a link to that? I'm trying to find it but I'm having trouble.

[August]

nogreaterjoymom.com/2011/02/redeeming-love.html

nogreaterjoymom.com/2010/04/we-almost-missed-out.html

God and Adeye, both fucked up dickwads.

[gardenvarietycitizen]

Okay yeah that's creepy. Even if legally the 10 days have passed, you'd think that if both parties are okay with arrangements they could have undone things? I just don't know that I could ever feel comfortable if I knew that at the last moment (or after the last moment) the kid's bioparent regretted and really wanted the kid back. I mean, I know that the adoptive family had been looking at pictures and then went and spent the three weeks there and all that, but they hadn't really known her that long either, at that point.

And I don't believe in any of the "God planned for this exact thing to happen from before the beginning of the world" so...

She does emphasize how much the dad never visited the kid, even while going to the orphanage. I just wonder what would have happened if the staff just kinda gave him the extra push to see the kid during one of those final visits, if things would have been different.

Also being so surprised that staff are so attached and know all the details of the girl's life, well, yes. They had lives with people in them, people who know them well already (and speak their language) when you stepped in. At first, you're not going to be the person they know best, how is that surprising?

[chaotic life]

Harper was added to the adoption while Adeye was in Ukraine for her first trip for Hailee. She saw Harper and decided she wanted her. She found out Harper's past and proceeded with the adoption. It's almost unheard of for someone to give the child back after coming to the US, even when fraud is discovered or birthparents want their child back. What I find creepy is what she posted about how this was a great God thing that they adopted another child themselves. She knew they were attached, heartbroken and visiting that baby. I've never been able to wrap my brain around what she was thinking in that situation.

[LilMissMetaphor]

I bet she was thinking that a child in an already overcrowded family in America with adoptive parents is still better off than a child in the Ukraine with her original family. Becuz America yay and God and no heathenz.

[dianapavelovna]

What I find creepy is what she posted about how this was a great God thing that they adopted another child themselves. She knew they were attached, heartbroken and visiting that baby. I've never been able to wrap my brain around what she was thinking in that situation.

I know. She had the incredible opportunity to reach out to Harper's father and try to bridge the gap and reunite a child with her biological family. But no, God wanted her to have that baby, so she did nothing.

[lizziesmom]

Are they related to Mia Farrow or Brangelina? On a more serious note, how are they getting so many children from China? I thought the government had clamped down on Americans adopting their kids.

[August]

Oh, hell, sorry about the unbroken links.

[gardenvarietycitizen]

I know. She had the incredible opportunity to reach out to Harper's father and try to bridge the gap and reunite a child with her biological family. But no, God wanted her to have that baby, so she did nothing.

And THAT is what had been nagging at the back of my head, you made it clear to me. Yeah. She mentions how dad is visiting the orphanage but not the kid - what with all the talk about how wonderful these kids are and how worthy and all the rest, she didn't even try to get them to meet once? Even just to say goodbye, or something? Of course then he might have changed his mind while there was still time, and it seems that adoptive mom (even while she says "God") had decided that the two girls had to be sisters, already...

[Joan of Snarc]

Harper's Dad was visiting the orphanage for two years and never once asked to see his daughter? Why would it be Adeye's responsibility to bring them together? I suppose if it were me, I would want to make sure the biological family did not want the child, but he had every opportunity to claim Harper, didn't he? And her mother never saw her. He could have stopped the adoption, but he didn't. I guess I'm missing how this is Adeye's fault.

[Mama Mia]

Um... why on earth would she change that little girl's name from Sophia to Harper ????????

It really bothers me when people change adopted children's names to begin with, but at least most of them seem to at least do so with the idea that they will make the child fit in better with their community because they have a hard to pronounce foreign name --- but why change from a completely common and lovely name like Sophia ??

And the little girl wasn't an infant.

What a sense of entitlement !

[ILoveJellybeans]

I think she changed it because theyre doing the Duggar thing-all the girls names start with H, and all the boys names start with K or C.

[chaotic life]

She changed all of the adopted children's names specifically to stick with her gendered letter theme. I detest the practice of changing children's names when they are adopted. I have also found that the exotic names actually garner my kids admiration amongst their peers, not scorn like the common assumption holds.

AFA Harper, my problem is not that she didn't seek reunification for the child and her family, as it was not her place to do so. My problem is the entitlement in the assumption that being adopted to the US is always better than anything a child can have overseas. My other problem is that Harper's birthfamily was still involved with her life, ethically her visa application should have been denied based upon that. US immigration states that a child must be abandoned or given up by a single parent unable to provide for the child to the standards set by their OWN country. Whether they were actually seeing Harper or not, her parents were still supervising her care, thus she was NOT abandeoned.

I don't think Adeye gives a rat's rear end if ethics and legality are followed in adoption at all. She shuts down any desent and any discussion about ethics because she assumes that all Christians follow ethical adoptions, and if they don't then it's still worth it for the outcome that the children are rescued to the US. She is the epitome of the attitude that permeates the Evangelical adoption movement and the sad reality that ethics are inconsequential to their mission of bringing all the children of the world to the US, regardless of whether they belong in their birth countries or not.

[dianapavelovna]

I agree with chaotic life. It's certainly not Adeye's responsibility to reunite the family - I got a little hyperbolic there. But to know that this little girl's family has enough of an attachment to provide financial support and check up on her? I can't imagine then turning around and having no qualms about taking her to the US, never to return. And then to be HAPPY that her family responded by adopting another child with DS? To me, that sounds like the most unhealthy kind of emotional compensation. The whole thing just skeeves me out. Once again, nothing mattered but God telling Adeye that Harper was hers.

[LilMissMetaphor]

Hi, everyone. Anthony here.

Well, we arrived in Nashville after a long day of travelling. God made a way for us to bring Harpy after she battled a long bout with a viral lung infection. It seems like she's been on oxygen for ages, poor baby. (Thus, you see a red blotch on her pretty little cheek from the cannula.) As recent as yesterday morning, her oxygen levels were hovering dangerously low on room air. I even cancelled her flight, with Adeye's flight. (Because mother's just can't leave a sick one home, don't you know!)

Adéye and I turned to each other and committed to not allow the enemy to disrupt our plans to attend the Summit conference. We prayed.

Then...

Shortly after I cancelled flights, my wife said Harpy's O2 levels shot up! We quickly scrambled to get our flights back and line up help again at home. But God did it!

And here we are. Excited about checking in early tomorrow morning. Harper is doing well and her oxygen levels are perfectly normal. We are so thankful!

Please pray for us. We sense God is going to do amazing things here in Grand Ole Opry country!

Seriously, Anthony. Just because your kid is sick doesn't mean the devil is attacking you. You're not that important, frankly. And when you pray it doesn't mean that God and Satan start lightsaber-battling. Do you think he actually pictures them doing this? Fighting it out over Harper's oxygen levels? Fuck sake, it's like a return to the superstitions of the 12th century.

[already hungover]

"Harpy" is a really, really terrible nickname.

[Indy80]

(Because mother's just can't leave a sick one home, don't you know!)

Yet she'll leave Hasya at home?

I'm pretty sure that common sense, not Satan, should be whispering in her ear and telling her that she maybe should stay home with her newly adopted medically fragile child (and her other newly adopted child as well).