This is INCREDIBLE!!!

Life With My Special Ks: Reece's Rainbow, Twitter and Patricia Heaton: "What in the world could these three things have in common? Well, you see, it all started with Kirill... word is spreading about this sweet l..."

PSA

UPDATE: The links are working now.

Reece's Rainbow's website is experiencing technical difficulties and as a result the links on my page are not working right now.  I hope they get them fixed soon and will let you know when that happens.

Keep praying for Kirill's family and all the orphans!

Thank you.

Please PRAY!!!

I am reposting this blog post from the Davis family blog.  This sweet little boy can use every prayer he can get.  Please help  pray him home!

Kirill's Story

Please feel free to share the following on your blogs. It is a summary of our adoption journey so far. Please help us spread the word. We are hoping somehow someone will be able to help us.

Two years ago Greg and I began praying for God to do whatever he wanted with our lives. We handed him a “blank check” so to speak, and told him to cash it. He opened our eyes to children with disabilities wasting away across the ocean in Eastern Europe. We joined God and started our adoption journey.

Our family is more than equipped to handle a child with special needs. I have a degree in Early Childhood Education. I am a member of the Board of Directors of Best Buddies of Alabama. I have volunteered for RISE and Eagles’ Wings. All of these organizations serve individuals with special needs. My husband I have close friends and family who have special needs and we are a big part of each other’s lives. Our wedding party included some of these special people. Our involvement with individuals with special needs led us to adopt a child with special needs; specifically, we chose Down Syndrome.

As we prayed over the faces of thousands of orphaned children with Down Syndrome, we ultimately chose a little boy named Sergey from Russia. Eight months later, as we neared the finish line of our adoption, one of Sergey’s family members in Russia stepped forward to adopt him. We were heartbroken for our loss, but God showed us that we were following him, and his ways are perfect. We knew we still wanted to adopt, so the way we saw it, two children would find homes because of our journey…Sergey went to his family and now we would choose another child to come into our family. We took great comfort in knowing that God could see this when we first committed to Sergey! We were honored to be a part of his plan.

Shortly after losing Sergey, we received a new referral with a grainy photo of a four-year-old blond-haired boy wearing pink glasses named Kirill. We were instantly in love with him. We had to re-file a lot of our paperwork because of the change in referrals and regions of Russia, but we were fast and we thought we were looking at three more months at the most until we would have Kirill home.

That was well over a year ago.

Since then so many things have happened. A tragic story of an adoptive mother sending her child back to his country alone on a plane with a note pinned to his shirt rocked our world…he was from Russia. Adoptions in Russia came to a screeching halt. Kirill’s region stopped processing adoptions for eight long months. The judge refused to accept any Amercian adoption cases until an official treaty was signed between the United States and Russia.

Even though we wouldn’t be able to finalize the adoption in court until the treaty was signed, we were allowed to go visit Kirill and sign our official petition to adopt him in August 2010. We fell more deeply in love with him. This was our son.

During that time, we found out that Kirill is the first child from his region EVER to be adopted with Down Syndrome. A birth mother keeping her child with Down Syndrome is unheard of in this area of the world. Adoptions of children with Down Syndrome just don’t happen there, these children are literally hidden away from society in orphanages and mental institutions. As our process continued, it became apparent that Kirill would be a pioneer. If our adoption was approved, it would pave the way for other children with special needs to be adopted from this region.

Then, a miracle happened around Christmas and the judge in this region suddenly changed her mind and began processing American adoptions again. We were elated.  Could this be the light at the end of a very long tunnel? I was somewhat nervous about Kirill being the first child adopted with Down Syndrome from his region, but our agency was very confident that if we got a court date, our adoption would be approved. In seventeen years, they had never had a case rejected IF the family was issued a court date. We were told not to worry, so I didn’t. After meeting the judge’s requests for several supporting court documents, we were finally granted a court date-March 17, 2011. St. Patrick’s Day…I was thrilled. This would be our new favorite holiday! Our son was coming home!

Our other son, Clayton, who had just turned three when we started this adoption process, has prayed fervently for his brother. He is now almost five. When we told him Kirill was coming home, oh my…we had an excited big brother on our hands! At one point he even went to his room, dumped out his toy cars and divided them into two stacks…one for him and one for Kirill.

Last week, as we sat in the courtroom and suffered through five agonizing hours of difficult questioning, we were not prepared for anything but an approval of our case. Two doctors, two social workers, and the Minister of Children’s Services all made very strong statements on our behalf. They fought for us. Hard.

But when the ruling was read, the judge said, “Your application to adopt is rejected.” The basis given was that Kirill was “not socially adaptable” due to his “medical condition” and he was better off in an institution than in a home with a family. As the judge read her ruling, she stated several times that we were a good family, that we met all the criteria to adopt a child, but that she would not approve our adoption because Kirill has Down Syndrome. She told us that we could adopt another child, because legally our application had no problems according to Russian adoption law. She said she would approve our adoption for a “typical” child, but not this child. Why? The only reason? Because he has Down Syndrome. Even though we were approved by our home study and by the USCIS to adopt a child with special needs. It makes no sense whatsoever. Denying a child a family because he has Down Syndrome is a violation of human rights at its most basic level!

It was like a terrible dream. We were so unprepared for this outcome. As we left the courthouse in a mental fog, the doctors and social workers that had testified came to us and said, “If you appeal, we will fight for you. Appeal. Fight this decision.” Of course we were going to appeal…I could no more walk away from our biological son, Clayton, at this point. Kirill is just as much my son.

So here we are, asking God to move the mountain that is standing between Kirill and us as we appeal to the Supreme Court in Moscow. There are also three other families who are in various stages of adopting children with Down Syndrome from Kirill’s region; one of the families has a court hearing set for next week.

We are hoping that someone will hear our outcry and help us bring our son and these other waiting children home. His adoption will set the precedent for many other children in his region. There are 98 children in his orphanage with special needs alone. It is one of many orphanages in this region that houses children with special needs. This is about more than just one child, the lives of hundreds of children with special need are at stake.  Please help us.

No title good enough

A little girl named Carrington was just rescued from an orphanage in EE.  After seeing photos of  her condition I am so afraid for the children left behind.

I am posting this link to show you what is happening to these sweet children who desperately need rescuing.  Please help in any way you can.

http://psalmsixtyeight.blogspot.com/2011/03/under-fluffy-pajamas.html

No child, no matter what they are born with, deserves to be treated (or not treated) this way!

The 3 angels!

These 3 girls are the ones who have captured my heart and who I long to see on the My Family Found Me Page.

This is Trina. She is my "original" angel. Isn't she the cutest little girl? She suffers from FAS (Fetal Alcohol Syndrome) and has spasticity because of it, but she is doing well otherwise. She is growing and can get around well. I was so taken with her little smile and you can just she the light in her eyes. I wish I had more information to share on her but they really can't give out too much info due to privacy regulations. When she is adopted they will get more information about her and her specific needs.

This is Giselle. She struggles with so much daily. She is in one of the poorest orphanages in her region and WILL be transferred in a few months when she turns 4! She will be transferred to an ADULT mental institution and remain bedridden for what will most likely be a very short life. No child deserves to be locked up for life for how they were born. Please help find her "forever family".

This is Arlene. There is not much information about Arlene on the website, but if you contact Andrea she can give you more info on Arlene. She does have some rather significant issues but with the help of a loving family she will blossom!






Please I am begging you to help me find these girls' "forever families". Share, share, share. Donate if possible. Please.

The purpose of this blog.

The purpose of this blog is to bring awareness to the plight of orphans in Easter Europe and to help them to find their "forever families".  After reading a popular mommy blog and visiting Reece's Rainbow I fell in love with one special little girl.  My family is not in the position to be able to adopt and it truly broke my heart.  I wanted to be able to do something, no matter how small.  I posted a blog post on my personal blog and let all my family and friends know about it.  I went back to Reece's Rainbow day after day hoping to find her on the My Family Found Me page and have not yet had that happen.  I also would look at the pictures in her "group".  They are some of the most heartbreaking photos I have ever seen.  Two more girls have captured my heart and I am praying, sobbing and hoping they all find their "forever families" before it is too late.  These, and many other, children are seen as less than in their countries of origin.  How can you not want to rescue them from these "prisons"?  Even if you are not in a position to adopt you can donate to their funds and spread the word!

Please share this blog with all you know, whether on Facebook, Twitter or your own blog we have to rescue these sweet children before they are transferred to ADULT mental institutions and die because no one cared enough to answer their calls for help and rescue.