This is a compilation of the video I took on my second to last night there. This was a powerful night, great to see all the kids with such faith and joy in song. The first song is for a little girl Charity who was adopted and is now home and doing well. Second is Christiana singing "Jesus loves the little children", definitely a heartbreaker for me. So frequently I questioned what I was seeing and understanding in her needs - she had these beautiful moments of human-ness and really was just a little girl at times. Last couple are the kids performing..

Taking a deep breath of gratitude

It has been just over 2 months since my return from Ghana. It's definitely been a challenging journey to date, but I do feel I've crested the pinnacle of my grief. Grief is complex and definitely not linear, particularly when infused with doubt, guilt, shame, anger and all those other complicated emotions. I've learned a lot about what I do to myself when I'm down, when I've made a tough choice that challenges my understanding of who I am at my very core. Intellectually I believe we made the right decision as a family, but I also made a decision to turn my back on a needy child which is a tough nugget to swallow putting it mildly. I am now at peace with our choice to move forward without bringing Christiana to the states, I believe with every fiber of my being that she is better off where she is.

An ironic turn of events, all adoptions are shutting down in Ghana. Even if we had chosen to continue to pursue to bring her home, the Ghanaian government would not allow her to be adopted by our family in the US. We would still be without her, with no prospects of getting her home. The other mother who was over there with me two months ago, who sat in the very same lawyers office and said "yes" to her daughter coming home, is now fighting to get Ghana to approve her adoption without much hope. The US has approved the adoption and now it's in Ghana's hands, and they want nothing to do with it.

There are layers and layers to this process which would require a novel to disclose. The biggest obstacle is that many of these kids who really are orphans do not have birth certificates. They are born into poverty in shanty "villages" that are nothing more than leftover metals parceled together to create make-shift shelters at best, thousands of people living with no infrastructure. T o know your birth date is a luxury. Many do not have plumbing, potable water and toilets are simply the trench full of garbage out back. This is where Chritiana was born. It took her current guardians several weeks to track down where she originally came from and a birth certificate was created based on stories told by others in the village. As part of the unintended deception, we were told a birth date to fit our desired criteria for a child under 3 but there is no real way to know her age. There was no question she was an orphan, nor is there question that the dozens of other kids in the home are without families as well, but the creation of birth certificates is a dubious process. Ghana calls these birth certificates forgeries and so these kids are stuck. I agree with this decision - no one should be in the business of forging birth certificates to push through an adoption, but it really leaves these kids with no options or future with families. I don't see anything they can do - they need to have checks and balances against forgery and there is definitely financial motivation around the international adoption process in Ghana, as it is in many countries. To me there is a silent but global cry to help these children through a different path, to help the development of health services, education, support that is direct and meaningful. Question is, what does that look like?

I think for the kids it would be helpful to shift their expectations and hopes into getting supported in different ways. In many ways these were some of the most joyful, faith filled children I've ever seen. The only scarcity they seemed connected to was their lack of parents, and this was somewhat fueled by the guardians (praying for a Mommy and Daddy while being thankful for all other things.) Don't get me wrong, I recognize an intrinsic human desire to be parented and held in the world, to be part of a family. I'm just saying that without that possibility, shifting to a sense of abundance could be incredibly powerful for these kids that already seem to have that capacity for thinking abundantly within their reach. They are truly children of God, believe that they are in God's hands at every turn.

There is a wonderful program in Nepal, called Rising Lotus Children's Foundation, which raises funds for orphaned children. The funds go to provide shelter, education, and a community family within the house of orphans and a set of foster parents. The kids then are educated to become active citizens and agents for change within Nepal. They are a hopeful lot and it seems to me the best future scenario for the orphaned kids in Ghana. The adoption agency I worked with is run by a single woman but I do think that over time she might be amenable to this kind of path with the kids. It is something I'm exploring.

Below are random pics from my trip, wanted to post for digestive purposes. To share some of the sites and names and experiences that I feel forever changed by. Please feel free to ask questions, make comments, or whatever. It is good to share...