Tuesday morning we flew to Haiti in our funeral clothes. When we arrived there, we drove to Hope House, saw Mallery and Frentz and met the amazing medical team that has been serving there this week and was with Jivenson when he passed away. We then went to the Viewing. Some of the nannies who work at Hope House met us there. We walked into this room with some chairs set up and flowers arranged around a small white casket. There he was...lying there. It was so surreal and I felt like I was outside of myself. People got up and talked about how much they loved Son Son... he was like one of their own, like their own flesh and blood. One nanny sang from her heart and others spoke beautiful words. I couldn't believe we were sitting there and I wanted to be anywhere else but there...but in the same moment I never wanted to leave. When it was time, I just looked at that sweet face once more. In Haiti, when someone dies they wail and mourn. They also take a picture of the deceased and keep it with them, but never look at it again. The reality in Haiti is that the time of mourning is short, because life goes on there in a crushingly real way. In part, I don't want to move on. I'm not ready to do that.
We've already been asked a couple times if we're going to look for another child to adopt.
Not now.... I can't even imagine wanting another child and the girls want Son Son as their brother. But that is not to be.... we do believe that God has put adoption in our hearts and it has taken root. We will wait and trust that growing our family will be in our future and we pray God will bless us with another child, whenever that may be. I have imagined Jivenson filling that chair at the dining room table, sleeping in that spare room and him playing on the living room floor for too long to imagine another child in those places. It was him. Jivenson, we love you so much and always will
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