On July 23, 2012, one year ago tomorrow, my wife and I met our adopted daughter for the first time. To honor the anniversary, I want to celebrate my daughter by celebrating her birth mom. Most of us know the story of the Chinese orphan. A harsh government policy of only one child per family […]
Joe is the kind of friend I can be honest with. When I told him my story, I held nothing back. But I would discover I wasn’t being honest with myself. I was telling him about our plans to adopt. We already had four kids and now we were looking to add to our family […]
I. When I look at them I see smiles and laughter. Sometimes I see jealously and anger. Sometimes I see that they are up to no good. At other times I see something deep in their hearts that I am unable to decipher. But I always see them. I see past the window dressing of […]
My heroes have no super powers. They can’t, to my knowledge, blow anything up. They probably don’t run very fast and can’t jump very far. I didn’t challenge them to an arm wrestling match, but I doubt they are very strong. They did for me what I couldn’t do. They did it even though I […]
Better stories are not about greatness or about winning. Better stories, when told well, will expose our weaknesses. When you choose to pursue a life that is more than anything you have ever done, you will become overwhelmed. You will become vulnerable. You will experience helplessness. Incredible stories show us how little we can really do. […]
What We Don’t Want Next week we are taking our adopted son to Indianapolis to have the first of two surgeries. He underwent a diagnostic procedure 6 weeks ago to develop the specific plan for the next surgery. When the surgeon was finished, he came out to sit down and talk to us and tell […]
I’ll never forget the day that we met our four year old adopted daughter. My wife and I were sitting in the civil affairs office for the Laoning province in city of Shenyang. We had already been in China for two weeks, having picked up our son in a different part of the country the […]
My wife and I adopted two kids from China 3 months ago. I am learning about multi-tasking. I am learning what it is like to have a child with a disability. I am learning about myself and how impatient and selfish I can be. But most importantly, I am learning about love. Answered Questions When […]
First Impressions My wife and I recently adopted a 4 year old girl from China with cerebral palsy (CP). CP is a disease that affects motor and sensory functions of the body. While she was still developing in the womb, her brain suffered an injury. Causes of CP vary from prematurity to hypoxia to infections. […]
Have you ever been on a field trip that you just wanted to be over? To an amusement park? To an art museum? A family vacation to Uncle Bob’s? Our saga has officially become a field trip. One that no picture, despite it’s worth of words, could adequately describe what this past Friday was like. […]
