Claire

February 17, 2009 AHH, AWAA, Family Stories, mediasinal tumor 0 Comments

by Keri, mom to Claire from China with a SN of mediastinal tumor

I have hesitated to share our story because I feel some guilt including it in a ‘special need’ category. You see, we experienced a true miracle with our Claire. We were clients of AWAA on the NSN route knowing nothing about SN. When we were DTC the wait was supposedly 6-7 months. Of course this ended up not being the case and we started hearing about SN adoptions and I called our family coordinator and spoke to her and we filled out a check-list. Our home study provider was AHH and because the wait had grown so long, we found it necessary to do a home study update. I got on AHH’s website to pay for our update and I just “happened” to check on their list of waiting children. I saw and instantly knew our daughter on their list. She had been there waiting for three months. Her diagnosis was a tumor in the mediastinal cavity. I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that this was our daughter, but I was concerned that my husband would be concerned about her diagnosis. At four months she had a chest x-ray and a CT-scan that documented the tumor and now she was 22 months old and she had received no treatment. AHH had been trying to get copies of the x-rays and CT-scan, but they still hadn’t received them. I called my husband and I told him that I really felt like I had seen our daughter. I gave him the web address and I asked him to stop and pray about it before he opened it and read her special need. He called me 15 minutes later and told me to call AHH and tell them we wanted her. We were very fortunate the our two agencies worked together to help us bring our daughter home.

We faithfully prayed for Claire every moment of every day. I don’t believe there was hardly a moment of any day that I wasn’t praying. I have met on-line and in person so many people who told me they were praying for Claire. Praying for her healing and for her to have a home. It just fills my heart so full when I hear that someone has prayed for my daughter. To those of you who did this, I want to say, “Thank you so much!”

We met Claire on December 11, 2006 and had a wonderful time in China. She loved, (and I mean loved) all the new clothes we had brought for her and she really adapted well. She was 2 years old. When we got back home she was able to meet her two brothers and her sister and it was love at first sight. She had seen a lot of pictures and we had sent a pillow ahead of time with a picture of our family on it. She came into our home squealing and excited. Not at all shy and reserved like I had expected! We were so happy that she felt at home.

Exactly one week later we had an appointment to meet with our wonderful International Adoption Specialist, Dr. Shawn Taylor. She gave her a very thorough physical, but I will admit the only thing we could concentrate on was the upcoming chest x-ray. We went for the x-ray and we waited with Dr. Taylor while the pediatric radiologist read it. She was on the phone with Dr. Taylor while we stood there with her. My heart was pounding and my stomach felt sick. All of the sudden for the first time since we had begun this journey, my faith began to waiver and all sorts of horrible things ran through my mind. At that moment, Dr. Taylor looks at us with a huge smile on her face and gives us a “thumbs up” sign. Claire’s x-ray was totally normal. “One-hundred per cent normal” were her words. I felt like my legs would collapse underneath me at that point with total relief. I will never be able to praise God long enough for this miracle, our daughter.

After we left Dr. Taylor’s, and had called everyone we knew to share the news, the realization hit me. If Claire had not had the diagnosis that she had, she would not have been ours. She would have gone onto a NSN list and gone on to another family and she wouldn’t have been ours. The thought brought me to tears for the second time that day. She is so our daughter and I can not imagine our lives without her.


You can visit our family blog here.



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