Ghanaean orphanages today

Summary: For those of you just tuning in, here is a summary of where we are to date:

Last week I took Jaden on a much needed vacation east of the Cascades to the Methow valley. That place is awesome. On June 6th I taught my last Saturday Yoga class in anticipation of the arrival of our daughter in mid-July to August. From beginning the paperwork in March we were told to expect a June to August arrival. I shortened my summer teaching schedule, we decided as a family to forgo a trip to Michigan for family camp, and shut down travel plans for the latter half of summer to be present for our new family member.

Two weeks ago we learned that her arrival is looking more like October or November (what happened to September?!) Sigh... make lemonade. Last week was the first successful attempt to regroup and have a blast, in spite of the difficulty of having our daughter so far away and an expectation of a summer of bonding. (We Seattlelites love summer, we live for it and suffer through a large part of the year for its arrival.) We also learned of some health challenges that she is facing, and worked on the mantra "let go". We will cross that bridge when she gets here: She is our family, we love her.

In sparing me during our vacation our adoption coordinator did not send us an update on the series of fiascos facing the orphanages in Ghana RIGHT NOW. Today, she made up for the break by sending me three updates explaining the chaos and disintegration of the orphanages in Ghana, including the one where our daughter is housed. It's hard to get clear information on why the government is shutting them down, but the general gist is that there has been financial corruption in some orphanages around the country receiving governmental funds. While the orphanage our daughter is located in checked out wonderfully and got a favorable investigation report, (and is an NGO independently run,) the landlord of the building is evicting the tenants rather than renewing their lease. The kids now have nowhere to go. While the government says they need to be moved to foster care, Ghana does not have a formal foster care system in place and are sort of making it up as they go, or so it's reported.

There is a man over there who has been working at our orphanage for years and he is trying to rent a home where he can keep the kids together. This change is really affecting the older children who do not have placements and whose only family has been the other children in the home. We have been assured that the kids who are on the adoption track are not going to be forced into the make-shift foster care they're trying to put together. That said, we are devastated for all the children whose names and faces we've gotten to know.

Sounds confusing? Indeed. Our coordinator waits on information from the NGO director, the orphanage director, the lawyer (who in theory will be in court for OUR FAMILY tomorrow or Thursday,) and the information changes by the minute. If you have questions I encourage you to follow our mantra too:

Be humble
Be open
Let go
Be Fearless
Believe you (WE) can
Be kind
Love
Make lemonade

We don't have the answers, we don't know what will happen but we have been assured that we will be traveling to get our daughter home at some time. I will send another update when I know anything. She is still en route to her forever family. When we started this process we were assured the stability of the Ghanaian adoption process, its ease, the short time frame. No one could foresee the derailment of the orphanage system.

I may be traveling over there on a relief mission of sorts this summer anyway, helping our beloved coordinator to sort out the myriad of mixed information coming her way, to love on all the kids, and to assure our daughter that she indeed will be coming home. I will post again when I know more...

Please keep all the kids in your hearts and be tremendously grateful for this unbelievably easy life we have.