Finding Home Part 5

The following weeks were spent having documents translated, court dates, long line ups and our first real experience with bureaucracy. Court appointments for adoptions in the district of Ploiesti were only available on every 2nd Friday, and if that Friday happened to be some sort of holiday (there were many), you had to wait another two weeks. For every day we felt we were getting somewhere in the adoption, we had many in which we were merely waiting. We hears stories of parents who were in and out of Romania within 3 weeks, going home with their new son or daughter. For a while we had hopes that we would be among those, seeing as how we had a child to adopt the moment we landed. We were wrong.

At about 4 weeks into our stay S determined that it would be best after all to have Katy come and stay with us. The adoption was taking longer than he had anticipated and he wasn’t able to pull strings anymore to keep Katy in the hospital. We were thrilled, but he was scared. S, our “father away from home” was not at all sure that these young Canadians could possibly know how to care for a baby. He was right of course, but really-what parent does at the beginning? S arranged for a nurse to arrive every evening to show us how to bathe Katy and to care for her. A week into the visits I thought I had successfully communicated to her through gestures and a few words that we no longer needed her services. Her arrival the next evening at the regular time proved I was wrong. We had to communicate the fact through S, who did it hesitatingly.

I will never forget the day we brought Katy home from the hospital. S went in with gifts for the nurses as thank yous for their care of Katy and came out with this huge bundle of blankets. I remember that it felt like my arms couldn't even reach around it all, but I held on tight. We got into S’s car and I dared to peak into the bundle, seeing those gorgeous brown eyes blinking up at me from her little cocoon. Our girl was coming home and we were so happy!

The following days were spent in learning to care for our daughter and getting to know who she was. It was stressful and wonderful at the same time, just like it is with the arrival of any baby. Our longing at this point was to take her home to Canada. We wanted so badly to be done with the uncertainty and feeling of displacement and the hidden, but very real fear that things would continue to go slowly and badly.

At about 5 weeks into our time in Bucharest, S and M dropped by with what he called “bad news”. He informed us that evening that the adoption was going to take much longer than he had anticipated and that we would need to stay longer. He did not know how long, but we should be prepared. Bob and I had both taken 6 week leaves from our jobs, so this was an issue. We needed those jobs! Bob arranged for an additional week and we asked his sister if she would be willing to fly out to be with me once he went home. His sister took a 3 week leave from her job and excitedly made plans to join me half way around the world.

Letting Bob go home was incredibly difficult. I can’t explain how far from home we felt in a country in which only one short year before had undergone a revolution to overthrow communism. The country was still reeling, and even though democracy is desirable, the transition for a country is very difficult and we were in the middle o f this. Markets selling only potatoes and onions were the norm when we arrived. Empty stores and long lineups for eggs or milk were normal.

There was no such thing as hopping into my car if I needed groceries or something for my baby. We used taxis (something we don’t use much here in the country) subways (even less), and did a lot of walking. We learned to make do with what we could find and relied heavily on the instant chicken noodle soup we had been advised to bring along from home. I still can not cheerfully eat that kind of soup, since we ate it daily for many, many weeks. As spring arrived in Romania the choice of produce in the markets greatly improved and we began to eat better.

Anyway, because of all of this, being alone in a strange country was overwhelming. I cannot begin to put into words both how much I struggled with my faith in God nor how faithful He was to meet me in that struggle. I remember times sitting on our front step, battling moment by moment to trust Him in a situation that felt so out of control. Would we ever go home with our daughter? Leaving without her was not an option. How long could this all possibly take? Could I handle another set back or delay with the adoption? Would things get worse before they got better? Would I be safe without Bob to protect me? Had we been naïve to think we could do this? Were the prayers people were praying for us actually making a difference? And the biggest question of all-why? Why was He not moving faster? Why did we have to suffer?