AIDS, Rainbows, and Magic Johnson

I started off writing this blog post and I wanted it to be witty and informative. I wanted it to reference Magic Johnson, gays, and AIDS. All the things we think of when someone first mentions HIV. But none of it seemed to matter when I started typing this out. None of it seemed witty or informative at all. It just seemed like meaningless facts, spread out over a 25-year time span.  

The bottom line is we have been misinformed and our heads have been stuck in the sand about HIV. We need to know the facts because there are thousands of children sitting in orphanages all over the world being overlooked, just because we have not caught up to the 21st century on this issue, and educated ourselves on the truth.  

Here are the facts:

• You CANNOT contract HIV from casual contact. 
• HIV is not found in tears, sweat, snot, feces, and urine.
• You don't have to fear catching HIV through day to day activities with people who are HIV+. 
• You are free to share plates, cups, utensils, food, toilets, towels, linens and other household items without risk of transmission.
• There has never been a case of accidental transmission in a normal household setting.
• HIV can not be spread by shaking hands, hugging, and kissing infected individuals.
• HIV is considered a chronic, but manageable disease.
• AIDS is no longer considered a death sentence thanks to advancements in medical treatment.
• With proper medical care, children and adults live indefinitely with the virus.
• Medications called ARVs are used to treat HIV. These medicines work so well they can reduce the amount of HIV virus in the body to undetectable and restore a person's immune system to normal function.
• A person with HIV presents NO risk of transmission to others when people are not engaging in risky behaviors (sex, sharing needles, and birth or breast feeding)
• Some of the greatest challenges individuals with HIV will face are related to social stigma and ignorance about how the HIV virus is transmitted. 

Three years ago our family prayed a prayer that we continue to pray everyday: "God break our hearts for the things that break yours."  This is why we have set off on a journey to rescue a HIV+ child we have never met by spending thousands of dollars, combing through mountains of paperwork and waiting months (if not years) while we hope and pray to bring home a little boy who was given a death sentence. We want to love the unlovable, reach the unreachable, and just hope along the way we can see Jesus more clearly and be a light to those who seek to see him too.


Update: as of Janurary 27th Our paperwork is signed, first big lump sum paid, and sent over to our agency. We are now working on dossier and updating our homestudy. We are trying to file our I-600 before the March 31st cutt off. Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers.

Disclaimer: We are ordinary

We have been so overwhelmed by all the beautiful emails, Facebook posts and texts of love, encouragement and prayer. We have had some very interesting questions that I will address in a later blog, but I really felt in my heart that I wanted to be100 percent transparent with everyone.

I think it's so easy to look at a picture and facebook page and paint a picture of someone that's not 100% accurate because you don't have a window into the full truth. I'm not on to brag and I shy away from being the center of attention, BUT I started this blog for two reasons:

1. To shed light on the misconceptions and stigma that comes with HIV.
2. To help other families that might be sitting on the fence with adoption. 

My hope is that you will see the struggles and more importantly the beauty of adoption. We have adopted before, so this isn't our first rodeo, but it is still uncharted territory in many ways.

First, I want to make it very clear there is NOTHING extraordinary or special about our family or our adoption journey. I am just an ordinary, selfish person who daily relies on God to combat my natural tendencies. I have the same struggles and doubts as most everyone. For example:

• I'm not a patient person by nature
• I don't read my bible everyday - sometimes I find other things more important like tmz.com
• I want to control things
• I like shopping and vacations
• I swear on a daily basis
• I struggle with the "we want more! we want more!" mind mentality 
• My husband and I fight (some weeks more then others)
• I scream and get angry at my kids
• I doubt my ability to raise 4 kids and stay sane.
• We are working through anxiety issues with one of our sons
• I have a teenager and toddler at the same time - enough said
• I have thought, "Will I love him as much as I loved Ava when we adopted her?"
• I have thought about his health and being in a third world country. I've even thought, "What if he died before we get him home?"
• I wonder how his life will play out because he is HIV+: will he date? get married? have babies?
• I have thought about how costly emotionally and financially it will be to raise an HIV+ child
• We are not wealthy people. In fact when we said "yes" I looked at our bank account and said " dear Lord if you want this to happen you better make it rain" yes I said that.

I'm saying all this to show you there is nothing special about our family we don't have some special calling that no one else has.. We are an average, God-fearing family trying to navigate through this messy thing we call life. The ONLY small difference between us and others, at this point, is one simple, yet hard thing. We said YES. YES to a God who is bigger then our messy lives, and prides himself on taking ordinary people and transforming them into extraordinary people so Gods glory can be seen on the earth. We can't take any of this with us, so I would rather have God use my broken, messy life to help others, than watch the world and its hurting people pass me by.

I also realize that even on my worst day, our adopted son will be better off with a mom and a dad because the alternative would mean being raised in an institution. There is something beautiful about family - even the messy, jacked-up kind.

I was reading the book Anything by Jennie Allen when I got the email that started this journey. She writes, "We have become such a pragmatic society with our pros and cons and schedules that when we get to matters of radical obedience it's easy for us to talk ourselves out of it. We rationalize that if the cost outweighs the benefit, then we shouldn't do it." 1 Corinthians 1:18, 20 says ...... has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?"

Here's a few other books that have helped me in the last few years:

• Love Does by Bob Goff
• Crazy Love by Francis Chan
• The Hole in Our Gospel by Richard Stearns
• Radical by David Platt
• Anything by Jennie Allen 

At the end of the day, doing stuff like this is not about having a special calling or being special, it's just about simply saying YES.

Kelly

With Love from Haiti (4 years later)

It was 4 years ago today that the devastating earthquake hit Haiti and killed over 300,000 people. I remember watching CNN and my heart aching for all those lost. The stories of all the orphans broke my heart. I think it's safe to say that a lot of people wanted to adopt from Haiti at that moment.

My new year's resolution was to "love extravagantly." Little did I know that God would ask me to fulfill that new year's resolution so quickly in 2014. On December 17th, we received a forwarded email from a friend that read, "The most beautiful set of brown eyes met me at my inbox today. A one month old baby boy in Haiti who is HIV+, but otherwise healthy and in a great orphanage. If you are considering special needs Haiti adoption let me know." For the last year, we have been looking to adopt older kids from the foster care system, but we weren't committed to anything. This certainly wasn't on our radar. Special needs wasn't and baby definitely wasn't.

But when I read that email something leaped in my spirit, tears streamed down my face and I knew we had to inquire. A few email exchanges back and forth and on December 26th we received an email asking us to submit our application so we can move forward to adopt this child (apparently people aren't lining up to adopt HIV+ babies, so they didn't have many options besides us). The other catch is we would have to move fairly quickly, which also means "hurry up and wait" as adoptions take a long time in Haiti.

So here we are starting this new journey in our lives holding on to the hope we have in Jesus and the fact that HE is ultimately writing our story. As my friend Tiffany said, "It is not so much our story as it is God's story and it only becomes ours as He writes us into it." I pray this story is one full of hope, redemption, love and healing. Not just for our family and our soon to be son's, but for every person who reads this and becomes part of this journey with us.

I hope to share as much as possible with you on this blog.  Please keep our family in your prayers and stay tuned...

Kelly

"He will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you." John 14:18