A Time to Vent

My posts have always been inspirational, generally. However, at this midnight hour, I feel the need to express some frustration.

Terri, my wonderful wife, and I have been foster parents since May 2005. Abbey, our daughter, was born in Anchorage, AK in Jan. 1994. We were unable to have anymore children. (In 1998, we experienced a miscarriage.) So, we had accepted the fact we would not have anymore children. Basically, I was content with one child. However, Abbey kept praying for a baby brother or sister. Almost nightly she would pray, "God, if you want us to have a baby in our family, we will gladly accept it."

So, in the Spring of '05, we enrolled in the Foster-to-Adopt Program through the Dept. of Human Services in Jackson Co., Mississippi. We were shocked at how quickly a child was placed in our home.

In the Summer of '04, we were blessed to have Jared (2 yrs-old at the time) placed in our home. He is a beautiful boy and he has greatly enriched and entertained us. In the Summer of '05, Charlee (5 mo.-old) was placed in our care. She has experienced major developmental delays, but she has gained a lot of ground in the last year. My wife is incredible with the kids. Abbey is a super big sister.

The process to adopt both of the children has been a long one. Many obstacles have been faced, but we have been patient.

On Sept. 14, we were told by our Adoption Specialist that both of the children were free to be adopted and their "Adoption Packets" were complete. So, we contacted an attorney and he wrote the appropriate letter to have the packets sent to him. Then, we were told, all we needed was for petitions to be signed by a judge and both of the children would be "Prices" officially. The attorney made the request on Sept. 14.

Since the law office had not received the packets, we were worried, but not too concerned. Then, today, we received a call from the Adoption Specialist who came to our home.

The "Adoption Packet" for Jared is lost. Unbelievable. They cannot locate his papers that contain the "Termination of Parental Rights" and the "Permission to Adopt" Form. We were anticipating having the Petitions for both of the children signed on Friday, Sept. 28, but if Jared's packet isn't found, we will have to go back to the Attorney Generals Office to "redo" a portion of the process. This is what we were told.

We are still in it for the long haul, but things like this really upset me. How can a State Agency not track such important papers. This is a child's life that is on hold.

On October 6, whether the adoptions are final or not, we are going to have an Adoption Celebration at the church I pastor. We will have a Dedication Service for our family and a reception, complete with inflatables for the kids.

So, I'm praying that tomorrow we'll get a call indicating the papers were found and we will be able to proceed with finalizing the adoptions on Friday, Sept. 28.

I haven't cursed yet, but I'm tempted to (as Evangelist Junior Hill has said) write a curse word on a piece of paper and sign my name to it!

I feel a little better. So, much for my first effort at self-disclosure and transparency in the blogosphere. Good Night.