Longing sets in....

Yesterday was a particularly emotional day for me-as proof of that, (aside from my first cry associated with the emotions that come with the adoption process) I am finding various items misplaced all over my house,  and my 2nd grader was sent off to school with David's preschool folder.  It was the day after the February group of  special needs Chinese children who were eligible to be adopted came in.  To make a long story short, our adoption agency (which we have had a wonderful experience with so far, and to which we felt God had led us) has had some changes in employees that have affected us.  The social worker in charge of the China program resigned shortly after we began this process and being the small agency that they are (and another reason we were drawn to them) were left with no "expert" in the China program.  So the assistant director, who specializes in Latin American adoptions has been working with us-and doing a great job considering she has had to learn some along the way as well.   So anyway, originally, they way the process was going to work is that the social worker over the China program would serve as our advocate in finding our child.  She would be the one to actually look at the children available for adoption who were sent in to the agencies.  The way that normally works is that there may be a few children who trickle in throughout the month (usually Special focus children I think), but a larger group is posted once a month.  And China being a full 12-13 hours difference time than we are, this happens over a night (usually our Monday night) and the social worker literally engages in a race during the night against other agencies to lock in a child that is a fit for your family.  Then, the family has 72 hours to have the child's medical history reviewed and to accept that child (accept the referral).  So as you can see, the process itself is quite suspenseful. 

Anyway, just days before this happened, we were told that now a social worker who is on the ground in China will be looking for our child because they can log them in faster.  Which is fine and seems logical.  However, Tuesday morning, we found out that we had not received a referral and not only that, we did not receive any feedback as to what kind of children were in the group, or any type of reason why we could not be matched.  We were basically told we'd have to wait and see if we could be matched at the end of next month.   We were not expecting to receive so little information about why a match could not be made.   So anyway, I won't continue to record all of the details of conversations we had yesterday-but we were left feeling like the process was leaving us at the mercy of a detached advocate.  One we have no access to and who has never met us (though we know who our true advocate really is:).  Andrew is going to seek clarity on this today, and I am sure things will settle out with this issue.  But I was not prepared for the influx of emotion that I felt when I got the news (and in the manner that we got it mainly) that no match or even a child to consider had been made.  Before I had been excited and anxious, but now I feel like I have had a little dose of what families who have had much longer waits than we have have experienced.  I know now that there will be an ache in my heart that will only become stronger as this process continues.  We have been praying that God would prepare our hearts to receive our daughter and that we would know beyond a doubt who our daughter was the minute we first saw a referral.  I wasn't expecting it to come like this, but I know somehow that this process is part of the very means that God is using to do just exactly what we have asked.

Romans 6:26-27  Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.  And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. 

Amy