Sasha's Story

Just one year ago Randy and I never would have imagined that our family would grow from five to eight in what seemed like overnight. In less than two years time and after two adoptions, we added David, Juliya, and James to our existing family with three biological children, Aidan, Garland Grace, and Anna.
Our children came to us in different ways and sometimes unexpectedly, but each one has truly been a sacred gift from God. Our adoption journey has been one of heartache and rewards, learning to trust God entirely along the way and in every situation. Now as we move forward with His calling to adopt one more, Sasha, a fifteen year old boy from Ukraine, again we are faced with putting our lives and future in God’s hands. We are following His road map each step of the way, though we’re uncertain at times where He is leading, but we do know our final destination will be with Him for eternity.

Sasha was outside waiting for us in the courtyard of the orphanage every day. Of course, he knew that we were coming to see our children, Juliya and Pasha (James). We met them over Christmas hosting and had come to Ukraine to adopt them and bring them home. Still, Sasha waited alone on the bench every day hoping to see us and maybe join in a game of soccer or basketball along with Juliya and Pasha.
Randy and I met so many incredible children in the first two weeks during our visiting hours at the orphanage, that we sent out many emails to family and friends back home with photos of the children, hoping maybe some would open their hearts and homes to these amazing kids.
After two weeks, Randy and I were talking about Sasha one evening back at the hotel. Earlier that day, Sasha had given me a note with a small cross on a chain. The note said, “Amanda, you are my best friend forever. I give you the cross to remember. With much love, your Sasha.” I looked at Randy sitting on the couch in our room and said, “I think we need to stop advocating for Sasha… I think Sasha is OURS.” Randy just nodded in agreement and bewilderment and said, “Yes, I think so too.”

The first day we met Sasha he was the “cool” kid. He was the one with the earring and small tattoo on his leg that looked like something the boys in the orphanage probably did themselves. I tried to get him to play ball with us, but he was way too cool to join in a game with the younger kids. Finally, I asked Juliya his name and called out to him, insisting that he join us. Sasha looked down, sheepishly grinned, and slowly walked to the circle to play. In the next few days I greeted him with a “high-five” or just called to him from across the orphanage grounds. In a matter of days, Sasha began looking for us and greeting us with hugs. With every hug and pat on the back, this cool fifteen year old boy was slowly melting and working his way into our hearts.

We went back to the orphanage to say goodbye to friends, and of course, Sasha before getting on the slow train back to Kiev. We brought Sasha new flip flops, school shoes, and loaded his cell phone with minutes so that we could stay in touch with him. When it was time to say goodbye, he grabbed me around the neck and sobbed in my arms. I had never seen a fifteen year old boy cry like that. As I wiped the tears from his cheeks, I reassured him that we would see him again. Then I probably exposed my feelings too much, but I said, “Sasha, I know you are a big boy, but in my heart I feel like you are my baby, my boy.” He continued sobbing with his head on my shoulder for some time and then buried himself into Randy’s chest and cried some more.

We spoke to him on the phone during the next few days in Kiev while we were filing paperwork at the US Embassy. Sasha texted and called us several times a day while we were there. In his messages he began calling us Mother and Father. He said that we were his family and he would love us forever. On our last night in Kiev Randy talked to him on the phone and encouraged him to study in school and stay out of trouble, to which Sasha replied, “Ok, I love you Dad.” As soon as we got off the phone he began texting again. The last message of the night said, “I want to see you. Please come in Ukraine for me.”
That message tore me apart and I had to call him even though it was around 10:30pm. He answered the phone in a whisper because the other boys in his room were asleep. I whispered back to him that we WOULD come to Ukraine for him. Always speaking in simple English with Sasha, that night I said, “Mama says go to sleep now, OK.” He responded, “OK, you go sleep too. I love you Mother.”
Early the next morning he called before school and repeated the question over and over, “When you come in Ukraine. When you come in Ukraine for me?” I didn’t have an answer, but I told him Dad and I would start the documents to bring him home.

Now that we’re home, Juliya and James are adjusting well and really finding that sense of freedom and wonder that all children should have. I watch them everyday with such joy as they ride their bikes, swim, practice English, or just play with their siblings. I thank God for bringing them into our lives and giving us the honor of parenting them on this earth. However, I never expected to leave Ukraine with a hole in my heart and an ache in my stomach that only adoptive parents can understand. Our journey isn’t over, we have one more child to bring home, and with the prayers of our family and friends, God will lead us back to Ukraine for Sasha in His timing and His way.

Journey to Ukraine for Juliya and Pasha

Juliya and James (Pasha) came into our lives during the Christmas 2009 hosting program. Oddly enough they had come to Texas because of another host family. We got to know their host family through the program and helped them raise money for their hosting fees and taught them in the Texas training class. Never did I dream that I would fall head over heals for another family's host children. By the second day after the kids arrived I knew Juliya and Pasha were meant to be in our family, but didn't tell anyone, not even Randy. I just prayed, actually whined, to God like a child. "Why did Juliya and Pasha have to come to the other family, instead of us? Why do I love them like they're mine?"
As soon as these questions entered my mind, I felt like God replied, "I brought them for YOU."

Within days their host mom made a comment that Juliya and Pasha actually fit in better in our family and that we should look into adoption from Ukraine. At this point, I realized I needed to include Randy in on my feelings about the kids. He agreed that we should get more information about adoption from Ukraine, though we already had USCIS approval for Latvia.

We were allowed to spend time with the kids over the next two weeks. Every time I looked in Juliya's, eyes I knew she was my daughter, and I felt that she knew it too. Our connection with Juliya and Pasha was immediate. Our children asked to spend time with them everyday and commented that they just wanted to be with them all the time.

Juliya and Pasha must have felt the same way, because they started asking the host mom to bring them to OUR house. She stopped letting us see the kids, and during the final week of hosting she called and said that she and her husband were going to adopt Juliya and Pasha. We were absolutely heart broken at the news. We were told by the director of the program that the host family had priority and all we could do was "sit back and pray." Well, that is exactly what we did. We fasted and prayed for weeks after the children returned to Ukraine.

During those long, agonizing weeks after Juliya and Pasha left, the Lord sustained us through the Holy Spirit, and I felt that God was giving me special care and words of encouragement during this time. I prayed that if it could somehow fit into God's plan for their lives, that He would give us the honor of parenting these children during their time on this earth. Once after reading about how we are God's adopted children grafted like olive shoots into the family of God, I felt the Holy Spirit speaking to me and saying that the work had already begun, Juliya and Pasha were being grafted into our family, even though everything seemed to be against it.

When the interview team for the hosting program went to Ukraine to interview kids for the summer hosting program, they spent time talking to Juliya and Pasha. Nothing was mentioned about our family specifically, and the kids had no idea that we wanted to bring them into our family. Juliya and Pasha agreed that they would go back to the host family for the summer, but "not forever." The interview was uneventful and the children left the room. The hosting team went on to interview another child, and during that interview Juliya burst into the room in tears.
She was saying, "Problem, problem!" After the team calmed her down she told them that if there was any way possible she and Pasha could go to the Hermes family they would, and forever.

By God's grace and the power of the Holy Spirit, Juliya had the courage to speak out about her desire to be with our family. Three months later, Randy and I were on our way to Ukraine to bring Juliya and Pasha home forever.

Journey to Latvia for Dzo David

Our adoption journey began in October 2007 when Randy and I started praying about the decision to grow our family through international adoption. We knew that God was calling us to this journey to adopt, but we didn't have a road map.
We started the adoption process with an agency that lead us along for quite some time, referring us to different children in a few different countries. After almost a year into the process we felt completely lost and began questioning God's call in our lives to adopt.

While in prayer early one November morning, I asked God, "If it is not your will for us to adopt, please release us from this desire. But if it is your will... Where in the WORLD is our child?"
While checking my email later that day, I came across a link to an international hosting program.
I called my husband immediately to see if he would be interested in hosting over Christmas.
He agreed that we should get more information, so I called the hosting program and was told that it was the FINAL day to sign up for the Christmas 2008 hosting program. We decided to give hosting a try and frantically faxed our homestudy and USCIS approval letter to the agency. Within the hour we received a phone call from the director of the program with information about a ten year old boy from Latvia.

Dzo came barreling through the crowd at the Bush Intercontinental Airport when I called out his name, searching for that little face of the boy whose picture had been on my refrigerator for a month. He ran to me and embraced me with such force that he almost knocked me over.
Little Dzo was so small for his age and had such a short haircut that I almost didn't recognize him as the same boy from the hosting picture. On the way home from the airport we knew he was ours, he was the little boy we had been waiting for, the one God had predestined to be in our family.